A Day (or Two) in the Life of Scott Hanno

Evening to you and how are things this holiday weekend ....... sure has been a long time in coming! And I also guess that it's also almost the beginning of summer even though I'm not sure what the official day is but today sure was hot enough to be classified as a summer day and think that it was in the 90's. My lawn is really hurting for rain as well and it's been at least a couple of weeks since we've seen any - and in looking at the 10 day forecast it looks like it's going to be another week yet before we see much. It did thunder for a bit this afternoon and then rained for less than five minutes and don't think that's really going to help things.

I have been watering my new grass that I planted last weekend on the side of the house and that is finally starting to sprout although it's got a long ways to go before it gets anywhere. At least I have a chance with regular watering and just have to remember to do that each day. Did I mention that I called to see about having an irrigation system installed as that's the only way to have a killer lawn ...... but the $5000 price tag kind of turned me off on having a green lawn and guess that I'll just have to live with is as it is. I also thought that I could get a well drilled pretty cheaply as I think I only paid a few hundred dollars in Florida - but I called about that too and they gave me a $8000 price tag so I guess that I'm stuck watering with city water. No update on my sliding back door project either but with a little luck it might be in this week.

I've also been getting the Vista itch again and figured out a way to partition my hard drive and to load Vista on one part but keep XP loaded as I had it. I'm pretty much done with that project and started it yesterday so now when I turn my computer on it gives me a choice of which system I want to run and can always go back to XP if I need to. But to tell you the truth they have come a long way in the last 90 days since Vista first came out and almost everything that I use now actually works, at least they have most of the drivers available for it now. And it's kind of funny though that the only thing left that won't work with is still webmail for work, guess that upgrade hasn't been much of a priority with them.

I am actually taking the week off (again!) and am going to try and get some projects accomplished that I never have time for during the week. I am almost finished with my bathroom but need to seal the grout and then cut the bottom of my door and rehang that, I need to do some painting outside and might even pressure wash the house ....... and then there is the garage project which I would also like to make a dent in. I definitely have enough to keep my busy although I'll probably do a little bit of work along the way too.

I guess that's about all that's happening with me this weekend, I hope that you do something real special for Memorial Day and have a steak on the barbecue for me! Talk with you again on another day and take care of yourself until then. Later days Dude!

posted by Scott @ 9:07 PM

Well, what do you know but here it is another Sunday night ....... and it such a beautiful evening at that! And speaking of beautiful weather this weekend also turned out to be very nice, it looked like they were forecasting rain for the most part but we didn't end up seeing any of that ....... most of the time it was sunny and in the high 70's! I was definitely looking forward to the weekend by the time that it got here and after working a full five days after sitting around the week before doing nothing really kind of wore me out. But I made it and the week flew right by, I had two days that were spent in meetings and that really didn't help me get caught up much. Plus I didn't end up going to Rocky Gap on Friday as they have a new GM and that was his first day so we decided to postpone it to another date in June and I'll schedule something in another few weeks.

But I am pretty worn out after my weekend as I haven't been sitting around much, got the lawn taken care of yesterday morning and then decided to get rid of the planter full of weeds on the side of the house. I ended up tearing up all of the weeds and a couple of bushes and dug it all up and decided to just plant grass there instead ....... I even have the blister on my thumb to prove what a pain in the butt that was and the thing really hurts. After that I went to Lowes and got some potting soil and about 10 things of sod and some seed and sprigged the sod into strips and then laid the seed. I think that it should grow ok and will look much better when it's done, I just have to remember to water it a couple of times a day. I also just ended up regrouting my bathroom tile floor with a different color grout, and that was after I dremmeled up the first stuff that was suppose to be beige but turned white whenever it dried. I'm hoping the new stuff isn't as dark as it was when it went down as it's almost too brown for my liking and was suppose to be a sandstone color so hopefully it will lighten up ..... as long as it doesn't lighten all the way up to white I might be ok.

I still have some other projects that I'd like to get done and think that I have spring fever as I'd love to take a week off and just work around the house. The house could even use a good pressure washing and the porch needs painting and I've still got my garage project that I don't think that I'll ever finish. We'll see how it goes but I'm all ready looking forward to having an extra day off next weekend. Oh, and I did order my back door to replace my 20 year old slider that doesn't slide any more, plus the seal on the inside of the window must have lost it's gas as it's all cloudy looking. I went with a atrium door instead of a slider but had a heck of a time deciding and I just hope that I like what I get once I get it! And for those that are wondering an atrium door is very similar to a french door but instead of both doors opening from the middle the atrium door only opens on one side but from the outside ....... I decided on going with something like this. And I guess that it take 7-10 days to order and then they'll install it on some weekend and if all goes well that'll be the weekend after next.

