My father has officially hit the road to start working more seriously on his North Carolina house. He pulled his RV out of my yard yesterday and hit the road. It was really redneck town around here for a while with him living in his RV in my yard. Once the house is built, the rest of my family will be leaving for NC. I will be the only Greb left in Florida. Everyone asks me if I am going to move also. No. I am staying. I have a lot invested here with my business and my friends. And I think I am plenty old enough to be on my own. But I’ll visit them once every five years or something. Just kidding!

Anyway, now with my father gone, I can start cleaning up around my house. Here is my plan:

• Dress up around the edges of the driveway
• Build a carport in the front for my truck
• Put plants around the yard to make it look nicer
• Clean up all the crap left over by my father
• Edge around trees, and trim trees
• Repair the kitchen floor
• Change they layout of my living room
• Repaint the master bathroom
• Clean up my second bedroom for guest use
• Consider putting a shower in the half bath
• Paint/remove leftover wallpaper from the kitchen/dining room
• Get a new couch/living room set
• Clean up the walkway leading to the backyard

I plan on doing a few of these steps this weekend like trim trees and such. Of course, a lot of this will take money I don’t have, but we shall see what happens.

I want more. I want to have fun. I want to get my well put in. I want more money. I want someone to hold. I want to play with Meiko. I want to sleep. I want to work out more. I want to be more motivated. I want to fix my floor. I want to eat. I want more good friends. I want to be in love again. I want to ride a Harley. I want to clean my house. I want to travel more. Do I have too many wants?

Things have been crazy lately. Both good and bad. Anyway, below are a few random pictures that I took that I thought were interesting. The first is an officer bowing her head as she waits for a funeral procession to pass. I’ve never seen an officer do this. I thought it was interesting. The next is an accident where it looks like a police car got rear-ended… someone’s in trouble. The next is just a rainbow that I saw in Auburndale. And the last is a plant that found its way through a small hole of my recycling bin.

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I have added a new item to my tower! If you don’t already know, I have a 45′ tall tri-pole antenna in the back of my house. I have a DirecTV dish (not in use, but signal is 99%!), and an antenna for a cell phone repeater/booster (which needs to be moved higher on the tower). I have just added a traditional VHF/UHF antenna to the tower (pictured below). I have this hooked up to a HD Over-The-Air receiver that has been given to me by Bobby as a birthday gift. And it works great!! I have about 15 HD channels now. It’s amazing to see HD on my TV. I must now throw Heroes and Bionic Woman parties! You should help me plan them.

I am sitting here watching a bunch of nerds do nerdy things like DnD. So I am getting on here instead. So I have my Glock. I wrote about getting one a long time ago. I am learning it’s ins and outs and am getting pretty good at handling it and dismantling and putting it back together. Tomorrow I get to shoot it! I am going to the range with a bunch of friends, and am even bring a friend that has never shot before. Bobby says I must put 200 rounds through it to break it in. I think it will break my hand instead. If you’d like to join us, we’ll be at Tenoroc at 2:00 on Saturday. All are welcome.

So a customer of mine, Dr. McNutt, invited me over to his lake house tonight for dinner. He needed a computer looked at, and wanted to feed me too. So I spent several hours with him and his family. It was a lovely evening. It was finished off with a beautiful sunset. Unfortunately, I had to enjoy it alone as the seat next to me was empty. Sigh. I need someone who wants to sit with me during the sunset by just sitting there quietly and enjoying the moment.

Here was the sunset:

Apparently, the shop foreman at the Michael Holly Chevy in Lakeland thinks I am an idiot. I took my tire over there to have the check it out to tell me if it was road hazard, or a defective tire. The guy looked at it, pulled out a bunch of rubber shavings and said, “This is continue run low.” Apparently, I am such a big idiot that I must have been riding around with a flat tire for a long time. Funny how when the tire blew, I had been driving down I-4 at 70mph and the tire that blew was my front tire… and I didn’t notice the flat tire. Amazing. I’m such an idiot… driving for miles with a flat tire at 70mph. Anyway… the service department at Michael Holley Chevy really sucks. You might ask, “Why is he giving us a link to them then?” Notice that I encapsulated “really sucks” and “thinks I am an idiot” into the link. I did that for Google, so it would pick up those words together.

On another note, I am going to a “Mexican Fiesta” tonight. Well, not really. Actually, the guy (one of my customers) is actually more of a redneck, and in no way Mexican, but he’s making a lot of Mexican food, including margaritas. I wish I had someone to bring with me. Sigh.

Ok… so I am taking Bryant to the airport this morning. We’re talking, and I hear this loud thing hit the underside of my truck, like I hit a bolt or something in the road. I think nothing of it (other than, “Oh man, I hope it didn’t scratch my truck”). Anyway, driving along for a bit, and I am going by this big truck. I start to feel my truck dragging, like it is having a hard time driving. Then I feel it… my truck drops slightly, and lots of noise outside… my tire blew out. Not went flat. Blew out. Like shredded into pieces. I drive slowly till I can get to a shoulder (there are jerseys on the side of the road from construction). I get the tire changed in under 10 minutes. This was extremely quick considering I have never even touched the tools that come with my truck for changing the tire. We still make it to the airport with plenty of time. Of course, now I am driving around all day on a spare (luckily not a donut). But now I have to buy one new tire and put it on a truck that has 3 old tires with 35000 miles on each one. So I am wondering if I should change them all, or just the one. I hate having one different.

This weekend was extremely exhausting, both emotionally and physically. First off, I am walking around bending over because of lower back pain. I helped my parents move a lot of furniture, and I had to dig a trench that was about 100′ long. My back hurts. We’ve been preparing for this move for a couple of weeks now, but it wasn’t until Sunday that it hit me. The house that I helped my father build… it will house a new family. I pulled into the driveway Sunday, and there were about 20 people all helping the new family move in. It felt weird to see these complete strangers moving into that house. However, as a plus, I have gained a workshop. It is still housing a lot of furniture, but it will be all mine in less than a year. My parents have only moved to some apartments about 15 minutes away, but it’s getting closer to being alone. Once they have moved away, I will be the only one left in Florida. I won’t have family anywhere near me. I think I have an aunt in Ocala, but I never talk to any of my extended family. Anyway, if you’d like to give me a back massage, just let me know :-p

I went to the dentist today (who also happens to be a customer). I thought I could come out of it with massive amounts of blood loss, and an aching pain in my mouth for days. Well, the pain is the same as after I floss (since I don’t floss a lot), and I don’t think I bled at all. However, I am still getting complaints that I need to remove my wisdom teeth. Bleh. Anyway, if you go to Dr. Barnes office for a cleaning, ask for Mariellen, she works wonders.