February 12 of 12: Lincoln's Birthday

Did you know that today is Lincoln's Birthday?  Well it is.  Of course I don't know if it's the dead President's or the car company but it is a holiday for some which if you keep on reading you'll know why I know of this.  Since I'm not working I don't normally know the day of the week never mind the actual date but since my birthday is Thursday the 14th I knew today was the 12th.  And if today is the 12th day of the month than it is time for 12 of 12.  Chad over at the Untitled Chad Darnell Project came up with this little photo essay and from time to time I remember to do it.  Sometimes I remember at 5pm and cram a few photos in to make it.  To see all of this month's 12 of 12 go over to his blog and check it out HERE

Picture 1 of 12:

Walking to the gym.  Since my access to my car was restricted as you'll read in a bit I walked to the gym.  I slept in this morning so I was walking to the gym at about 9:15am.  It was a postcard perfect day in Los Angeles today. 

Picture 2 of 12:

After about 45 minutes of weight training it was time to walk the .7 miles home.  So far this makes for 1.4 miles of walking. 

Picture 3 of 12:

Just another postcard perfect day picture.

Picture 4 of 12:

As a great man once said "Public transportation is for jerks and lesbians." or in my case a guy without a car.  It's now around 12:40 and I'm about to go on a 4 hour adventure to get my car back.  As I was in Palm Springs on Friday my car was towed away.  So now I must go to the police station in West LA show some papers than go to the impound lot and get my car.  I went online to get the bus route via the MTA Trip Advisor but they gave me over 90 minutes of bizarre bus directions.  Looking at maps and google I realized I could take a 20 minute bus ride and walk a little over a mile and get this done.  So I'm on my way on the Big Blue Bus 7 on Pico to Barrington

Picture 4 of 12:

I get off at Barrington and walk the 1.1 miles to Butler Ave to the police station.  Now that is a total of 2.5 miles walked.  Once at the station a nice lady told me I needed to go to the towing place, Quicksilver Tow, on Barrington and get my registration papers out of the car and then go to the DMV and back to the police station.  Long Story, to sum it up I'm an idiot.  So I then walk the 1 mile to the towing station, 3.5 miles.

Picture 5 of 12:

Back at the towing place I get to my car and get my registration and other paperwork to my car.  Then walk to the DMV in Santa Monica.  This is about  2.1 miles.  With my iPhone mapping function I figure out how to walk to it.  5.6 miles so far.

Picture 6 of 12:

Today is Lincoln's Birthday.  Which is only celebrated by government offices including the DMV.  The DMV is closed.  I just walked 2.1 miles to Colorado in Santa Monica for nothing.  Now since I was planning on driving home I only took a few coins for one bus ride and no cash.  I'm so screwed.  I map it out and think about walking the 5.9 miles home.  I go online and try to find a BofA atm to get cash for a bus ride home then I remember seeing a 7/11 on Barrington and Olympic.  Thinking I havn't eaten anything since breakfast I could buy a snack and get some cash using my ATM/VISA card.  So I walk the 2 miles back to Barrington. 7.6 miles so far today.

Picture 7 of 12:

Lunch via 7/11.  A nestle crunch crisp bar and a Diet Dr Pepper.  Walk the .1 miles back to Pico and Barrington for the Big Blue Bus 7 ride home. 7.7 miles.

Picture 8 of 12:

Got home around 4:45 and watched some MSNBC election coverage then about 6:30 realized I had no food so I walked the .97 miles to Ralph on Pico and Beverlyhill.  Rounding up that would be one mile for 8.7 miles.  On my way to Ralphs I walked past a former work client who was running.  Oy!  Very hot straight guy running past me.  My old job keeps popping up.  The other day work called me because the internet was down and they didn't know what to do.  Coworkers call me to hang out but I really don't.  Had to stop by to pick up some personal mail last week.  Oh and one of the interviews I had a few weeks ago that was related to this past job went bust.  After four years of me dealing with this person they didn't have the decency to call me and let me know they weren't interested.  Also a former client emailed me asking me something.  I don't think I'll every escape this job.

