My Florida Bank of America account is finally cloesd with balance check in hand, after having requested the closure in August of this year. It only took four months of unreturned phone calls, useless e-mails, disappearing snail mail, and unintelligent customer service reps before I found a single person who realized what was going on and turned the check around in less than three days.

I would definitely recommend them for your next banking experience.

I also hear that Saddam has been tagged a terrorist now. I'm sure Bin Laden is thrilled that his spotlight has been stolen away. The Ayatollah better watch out -- with Iraq out of the picture, someone might mispronounce Iran back into the Axis of Evil.

Drive-By Musings

Chad Darnell's 12 of 12: Deluxe Edition

The world has now been graced with 12 full editions of Chad Darnell's 12 of 12. With all the pieces in place, readers have been instructed to take one picture from every time they participated and combine them as the thirteenth twelve-on-twelve-extravaganza, the results of which will either reveal the Rambaldi endgame to us all, or just tell us to drink our Ovaltine (odds are running 50-50 either way right now).

Tragically, I did not participate in every single month, which I blame on varying occurences of being too busy, forgetting the camera, forgetting what day it was, or commies. However, here are the four months that I did participate, now with brand new captions since they're taking completely out of context. Enjoy!

April 12, 2006

The live-action game of Pac-Man on the streets of Reston raised over four thousand dollars for the care of aging video game champions with carpal tunnel syndrome.

June 12, 2006

My plans to decorate the laundry room were clearly a bust.

August 12, 2006

Day Four without supplies . . . the jungle cats creep ever closer whenever I close my eyes.

November 12, 2006

Rather than risk dishpan hands, I decided to return all the dinnerware to Target as "defective".

Bonus Pic: December 12, 2006

Apparently an evil witch turned Booty's fourth paw into a mouse!

Happy Birthday Kytty!

Friday Fragments

The final Fragments column of 2007

♠ I received an email invitation to my company's holiday party last week. You can ignore the now-typical January date (because scheduling things in December is so stressful for everyone, so it's better to place the party alongside the delivery of the first post-Christmas credit card bill). What you can't ignore is the location: the office. While I do like our office, it's definitely not the proper setting for anything labelled as a party. Were both the Hyatt and the Elks Lodge Community Center booked up already?

♠ I would be more mocking of this if I actually attended office parties, but that fact that I don't takes away some of my mocking privileges. Generally, I just stay home where I can be "firing ice" in private and waiting for Anna to drink too much at her office parties and have to crash at my house.

♠ However, I fully expect to get the money they saved on renting a party location as a Christmas bonus. If not, I may choose to continue mocking the party venue from this website behind my alter-ego, "BU".

♠ I saw a fun typo online the other day that I have claimed for my own. Some clueless individual used the nonsense word "anonymosity" when they really meant "anonymity". This new word is the perfect term to describe the viscious sniping and ranting vitriol that you encounter online from nameless, faceless Internet people who wouldn't be nearly as scathing in a face-to-face conversation.

♠ Here's a lovely picture of my icicle-like Christmas lights, a subdued non-denominational expression of holiday cheer guaranteed to appeal to everyone. Even though Anna hates them, they're far better than one of those ludicrous globes. I'm not sure where Santa and Baby Jesus want to be this holiday season, but I'm pretty sure it's not inside a drive-by peep show that gradually deflates a little bit every hour.

♠ There's a house on Church Road with one of those ridiculous inflatable snow globes surrounded by all manner of glow-in-the-dark festive-yuppy paraphernalia. The effect of this Fairfaxian Winter Wonderland is marred by the 1970s era car sitting in the back yard. It's not even up on blocks -- it's just parked on the patio next to the screen porch.

♠ Apparently, these people never learned the basics of topography. Lesson number one: If you try to hide an abandoned vehicle in your back yard, and you live on the corner of two streets, you've pretty much put it in your front yard. All you need is a lawn chair and a six pack of beer and you could be from West Virginia.

♠ I picked up a twenty-four pack sampler of Sam Adams Winter Ales at Costco on Wednesday, because a Sam Adams lager is almost as good as half of a Guinness. That was my thinking, at least, before I tried the hideous Cranberry Lambic which tasted like someone tried to make a dessert wine out of hops and Jolly Ranchers. Whoever thought cranberries and beer would make a good fit should be shot. Cranberry lambic is the worst of all.

♠ (The last sentence in the above fragment was written in lambic pentameter).

♠ I had to look up iambic pentameter for today's post because I couldn't recall exactly how it went. I remember very little from any given English class.

♠ I'm not sure I can trust my Learn Spanish Now CDs anymore, because the previous lesson introduced conjugations with this description: Consider the English verb "to be". There is a different form of this verb for each pronoun: I am, you are, he is, she is, we are, y'all are, and they are. I did not realize that y'all had been promoted to an official pronoun. If that's the case, then Pluto should be a planet, even if it is just a tiny ball of rock and ice.

♠ Speaking of ice, the plan for Saturday calls for ice-skating at the Sculpture Garden in the evening. I've never been ice-skating before, but it's essentially attacking some ice with paired metal blades, and I'm expecting to be a pretty decent ice ninja. Sunday is "put up the tree and make cookies" day at my parents' house. Next week at work should be pretty relaxing, because it's the first week in which everyone who works for the government or pretends to be a business developer takes off for a month-long vacation. The offices will be pretty quiet, no doubt.

♠ Happy Birthday Kytty! Have a great weekend everyone!

