My Latest Project

For my job, I have to keep track of mileage in order to be reimbursed for gas/wear&tear/etc. This is the hugest pain in the butt I've ever experienced. I've been trying several different solutions for the past year, and they've all worked reasonably well, but they were still a pain in the butt.

Here are the past solutions:

1. Print out a blank mileage spreadsheet every month, write down destinations and date, at the end of the month add up mileage using Google Maps. I didn't like this one because I didn't always have my bag with me which had the spreadsheet in it.
2. Use a mileage journal. Write down beginning odometer, ending odometer and destinations+date. I didn't like this one because it was extremely difficult if I made a personal stop in the middle of a trip. The first method was far better at accounting for those because I could just leave the destinations out of the spreadsheet.
3. Currently I am emailing myself from my phone with 2 destinations at a time and adding up the mileage at the end of the month a la method #1. This is the best so far because I have all of my mileage emails automatically go to a folder in my inbox called "mileage" (clever, eh?). Still, it's a pain in the butt to add up my miles at the end of the month, but this is the best so far.


So here's my ultimate scalable mileage calculator solution, in a series of steps.

1. From my phone, I will send an email with the subject of "destination1 to destination2" to mileage@minditbilling.com. These will be client names, "home", or a full address if it's a new client or random trip.
2. mileage@minditbilling.com will be restricted to only receive mail from internal sources so other people can't send in random mileage for fun.
3. Our Exchange (email) server will receive the email, and once a day will save the inbox to text files-- one for every message it has received.
4. The server will then go through each of the text files and do the following:
a. Note the sender
b. Note the "from" destination.
c. Note the "to"destination.
d. Cross reference each of the destinations with a list of common destinations held in another text file (e.g. "home" for graham@minditbilling.com = 3307 Chadwell Dr, Farmers Branch, TX 75234)
e. Open a Javascript webpage and get directions and distance information through the Google Maps API (e.g.)
f. Write the distance to text file directly from the webpage using an ActiveX control.
g. Server waits for the distance text file to appear, then gets the value contained the file and appends it, the date, and the destination names to another text file named "graham@minditbilling.com.mileage.[month name].txt", then deletes the temporary text file.
5. One the first of the next month, the server runs a script that emails my boss (in the future, another cross reference driver with boss) the previous month's text file for each email address (to start, just graham@minditbilling.com) and moves the mileage for the previous month to an /archive subfolder.

So far I have steps 4e and 4f done. I'm excited! I like projects. It will be based in VBScript because VBScript is easy and I know it.

Our house is a very very very fine house

1. We got the house! We closed on May 4th, got the keys May 5th, and we officially (depending on how you define it) own our house! We're been spending our Saturdays cleaning up stuff and tearing stuff out. Amazingly fun!

I filed for the $8000 tax credit yesterday and that should be here shortly. Unfortunately, we weren't able to put down 20% when we purchased (only 10%). In order to avoid paying PMI, we have a piggyback 10% loan... which should be paid off shortly before our first official mortgage payment in July.

Natalie and I worked really hard to get our student loans paid off last year and I'm just as excited to get our full mortgage paid off as well. Natalie really wants to work on the house and make it real nice, so our interests are slightly divided since there's only so much to go around... which brings me to my second point!

2. 15 minutes after we closed on the house I got a call from my boss and he told me he was resigning effective immediately. What a gut-wrenching call to get after making such a huge financial commitment. Anyway, two weeks later things are going fine without him-- I got a 30% raise and his old position. Turns out I knew more about my job than I thought.

With this new raise, and some kind circumstances in our favor, I think we could get the house paid off in under 3 years.

3. We are also considering renting out a room. Because a) It would be fun to have a friend around, b) we have TONS of extra space and c) it's a good financial decision for both sides (cheap rent and a little extra to throw at the mortgage).

So... who wants to live at 3307 Chadwell? :)

Don't don't don't do it, Charity!

I figured I'd look this up since my wife was walking around the apartment singing "Don't, don't, don't do iiiitttt, Charity!" and she has never heard the song. I probably sing it too much.