Picture 9 of 12:

It's night time and I'm walking my last mile of the day for my 9.7 mile day.  Of course I will be walking a bit tomorrow as I'll take the bus to Pico and Cloverfield and walk a mile to the DMV then the 2 miles to the Police station then the 1 mile to the tow place.  But that is tomorrow.  Oh I also have an 11am meeting but that is less than a mile from home.  I'll bike the 2 miles to swim in the morning.  Needless to say I didn't make it to either spin class or swim tonight.

Picture 10 of 12:

Dinner and some wine.  Pasta with a meat sauce and topped with lots of cheese.  Oh fuck I need two more photos. 

Picture 11 of 12:

This is me waiting for the bus earlier on Pico and my street.  It's not so bad taking the bus as it is waiting for the bus.  I took the 7 bus as it runs every 20 minutes so it was a lot faster than taking the bus route suggested by the MTA website.  I could have biked my trip today but thought it wasn't going to be such a hassle.  Ugh!

Picture 12 of 12:

Okay yeah I'm cheating.  This is a screengrab and not a picture but here is the map of what I walked.  The green arrow is the dmv which I walked from the very top right of the map Butler Ave and Santa Monica Blvd.  All part of my 9.7 mile Lincoln's Birthday 12 of 12 / 2 Days Before My Birthday March. 

How was your 12 of 12?

12/12/07 12 of 12. That's a lot of 12's!

Chad has a nifty little blog called the Untitled Chad Darnell Project and once a month on the 12th day of said month he has this little photo project.  Click the link above to read more about it but to quickly sum it up it's voyeurism at it's best.  People take 12 photos on the 12th day of the month and post them.  These photos are from various cities, states, countries and planets from individual bloggers and these bloggers post 12 photos that best summarizes a day in the life of said blogger. 

The last few months I started at various points of the 12th day of each month to take photos and gave up.  Some past months I'd remember 1st thing in the am of the day but give up taking photos by noon.  Other months I'd remember around dinner tie and some other months I'd remember the next day.  Yesterday being the 12th day of December I started taking photos at 5:55am then again at 9am only to forget to about 6:30pm.  So these photo's are not a day in the life of but do will lead to a rant. 

Photo 1 of 12:

The West Hollywood Pool at 5:55am.  Air temp about 40 degrees F.  I know for some that isn't cold but for Los Angeles it is fucking sub zero!  Notice that the pool is uncovered and the deck is dry meaning no cover was on the pool all night.  With water temp at about 81 degree's F that is a lot of wasted heat going into the air.  Good thing I don't pay taxes to the city of West Hollywood or I'd be pissed.  I don't think I've seen the cover on the pool since last year. 

Photo 2 of 12:

Just another picture of the dry pool deck.  Notice to the very right you can see a dry deck from the pool to the pool covers. 

Photo 3 of 12:

Well this proves that the town does own pool covers.  They are just too lazy to use them.  Later on I'll do some research about energy savings from using pool covers.  It just amazes me that they don't use these covers.  The pool water temp has been really warm yet the air temp has been really cold.  So you know the pool heaters are working overtime to keep the pool warm.  Not only is it wasted energy it can't be good for the heaters.  No wonder every year they seem to break down. 

Photo 4 of 12:

Just another photo of what a pool looks like at 5:55am!

Photo 5 of 12:

Me upside down.  The point is that it is cold outside so I'm layering with a sweater.  So festive!

Photo 6 of 12:

The holidays are here.  People have been bringing me Holiday gifts at work.  I love this time of year.  Although I'm eating bad and drinking even worse so I need to workout more.  Ugh.

Photo 6 of 12:

It's freezing so what is on my door?  Coupons for frozen yogurt.  Doh!  This place is near the office so I bring the coupons to work in case anyone wants frozen yogurt.

Photo 7 of 12:

9am.  I arrive at work.  Ugh!  Happy Holidays!

