So this week has been split between living in a hotel and camping out in my empty apartment which to be honest is just depressing as hell. It’s jacked up how much an empty home affects your mood. I remember being in the same sort of funk when I moved to SD initially. It’s totally like when you break up with your gf (or politically correct non-contractual spousal partner) and they take their stuff and move out and everything is all hollow and echo-y like your heart and there’s this void and maybe this Loreena McKennitt album will make the pain go away and…

Uh. Yeah. You get the idea.

Anyway in my efforts to keep busy I noticed I had 800+ photos on my phone and Holy Jesus did the camera roll ever take forever to open. I decided it was time to clean it out and spent um, 3 hours deleting the bad and blurry ones and archiving the naughty ones for ‘later review’. *wink*wink*nudge*nudge* I came across a lot of good memories- about 70ish- dating back over the last two years. Apparently my camera roll dated back to the week I came to San Diego to do some vacation / job hunting, which was exactly a week ago two years ago. Here’s a gallery of a few but check out the Flickr stream here. There’s actually like, captions and junk there on Flickr explaining them.

Two years ago today I was on vacation in San Diego. At the precise hour of this writing in fact I was in my interview of a certain large Japanese gaming company; it had been bumped from 11am to 8:30am and I was definitely still feeling the effects of splitting a bottle of Jack with Dorian and Spaz the night before. I wasn’t hungover and I wasn’t drunk, I was just really REALLY thirsty. We’re talking Saraha during the dry season here. So what if I did fall back in bed the first time I tried to get up; don’t judge me. The point is tipsy me apparently knocked it out of the park (or I was cheapest) and I got an offer before I flew home on my birthday two days from now.

I first visited San Diego probably close to 4 years ago now. I don’t remember what I was thinking when I flew in, but I do remember what I thought when I flew out; I knew beyond any doubt that I WOULD live here. San Diego clicked with me in ways I couldn’t fathom or explain. Everything looked somehow familiar and yet was glisteningshinywetnew at the same time, and that feeling that hasn’t dimmed in the slightest over the past two years. I’m perfectly content to sit at home reading while ocean breezes waft through the apartment, driving to work along the 101 with surfers as my fellow commuters, or even walking around downtown looking at the unwashed masses of humanity. I’ve never encountered such a diversity of experience in such a concentrated area- seals and sea lions basking 3 feet away from you in La Jolla, sharks and dolphins nosing you while surfing in North County, coyotes skirting you with their sideways walk out in the desert, the list goes on and on. Even after all the time I’ve spent here I MIGHT have seen maybe 10% of what there is to see here. The idea of moving and leaving it all behind was pretty lackluster to say the least.

Frankly it went way beyond just not appealing to me; I outright dreaded it with the cold shivering certainty that I’d hate it. It was the cold and clammy lump of iron dread coupled with the blind unreasoning panic that prehistoric man felt in the dark. I was grumpy and I certainly wasn’t sleeping well. I kept trying to reassure myself that it would be fine, that I would come down to visit San Diego on the weekends like that would somehow make it OK. It didn’t work of course; it was a repetitive mantra that was overlaid with an overpowering stench of fear and a subtle touch of desperation. Why was I so determinedly unhappy with this? Was it because it San Diego first city that I ever felt like I fit in, somewhere I could call home? As it turns out, that was pretty close to the truth- I had put down roots in San Diego in 2 short years which was something I hadn’t ever managed in 30 odd years while living in Alabama. Perspective is a bitch; this must be what most people went through when leaving home for the first time. Once I realized that everything began to make sense. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t want to move up to the Bay Area, I felt safe and secure here and I didn’t want to give that up. I was more fighting mentally for that security and comfort than anything specific to San Diego. I was willfully locking myself in complacency, like the little kid with their eyes screwed up tight and fingers in their ears singing at the top of their lungs.