I watched the Pursuit of Happyness the other night on pay per view and would recommend it if you are looking for a heartbreaking movie with a happy ending ........ just when you think you've had a bad day you should see what Will Smith has to go through! And on a final note I end up changing my desktop picture all of the time and found this site that has a ton of free photos and many of them are really cool, I think I have the "Cabo San Lucas, Mexico - El Arco" up right now but they have a ton more - check them out by clicking here. And so I guess that is it for another week, stay in touch and have a great week. Talk with you soon.

posted by Scott @ 9:05 PM

I posted most of my vacation pictures and you can click here to check them out ...... I will try and reformat the layout and add some comments to them some day. And on another note that I forgot to mention earlier but did you know that the Post Office lets you stop and start you mail all from their website? I stopped mine while I was gone and had it delivered on the last day and thought that was a very cool service that they offered, you should try it out some day.

Talk with later!

posted by Scott @ 9:58 PM

Good Sunday Mom's Evening to you! And how's things with you? Not too bad here other than my vacation has come to a close and it's back to the office in the morning, hopefully I'll be able to wake up on time to get there. And what did you do special for Mom today, seems like everyone was going out to dinner somewhere but the grocery store sure was busy? I ended up stopping over at my next door neighbors to thank them for mowing my lawn over the weekend and they were in the middle of a cook out so I even scored a hot dog out of the deal, and hung out with them in between loads of laundry.

Not much else going on here though but it seems like I missed the first half of the month and I was only gone for seven days, but here it is May 13th all ready and I don't even remember it starting. I don't think that much should be up at work this week but we do have a couple of meeting going on and then I think that I'm off to Rocky Gap Resort at the end of the week for a day or so there, but it's close enough where it's only a couple of hours drive so that should be a nice change to the rest of the week. Oh, it's in Flintstone MD if you were wondering and you can check out there website by clicking here and we've had the hotel for a while now and guess that it's a resort in the middle of a state park and they do very well during the summer months. Too bad I don't golf though ....... I might have to take that up at some point.

And I think that I'm down to only 85 unread e-mails in my in-box that will be waiting for me in the morning, I've been trying to clear out as much as I could along the way and think that I had ab out 250 when I logged in on Wednesday and got that down to about 130, but then it was back up to 200 by the time that I got home yesterday so at least I'm better than half way there. The issue is that everything that is left pretty much is something that I need to do, I just did the easy part and weeded through all of the junk before. And the weather here was beautiful and in the mid-70's and kind of reminded me of my last week, but I think that they are saying that it is going to go down to like 39' tonight, what the heck is up with that? And then Tuesday is suppose to be close to 90' but only for a day and then the rest of the week looks to be in the 70's again. And when the heck is this pollen crap going to end, I wash my car every week and within a day it's covered with the stuff and looking like crap again?

I also realized that my storm door on my front door which is one big piece of glass transforms into a screen door and the screen for it has been sitting in my garage all this time. I'm not sure if my Home Owners Association allows screen doors but guess that I can wait until they say something to do differently but I put the screen on it and now I can leave the front door (and back door) open and get one heck of a breeze blowing through. I also found the screen that's been missing for my other bedroom window and put that in a little while ago and have both those windows open too, but had to close the downstairs one's as I was getting a little bit chilly. I don't even remember if I mentioned that I was going to replace my sliding glass door and had a couple of people over for an estimate and the price isn't all too bad, now I just have to figure out what door I want to replace it with and schedule a time for it. I was thinking that I wanted french doors but they kind of talked me in to the one's where only one of the doors open, I can't for the life of me think of the name of them but guess they work (and last) a lot better than the two door thing. Otherwise I might just go with a regular slider but I'm not sure yet, but they haven't been too good with giving me the available options to look at either.

I have a dentist appointment for my six month on Friday but might need to reschedule that if I'm not going to be here and that's the hard part about making appointments so far in advance as I never know what my schedule is going to be or where I'll be ....... but we'll see. Oh, and I've been getting into books lately since I had nothing better to do on vacation and read a good book called "Step on a Crack" by James Patterson that a friend lent to me ...... I flew right through that book and it usually takes me years to finish something. I need to find another one that I can get into as much and then the time to read them ...... if nothing else it does a pretty good job of putting me to sleep!

I guess that's it for this week, I have another project that I need to try and work on for work before it gets too late. And I'll try and post some of my vacation pics sometime this week, some of them turned out pretty well while others not so good. But check back later and you can check out the resort that I was at ....... Barcelo's Bavaro Beach Palace! Have a great week and I'll talk with you on another day! Take care till then.

posted by Scott @ 9:01 PM

Just back from Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic after spending seven long and very relaxing days ...... my flight was delayed through Miami so I got home at 1am (Saturday night / Mom's Day morning) but oh well, it's just the way it goes sometimes! And I spent the week doing nothing ....... laying on a lounge chair on the beach reading a book and snorkeling in the ocean, slept a lot and ate well too! Here's one picture of my favorite hangout and I'll try and have plenty more to follow (you've gotta watch out for those 60 year old topless women! :)

And here's a run down on my daily routine and I'll try and add the last few days sometime in the near future ....... it was getting a little boring at the end there too!