Photo 8 of 12:

Holiday Gifts.  Our company gives out gifts to people.  The last 3 years I've sat on the Holiday Gift Committee but not this year.  I dropped out of the decision making back in August.  Yeah it takes 3 months to decide on what we will give out.  I can't say what it is as someone reading this will be getting one.  I will do a deconstruction post around the Holiday's about this gift and it's packaging.

Photo 9 of 12:

My passcard and my parking ticket.  After 4 years of use my passcard to the garage at work is broken and taped together.  Therefore it doesn't always work at the gate leading the parking guy to yell at me.  The AMMPCO parking company expects me to pay 25 dollars for a new card.  I refuse so I take a ticket.  The parking garage an yells at me to not take a ticket unless I plan on paying for parking.  I tell him to take it up with my work and sometimes I tell him to fuck off and get out of my way.  Depends on my mood.

Photo 10 of 12:

The workout.  Tuesday's coach printed the workout so I snagged our lane's copy of the workout on my way out. 

Photo 11 of 12:

It's now 9:10.  Time to get to work.  My work keyboard is so dirty.  That is what happens when you eat 2 meals at work every day and countless snacks.

Photo 12 of 12:

About 6:40 and it's time to head home.

BONUS PHOTO: 

The bonus photo is month had to be based on the word Believe.  As in this month I believe I'm going to get fat!

August 12 of 12

Just uploading pix before I head to work.  Will update during the day...

1.  The After Party Cupcake and Alcohol Remains.  The bf's birthday was last week so we had a Cupcake Reception.  Lot's and lot's of cupcakes.

2. The Homo, I mean Home Depot Center in Carson.

3.  Tennis anyone?  Live from the East West Bank Classic.

4.  The Match:  Ana Ianonovic vs Nadia Petrova

5. Then Doubles:  Who cares.  Most of the spectators didn't and left.

6.  Olympian:  At the Home Depot Center they have some sort of monument with plaques of various former Olympians including Scott Tucker.

7. The Goodyear Blimp

8.  Sprinkles Cupcakes

9.  Pizza

10.  The New Stove:  One year later the landlord replaced the broken stove!  We can bake again.  Just in time for the hotest months of the year.

11.  The Winner:  Ana Ivanovic.

12.  They shake hands.  Yes I didn't have enough pictures so I'm using filler.

Bonus Pix:  Energy Saving LIGHT bulbs for Costco

Check out all of Chad's 12 of 12 HERE

July 12 of 12

Here is my lamest 12 of 12 yet.  To see other 12 of 12 check out Chad's blog HERE

Picture One:  7am Leaving LA Fitness on La Cinega, walking to my car.
 
Picture Two:  Driving away, I told you these were lame.

Picture Three:  Oh Shit!  Cars on empty.  Need to fill up later.

Picture Four:  First one at work means grabbing the trades that pretty much no one really reads.  About a year ago no one noticed that the subscription had run out for over 3   months.  Idiots!  I've always just read it online.

Picture Five:  My workspace.  Yup no more office.  I'm back to a space with no tv.  Whatever I'm not bitter at all, yeah right.

Picture Six:  6:40 time to get out of here and head to swim!

Picture Seven:  Something was going on at the WeHo Park.  All during practice music was blearing form the park.  I liked it.  Kept me going.

Picture Eight:  Time to hang my suit up to dry for tomorrow.  I like orange!

Picture Nine:  Time for a protein shake with a mixture of oj and milk.

Picture Ten:  A new game from Gamefly has arrived for the Wii.  It's some shoot em' up game called Heatseaker.

Picture Eleven:  Nice eyecandy. Got hi from Quac during the Ski n Swim weekend back in Feb in Utah.

Picture Twelve:  Me.  I looked like a serial killer whenever I try to take my own pic.

well that is it.  check out chad's and more 12 of 12 HERE

12 of 12

It's July and although I have not done Chad's 12 of 12 in a few months I figured I'd promote it to all you other bloggers who might not know about it.  Chad of the Untitled Chad Darnell Project has a fun once a month photo essay project.  For more info check it out at Chad's blog HERE.  To see some of my old 12 of 12 click the link to the side in the "category" bar.

