I'm Not Dead...

I was, however, taken hostage by a group of Buddhist Mormons bent on world domination who thought I was the reincarnation of a magical ferret that was prophesized to help them rule all.

Once they realized I was actually just a fat schmuck, they let me go.

Blogging will resume shortly!

The First Couple Weeks... And Then Some (Part One)

Warning... This will be the most bitching you have ever seen in a single post! Although it's not bitching about anyone or anything in particular, I suppose it is still bitching. This will also probably be the most pictures as well...

April 11th was my last day at KLAS. For the most part it was uneventful and as I reported before, was a rather emotional day for me - which was somewhat surprising.

I spent most of the morning (as there was really nothing for me to do after we got back from the standoff) hanging out in the studio. Over two years these guys had become my friends, and what better way to show my gratitude by harassing them and making lots of noise while they were trying to do a morning show?



Justin (above top) and Sherry (above bottom - and if you couldn't figure that out, you're a total dumbass) got the most harassment, since they are only on air every few minutes rather than almost all the time like Denise and Dave are.

Still good times were to be had, until Justin made my fatass come up onto the traffic stage and then put me on television. I will post my 'on purpose' Las Vegas television debut (I've been on TV before - it's one of the hazards of doing shoots with all the other stations and everyone running around trying to get shots from different angles).

At any rate, it was actually a very nice gesture. Justin was one of my favorite people to work with in Vegas (reporter wise, don’t get your panties in a knot, John...). Here is one of my blog posts about a story I did with Coop, in case you're interested.

After work I went home and was all emo for a couple of hours thinking about the past couple of years. Then I prepared for my big night partying with everyone! Cause as I wrote before, when photogs party, shenanigans are bound to be afoot!

Of course that's when things started to go wrong. I guess actually things had been going wrong since about 1977, but for the sake of brevity, we'll only talk about the things that went wrong in the past 30 days. When the gang arrived at Hooters on Sahara, we found it closed. Not like 'closed for the night' but 'closed to be blown up.' Very sad. But we headed over to TGIFriday's, which was just down the street and had a pretty cute waitress. I think John got some video of her, but who knows. She would have looked so much better in a Hooters outfit, but what can you do. Anyway, the gang all had a good time with drinks and yummy TGIFriday's food!

From left to right, top to bottom, Peter, Sol, Tony and Mutha Fuckin' John Farrell.

Unfortunately a couple of people couldn't come, and I forgot to tell a couple others. At any rate, we ate, we drank, we told some of our favorite 'Erin's a fucking schmuck' stories (I don't understand how they had so many...) and then we headed over to the second part of the party!

Firefly Bar is where we went. Binky, the guy who isn't Mutha Fuckin' John Farrell, said it was a cool bar. He lied. Not really, but it was more of a restaurant than it was a bar. I was worried, but the problem soon solved its self!

No one showed up! (And I'm not going to pretend that it didn't hurt just a little bit...)

Well, almost no one. Weather Pimp (also known as Tedd Florendo) rolled in as well as Duke (below top) and Jason (below bottom). Lovely Carissa (who I was SO infatuated with.. damn her for being engaged) also showed for like 30 seconds, but it was long enough for me to get a hug! Unfortunately (or fortunately) I forgot to confess my love and propose. I wasn't drunk enough yet. And it didn't work the last time I did it (to a different girl) so it probably wouldn't have worked this time either.


Time passed and I got all packed up. Special thanks to Tony who was awesome and came over and helped me and my mom pack my stuff into the U-Haul. Less special thanks to Binky who arrived right after we finished. It's the thought that counts, I guess.

Mom and I hit the casinos before we left (we decided to leave a day early, which spurned the wrath of Mutha Fuckin' John Farrell who wanted to do Starbucks. After calming him down and getting the gates of hell closed again, Mom and I did some gambling and won some money! Hurrah! We spent it all on a real nice dinner!

Then move began. We stayed overnight in Laughlin which was neat. It was the first time I had ever been there. Was kind of nice. (This is actually when John called.. I'm a little out of order here...) In the morning we began the trek with plans to stay overnight in Amarillo, Texas.

Of course spurning John Farrell has consequences. Halfway between Bullhead City and Kingman, AZ, my car stopped working. Dead.

After two hours, the tow truck finally arrived. My mom's car insurance actually paid to tow my Malibu, but not the trailer. So I had to fork over $100 to pay for the towing of the trailer.

The tow truck driver was really nice and told us about a place in Kingman that could most likely get us on the road again today. But to be on the safe side he suggested that we get a hotel room. So he took us to a Motel 6 where we dropped off the trailer, and then headed over to Steve's Route 66 Auto Repair in Kingman.

Steve checked out the car and came to the conclusion that the alternator decided that it didn't like towing my possessions as well as my own fatass and decided to assplode. He found me a new alternator and replaced it, as well as replaced my air filter for $250 (he gave me the air filter for free!).

It took them about an hour and a half to actually replace the alternator. As a side note, I really recommend these guys if you are ever in need of auto repair in Kingman. They were very nice and did a great job. Also major props go out to Jim (#15) with Mike Pow-R-Tow, also out of Kingman; a really nice guy and great service.

After checking the time (it was about 6PM PDT) and the mileage we had to go, we decided to make a run for it. We figured that we could manage to get to Tulsa by 2PM - which is when the apartment place closed, according to their website. So we drove and drove and drove and eventually switched off a couple of times so we could nap a bit (I suck at sleeping in the car though, so I didn't sleep long).

We arrived near Tulsa at about 1PM. We had a 40 minute drive still so Mom called the apartment place who then informed us that the office was actually open till 4 and the website was out dated. We groaned as we skipped a tasty Cracker Barrel breakfast to make sure we arrived by 2.

Such is life I suppose.

After arrival we spent the next couple of hours unloading the trailer and dragging everything up to my third floor apartment. Luckily though this place has elevators! Hizzah! Could my fortune be turning around?

I'll tell you in the next post!