My brothers and I grew up listening to an audio tape of this. Psalty the Songbook (yep, always thought he was a Bible...) isn't quite as hip as I hoped he would be.

Keep in touch!

I deleted my Facebook account in mid-February. I don't miss it. I didn't delete it because I had privacy concerns, I was spending too much time browsing Facebook, or my grades were suffering. No, not at all.

People wonder why somebody would delete their Facebook account if none of these things were an issue. I think we tend to assume that keeping in touch with nearly everybody we've ever known is a good thing. I beg to differ.

We love information. We love indexing it so we can search it instantaneously (Google). We love giving and getting information instantly and without full context (bumper stickers, evening news, text messaging, etc.). But should we remember everything? Should we know everything about everybody's lives?

I don't have 200 friends. I can't have 200 friends. Unfortunately, a computer doesn't forget unless it's told to forget. I only know so many people, and I will soon forget the ones that aren't constantly in my thoughts. But with the help of social networks, I can "know" many more people, and I will never forget them. On a related note, I think this can be a huge detriment to your IRL (in real life, duuuuh) friendships because if you come into a conversation already "knowing" what is going on in their lives, then conversation is dead. Why ask questions to which you already know the answer?

I think a show called Super News (which I had not heard of until I saw this video) sums it up nicely (and ironically does quite a good job in under 4 minutes-- bite-sized!): "This is how our generation communicates now! With detached, bite-sized, yippity yap!"



I don't think I'm totally clear on my thoughts (and I started writing around midnight...) but I thought I'd throw a post up. Blogging is kind of weird to me, too, and in the same realm as Twitter/Facebook at times. Although, I do see the importance of looking back on your life and being able to see progress/sanctification. So if you're reading this, I'm not writing it for you (though I don't think it would be a bad thing if Facebook went away and my amazing rhetoric convinced you to leave it...), but I'm glad that you're reading!

And if you want to be my friend, just shoot me an email and we'll talk, but please stop tagging photos of my on Facebook! I don't want to come back!

We're Under Contract!

We are officially under contract for a house! We found the perfect place in Farmer's Branch and we are going for it. The inspection is Monday and if everything checks out reasonably well, we will be homeowners near the end of the month. Have some pictures! I'll tell you what we're going to eventually change. :)

We also got some history on the house from the listing agent this evening. Apparently the guy who owned it before sold it, then married the lady he sold it to. "He must've really loved the house."

Yay!

See the lovely... volleyball net poles? Gone. Natalie may start some exotic dancing to help with the house payments. (See? She's already getting a feel for it!)

Under the picture: hole where the hot tub used to be. To the right, random roof overhang. I'm not sure what to make of it at the moment. There's concrete... maybe put a table there?

We'd eventually like to close in the door on the left side, which connects to the master bedroom. Low priority.
We're also considering removing or making a pathway through the... fence thing on the left side of the patio.
This is the incredible dual-entry garage. We will be building a wall over the left side garage door, along with some concrete work to match the rest of the wall.

More of my lovely photography.
The garage could almost fit 4 cars. The area shown here will be my workshop. I'm going to kick butts and take names here. Then I can wash my hands in the sink!
Utility room. Natalie is super excited about this for some reason?


Oh, lovely kitchen. We will be replacing the countertops, possibly painting (probably just cleaning/oiling) the cabinets, and removing the thin brick veneer next to the stove? Also we may remove the overhang with the vent. I like the extra cabinet facing outward... it's actually pretty practical. (Could somebody get me an extra _____? Why, yes, allow me! Then I just reach over into the magical bizarro cabinet and it'd be there waiting!)

Second bath. Known in Texas as a "hollywood bath." Known everywhere else as a Jack 'n' Jill bath. Not too much to do in here. Maybe raise the ceiling in the shower and replace fixtures. Nothing high priority whatsoever. I kind of like the wallpaper in here-- at least, the border wallpaper. The rest looks like cheap toilet paper packaging.

I am digging the retro soap holder and toothbrush holder. Anybody notice how much thicker our toothbrush handles are from 10-15+ years ago? Probably for increased maneuverability and cleaning potential.

One of the bedrooms. