What could have gone wrong?!?!?!

Rumor on the street was that I was going to be hired for the open District Court Commissioner slot.

Well, the rumors, were just rumors. Everyone that had inside information said "What the hell?" when I told them I had not got the job.

Since my last post, I finally met up with a US Park Police officer I have talked to online since 2000. In eight years, we never could get our schedules to line up right to meet up. He was even the person that gave me the right contact information to schedule the ride along that I enjoyed so much. Lately we have been texting and instant messaging each other, and we both happened to have a few free minutes, so we met up. He seemed to be a good guy, loves his job, gave me hell for not getting myself back to agility shape to apply to his agency, and whatnot. I told him I thought I was going to get hired by the District Court Commissioner and he was proud of me for finally making a step towards law enforcement.

Freddy and I went to the University of Maryland vs. California game at Chevy Chase Bank Field. Kelly's parents sold me the tickets for half face value because they had to go to something else, and Kelly was already working at the game. What was really annoying for me was the fact all the Troopers kept saluting Freddy, because of his rank before he retired from the MSP. It was already starting to annoy me a little bit, because of my MSP epic fail story. But then Freddy kinda rubbed it in my face making a comment about it. It put me in a bad mood for part of the game, until I saw a ghost from Christmas past. Above the section we were sitting in, was my Lieutenant from when I was an intern for the Park Police. I went up and talked to him for a few minutes, then he had to step away when his radio went off. I had expected him to have retired from the Park Police by now, but he told me he was staying on to max out his pension and time it so he retired around the time his wife, who is also a Lieutenant for the MSP, would turn in her badge. Grrrrrr, another MSP reference. At the end of the game I went over to the section where Tricia, Dan and Jessie were sitting and talked to them for a few minutes. Afterwards, Freddy and I went to Costco to get some random things he needed, and then he took me out to dinner at Jaspers in Greenbelt.

On Monday I cleaned out the remaining stuff in two of the vacant apartments and sent it up to Dan and Tricia's place in Tacoma Park. They were glad to get the dressing armoire, dresser, bakers rack, two random metal beds, a surge protector, light bulbs and a few other random odds and ends. When Tricia got home from class, the three of us went out to the diner in Silver Spring. When we returned, the broke the news to me that they were getting married! I was so excited for them, I knew that it was getting to be time. The funny thing was I kept joking with them about name changes and whatnot earlier in the night.

On Tuesday I got the letter that shocked the nation.

On Wednesday, I went to work, depressed, but worked enough to do what needed to be done.

Thursday I left to go up to Deep Creek Lake. I took it easy all weekend, going out to the new Microbrew off Sang Run Road. It was good. On Sunday some friends were having a cookout at their place. I got super drunk, made an ass of myself, including throwing up all over the place. My chest is still sore a few days later.

Tuesday at work I met with some staff from 4th Presbyterian Church to give away some of Adam's stuff. I'm kind of disappointed that I was not given the chance to ask for any of it, especially since I have given seven years of my adult life working at the complex. What is worse yet is the tools may be given away to the church, a few of which I have borrowed many times in the past to do side jobs.

Today before I went to work I filled out paper work for a few other District Court Commissioner positions that are open. Too bad two of them are contract and at will, but it would be better than being unemployed. They were working on the roof too when I got to work, so I finally will be able to fix the ceiling in Joe's apartment next week.

I dropped my car off at the dealership before I went to Deep Creek, I picked it up tonight after work. They finally fixed the leak in the tire (it was the tire pressure sensor), ordered the parts for a second fix of the drivers seat, and could not duplicate the problem with the gearbox. I'm getting really frustrated with the 2-3 upshift grinding problem.

Starting October 1st, my parents rental property will be vacant again. We are going to do some repairs, but not as extensive of a refurbishment as last time. Hopefully my parents can get it re-rented quickly so my mom can buy a new car. Also my sister and brother invited me to go to Las Vegas with them in early November, so I am looking forward to getting four new states (and unfortunately only four new counties) while I am out there. At least I will be able to clinch I-15 in Nevada and Arizona. :-)

What have I been up to?

Fixing Tim's house. It's coming along. We are painting the upstairs bedrooms and kitchen this weekend. Kelly and Freddy are going to come over to help, so I can work more on the joint compound work downstairs. All three coats, mudded and sanded in the living room and dining room should be complete sometime around the 12th of August. Then those can be painted, along with the upstairs hallway. Then painting that weekend and staging the following week so everything is ready for the House Rewarming party.

