Spent all day yesterday traveling - Woke up at 7am, ate at the lodge, drove back to Las Vegas, ate at the Rio (the food was pretty bad), waited around at the airport, caught a flight to Dallas and finally back to Orlando sometime after midnight. On the plane, dad, Emily and I wrote an article about Big Picture DVD for the Heritage and for Lake Mary Life Magazine. Mom revised and rewrote the article. It came out pretty well. Today the woman who was suppose to interview us from Lake Mary Life magazine canceled again.

Emily and I picked up the dogs first thing in the morning and ran errands for the rest of the day. I got a haircut for the first time in months. I hate getting haircuts. Now we're packing and cleaning to prepare for tomorrow's move.

Slept like crap last night, because of the obvious. Got woken up by my parents banging pots and pans together. It put me in a bad mood for hours. At 9am Emily, Lindsey, Dad and I learned to ride ATVs. I never imagined that such a redneck sport could be so much fun. We went through back woods trails. Muddy and exciting. Then we rappelled off the top of the rec center building. Emily was terrified. Lindsey got her hair stuck in the belay device. After lunch we hiked around Zion National Park, took pictures and climbed the rocks. Then more ATV riding. This time on a more advanced trail. Dinner was the typical ranch food. I didn't like it very much, but everyone else did. When we got back to the cabin, the snow storm started and lightning knocked out the power. We fumbled around in the dark for a while, before the guy who runs the place brought us some lanterns

Checked out of the hotel around 10am. Ate breakfast at some random bagel place with really good food. After breakfast, we went to Bank of America and saw an unoccupied car rolling through the parking lot backwards. I ran out and stopped it. Someone went inside to find the owner. An old Asian woman came out, thanked me profusely and told me that her head was spinning because her daughter died yesterday.

We drove 4 hours to Zion Ponderosa, a ranch style resort. We're staying in a cozy cabin overlooking the mountains. Emily and I are sleeping on the floor.

Slept well for the first time in months. Ate breakfast at the Paris Hotel. I had vanilla bean french toast, which was good. After breakfast we walked around the Venetian Hotel, looked at the shops and rode the gondolas. The hotel would be like the real Venice, if the city was owned by Disney. We walked to the New York Hotel, rode the roller coaster and ate at one of the delis at the hotel. Now we're back at the room relaxing before Thanksgiving dinner.

Later- We wanted to go to the Paris Hotel's buffet, but it was full when we got there. Ended up eating at some random hotel restaurant. I hate holidays. They're a pointless excuse to over indulge and buy pointless crap. Went to the Cirque du Soleil show called "O". It was fantastic. Gymnastics, water, music, crazy costumes and near death experiences. Lindsey, Emily and I went to the Broadway casino after the show. We played slots and Blackjack. Amazingly Lindsey won $20, Emily won $10 and I broke even.

Woke up at 7am. Took the dogs to the vet for boarding, it was very sad. I hate having to leave my dogs there. Hope they'll be ok. Ate donuts and coffee for breakfast. Met my parents at home drove to the airport. Breakfast made me sick, so I had to run to the bathroom when we got there. The was long and uneventful. They showed the Stepford Wives, which was surprisingly good, but I would like to see the original. Got into Las Vegas and found out that Lindsey had missed her flight. She took a second flight to Dallas and should be here around 7pm. We're staying at the Bellagio. It is freaking ridiculous. I have never seen such a large and extravagant hotel. As we drove into Vegas, I marveled at the plastic glamour of the city. It's like an alternative reality. Like being in a movie. Emily got me tickets to George Carlin for my birthday. I can't wait. He's my favorite comedian.

Later- We ate dinner at the Bellagio's buffet. I have never seen so much food in one place. Except maybe at the supermarket. And I don't think I've ever eaten as much in one sitting. It didn't seen like that much though, because we spaced out the courses. Everything was good. We met up with Lindsey at the MGM Grand, just before George Carlin took the stage. He was amazing. Most of the routine centered on his idea for a suicide TV channel. Hilarious. After the show, we walked down the strip and marveled at the campy, consumerist trash that is the strip. I was amazed and horrified. I can see how this place can get real old real fast, but for some reason I never want to leave. Everyone tries to look and act like they have money. But the casinos are the only ones who really do.

I have moved ten times in the last five years. I'm sick of it. Hopefully I will stay in the new apartment for a while. Em and I have started packing re-packing our stuff to prepare for the move. We brought everything except our clothes and business stuff downstairs and started taping up the boxes. Luckily most of our stuff is still in boxes, so we won't have too much to pack.

Oh, and we got Franklin Covey planners. Holy crap! I am addicted. I don't know how I survived without it. My hands were covered with notes, my pockets were full of little scraps of paper and I forgot every appointment I ever made. Now I have a nice little book that tells me everything I need to know and gives me plenty of room to write any notes. Never again will I have to rely on my defective memory. I have purchased three other planners in the last five years, but I never used them. Or I used it for a few weeks then stopped. This one is an hundred times better than any of the others because it actually give me room to write. It has a page a day, complete with room for a to-do list, appointment schedule and a whole page of notes.