12 of 12: April 2007

Oh another month and it's time to hop on Chad's bandwagon for 12 of 12...

1.  The Miles:  We start this month home from the gym with my iPod Nano telling me I ran a bit over 4 miles this morning.  I never realized how scratched up it was to I saw this picture.

2.  The Green:  Aren't I green today?

3.  Lunch:  Okay so last night the bf stopped a fast food place grabbed some food including a leftover side salad that I grabbed for my lunch.

4.  Lost:  Okay so I don't own those Nike sneakers that you place the Nike+ iPod sensor in and with the quick fix of velcro to my Puma only last three months till today when the sensor came off.  Doh!  I called my gym and visited it hoping someone would turn in the sensor but nothing yet.  Oh well I need new sneakers anyways and I guess I'll buy a new kit.  Ugh!

5.  Wind Damage:  In case you didn't hear it on the news LA was hit by high winds knocking down power lines and the tree out front of my place.

6.  Hungry?:  Time to order up some food.  King Fu it is.

7. Labor:  Need to move the tree out of the way for the delivery man to bring me food.

8. Wine:  Yeah I know I promised to cut back but it's been a stress filled day!  Really!

9.  Dykes:  So here I am watching one of the best shows of televsion when the delivery man brings me my food just when Jackie and some other dyke are full on kissing.  I think he got a hard on.

10.  Food:  It's here, dine in.

11.  Left:  The one random piece left of my Nike+ iPod device.  Without the sensor it is useless.  "Just like David Spade without Chris Farley: totally and utterly useless!" - the Simpsons

12. Suiting Up:  Every year our swim team has an official team suit these were the 2 finalist. 

The bonus picture was to be from a generated random word but mine was "Mark" and I don't know anyone with that name although I could have taken a marker and marked a piece of paper for a picture.  Either way I don't have a bonus picture.  Check out Chad's 12 of 12 [link]

March 12 of 12

So after a few months of not doing 12 of 12 or taking 3 pictures and giving up I'm back for March.  Check out 12 of 12 started by Chad at his blog for March HERE.

1.  So I wake up at 5:10ish and once I grab my swim stuff I read the paper.  After reading a bit of the biz and entertainment sections I pick up the health section of the LA Times and find a letter regarding a Master Swimmer Profile from last week.  NOTE:  The Health section is always hidden behind the classifieds.  I never even knew it exhisted until I found it by accident.

2.   Damn DST!  It's now 5:55am and I'm on deck ready to hit the water.  Just a few days ago it was daylight at this time of day!  I hate you so much DST!

3. Mmmmm...Bacon!

4.  Well the swimming cancelled out the bacon and I weigh only 156 pounds.  Not bad for a 37 year old man who is 5'9".

5.  Snacks, Drinks and Lunch all ready to go to work.

6.  I gave into peer presure and got into the office NCAA pool.  Go Florida!

7.  I bought tickets from ticketmaster for the Human Rights Campaign's True Colors Concert this summer with Erasure, Cyndi Lauper, Debbie Harry and some other group or person that I don't remember right now.  The tickets went on presale today for HRC donors.

8.  Work.  One of the screens I see all day.  Yawn. 

9.  Yahoo the mail is here.  I get home from work only to find two letters asking for more money from an earlier donation but at least I got this bumper sticker for my car.  Go Dems!

10.  Ahhh...cheap grocery market wine to gulp while cooking.

11.  Fire!  I am a man and I grill!

12.  Ahh...steak!  Only real men eat steak.  Oh and us gays like it too!   Oh and veggies are being cooked in the tin foil.

BONUS PIX:  This months keyword was green.  And today my girl scout cookie order arrived and in that was two boxes of thin mints sitting in GREEN boxes.  MMM...cookies.

