When I'm Thirty-Five

And lo, on this day a child was born and it was good.

That child, in case you haven't guess yet, was me. Well, not just me, as I have it on good authority that other people also share this birthday, but for the purposes of this post, the child in question is me. Glad we got that cleared up.

Yes dear reader, I am the grand old age of 35 today. In many parts of the world, this would put me at, or beyond middle age. I still have a few years to get to that part for here in the good old U S of A, provided my lumbago doesn't act up and kill me. Can you even die of lumbago? Something to ponder.

This birthday is different from my recent birthdays in that I'm working today. Well, I'm at work today. Ever since I had kids, every one of my celebratory birthday days off has been crashed by a sick child so I decided to end the streak today and go to work. In retrospect, this was a bad idea as I'd really like to be at home right now playing Okami. Next year I'll try and fake them out and take the day after my birthday off. That'll teach those fuckers.

Being that it's my birthday, I think it's time to take stock in my life and see where I am in my grand plans for complete global domination.

Health
A healthy dictator is a happy dictator. Once I take over the world, I can't have rumors of poor health sparking the populace into revolt. I don't know how Castro does it as he appears to have died several years ago and now is just an animated corpse, ruling from beyond the grave. So far, I have no health issues to speak of, other than all the skin on my face falling off. Seriously. It's kind of gross. I think it's stress. Really, I have no idea, but after a trip to the dermatologist, things appear to be under control. On the plus side, if it continues, I can get one of those bad ass Cobra Commander hoods. It's what every despot needs! I'd consider a Destro style metal mask, but I don't think that thing breathes too well. What's that gotta smell like at the end of a hard day of mercenary style destruction? Not good.

I have applied for life insurance so that my family is provided for should I perish, and in doing so have gotten a full run down on all of my bodily humours. No real surprises there. Slightly low good cholesterol and slightly high non-bad fat. Basically I need to eat more fish and exercise. I abhor fish, so that ain't gonna happen but I have started working out 3 times a week. We have a free gym in my office building now, so between that and rollerblading I've already lost no weight to speak of. This is mostly because I haven't changed my eating habits any. I figured that if I started working out and starving myself, I wouldn't stick to either, so my plan is to get used to working out and then start eating less. So far I'm finding working out quite enjoyable as the treadmill allows me to keep up on all of my magazines. There's nothing like walking on a treadmill while reading "Food and Wine" and watching the Food Network. Hmmmm, I think I see why I'm not eating less.

Career
The job is going swimmingly, thanks. Everyone is still very nice to work with and I'm enjoying the work. Testing can still be boring, but there's enough test case development and general process improvement stuff to make it interesting. Plus, at times the workload is slow enough to allow me to do things like post on this here site. Can't complain there.

On a somewhat related note, I've been given the opportunity to write game reviews over at GameShark.com. I'm not considering it a done deal until I see my name over there on a review, but just the fact that they're willing to give me a shot is enough for me. I don't see this as being a career change for me, as 50 bucks a review ain't gonna feed my family, but to be paid for something that I've written, no matter how small is a huge deal for me. I've been writing on this site, and it's previous incarnation for about 4 years now and it's always been tough for me to get my writing out in front of more eyes. That's not to say that I'll be using GameShark to promote this site, but the fact that more people will be able to read my writing is thrilling. It's also completely terrifying and I get wigged out about once a day over it. I apologize in advance for the GameShark pimpery that begins once my reviews start popping up.

Family
The family is great. No complaints there. The kids are still a pain in the ass, but at 2 and 4, that's pretty much their function. I'm not going to jinx anything and mention anything else positive about them and instead just say that they are functioning well within normal operational parameters.

Linda continues to be the bright point in my life. I don't know what I'd do without her and I'm thankful for every day I get to spend with her. She too is still a pain in the ass.

Leisure
This is where the majority of my problems lie. There's just not enough time in the day to do everything I want to do. There are too many movies to watch and games to play and not enough time to do it. I'm about a third of the way through Okami, about half way through Guitar Hero 2, still have to finish Gears of War in Insane, haven't broken 200 in Wii Sports bowling yet and have over 100 movies that I've purchased and haven't watched yet. I also have a stack of PS2 and Gamecube games to play and I have to finish Puzzle Quest and Pokemon Diamond. If you add review games to the mix, I'll be spending even less time playing the games I've purchased. Not a bad problem to have, but a problem nonetheless. Hopefully, once I've ground the world beneath my boot heel I'll have some spare time. I'm hoping to outsource all of the putting down of uprisings, so that should free up some time on my schedule.

So, as you can see, things are going pretty well for me, which is why I expect to be flattened by a piano the moment I stop writing this and get u---

Ouch.