Welcome to my Blog

Well, the year 2006 is coming to an end, and I finally broke down and decided to join the millions of lemmings that are already a step ahead of me and create a blog. Whether it blossims into something entertaining and/or useful or sits here, stale with no future updates remains to be seen. Why start this blog at all? I don't know. Kristin (My fiance) has one, and she seems to enjoy writing in it daily, so I figured maybe I'm missing something and should try it. When I was a kid I kept a daily diary, and I think there is quite a bit of merit in doing so. Just the word "diary" conjurs up thoughts of gayness and sissy behavior, but keeping a daily record of your life isn't such a bad idea for the simple reason that it forces you to spend a couple minutes thinking about the day that just went by, and sometimes, that 2 minutes spent will help you learn from your day's experiences, and with a little bit of luck, you'll be slightly less stupid as a result.

If you're into speakers, cars, sports, sex and other Man stuff, you may enjoy my blog. If you're looking for a bunch of emotional crap about how much life means to me, then you'll probably find this spot a bit boring.

So... info about me. I'm not sure why, because nobody who doesn't already know me is likely to read this, but incase you're one of those losers who actually reads shit from random people that you have no hope of ever meeting, here's some info:

I'm Jim. I'm almost 30. I'm engaged to Kristin. I like cars. I like audio. I'm an electrical engineer. I'm a republican. I don't have a religion per-se. I just bought a house. Here's all that shit restated in more words and probably not in the same order:

I have 5 cars: My newly acquired 91 GMC Jimmy winter-beater shitbox; my 87 GMC Sierra Classic K3500 that I bought a couple years ago (but have wanted since I was a kid); My 1991 Chevy Corvette daily driver; my 88 Pontiac Trans Am GTA that I've had since sometime around 2000; and my baby, my 1985 Chevy Camaro IROC-Z. Yes, I'm a redneck. I have more cars than I should, and I like them all except for the Jimmy, which is simply cheap 4 wheel drive transportation. Only 1 has a valid inspection. For info and pics on my vehicles (and Kristin's Camry), go to http://www.cardomain.com/id/jim85iroc.

Beyond my cars, my other main interest is audio. I've been into audio since I was in 8th grade, and the burning desire to learn more about it has never stopped. I installed stereos in every car I've had, worked in home and car audio shops during college, and in the last few years I've taken on home speaker building, which is a very challenging task that combines the need for woodworking with the electrical knowledge necessary to design and build the electrical filter networks. Lastly, it requires a good systems engineering mindset in order to select the proper components that will compliment each other in the design.

I work at General Dynamics in Pittsfield MA as a Hardware Engineer. They're a defense contractor. I used to work on the "Fire Control" systems for Trident Submarines. In other words, I worked on the system that fires up to 24 nuclear missles out of the submarine toward some doomed country with only remaining moments of existance. I enjoyed being part of that whole philosophy, but ultimately, the work itself sucked. Now I work on a different program that I can't tell you about. Say what you want about nuclear missiles and the submarines that hold them, but the fact that we have MULTIPLE submarines somewhere in the world's oceans at any given time, each with enough nuclear firepower to end the world in minutes is reason enough for no other country to ever consider screwing with us. The best defense, is indeed, a good offense.

I went to college at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester NY. It was a 5 year program that took me 6 years to complete. I started off in Electrical Engineering, and after failing virtually every math and physics course I took, I moved into Electrical Engineering Technology. What's the difference? In the real world, virtually nothing. We all apply (and get) the same jobs for the most part. EE students spend more time on theory and EETs spend more time on applications. Since I'm a hands-on guy and not a "book lerner", EET wound up being a better fit for me. As for all that math and physics that I failed, once all that stuff was taught to me in my engineering courses instead of by the math & science department, it all became much easier to understand. :)

I'm a republican, though I'm sure that has become fairly obvious by now. I hate tree-hugging pinko liberals who are too narrow minded and ignorant to realize that it's not the government's job to protect me from myself. I have a right to own my guns. I have a right to keep more of my paycheck instead of giving it to those in a lower tax bracket. Sure, we need to help those who can't help themselves, but it's about goddamned time that we stop helping those who choose not to help themselves. Global warming isn't our fault. Stop thinking that we've got nearly that much power over the world. We don't. Learn a little bit about geology and the history of the world. Temperatures have fluctuated greatly over the earth's history, and the fact that temperatures are starting to rise coincides perfectly with the natural oscillation of the earth's temperatures. If you don't understand what I just said, you're too stupid to have an opinion anyway. Oh hell, this is is why I don't like talking politics. I've only touched upon the tip of the iceberg and already I'm all fired up, irritated, and getting a bug up my ass over it. I didn't even get to talk about the million stupid laws that Massachusetts Liberals have forced down our throat. That's for another time.

On to religion. On second thought, maybe not. I'll condense: I grew up catholic until I began to form the opinion that all religion (or at least all the ones that I'm somewhat familiar with) are a crock of shit intended for nothing more than to help humans deal with death and the nothingness that follows it. Does that mean I don't believe in God? I don't know. That part still confuses me, probably because like a typical human, I need to cling to at least one small thread of hope that there is an afterlife and that the game isn't over when I check out. I still pray on a regular basis and I still tell myself that God exists. I have a feeling that I'll elaborate on these thoughts in the near future.

Now on to my personal life. I have a fiance, Kristin. I'm not going to say much about my relationship with her, because that's the one and only part of my life that is private. I'm sure I'll share plenty of superficial shit over time, but that's about it. You may gain some insight about our relationship from her perspective if you read her blog (http://www.fyi-kiki.blogspot.com/).

We recently bought a home in Readsboro, VT. Owning a home is a bittersweet type of thing. It's sweet because it's ours. We own it. We don't have a hormonal mullet-wearing trailer trash bitch of a landlord to deal with anymore, and we can finally take pride in making it how we want it. I finally have enough room to start on so many projects that I've been wanting to do. The bitter part is that now I'm too broke and too busy to do any of these projects that I finally have room for.

Well, this should be enough of a primer for my first entry. Incase there's anybody that hasn't gotten offended and left this page yet, welcome to my blog. :)