I like to think that’s not me. While I don’t espouse change for the sake of change, I don’t think we as human beings can grow without constant change and stimulation. We should fear stagnation in our lives; it’s an insidious rot that erodes you from the inside out and we’re generally incapable of seeing it in ourselves until it’s too late. I made the conscious decision to embrace this move as a chance for that and haven’t looked back. It might be a year, it might be for 10, but it’s a new experience and I want to learn from it and enjoy it to every extent I’m capable of. I’m trying to approach it with the same outlook and enthusiasm as I did moving here and it’s working. I’ve already got stuff lined up to do in September and October, including trips to Yosemite, Monterrey Bay, San Francisco, scuba diving, and going out to see the giant redwoods. I’m sure there’s a Napa trip going to be wedged in there somewheres. *ahem*

My friends here are still my friends, just like my friends back in Alabama. I can easily come down to visit just like I go back to the South now. The mistake that I almost made is in assuming that my old life would be somehow closed to me now, and I don’t think it has to be like that. There are people who will write you off for sure- I saw that firsthand when I moved to San Diego originally. Some folks just take you leaving personally, like they’re only in your social circle due to physical proximity. I expect it’s some a heady cocktail of subconscious envy and feelings akin to betrayal. They’ll either get over it or not; so far in my limited experience it’s been roughly a 50% turnover rate.

Funny how life comes full circle. Why does it seem I always move on Labor Day? In two days I’ll be camping out in my apartment in San Diego with most of my worldly goods making the trip to Sunnyvale. In one week I’ll be on a sightseeing tour bus in San Francisco. In two weeks I’ll (hopefully) have started unpacking. With all that living to do, I should probably get out of this freezing Starbucks and start getting ready for the packers and movers huh?

Something #1 – something old
I’m turning 33. Sweet Jesus Crimminey. The actual date is August 23rd, but due to Something #2, I’m probably having a gathering the weekend of the Aug 20th.

Something #2 – something new
Some people know, some don’t, but I’m relocating to Palo Alto in 3 short weeks. I’m still working for Playdom/Disney Interactive, the relocation is just an effort to cut down on the sheer amount of travel I’ve been doing for the past 8 months or so. I still plan to be in San Diego for at least a week of every month for a while. My combo going away/birthday bash will probably be the 20th.

Something #3 – something borrowed
I had an early exposure to photography (pun intended) in the 5th grade. For the past few years I’ve been using a Sony A100 DSLR I borrowed from Dad- as of last week, that’s changed! I’ve upgraded to a Canon 5D Mark 2, which is just…unbelievably sweet. The pics in the header up there come from it With the new camera also comes my new side gig as a freelance photographer which I’ll be talking about later.

Something #4 – something blue
Uh, at this point the theme fails me. The only things blue right now are:

• Me! I hate to leave San Diego behind!
• This sweet sweet panorama background you can download for free! If you like it, you can download the full size version all with some color variations here.

Tijuana to Temecula, from the top of Palomar Mountain

We’ll call it here for tonight- it’s a teaser post. I got lots to say on each of the subjects above but the laundry is done and it’s time to pack so I can fly out in the morning.

photo credit: Tawni Rae

Every year I make a list of things to do that year. I refuse to call them resolutions because no one ever does those anyway. I am slightly OCD and organized in life (otherwise I procrastinate horribly) but it’s written on a list, I’ma friggin do it. It’s a weird little compulsion that I’ve harnessed as a way to Get Shit Done(TM). At some point, an enterprising young woman will figure this out and try to write “propose to me” on a piece of paper and slip it to me. Meh. Might be easier than doing it on my own. At any rate my equivalence of resolutions is a public list of all the stuff I want to get done for the year. This year’s was actually not half bad. I was going to link it in this post to give an example of my weird to-do list mentality when I realized- holy crap, I’ve accomplished most of my list already. The year is barely half over and I’ve got like 2.5 items out of 10 to go.

So what does this have to do with anything? Other than pointing out to all you slackers how much I’ve done so far, I was going to announce that I took my first stab at surfing today and could cross it off the list. That’s when I noticed- it wasn’t even on the damn list. I had put it off in the past because I thought I wasn’t in good enough shape or coordinated enough (newsflash, I’m still not!) but the idea was still kicking around in the back of my mind. “Must be a bucket list item or something”, I thought. Not that I maintain one, or even like the idea of one mind you, but I’ve been kicking around the idea of learning ever since a friend offered to teach me. While we’re on the subject, had anyone even heard of the phrase before the Jack Nicholson movie came out? I certainly hadn’t and now it’s a cemented into everyone’s vocabulary to the point you couldn’t get it out with an Urban Dictionary sized crowbar. I’ve come to the decision that I hate this damn phrase and everything it represents.

Because it makes people lazy, that’s why.

