Well I’m glad my last post was such a hit with everybody! It’s good to see that all of my friends and family are also crazy about Avril. I would never believe that my dad listens to her while he’s at work! And my sis folds clothes and irons to her CDs.

 It’s also good to know that everybody can tell the difference between when I really and truely think a girl is a godly girl and a model of true Christianity and when I’m just voicing my opinion about some hot girl out there.

Anyway, have a great Day of Rest!  

Okay people. This is one of those blog entries that everybody will roll there eyes at. But I had to do it. Eventually I had to tell the world that Avril Lavigne is the hottest thing ever!

I think I’ve been crazy about her since 2001. It all started when I illegally downloaded a bunch of her music off the web for free in my room at BJU’s CVA apartment. Haha! Wow, how about that for an honest admission. And btw, if the RIAA is reading this, I have now legally purchased all of her albums and no longer download illegally. Aaaaaaaaaanyway.

Yea, so that was the time in my life when I was writing the first lines of code for my ConvenientClassifieds.com concept. I’d stay up till 2:30am every night writing code with my headphones on listening to Avril. I listened to those songs prolly a hundred times. There are certain songs in my library that are now in the category of “coding songs”. Songs I love like crazy and motivate me to stay up really late and crank out code. My classifieds website has been one of the most fun ongoing endevours in my life and Avril’s been there with me the whole way!

So anyway, why do I like her? There are lots of reasons. So I’ll start with her music. She writes all of her lyrics and really plays the guitar. This sets her apart musically because many artists sing other people’s lyrics and have other musicians play all the instruments. Her lyrics are great because she writes straight from the heart. She’s suprisingly deep for a girl who didn’t fit in well in school and is basically a punk and a tomgirl. I just got done watching this video of her when she was probably 10 years old. She was playing in a hockey game right in with a bunch of boys and she actually got in a fight with the goaly. She threw the first punch – right in the face! The ref broke it up quickly and she got sent off the ice.

That’s awesome. I love a girl who’s ticked at a guy and punches him or pushes him down. And then stands there and holds her ground. (Btw, I absolutely hate it when girls slap.) I think of some girls in my past that were super cool like that. They’re all married now. Bummer.

So there’s something else I like about her that I can’t explain. But it always gets me. When a girl looks depressed or forlorn and mad at the world they seem so cute to me. And Avril has so many pics of her that look like that. I just can’t stop staring at her.

She’s got these huge hazel eyes. Long straight hair (brown, black, blond or pink). She’s short which is another thing that I love. She’s got the perfect figure. And she’s got an abstract sense of fashion. Her outfits are always what no other girl would put together but it just looks so good on her. She always does her own thing. She got kicked out of school a couple times. She a high-school dropout. But she showed the world what highschool’s good for. She’s a self-made millionaire now.

She’s one of those types of girls who gets along with the boys much better than the girls. She’s got that agressive/tempermental streak, but in reality she’s very feminine. She’s had boyfriends. She’s gotten dumped. She’s dumped boys. She’s dated sweet/nice guys and losers. She’s just trying find the right guy. Just like every other girl. She likes it when guys open the door for her. She is not promiscuous. She’s got several songs where she’s talking about a boyfriend who she dumped because he wanted her to go “too far”.

Plus she’s Canadian. She’s got that cute accent. I love girls who have European or Canadian accent. So what’s my favorite thing about Avril? Probably that she’s so punky but a good girl at heart. And she’s smokin’ hot.

So there you have it folks! I’m crazy about Avril. Now everybody knows. Next time I’ll tell you why I’ve got a crush on Amy Lee too. ) Hehe, stay tuned. . .

 In the mean time, here’s a good bio of Avril:  http://www.superiorpics.com/avril_lavigne/

Okay, so I’ve talked to several people over the past few days who have, without realizing it, let me know that they’ve told other people about my blog. Yes, this very blog. And since I’m feelin’ so good this early Tuesday morning I figured that I’d share my thoughts about the purpose of this blog.