I still am working on Capitol Hill. It's been slow down there (thank god), though we had another burglary. This time the kid kicked in the door to the back stairwell for units 3&4. The kid then knocked on the door to unit 4, and fortunately the tenant was home. The tenant got a good look at the kid when he answered the door, and gave a solid description to the police. His description of the kid matches my description from last year. Most likely the same kid coming back for more.
I also ran into one of the US Park Police officers I rode with at Dunkin Donuts. He gave me a hard time about not applying with the last process. I just was not up to it yet.

No word on the District Court Commissioner position. Still waiting. I decided to book my plane tickets for Justin and Simi's wedding in Chicago for the last Saturday of August.

My dad's new, final prescription of glasses are in. He's driving solo. He wants a new car. My parents Camry is pushing nine years old, with 150,000 miles on it. It's been reliable, but it's high mileage.

Whew

At least my throat infection is getting better.

At work today, I did some gardening, tried to figure out why the sound was not working at that guy's house where I installed the TV yesterday, cleaned up some dead baby birds, bugged Verizon about the low hanging wire in the yard, replaced seats, springs and stems for a faucet and did some vacuuming.

On the way to the hardware store, when I walked by the Eastern Market Metro station, I heard this guy spewing off religious nut job stuff over an amplified megaphone. So I dialed 411 and tried to get the number for the US Park Police. The wonderful Verzion 411 person put me through to the Kennedy Center Security desk. So I had to call my brother and have him look up the number. I hope the USPP came by, because he kept spewing off "A doe, a deer, a female deer" and "bird, bird, bird, bird is a word", which now reminds me of the scene from Pink Flamingos where a contortionist who "lip syncs" the song with his exposed anus. Thank you John Watters for ruining this song.

This will probably be my last post until I get back from Western Maryland on Monday May 12th. See you all then!

Should I Really be Doing This?

On Thursday at work, one of the tenants complained to me that I was making their building too nice. I guess since that building is under contract and going to settlement in early June, I should have scaled back the flowers a little bit. However, all the neighbors appreciated that I was making the building look as nice as I did last year. The grass is perfect, the flowers are looking great, and everything is clean and neat outside. I take pride in how the buildings I maintain are kept, both from a superficial standpoint (flowers, grass, clean common areas) and a mechanical standpoint (no leaking faucets, things installed properly, no roof leaks, no peeling paint). The care I put forth shows and is truly appreciated by our tenants and all around us.

Also on Thursday, my sister called me, spent over two hours on the phone with me discussing my Resume. She asked about my duties at each job I worked at. I think she is starting from scratch because my Resume looked like a college English project (it was).

On Friday, I took the day off of work. I scheduled my ride along with the US Park Police for 6 PM through 2 AM. I also mailed my paperwork back to the District Court, went to Target to get some groceries and health care products, got the Accord washed and cleaned out, and some laundry. I arrived at the US Park Police D-1 Substation at 5:45, got to watch roll call. My first impression of their officers were that they were very proud of their jobs, to help people, but not to the point they feel the urge to over power people that are honest with them. They may not have a flashy take home car program, or fancy computers in their cars. They just do their patrol duties in a more pure, old school way. I was extremely impressed, to the point I thought... "Why would I ever want to be a Trooper?" That question goes a lot deeper, but I think if I had done this ride along back in late 2005, I would have chosen the US Park Police ahead of Maryland State Police, not in a heartbeat, but with a lot of thinking things over. Hopefully when I apply, I will have better luck. In the end, things might after all work out for the better.

Counting on a Wing and a Prayer

The weather today was very very nice. So nice my allergies kicked into overdrive. Oh well, so is spring. At work I did gardening, sprayed for weeds and bugs, and went on the roof to investigate where the leaks could be.

Today I turned in an application to be a District Court Commissioner. The pay starts in the mid 40K range. A perfectly acceptable salary. I also picked up, and dropped off a ride along form for US Park Police. My sister rounded up a list of jobs with Northrop Grumman I can qualify for. Loosing my job in 6-7 weeks has been a unnerving process for me, that's for sure. But at least I know I am not the only other person looking for a job. André suddenly lost his job last week and has been frantically searching for one too.

Hillary Clinton won Pennsylvania. No shock there. The 10% win was slightly higher than I expected (6%-8% was my prediction) What was surprising was the fact that Barrack Obama carried Dauphin, Lancaster, and Union Counties. Dauphin County has a +10 Republican registration advantage. Lancaster PA has the largest concentration of Puerto Ricans by percentage outside Puerto Rico. Union County just leaves my head scratching. Spill over from neighboring Centre County (where Penn State is located)? Any thoughts?

My birthday party is coming up on May 2nd. As usual, K9 John won't be able to make it. For some reason the idea of putting K9 John, Tara, Shawon, André, Shannon and Tim all in the same place at the same time seems like a John Waters movie in the making. Actually my life in a lot of ways is like a bad John Waters movie. At least there have been no chickens harmed in the living of my life.