Life is about goals people. Wait, no, I take that back. Life is about having and accomplishing your goals. This “bucket list” bullshit encourages people to put their desires on a magical list and get to it before they die. It’s the ultimate New Year’s resolution / procrastinator bastard love child. It’s resolutions for lazy people- don’t worry about accomplishing them this year, you have your whole life. You don’t need that kind of pressure man!

F that. I got junk to do and no magical “eventually” wish list is going to make it happen for me. There is a list, it is short, it has an expiration date, and shit is getting done man. Each year’s list builds off the previous years. Bucket list. Whatever.

And yeah, I’m going surfing against next weekend. Probably every weekend from here on actually, until I can actually manage to stay upright on the board for longer than 0.2s. I will however be buying a rashguard because right now my chest looks like a slab of raw meat.

I really need to make better lists. 2010′s already needs more stuff on it.

Peace out!

(heh, I said rectify.)

photo credit: dougtone

I suspected that moving cross country would involve tons of new and exciting experiences for me, not the least of which would be able to see the sky for more than 5 minutes continuously. For those of you not familiar with Mobile, AL it rains a lot. How much do I mean by “a lot?” you ask? There’s used ark lots every few miles and the day after I flew out it began raining and did so every single day for the next 22 days. I wish I could act shocked but this is actually pretty common.

As a side result of growing up in a city that could pass for Atlantis to the ancient Greeks, I feel my driving skills (especially in this stuff called “weather”) are pretty respectable. I’m not talking stunt car driving here; I think I’m somewhere halfway between that level and the level that every male over the age of 16 thinks he is. Pretty aight in other words yeah? Despite my ninja-like reflexes and cool demeanor under pressure, it still took me about three months to learn the unwritten rules of driving in San Diego. In an effort to save visitors some time and frustration in the future I’ve compiled my wisdom here. Without further ado, the 10 Rules to Driving in San Diego

1. All Mercedes are driven by women and all BMWs are driven by men. This is an important thing to know because Mercedes will run you off the road Mad Max style, whereas BMWs will drive faster than you no matter what.

*exception: Older model Mercedes can be driven by men and older model BMWs can be driven by women. My theory is that men have to buy their wife new car and get stuck with her old Merc, or they buy themselves a new car and foist their old one off on the wife. Interestingly enough this theory has its roots in geeks and new computer systems.



Old men and luxury cars? Napping on the freeway!

2. Always follow an Audi when speeding. Every Audi owner in existence drives 10-15 mph over the speed limit and thinks he’s an Indy car superstar.
3. The closer you get to LA, the faster you will drive. LA has its own speed-gravity well that will make you drive faster. The exception to this is of course rushhour(s) which is from 4am to 3:50am every day.
4. If you see other lanes moving faster than yours DO NOT change lanes, I can’t emphasis this enough. Everyone else sees it just like you and they’re all going to jump into it making it the new slow lane. Stay where you are and your turn to be the fast lane will come. Then everyone will want in YOUR lane (just stay outta mine).
5. Wrecks will ruin your commute, period. It doesn’t matter that it’s just a fender bender in the carpool lane because all traffic will be stopped at least 5 miles before it and possibly after it. Even longer if there’s flashing lights.
6. The carpool lane. Oh, the carpool lane. Where else do we spend millions of dollars to build something that most people never get to use? Probably 5% of people use it regularly, and any time one starts, ends, or there’s a wreck, it completely @#$@# up the flow of traffic for the other 95% of us. Hoorah.
7. Weather. Hoooly crap weather. San Diegians are great with sunshine and fog and cloudiness. They are not so great with rain. In their defense it’s pretty hard to be a good driver in conditions that you see maybe twice in your life. Coupled on top of that is the fun fact that on the whole, San Diego doesn’t have storm drains. The ground doesn’t absorb it either; the roadside is so tough that rainwater runs back on the road in an effort to find somewhere soft to hide. Since it doesn’t rain that often the rainwater picks up the layer of oil and emissions on the road and the freeway is now a ghetto recreation of the Icecapades with two ton death machines with squealing tires instead of highly trained singing dancers.


Hey I know, let's reenact Footloose!