Ya ready? Honestly, I don’t have any grand purpose whatsoever. It started by me wanting to have a place post entries and pictures about my trip to Hawaii. “Trip to Hawaii?” you say? Yea, I’ve cancelled it for biz reasons. But since then I’ve enjoyed jumping on late at night to tell my tiny audience vartious random things I’ve been thinking lately. It started with just my family knowing about it. Now a few more people have discovered it. It even pops up in the top Google listings for various search terms. Want a laugh? Do a Google search for “lostwithme daryl” and see what comes up! The helpful little GoogleBot picked a wonderful little sentance from a random post that has to do with “hotties” and “rubbing”. That’s all I’m gonna say!!!!

So now that I’ve gotten off to a serious note with this entry I figured I’d share why I picked the title “Lost With Me”. First of all, it’s because I don’t want ANYBODY to take this blog seriously. If I’m practically admitting up front that I get lost all the time, that should clue you in that it may be hazardous to your health to follow any advice you find here. So I’m hoping when you read my posts you’re just relaxing and want a good laugh more than anything. I’m a peculiar guy with a different outlook on life. And I hope it’s entertaining. If you ever get offended or feel like your feathers have been ruffled by a post just take a deap breath. I promise I didn’t mean to offend you. Maybe I’m just blowing off steam or something. I get in moods sometimes. I promise you, if I ever met you we’d probably have a swell time.

Also, and this is a big one, I don’t have any single person in mind when I’m writing. So if you read something and thought to yourself, “I bet this is about me. ” You can bet your boots that I was not thinking about you. Sometimes I just come up with these broad generalizations and decide to tell the world how it ought to be.  Hey, here’s a tip . . . there’s this little red “X” at the top right of your browser window (if you’re a Mac person I have no clue what shiny little button is up there on your browser). Just click that button. If it makes you feel better you can even pretend that it instantly sends me an email that says, “Somebody was majorly ticked off with your insensitive post.” I promise I won’t do it again. [fingers crossed]. Hey, there are about 6 people in the whole world that have known me long enough to know that I’ll slip up and just run my mouth about some seemingly insensitive opinion of mine without realizing that if I was talking to anybody else they would probably take offense. They humor me when I do that. And I really appreciate it. Because they know I’m about as harmless as a BB-gun. It stings from time to time. But you gotta love the guts of somebody who’ll at least take a shot like that. Rest assured, after about 15 minutes I’ll realize what I said and maybe I won’t take the extra effort to qualify what I said, but nonetheless I do feel bad about it.

I really do. When I was in highschool (a christian highschool) I rarely felt bad about anything I said. After all, I had scripture to back it up, right? Of course! And my interpretation was ALWAYS correct! But since then I think I’ve mellowed a bit. I realize that anybody can think their interpretation is correct. Hey, whatever. You know, I think everything’s better when we both just realize that either of us could be right. Sure, we’ll find out someday who’s right. But let’s just be friends in the meantime. Hey, you could even be a tree-hugging Green Party member. Yo, it’s cool. We can be friends. I’ll laugh and nod my head agreeably when you talk about saving some wildlife by voting against some oil rig or someting. I just ask that you just be agreeable when I talk about how tax cuts are good for everybody too.

Maybe this blog ends up containing more than a few insightful entries, but always keep in mind: I’d probably like you if I met you. In fact, many times, I enjoy meeting somebody who’s belief’s are totally opposite of mine. It gives me a chance to ask questions and see if I have good answers to any of their responses. I may not voice them. But, to tell you the truth, I am very convinced about my convictions. And it’s wonderful! If you make a great arguement against something I believe in strongly, I really cheer you on! Wow! The way you voiced your opinion was very effective! On the other hand, if you make a strong stance for your opinion, occasionally I get special satisfaction from the knowledge that, even though I may not say anything, I know I’ve got all the ammo I need to blow you off the face of the universe.

So now that I’ve said that, I am 100% aware of what this blog could do. This blog could be the sole reason that people, 10 years from now, laugh and say something like, “I knew this really opinionated guy one time and you know what absurd statement he made about this topic?” I know. I know. That’s the downside about putting your thoughts out there for the public to have their way with. But you know what? That risk briefly flutters past my mind with every post I make. And each time I decide that it’s worth it to go ahead and leave whatever I say posted.