Chad Darnell's 12 of 12 on 12/12

7:51 AM: Amber tries to wake us up before the alarm goes off. (Booty is outside behind the closed door, having tried to wake us up over an hour earlier).		8:46 AM: Shower time after a length snooze.
9:07 AM: Bagels and cream cheese for breakfast.		10:32 AM: Printing out some wedding pictures for friends.
11:12 AM: Christmas Booty stays clean for Christmas.		11:21 AM: Booty helps me beat a difficult level in New Super Mario Brothers Wii.
12:11 PM: Sorting through this year's 12 of 12s for Tuesday's compilation post.		1:32 PM: A "bachelor-style" lunch, consisting of waffle fries and, well, not much else.
2:58 PM: Doing a little composing.		7:57 PM: Down in Manassas at Anna & Ben's for a cheese-filled dinner.
9:04 PM: Rosie wakes up to say hello.		10:36 PM: Ending the night with a game of "UPS-opoly".

See more 12 of 12ers at Chad's site!

Twelve 12 of 12s

The final post of the 12 of 12 series is a highlight reel with the best picture from each month to show how you've blossomed into a beautiful songbird over the course of the year.

January: Artsy vistas on the way to work.		February: Lusting after sandwiches.
March: Greetings from my crotch.		April: Butt ghosts.
May: Giant (visible) sandwich!		June: Weddings on the hottest days of the year.
July: Mr. Crepe is unhappy.		August: The cat market is bullish this week.
September: On Emerald Isle, playing with knick-knacks in a tourist shop.		October: Sleeping in.
November: Suitably rustic.		December: Delicious homemade soup!

List Day: 2011 in Twelves

• BU has childhood confessions
  
• BU judges your taste
  
• BU on the cost of living
  
• BU on work phrases that need to go
  
• BU on averting a government shutdown
  
• BU equates Osama bin Laden to LOST
  
• BU explains gene therapy
  
• BU animates his kitchen remodeling
  
• BU beats up on NASA
  
• BU is hit by the earthquake
  
• BU was always a smartass
  
• BU runs for Sterling Supervisor
  

I guarantee that you will not go wrong by buying, watching, or listening to anything on this list:

• All-Night Cinema by Just Jack
  
• Breville BOV650XL Toaster Oven
  
• The Office, Season 2
  
• Portal 2
  
• Weber Spirit E-310 Grill
  
• Lost Cities
  
• Adjustment Bureau
  
• Lenka by Lenka
  
• The Wire
  
• Record Collection by Mark Ronson
  
• The Mating Game by Bitter:Sweet
  
• Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
  

Recommend something for me to buy in the Comments section! Hoarding my excess wealth is bad for the economy, and thus, bad for America.

2012 in Twelves

Top 12 Website Images in 2012

January 3, 2012		January 23, 2012
February 3, 2012
February 10, 2012		February 29, 2012
June 1, 2012		June 19, 2012
July 3, 2012		October 15, 2012
October 30, 2012
November 20, 2012		November 21, 2012

Chad Darnell's 12 of 12

7:57 AM: Up and awake.

8:15 AM: Breakfast with Sydney.

10:08 AM: Back from Costco with fruit.

11:59 AM: Exercising and rewatching The Wire.

1:05 PM: Leftovers for lunch.

2:13 PM: Meatballs with barbeque sauce in the slow cooker.

3:19 PM: Decorating the fake tree.

5:37 PM: Time for a potluck!

7:12 PM: Potluck participants.

7:18 PM: Florida State friends.

7:45 PM: A change in soundtrack.

11:54 PM: Ending the evening with Telestrations.

Twelve 12 of 12s

January: I probably spent as much time planning out my character as I did actually playing Fallout 4.

February: Still a three-cat household at the time.

March: Partying with the Lowrys.

April: A rare day where Donald Trump was NOT on the front page!

May: The office at my old company had a much better view.

June: Back Porch Taco Night.

July: Rebecca takes all the bags to work.

August: Booty got hooked on yogurt boxes this year.

September: Plenty of time for carpet cat-naps.

October: I just learned that my old company finally won the work for the proposal I was working on in this picture!

November: Chuy's is the best restaurant we discovered in 2016.

December: This is me at 37.

Twelve 12 of 12s

a recap of 12 of 12 posts from 2018

January: Maia gets the royal treatment from Anna's kids. Sydney is ignored.

February: Couch lunges.

March: First dinner at home after our trip to LA.

April: Cat hunter.

May: Helping with lawn care.

June: Just voted in the primary.

July: Messier than Dad would prefer.

August: Starting a band.

September: Learning about angular momentum.

October: Bunny lover.

November: Encroaching wildlife and sad pinwheel.

December: Disrupted sleep cycles for Advent of Code.

Chad Darnell's 12 of 12

12 pictures of your day on the 12th of every month

12:38 AM: Wrapping up Day 12 of Advent of Code (6th place).

8:40 AM: Showered and ready for the day.

8:55 AM: Bagel for breakfast, in the shade of the avocado tree.

9:44 AM: Second breakfast with the rest of the family.

10:21 AM: Taking a break from the crossword puzzle.

11:07 AM: Inventing a hex-based board game in which Aladdin goes fishing with Stitch.

12:50 PM: Leftovers from Joe's Pizzaria for lunch, on a porch visit with Rebecca's parents.

3:21 PM: Quick nap.

5:00 PM: Gingerbread cookie time!

5:59 PM: Dinner's gettin' weird.

7:27 PM: Tonight's bedtime story selection.

11:51 PM: Back up for Advent of Code, Day 13.

12 12 of 12s

a recap of 12 of 12 posts from 2022

January: A pre-snow-storm Costco run.

February: Enjoying a warm day in Claude Moore.

March: A snowy day.

April: On the farm.

May: Rejuvenating a sidewalk.

June: First restaurant breakfast.

July: Special guest on my work call.

August: Walking around Lake Anne.

September: The day a bug flew in her ear at school.

October: Group story time.

November: Dinner at Ford's.

December: Encanto roleplay.