8. Every Prius you see (and there are plenty) will attempt to cut you off. No question. Just be ready for it and don’t expect the blinker.
9. Blinkers are optional, but highly advisable. If you cut someone off with your blinker on they’ll wave and smile politely like they intended for you to get over. If you don’t use a blinker and try this you get flipped the bird.
10. The best lane to pass in is the upcoming exit lane, especially if it’s an exit only lane. By far these are the least populated lanes on the freeway making them ideal for quick acceleration and maximum anger-inducing in your fellow drivers.
11. Pedestrians have the right-of-way no matter what. This was a bit of an adjustment for me personally since the Alabama law states “on a crosswalk” at the end. Not so much here- people feel perfectly safe crossing parking lots while playing hopscotch or say, trying to perform handstands, and have no fear of getting hit by a car. By comparison bicyclists do not enjoy the same immunity and are supposed to be treated like any other vehicle. It’s always fun to slam on your breaks and watch an obnoxious cyclist go flying over your trunk and hood.


Hahah..wait, that's not funny.

photo credit: carolyntiry

A lot of people don’t like to make New Year’s resolutions for a variety of reasons. I’d like to think that I’ve heard every excuse there is at this point but people continually find new ways to surprise me. The two most common (to date) that I’ve heard are:

1. “Oh, I don’t need a reason to make goals, I have them year-round.”
2. “People never stick to resolutions anyway so why bother.”

There’s a whole slew of ways to argue these points, but for me it just isn’t worth it. While I agree with the first statement in principle, New Years and its associated traditions provide a logical, easily remembered point in time to set goals for yourself for the coming year. If you’re committed enough to not need such a landmark date that’s great, but I’ll stick with what works for me.

In years past I never bothered setting goals for myself. Sometimes (infrequently) New Years was a good time to look over what happened to me in the last year and try to figure out what went wrong. The past two years were the first times I tried setting concrete goals for myself and it worked out pretty well. I think that where this practice fails for a lot of folks is that they don’t set concrete enough goals. If you don’t know your goal, how can you judge your progress or success / failure?

Now without further pontificating- my goals for 2010.

Fitness

• I want to maintain a 30-31 inch waist.
• Make it to the gym 4 days a week at least every other week, if not every week.
• Reduce my bodyfat. My scale currently says I’m at ~8-9%, but I wonder how accurate that is. That might be true overall, but most of my bodyfat is concentrated around the ‘ole waistline. Needs to even out!
• Be able to squat 160lbs, bench press 180lbs, and do 100 pushups. Not necessarily all of these back to back

Hobbies

• Read at least 3 books a month (or 36 books for the year) with at least half being non-fiction. I’m great at tearing through fiction but I’m slow on the nonfic.
• Draw more. I haven’t actively sketched anything in years, and the LA Ink marathon I watched while fighting off the deadly ninja sinus virus ..thing rekindled the creative urge in me. I haven’t decided what I’m going to draw yet but I want to have at least four finished pieces by the end of the year.
• Photography. I definitely want to take more pictures, and I’ve started on that by joining the 365 Project. It’s not a competition- you just take a picture every day and post it. I also want to enter at least two photo contests this year.
• San Diego Exploration. At least once a month, try something new around town. This includes hiking.

Self Improvement

• Learn a foreign language. This is one of my failed goals from last year, sadly. Logically enough I’m starting with Latin American Spanish since it’s the second most popular language here. I’d also like to be able to talk to the nice smiling people who run the 24 hour burrito drive thru near my house.
• Add a new technical skill / certification. I’m leaning strongly toward PHP here due to my increasing WordPress involvement. Currently I’m more of a talented amateur hacker at it than anything else.

So thems my goals for the year. The fitness ones should be a breeze, the hobby ones a bit harder, and I think that the self improvement ones will be the hardest of all.

photo credit: nDevilTV

Traditionally this is the time of year that I do the typical year in review type post. I broke tradition the past several years by either not posting at all or posting my todo list / resolutions for the year. Since the todo thing worked out well last year, I’m going to be wild and do both this year, though not in the same post. I’m writing this amid dirty looks and calls of “see you next year!” at a crowded Starbucks. The dirty looks are probably because I’m taking up an entire couch thingy with my feet propped up. Too bad! It’s near a power outlet. Finders keepers and all that.