I fully realize that in 15 years I might look back on some of my entries and feel a little weird about them. I’ll think to myself, “Boy should I delete that post? I don’t really think like that anymore.” But I know I won’t delete it. Why? Because I hate censorship. I don’t like it when somebody changes their opinion and tries to convince everybody, “What , No. I never said that!!!” Yea right. Believe it or not every one of us has different beliefs than we did 15 years ago. Not every belief is different. Maybe even 90% of them are the same. But we will have lived a little since then and are willing to admit that we were a bit narrow-minded back then.

Ahh, anyways. I’m done talking about that. I think one word comes to mind now about the previous topic. What’s that word? “Exhausted.” Right. On to another topic now.

Yea, so when I’m writing a blog entry what are my surroundings like? Well there are several requirements, like having my trusty laptop nearby. But I almost always have some delecacy present. Yep, like right now, it’s my “Extra Sharp Cheedar Cheese”. I love that cheese. I’m not gonna lie, it’s Cracker Barrel brand. Right, you can find it in most grocery stores these days. I wish it was some gormet brand of cheese. But, alas, it’s all the goodness I need right now. Just nibbling and typing. Ahhhhh! It’s quite heavenly. The only item to add to my blog ambiance is some choice tunes. Nope, I’m not gonna tell you what’s playing over my reference studio-quality speakers right now. I’ll leave that up to your immagination. (Hint: No, it’s not rap.) Hahaha! That leaves a LOT of genre’s to guess from though!

Yea, Daryl’s world is a lot of fun. I really do enjoy my single life quite a bit. Why, you ask? Mostly because I’m in that male stage where I don’t feel like I deserve a girl yet. After all, I’m not making millions yet! What respecitable girl would feel at home with me if she couldn’t afford the best? So, I probably won’t feel good about dating till I’m making a boatload on the stock market and own at least 2 serious businesses. Like I was talking about with a friend tonight, “I’m not going to marry no ugly chick.” I’ve had several pretty x-girlfrieds. But unfortunately, I didn’t feel comfortable about my situation in life at the time I was dating them. So I’m still looking for a gorgeous girl. Are you a gorgeous girl? Are you single? Hey, wait, woah, woah. When I say gorgeous I don’t mean average. I mean drop-dead. I mean you have to use all of your feminine tactics every day to keep the guys off you. Like, you have had to change your cell number at least 2 times because you kept getting calls from guys you now put in the “stalker” category? Lol! Well, truthfully, I really like “cute” girls. I’m probably about 5′9″. So if you’re in the 5′0″ – 5′4″ range that is just perfect! Perfect for what, you ask? If you have to ask you’re obviously not a girl. Or you’re just a curious one ) What’s with girl’s always getting away with calling themselves “curious”? When guys do the same thing it’s called “nosy”. Grrr!

Boy, this post is quite the ramble, isn’t it? I always end up taking things to their limit. Ahh, sorry. Since I’m on the topic . . . Um. . . Second though  . . . Okay, well I’ll save that for another post. So nevermind. (sorry) Yea, well, I think I’ve run out of things to talk about.

So are you now convinced that you should just be in a lighthearted and fun mood when you read my blog? I hope so. See, I practically typed this whole entry in a single breath (figuratively speeking). It just flowed out. Boom, done!

Saturday night has got to be one of the best times of the week. Why? Well because you’re smack dab in the middle of the weekend. Everybody loves the weekend. It doesn’t matter whether you’re employed by a big company or self-employed, like me. It’s 3am right now and all I’m doing is nibbling on a fresh slice of Parmesan cheese and listening to Radiohead’s “Kid A”. Oh, what a lush combination. Yea, I said “lush”. Get over it.

Anyways, I’m between a rock and a hard place. Right, Parmesan cheese is hard; but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about what I  should do for the next few days. “Well you need to show up to work on Monday!” Uh, nope I don’t. I just love thinking about that. Ahhhh! I should really have that date memorized. Yea, the date I retired from the corporate world. [hold on, I've got to go down stares and get some more cheese] . . .

Ahhh, Pecorino Romano. In thin little slices that I can just chew on for minutes on end. Kinda like beef jerky. But more lush. Right, I said “lush” again.