Saturday -
I left my house around 5:45am for a 8am flight to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic for a week's vacation at Barcelo's Bavaro Palace Resort. I ended up having way too much time on my hands as there were no lines at Dulles anywhere and I ended up going right through security in minutes and then ended up having breakfast and just hung out. I ended up having a layover in San Juan Puerto Rico which was cool and since I had like an hour and a half to burn I went outside and walked around and guess that I didn't realize how much a part of the US it really is ..... it kind of reminded me of Miami or some place like that. The flight from DC to San Juan was kind of long though and took us about three hours to get to San Juan and then we took a prop plane from there for a 45 minute flight to Punta Cana and arrived here around 2:00pm. Customs was a piece of cake and walked right through, my shuttle that I had arranged was waiting for me and the hotel was about 15 minutes from the airport. I went to check in and they couldn't seem to find my reservation right off and that got me a little worried but at least I had my confirmation printed and I seemed to have been in the back with the "special" people. After that I was off and my room is great, it's on the second floor in probably the best building to be in just up the stairs from the pool and the buffet and the bars and I can even see the ocean from my balcony. The hotel was also real nice and set me up a fruit and cheese basket that I nibbled on for breakfast for the next few days ..... until the bugs started to eat more than I did.

Once I go to my room I unpacked a little, then went to the beach and hung out for a while until a small rain shower rolled in and then I went and got something to eat. That's the nice thing about these places is that there is always somewhere to get some food no matter what time of the day it is and then I came back to my room and sat around for a while. Then it was time for dinner and went and ate at the buffet and then caught the show at the theater and I was in bed by 11pm I think. Day #01 down and all ready starting to get into my routine :).


Sunday -
I ended up getting up around 7:30 this morning as the sun was blaring it's way into my room since I hadn't closed the blinds all of the way and I wanted to hit the beach kind of early any ways so it was probably a good thing. I think that the beds are just as hard here as they are at Maya so they must use the same kind, at least I don't mind a good hard bed! I kind of keep comparing this hotel with the resort in Mexico and probably shouldn't since I'm in a different country and all but it's different, and I guess that's probably a good thing..... more on that later. The beach is almost as long as in Mexico but not quiet as white but it's cool on your feet and is nice in it's own way. I spent most of the day today at the beach and it's great because there aren't really that many people around and there is plenty of room for everyone to do their own thing. I also went snorkeling a few times and the water is cool and refreshing and you get used to it as soon as you dunk you head. But there isn't as much to see underwater as there is in Mexico, it's cool and saw a few fishies and star fish and other things swimming around but other than that there is just a bunch of grassy stuff and kind of reminds me of my back yard. They also have a small section roped off for swimming which you can't go beyond, I guess their intent is to keep the power boats from running us over so I guess that it's probably a good thing. It's also kind of weird but as the clouds roll by it would end up sprinkling even though it didn't look like there was a rain cloud in the sky. That's happened almost every day that I've been here but the showers usually don't last long and it kind of cools you off at the same time.

I also ended up getting a massage this afternoon after lunch and that felt great and at $50 for an hour it's a lot less than it is at other places and luckily I brought enough cash for it so I will definitely do it again before the week is up. The massage "shacks" are kind of cool too as they are right on the beach and today it was beautiful out with a nice cool breeze and that also made it even more relaxing but the hour flew by too quickly. Then I came back to my room and read a book for a while and have just started to get into one that a girl from work sent me and if I'm lucky I'll finish it by the end of the week - I should as there is plenty of time for reading. I don't really have much at all planned for the week ahead though other than hanging at the beach during the day and maybe the pool every now and then, eating at the buffets and then a show at night, and at least I should get caught up on my sleep. Well, it's about 8pm so I think that I'm off to dinner, they have quiet an assortment of everything and think that I ate too much last night but it all tasted pretty good ..... at least the normal food that I knew what it was. One other thing that is going to be my downfall this week is the deserts as they must have like ten different choices each day and night and I end up scarfing up about three of them at each meal and then they have soft ice cream so I pile that On top of my plate and there's another ten extra pounds!


Monday -
It's kind of weird as I don't set my clock and if I wake up before 7:30am all is quiet and you can't tell that there is another sole around. But then as soon as 7:30 hits everyone and there brother must get up and turn on the tv and slid chairs across the floor - and I guess that means that it's time for me to also awake. I swear the walls are paper thin as I can clearly hear the conversations of my next door neighbors and some of them have gotten on my nerves but it really gets to me when they crank up the tv in some foreign language and I wake up to that. I'm just glad that I brought my IPOD as I've been sleeping with that on to either cover up the music at night or the people in the morning or the middle of the day, it's come in very handy this week.