2009 in Rewind
I don’t think there’s any way I can describe 2009 other than frelling awesome. (Yes, I used frelling in a sentence. I’m aware it’s a made up word. So is grok and I plan to use that at some point too so shove off.) Overall I think 2009 has gone well for me

Where I succeeded:

• I got in better shape. It hasn’t been as quick as I wanted but I think I had some pretty unrealistic expectations going in. I’ve still got a long way to go but now I’m educated. I know more about muscle groups, exercises, and nutrition which will make this year even easier. It’s like running downhill I think; the further you go the easier it gets. Daily Burn and my trainer Dennis were vital parts of this process as was the support of my friends and family.
• I was better at managing my money. I’ve setup automatic transfers into savings each pay check and a small spending stipend for things like books and movies. Mint.com has been a huge bonus to getting this done. Mint is like an automated version of Quicken allowing for automatic transaction categorization and alerts for a variety of situations (pending credit card payments, over budget, etc).
• Get more into my hobbies. Another one for the “win” column. I’ve been delving more and more into amateur digital photography/art, even to the point of opening my own store to sell prints. I’ve read more too, thanks to the Kindle app for the PC and iPhone, and I’m keeping up with it all via GoodReads. I rebuilt my website into something I like and I’m willing to maintain. As a side benefit I’ve learned a ton more about WordPress and I’ve actually done some custom site work and hosting. Hiking and camping excursions continue to grow, though not quite to the level I’d like. Moving out to San Diego will probably help that quite a bit.
• I moved to San Diego. Oh yes, this was a goal and it was most definitely met.

Where I failed:

• Self improvement. I didn’t add a new technical skill or certification to my repertoire, and I didn’t learn a new language. Gonna have to bump this one into this coming year.

Everything else:

• I bought a new car.
• I got invaded by ants.
• I had a few issues with the neighbors.
• I (unsuccessfully) tried Rogaine. More on this later.
• Attended MetaCon ’09. Words cannot describe this event, ever. Probably because of the gag order from the judge. This year’s MetaCon 2010 promises to be better!
• I got a job with Sony and moved to San Diego.
• Got told the truth a lot. Example: : patience (you don’t have) is a virtue (again which you don’t have)
• Did a fair amount of blogging. God, I hate that word. How about we say writing instead?
• Gained (and lost) a roommate.
• Went camping twice. Must do more!
• Got closer to my family. (Yeah, a win/loss there right? )
• Did I mention I took a lot of pictures?
• Got inspired by a pretty awe-inspiring blog post related to Harry Potter. I kid you not. Thankfully it’s mostly due to the writer not the Harry Potter aspect.

Stay tuned for the 2010 todo list! Here’s to another awesome year.

Of course there’s a downside to this shiny happy sharing world- sometimes, very rarely, you get bad neighbors. Maybe they throw wild parties and don’t invite you, or hang pictures all night. Yup, just pounding away at the walls with hammers in a rhythmic fashion. Definitely hanging pictures. Whatever the case may be everyone has had them and everyone has had to deal with them. But what happens when YOU’RE the bad neighbor? I’ve never thought of myself as the bad neighbor. I’ve definitely thrown a few shindigs in my day, listened to my fair share of gangsta rap too loud at night (west side!), and certainly I’ve cranked the bass for the occasional testosterone-and-explosion movie fest from time to time. Despite all of that I’ve never once had a complaint lodged against me in all my 10 years of apartment living until last week.

It started innocently enough. A voicemail popped up on my cell Monday morning from my apartment complex letting me know that “a neighbor” had complained about noise from my apartment over the weekend. They were very helpful, even going so far as to give me a few tips and pointers on how to move my subwoofer away from the walls so to not disturb others. “It’s not the actual VOLUME you understand, just the bass every now and again. Thanks for looking into it!” I’m sure it’s just a random coincidence that I had finished running the wiring for my surround sound setup the day before, and had felt the need to test it a wee bit. I shrugged it off with a laugh and a mental “oops” and went about my week. “Boy”, I thought. “How lucky am I to move into an apartment complex that offers surround sound hookup advice?! Who needs GeekSquad? Not me buddy! I got Mission Ridge.”