Okay, so here’s my delima. I’m totally stoked about this new website I’m writing for myself called QTurret.com. No, it’s not on the www yet; so don’t bother opening your browser. So here’s the whole reason behind it. GW, the options class teacher, always says, “It’s a work thing!”. Well, he’s prolly the hardest working dude I’ve ever known. Plus he’s got a near-photographic memory. So, you say, “Daryl, he makes $220 million each year. Wouldn’t you be content with the $100 million you could make with your non-photographic memory and your desire to not work as hard???” Content? Did you say “content”? Content is for people who aren’t allowed to have lots of money. There’s plenty of “professions” that could go in that list. But I won’t waste time with that. If I was a “content” kind of person then I would still be swiping my BJU ID card to get in the door to the BJU IT department every morning. I’m not “content” in that sense. I’m very driven. Driven to squeeze the most out of this brain the Lord has given me. We should be good stewards of what the Lord has given us. Most preachers forget that the Lord gave us our unique brain. We shouldn’t waste it.

Oops, sorry for that rant. So I’m stoked about QTurret.com. The reasosn I’m so excited about it is because I’ve already written about 10% of it and it is turning out to be very sweet! Yep, I’m building it on top of my “Foundation” code-base. Which means that it’s already an enterprise-grade app, ready for multi-users and lots of other cool jazz. [ . . . sorry, I had to get another slice to nibble on.] So yea, I desparately want to add 2 more modules to it that will make my daily options trading routine much quicker and more effective. GW thinks tha that the harder you work the better you’ll become. But in order to top his $220 mil/yr I’ll have to work smarter, because I don’t/can’t work harder than him.

See, GW can’t write automation software. I can! So that’s how I’ll get ahead of the curve. Plus it will make traveling much easier. I don’t have to lug around a library of 3-ring binders. I just hit my website! Everything’s right there. All linked together. Efficiency. That’s the name of my game. Work smarter not harder. I’ll say, ”It’s not necessarily a work thing, it’s a smart thing!” I’m just sitting on a beach in Hawaii knowing that when I get back to my grass hut on the end of my dock out in the crystal-clear blue water I’ve just got to flip up the lid of my little laptop to have my entire trading world right at my fingertips. No duffle bags of spiral notebooks and file-cabinates of printouts. Blech! Nope, just one thin little laptop That’s the Daryl style. Yea. Crankin’ out the mils and snorklin’ with the gills. (Shut up. I know it was lame.)

 Ahhhhhhh! Yea, so now it’s 3:36am and I’ve decided that it’s probably best to get as far as I can by Monday on my QTurret.com and then work on my Xterra project (the one that’s gonna pay of the X) till I finish it. QT is cool. But, right now, it’s not paying the bills. So, that’s kinda how the priorities go right now. Hey, look at that, something that makes sense.

This post hasn’t been very fluid. Woot Woot! Yea, I said “fluid”. But hey, it’s 3-forever o’clock. So did you really expect this to look like something Charles H. Spurgeon wrote? Wouldn’t it be funny to read a Spurgeon love letter? Yea. Believe it or not Suprgeon was a human being. He did love his wife. And he probably wrote her a letter telling her how much he loved her. LOL! That would be awesome to read that.

But now it’s getting close to 4am. I’m feeling like my old self now! I think it’s great! Everybody else’s alarm clock is sitting there on the pedistal getting anxious. It just can’t wait to blare it’s annoying tone in your ear and wake you from your sweet dreams. But my alarm clock has been trained. Yep. It sits there and knows full well that it will be slapped at least 5 times before I get out of bed. But chances are good that I’ll take the extra effort to just turn it off instead of getting up. I love my little alarm clock though. Yea, I haven’t even installed a new 9v battery in it in 9 years. It keeps ticking. It loves me. It faithfully does it’s bleeping job every morning! And it deserves respect for that, right?

Yep, I’ve been talking a lot about hot stuff lately. Well today I went to my favorite store, Williams & Sonoma and bought me a sweet little package. Yea! I’ve been dreaming about it for prolly about 2 months. I’ve just got this little $16 cheapo from Wal*Mart and I use it all the time. Way more than I use my Microwave. So I decided it was time for an upgrade.

As soon as my Real Estate class got over I jumped in the X and headed str8 to W&S. I also coudln’t resist buying a special All Clad spatula with a long spatula part; perfect for scooping tasty baked items out of the new toaster oven.