I spent most of the day buying stuff for the new apartment. Em and I got a new mattress. A good one this time. Our last one was a piece of crap foam mattress that we got at Ikea. It gave us permanent back problems. We went to Appliance Direct for a washer/dryer. It was exciting because we have never bought appliances before. We ended up getting some high quality brand name units with slight dents, for a very good price. I just hope they work.

In the early evening, we went to the Salvation Army to help my dad with his new photography project. He will be visiting the Salvation Army every couple weeks for the next few months, taking pictures of the people who come to the soup kitchen and eventually holding a gallery show to raise money for the organization. Today was the first day. The people were pretty skeptical; they thought we were from America's Most Wanted or something. We were able to convince five people to sit for pictures. Hopefully we will build trust over time.

Em and I stopped by the printer this morning, before going to Orlando. They were suppose to have our business cards and order forms done last Friday, but they still weren't done. We are suppose to bring our Heritage insert to their office on Wednesday morning. The printer promised us that they could have it done and they better do it on time. We did a pickup in Casselberry before heading over to our new apartment to drop off our deposit. The people in the office at the new apartment were disorganized. They couldn't find our file, so it ended up taking much longer than it should. All I wanted to do was give them money! We were a little late meeting my grandma at my parents' house. We were there to reshoot the Lifetime Tribute Video demo (the original was poorly lit). It took us a while to set up the lights correctly, and it still didn't look as good as we wanted them to. We just have to buy better lights. By the time everything was set up and Grandma started talking, I had to go drop off the Photo Slide-Show that we had been working on. When I got home, the interview was over. I made chicken for dinner tonight. It didn't come out that well because it was kosher chicken and I didn't have enough coals for the grill (so it was crappy tasting and undercooked).

My parents had a brunch for some of the top photographers in the state (Greg and Lesa Daniel, Tim Kelly, and Peter Burg). Em and I went to play Cash Flow, but we never ended up playing. Instead we got some really good advice from the photographers; they target the same people we do and they've been doing it for much longer than we have. Basically they said that we should make our product really high class and up the price. Sounds good to me. Now we have to look into designers to help with our image.

I am obsessed with news. Most days I will spend up to three hours reading online news stories. I read major newspapers, TV news web sites, foreign news (including Algazeera and BBC), independent news, blogs and weird news sites. It is really a problem. I waste way too much time reading that crap. So, I have made a decision. I will only read one news source, the New York Times. By limiting myself to one source, hopefully, I will limit the amount of time I spend reading this crap.

Our 1/4 page ads finally came out in the big glossy magazines. Already we have gotten more calls from them, then from all of the smaller ads combined. Either our small ads were too small to read or the nice magazines are better at attracting serious customers.

A couple days ago, Em and I conducted a video interview of Grandma Lil. She gave a nice interview, full of interesting stories. Yesterday we spent the entire day editing a rough cut. It looks very good and my parents were impressed. My sister was in for the weekend. She slept over here last night, but got in too late to hang out.

Today, Em and I conducted another video interview for Marc Schwartz's grandmother. This interview was much more difficult; her family members were seated far apart while asking the questions. It was almost impossible to mic them all at once. The grandmother couldn't remember much about her history (she is 98 years old), but she was in good spirits, so it didn't really matter. Editing will be a bitch. I have no idea how we will cut together a coherent video. We'll just have to do our best...

I finished writing the short story I was working on (it wasn't suppose to be a short story, but it just turned out that way). I have been working on typing it into my word processor, but progress has been slow. Copying and editing the text just doesn't hold my interest. Next time I will just type the damn thing to begin with. It is 30 pages hand written. So far, I have typed maybe 15. Hopefully it will be done soon and maybe I will post it. But don't hold your breath

Congratulations to George Bush for winning the election (he even got the popular vote this time, way to go buddy!). The real loser this time is not John Kerry, it is the American people. My prediction is that the deficit will grow larger, more Americans will die overseas, and we will soon be barred from leaving the country because no one will want the dirty infidels stepping on their holy soil. I digress, we are suppose to respect the democratic process and put our full support behind the President (even if he was elected by a bunch of war loving rednecks, who voted for him based on biblical morality and the guise of patriotism). Sorry, I got off topic again. Maybe I should stop writing about politics for a little while.

Emily and I have been busy redesigning our business card sized ads. We realized that the text was too small, so we had to change the layout (I should say, SHE had to change the layout around - I don't deal with design issues). Our quarter page ads finally came out in the nice glossy magazines. They look really good and will hopefully attract some new customers. Yesterday, we shot a Lifetime Tribute Video of my grandma to use as a demo. The interview came out very well. Now we're working on editing it.

Lindsey is coming down this weekend. She'll probably come to the beach this weekend. Should be lots of fun! Oh, and yesterday Emily and I signed a lease on our new apartment! We have been looking for months, and finally found the right one. It is a villa style apartment (like a one story town house), no neighbors above or below us, a nice little fenced in back yard, a very large bedroom and a perfect space for our business. Plus, the rent is cheap and it has everything we were looking for. I can't wait to move in!

Whoever wins the election, I hope we don't have four more years of lies, deceit, unjustified wars, corruption, expanding government and inflated budget deficit.