Thursday, August 12, 2004

The Longest Day

[Mood - Numb]
[Music - This Ascension: Sever]

4:00am
Wake up suddenly. My room is damp and I quickly look at the clock, then the window. It really was 4am, and it was dark out. My alarm was supposed to go on at 4:30. I'm to pick up Doug & Michelle at 5:20 to get them to the Philadelphia airport by 6:30. Since a major website I'm developing at work goes live today... I must get to work after dropping them off.

4:42am
Doug's 4:30 wake-up call. I inform him I am on the road.

4:51am
Stop at Dunkin Donuts to buy two glazed donuts and a large coffee.

4:53am
En Route to Doug & Michelle's apartment, when I discover NAPKINS are not included in my donut order.

4:54am
Make a swift u-turn back to Dunkin Donuts, and (without really noticing) I snappingly ask for napkins. The kid (who I think was Indian) asked, "I have done something wrong?" in reply to being snapped at. Realizing I was snappy over NAPKINS, I smile and say "No.. just forgot some napkins."

5:14am
Arrive at Doug & Michelle's. Proceed to Philadelphia Airport shortly after.

6:20am
Arrive at Philadelphia Airport, quick thank you's and goodbye's are exchanged. Doug & Michelle are off to California.

6:25am
Take I-95 North... what I believe is the way back to Bethlehem.

6:33am
After crossing huge bridge into Philadelphia, realize that it was I-95 SOUTH I should've taken, which would've lead me back to I-476 North... which is the way back to Bethlehem. See, it's the whole North-South thing. I took I-95 North to get to the airport, even though I was traveling I-476 South the whole time, before the highway divided. So, after getitng out of the busy airport, I figured... North is the way home.

6:46am
Cross huge bridge after figuring out the whole North-South thing, and getting a good look at Lincoln Financial Field and Wachovia center.

7:00am
Traffic congestion on I-476 (Turnpike).

7:10am
Same congestion.

7:52am
Listen to Howard Stern have phone sex with a retarded girl.

8:12am
Dealing with Turnpike traffic.

8:49am
Drive past Lehigh University and catch a glimps of Eagle's last practice of Training Camp.

9:12am
Arrive at work, begin finishing efforts to bring site live.

3:00pm
Run into major problems with the Flash map I've been working on.

3:25pm
Raquel calls to remind me to call Lincoln Financial Field to try to get Eagles tickets.

3:38pm
Solve problem in FLASH!

3:41pm
Call LFF... got a recording, no closer to tickets.

4:45pm
Final touches to graphics work for new website.

6:28pm
Major website begins to go live.

6:29pm
Doug calls from California. They made it just fine. He loves the weather.

7:00pm
Site continues to go live.

8:12pm
Very, very, very last minute revisions to a few graphics. Site officially live.

8:13pm
A steady stream of hundreds of errors are reported to my co-worker, the back-end webmaster. The record is NOT broken.

8:24pm
Leave work.

8:40pm
Arrive at Lehigh Pizza for a couple of slices to go, with two bottles of Yeungling (they were out of Rolling Rock).

8:46pm
Arrive home... engage in conversation with the Madre for about 15 minutes.

9:01PM
Crack open a beer, sit back to watch Kill Bill Vol. 2 with dinner.

11:04 PM
Check email and decide to post to Weblog.