Yea, so anyways, we took our first review test in the RE class today. I was pretty happy because I finished a bit early and scored above average. The teacher said that the students generally think this test is harder than the one we have to take for real at the end of the class. There are definately some things I need to study but I feel like the concepts are gelling now. The first 3 classes it was all fresh and difficult. But today it seemed much better.

Anyways, other than that my day was pretty good. I’m surprised that I’m not going crazy from waking up so early every day. I’m definately getting to bed earlier though. That helps. It’s so cool not having to take 2 weeks off of work to take this class. Last week I worked for 20 hours and got a check for 2 weeks worth of Rubbermaid pay. Boy, ’tis certainly a good thing! So now the game is, “How many new big skills can I learn all at once.” Yea. Real Estate, Options, Mortgage Lending, Running PNL. A very wise and rich person recently told me, “You’re going to [stink] at anything you try for the first 2 years.” So going along with that, I should be decent after 2 years. So by 2009 I’ll be proficient at all 4 of the above. Which I will be very happy about if it works out that way. Who knows what will happen.

One thing’s for sure. I’ll be 30 by then. Thirty. That’s halfway to 60. Hmmm. . . But maybe I’ll be married to a super hot chick who worked at a certain nameless eating establishment

I have finally unlocked the secret of an exquisite gormet French recipe I’ve been working on. Yes folks, I pulled my All Clad fry pan off of my pot rack tonight, fired up my $2800 gas range and started working. First I scrambled the eggs and cooked them up to a perfect yellow hue. Then I held the trusty stainless steel Rosle can opener in my right hand and carefully gripped a special can of the most delicate perfection in my left. After carefully removing the can’s top the hearty smell of corned beef hash wafted in the winter’s air. This time though I did a few things different. I turned the heat up to 7 (instead of 5). Then I stood there and gave the corned beef hash something everything delecate requires – TLC. Yep, I just kept stirring it and tossing it around in the pan. And after about 10 minutes it was evenly browned and crunchy. Yep, I mixed in the scrambled eggs grabbed the pan off of the range and reached for my faithful thick blue oven mitt. I took the whole fry pan and a large soup spoon over to my Italian leather feather stuffed sofa and partook of a hearty feast fit only for a bachelor at 2am. Lol!

Yep yep yep. I was talking to my friend M about a biz he wants to start. I’ll tell ya, it’s pretty cool to feel somebody else’s entrepreneuristic energy. I never quit with that stuff. I often wonder if people get sick of hearing about “my plans”. But I don’t run into many people who are trying to kick the day job for the freedom of being on your own. It’s pretty cool though. I can’t wait to hear about his small successes that start to pile up into a big ol’ pile of success. Success in the face of risk and doubters is so sweet when acheaved. Success makes you feel like you feel when you are looking at yourself in the mirror wearing a brand new perfectly-fitting sport coat. You’re just like, “Dang, I never knew I could look so good!” Haha! Yea, it also feels a lot like what you feel like when you’re speeding past all the surfers at Mailbu on Hwy 1 with the top down in your convertable. Success even smells good. Ever ridden in a brand new sports car with a leather interior? That bucket seat just grips you tight and you can feel the stitched leather stearing wheel. You’re in control. Where do you want to go? How fast do you want to get there? Want the windows down or up? Want the stereo up loud or nice and soft? No, don’t check with the boss. He doesn’t care any more. He’s sitting in his soiled office chair rubbing his bald head wondering where all those years went. He’s 55 now and all he can think about is how he can “save” $25 on a new refrigerator because his just went on the blink. Oh yea, and his daughter left a viocemail about getting together for Christmas. But he’ll probably have to work because he used up his vacation on doctor’s visits. Uh where were we? Oh yea. We were in our sports car driving down the highway with nowhere to go. Might as well pull into a quiet little Mexican restaraunt and stare out the window while eating chips and salsa. Why not? What else do we need to be doing? Oh yea, we might want to get home before 8p so we can get ready to head over to the spa for a dip in the hot tub. But that’s 5 hours away. Most people don’t eat lunch at 3pm. So since you’ve got the whole place to yourself you don’t feel rude about reaching for your phone to call a buddy and chat for a while.