Friday night rolls around and I’m deep into my latest addiction- internet pr0n. Kidding… that’s my fallback addiction. I’d been squeezing in a few hours of Dragon Age: Origins between work and gym nights, so I was looking forward to an uninterrupted romp through the game. Instead I got a visit from my upstairs neighbor at 11:30 at night. Talk about immersion breaking yeah? Nothing like opening the door to a barefoot schlub wearing pajama pants and an Affliction T-shirt to get you out of the RPG mood. Maybe he should have shown up dressed as Elrond (or his daughter, rawr!) and I’d have been more receptive. Instead the conversation went more like this:

Him: “So uh, like, hey. We can sorta hear some noise from down here? We think it’s the bass from your stereo. It’s definitely not the volume though, no question!. You seem like a nice guy even though I just met you and…”
Me: “Hrm, that’s weird. Can you hear anything like now? I mean my door and windows are open, did you hear anything outside?”
Him: “Upstairs, yeah! But not out here. Want to come listen?”
Me: “Not really. I mean, it’s 11:30 at night….”
Him: “Um… right.. I mean…
Me: “Kbye!”

Understandably I was confused; what kind of magical sound could travel through the floor, walls, ceiling, and air to reach out and disturb these poor people and yet not be audible from eight feet away. Clearly witchcraft was afoot or I was being framed. Or both… those crafty witches, always out to get us techno-savy regular folks. Obviously a case of techno-envy. If it wasn’t the witches then certainly this was a fluke right? To be on the safe side I lowered the bass, treble, and overall volume on the subwoofer, but apparently that wasn’t enough as someone began pounding on my ceiling at 9:30 on Sunday night. Now THAT was some magical floor transitioning noise.

By Tuesday I’d found a letter on my door. Reading between the lines (and the grammar issues) its obvious that he’s been complaining to the apartment complex again. I’m going to call them in the morning to see what we can do to straighten this out. Between the letter, the neighbor harassment, and reading things like this on the web, it makes me lean pretty strongly towards finding another place when my lease is up in March.

I’m sorry I haven’t posted more. Life in California is pretty busy, so I don’t have a lot of free time to hang out on the internet. It’s somewhat ironic to me that I feel busier here than I did in Alabama when by and large the culture here is far more laid back and relaxed. Work hours start later and are far more relaxed, holidays are longer and there are more of them, and no one really ever appears to be in a hurry. I don’t know if this is true for most jobs here, just tech jobs, or just “game industry” jobs of which I’m on the very periphery of.

So what’s keeping me so busy you ask? The biggest push for me personally has been re-furnishing my pad. When I left Alabama I threw out just about everything that I didn’t personally pick out, or furniture that I didn’t like. I took pictures of my old apartment right before I left of everything packed up. It’s pretty drastic that when moving from a 989 sq foot, 2 bed/bath apartment to a 830 sq foot, 1 bed/bath apartment almost everything I moved fit in half my living room. I had 86 “items” for the movers to move. That’s it. I threw away a lot both physically and mentally to make this move, and one of my first orders of business has been to get my sense of “home” re-established. It’s still a work in progress, but I’m done enough to actually show it to people and not feel like I’m living in a dorm room. You can see the full album on my photos page. Here’s a few samples:

Some of my free time has been devoted to working on my official blog of course (www.thefirestarter.org), working on my dad’s photography site (www.thruthelenz.com), and I just finished a website for Dennis my old personal trainer (www.1on1personaltrainingnow.com). Website work is sort of hit or miss for me, I don’t generally enjoy it and have to be “in the mood” to get anything done. I need to finish Thru the Lenz and one more site for a friend’s computer consulting gig before I can quit for another year or two. Hopefully. What’s left of my free time has been split between gym, various social events, reading, and a renewed interest in gaming. I’m still trying to find a good multiplayer (co-op) RPG, so if anyone has recommendations I’m all ears. Gym is indirectly taking up more time than I’m used to; eating 3000 (or more!) calories a day while trying to bulk is not as easy as I would hoped. There’s food prep time, sleep time, longer gym sessions.. but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think it was worth it and didn’t enjoy every minute of it.

The only thing I’d like to do more of that I haven’t is hiking. I got to do a quick 2 hour trip to Torrey Pines a few weekends back (photos here), but I haven’t done any real stuff yet. I’m trying to get a group together to do a hike at Volcan Mountain this weekend but those pesky social obligations I mentioned keep cropping up =). Along with the hiking comes photography of course, but that’s still very much a shelved project until all my website work finishes up.

Next post will be sometime this week and will probably be a Rogaine update. Stay tuned!