December's 12 of 12

Woke up this morning knowing it was the 12^th day of the month so that meant 12 of 12. I was trying to think of a theme as I grabbed my stuff and I thought damn my life is a scattered clump of stuff here and there. Gym and swim stuff in this corner, three piles on my computer desk, I carry a bag full of crap, my desk at work has a pile of crap. So the theme slowly became all about stuff. Just stuff in general. So here is the17thman’s 12 of 12 Stuff Edition.

Picture Number One: “iPod and the stuff” - My desk is sort of the burial ground for my mail. To the left of the computer screen is the current stuff. Once a magazine or catalog reaches this point it pretty much is the kiss of death. If it doesn’t get to the bedroom or the coffee table it’ll linger on my desk till the next issue comes out. As for the free porn dvd offer, well I get adult mailings since I subscribe to the advocate. I still wonder why I get the Frontrunner’s newsletter as although I did join I’ve actually never run with them. Well except the annual Pride 10K.
 


Picture Number Two: “Bag of Shit” – I bought this bag at H&M while in Chicago for Gay Games for eight bucks. I carry it back and forth to work. Right now it has the USMS Rule Book for reasons I don’t know, my handy dandy notebook that I write my swim workouts in, a dvd teaching a new freestyle stroke style, some vitamins, parking meter money and various scraps of paper.

Picture Number Three: “Work Desk”- More junk but this time the catalog is to remind me to contact the supplier regarding the 2007 swim team suits and other merchandise. Work took over and still haven’t called them. Shit!

Picture Number Four: “The Presidents and The Presents” – My holiday tree and some of my holiday cards. Note the White House theme. I have a White House Ornament on the tree and three cards from Presidents. One from George H. Bush from 1992, one from Jimmy Carter and one from George W Bush from 2006. Non presidential cards go over to the other window area.  

 

Picture Number Five: “The Presents” – Gifts started to arrive including a basket from Henry and David which the bf will regift to his assistant. One less gift.

Picture Number Six: The Amazon Wii discussion board. I keep checking for the latest on my Wii order. It’s on backorder and it keeps getting pushed back. Damn! Hopefully the Wii will be delivered next week unless Amazon.Target Direct delay it again. Damn Them!

Picture Number Seven: “Coffee Table” - Just more shit. But this stuff actually gets read before tossing.

Picture Number Eight: “The ¼’s” – I so needed to do laundry tonight or it was Free Balling Wednesday.

Picture Number Nine : “The Nightstand” – The magazines and crap I try to read every night before passing out to whatever alcoholic cocktail was in the espresso mug the previous night.

Picture Number Eleven: “The Laundry Basket” – Ugh! Once again need to do laundry. Even my Marvel Comics H&M underwear needs to be washed. No Freeballing on Wednesday for me.

 

Picture Number Twelve: “Swimming” – Well it’s 9pm time to gather my swim stuff in a pile so I can find it when I wake up at 5:15. I keep it all in the hall outside the bathroom so I can put on my suit in the bathroom not disturbing the bf while he sleeps. 

And that is Decembers 12 of 12. Pretty boring day. Check back tomorrow for the Bonus Photos! Once again check out Chad and all of the 12 of 12 Gang.

 

November's 12 of 12

I woke up really this morning after sleeping on and off for 12 hours last night so I grabbed my gym equipment and decided to workout. Since I have some sort of ear infection I can’t swim to at least Wednesday. So instead of swimming I figured I’d do weights today, run tomorrow morning and weights Tuesday morning and then run that night.

But before I go I would put in my ear drops and wait till after for the pills. So I put in the drops laying down on my side for five minutes so the drops would do whatever it is they do. The drops are a combination antibiotic and cortisone-like medicine. The five minutes are up I read the paper to kill some more time. The gym doesn’t open to 8am and I don’t want to be one of those people waiting outside the gym waiting for it to open. Before I leave I take GNC’s Thermo Burst pills as I normally do. Thermo burst is just an overpriced caffeine pill. So I get to the gym and try to warm up on a bike. Hmm…I feel all out of synch so after 5 minutes I move on. I start off with some pull down thingy to work on my back muscles. At this point I should of realized going to the gym wasn’t a good thing. I felt a bit woozy. I moved on to do a few more machines/free weights only to realize that yeah I’m not feeling to good. I feel dizzy and sort of stoned at this point but continue on. After being a the gym for about 30 minutes I realized I had to go or something was going to happen like passing out on the gym floor.  Funny before I started these meds I was just having a hard time hearing now I’m all fucked up.