As I hoist my Dr. P. I raise a private little toast to all those with the courage to stand up and say, “I choose a differnt path. Ya’ll all have a good one, k?” Yep. It’s a fun adventure. It’s not for everybody though. And it’s not necessarily easy. But it’s sure worth it to me. Hey, I may even fail at a thing or two that I’m going for. But at least I won’t fire myself for it. Speaking of getting fired. It’s 5:30am. I better get to sleep. Hey’ I didn’t go to bed till about 7am yesterday. So I’m improving! But who’s keeping track? And, no, I don’t have a $2800 gas range. Lol! Ah, what a mess I am. Yep, a mess. Who understands a punk like me? Maybe a hot chick somewhere. That’d be nice. Okay, time to slip off into dreamland. ZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz . . .

So that’s why I’m awake at 8am. Yep I was lying in my bed realizing that I was still wide awake when I started to think that it might be fun to go to McDonalds or something. But I didn’t feel like a burger. So I started to think of other things that I might feel like eating. That French toast from Burger King is always good. But I didn’t want something sweet and fattening. So I decided to go with a bacon egg and cheese bizkit. I hopped out of bed put on some clothes (including my Billabong hooded sweatshirt cause it’s cold and raining) and padded out to my car. Btw, there are 2 trains going buy outside right now. Anyways, I was just sitting in my car thinking to my self how I used to be on the road to Michelin every day at this time. Holy cow. It struck me how weird the whole world is. As I drove down the street I saw all the parents driving their kids to school. I can’t believe I spent 12 years of my life going to school so early. I just found myself wondering who in the world ever came up with the concept of not only waking up that early but having to actually be at work ready to serve the world at that ungodly time of night. People should be sleeping at 8am!!!!

No wonder there’s so much poverty, death and natural disasters on this orb we call earth. Anyways, I pulled off the road so I could take my Taco Bell shortcut to Mickey D’s. Next thing you know I had my breakfast and was back on the road to face all of those minivans and soccer moms. Fortunately I made it back to my cozy house safe and sound. I ate my Mickey D’s and now I’m full and ready to watch the stock market open at 9:30a. Maybe I’ll go to lunch with the fam if they’re swinging through. That would be nice.

Well it’s time to drop the Five Browns off at the pool. So, talk acha later. -The Townsfolk

http://flickr.com/photos/lostwithdaryl/

Okay well just check out the pics. I had a pretty good Friday. There were definately some cool parts. But I’d rather talk about the pics I posted. Okay, the little furry cree-ature was just what I needed that night when I was feeling a little alone in the world. And then I’m glad I took a picture of Dad’s loving chalk talk about my big huge 32″ television  I bought (like 4 years ago). Yea that seems like a whole lifetime ago. Arg. Oh well.

Howdy Everybody! It’s 4:30am and guess what I’m doing. Yep, nibbling on nachos dipped in Monterey Jack Queso cheese dip. Yea, I know Queso is the same as Cheese. Thank you. You should get a job with Mexico or something.

Anyways, since nobody really reads my blog much I’ve recently found out that the biggest fan of “Lost With Me” is Virus Boy. Yep. And as a tribute to my good bro, Virus Boy, I decided to post some pics to my Flickr page that should make VB laugh.

Here’s the link: http://flickr.com/photos/lostwithdaryl/sets/72157594322776808/

We had quite the fun time burning down my house that evening. It was just a good old bachelor’s party (of sorts). We had a fine kettle of fairs making these match towers that we lit and then watched the destruction before our very optic orbs. Yep. Lots of smoke, lots of destruction. Yes, I definately took the battery out of the smoke detector before we commenced our show. We probably torched a tree’s worth of matches that night. But that tree should be proud that it was put to such quality use.

You could watch TV. You could go to a movie theatre (yea some people do that). You could play in a golf tyoonament. Or you could burn down a dump truck full of matches. Now, which would you rather do? If you say golf tyoonament I’ll have to shoot you. And it wouldn’t be wrong either. Why? Kuz I said so. Yea.

We also cooked up some of our favorite Corned Beef Hash and Eggs. It just doesn’t get any better, folks! )