I haven't been doing breakfast at all as I get plenty to eat the rest of the day so I head out to the beach at about 9am and spend about three or four hours just lounging around reading and snorkeling and napping, strenuous activities and stuff like that. Then I come back in for lunch but first stop by the pool bar for a strawberry daiquiri and sit there for a few minutes and savor that and then it's lunch. I've mostly been doing hamburgers and hot dogs for lunch along with some fries and they have some really decent corn on the cob too. Then it's time for desert ..... After that I usually come back to the room and hang out on the patio and read, then take a nap, then head to the gym, then it's time for dinner again! The theaters start around 9pm so I hang out in the bar and watch that for a couple of hours and have a few drafts ....... but they don't have Corona on top like in Mexico but have Presidente ....... tastes about the same I guess but it's a matter of principle.


Tuesday -
Same schedule but the massage lady talked me into getting another massage since she wasn't going to be around the rest of the week so that was my afternoon, and then by the time you get done with that you are a greased pig and have to come back and shower off the stuff they use, then the usual after that.


Wednesday -
I woke up Wednesday morning and there was no sun shining and the clouds were dark and it looked like it was going to rain. And rain it did for pretty much the entire day and think that it didn't stop until around 6pm. So I ended up ordering up some Internet access for the day (cable modem which worked great) and played around on the computer and then worked on cleaning out my in-boxes, at least I got a head start and won't be such a job when I get home. Then last night I ended up going to dinner but didn't eat all that much and think that it's starting to catch up with me as I am always stuffed. I didn't even have desert if you can believe that ....... then the theater and then it was off to bed.


Thursday -
I had checked the weather yesterday when I had Internet access and it looked like today was also going to be a rain out and it was cloudy when I woke up so I took my time getting ready. But then by about 9:30 or 10am the sun had come out and it turned out to be a wonderfully sunny day. I'm trying to not get so much sun these days though as I'm looking a little bit like a bald beet, or maybe a tomato or something like that. But I ended up hanging out at the beach until around 1pm, strawberry daiquiri and then lunch ...... I found that they'll grill up a nice steak and onions and can make it into this wonderful and fulfilling steak sandwich that tasted wonderful. I even had an ice cream cone to go so I am pretty much back on my old routine.

I also ended up taking the train that they have that runs the course of the resort every twenty minutes and takes about twenty minutes to go all the way around and got a pretty good lay of the land - the resort is made up of five different hotels including a casino that's open 24 hours a day and a 18 hole golf course, they pretty much have something for everyone. I'm not much of a gambler though so that doesn't really interest me and I don't golf but we drove by the disco that I was thinking of checking out ...... but the challenge is that it doesn't open until 11pm and goes til 4am so it's kind of past my bedtime. I was thinking that maybe if I start out later tonight on dinner I might make it for an hour, not that it doesn't start to hop until after midnight but I might be able to go and hang out with the oldies crowd if I go early enough. We'll see, that hasn't happened quite yet. Two more nights, what seemed like only a few days ago the week would never end it's now flying by faster than I would like it to.


Friday -



Saturday -


I also learned that I need to bring my av cables for my IPOD Video as I brought about 10 movies on it but have been stuck watching them on the little screen when I could easily plug it into the TV and watch them on there. And speaking of TV there is only about one channel that's in English and that's CNN so that's the only channel that I've been watching if I'm watching so at least I've been able to keep up with the world events ...... I hope that tropical storm doesn't mess up my return flight home through Miami on Saturday ..... but it might all ready be gone by then.

I've also been trying to compare this place with Maya Riviera and I can definitely say that Mexico spoiled me and that is still my favorite place on earth ..... I am definitely headed back there the next time no matter what it costs me! This hotel is a lot like that and the food is just as good, the pool is smaller but still big enough for the number of rooms, the beach and the reefs can't compare and I dunno - there just seems to be more to do there when you aren't at the beach and I don't even remember what I did differently. But I've been bored here a few times and guess that I've had a few hours here and there to kill when I couldn't think of anything to do and don't remember that in Maya. Plus the rooms are close but they aren't quite as nice here as they are there and I'm staying at the best hotel in the complex - they are definitely close but I miss that stand up shower with the rain fall shower head ...... the thing was great after the beach. The tubs here don't even have a shower built in and have a shower massager thing on a hose that looks like it was added after the fact - it does the trick but it's just not quite the same. This hotel was built in 1993 and is the newest of them all and the cool part is that if you stay here you can go and eat at any of the other resorts all inclusive while if you stay at the others you pay extra to come and eat here ...... that's a big plus if you like variety (but guess that's not so important to me!).

posted by Scott @ 1:54 AM