I realize now that the Pseudovent I’m on can react with caffeine and that the pills may cause dizziness or fainting spells. Anyone who saw me at the gym today almost got to see that. I think if anyone did even look at me today they would have thought I was doped up. I was just legally doped up. I’m also on Avelox which also has the side effects of Nausea, diarrhea, dizziness.

Oh well maybe I’ll be okay to run tomorrow. I’ll just run in the park nearby so if I feel woozy I can just stop and walk home. I am disappointed at my aborted gym workout today as I really do prefer working out on weekends over weekdays. I don’t feel rushed to hurry up and get to work. I can take my time. Also I like the never ending hot showers! At home I stay in the shower to the hot water fades away. I use to shower and change at the gym on weekdays then head straight to the office but over time I’d forget one thing or another and would have to come home anyway so I started showering at home. But on weekends I don’t have to worry about forgetting anything for work so I can take 5 minutes in the sauna and a nice long shower afterwards. That was my plan today until the woozies started. Good thing anyways cuz’ when I got home I realized I left my shampoo, conditioner and shave kit at home.

Damn Costco is too big! The bf and I went to Costco to stock up on a few things. Four hundred plus dollars later we leave Costco with a trunk load of food, cleaning stuff and a new gym bag for the boyfriend. In his attempt to get read for our Holiday vacation he is hitting the gym twice a day so he needed a jumbo bag to carry all of his gear. He also bought the cd of some group called the Beatles. I don’t know much about music but I did recognize a few songs from television and commercials. We also got a lot of sponges. A lifetime supply.

So I’m sitting on the couch watching some Sex & The City when I decide to leaf through a few magazines laying around.  When I get to the fashion mag “The Daily” from this past fashion week I notice an ad for sneakers with a GPS antenna. Why oh why would you need these? And at $350 a pop that is one expensive shoe. These expensive sneakers even keep track of your body temperature. Check them out at Isaac Daniel.  Back to Sex & The City it was the one when in which Stanford says “My God, She’s Fashion Roadkill” one of my favorite lines ever.   Time for more ear drops.  Notice the cotton in my ear.

 

So when that was done it was time to head to the Grove to see “Running With Scissors” which I liked but noticed a few people left during the movie and never came back. Including the lady next to me who had me and the bf move from our original seats down a few so her and her friends could sit together. Her friends came about 10 minutes into the movie and she left about 30 minutes into the movie never to return.  Also I’m sick of advertising everywhere including my parking stub.

 

I am so over due for a haircut. My last haircut was over a month ago when I had my hair all shaved off. Ugh! I looked like a freak but now my hairline on my neck is out of control. Next weekend is hair cut time.

Outside the bedroom window use to be a tree now it’s just a stump with this mushroom fungus growing all over.


The bathroom tub becomes a graveyard for old LA Times. House Rule: any magazine or newspaper that goes into the bathroom stays in the bathroom or until it is sent to the trash.  That makes 12 of 12!


The bonus picture this month is thankful.  Hmmmm...I'm thankfull for the bf.


See more 12 of 12 at the Untitled Chad Darnell Project..
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12 of 12: The Extra Booty

Just like all the extra footage from deleted scenes to behind the scenes footage on DVD's here are the17thman's 12 OF 12 BONUS FEATURES.  Since picture 13 was to be influenced by Halloween and it got me in the holiday spirit here are pictures of my little office decked out for Halloween.  Enjoy

Of course I just realized I wont be be able to open the cabinet or drawers until after Halloween...oh well.  No filing this month...Yahoo!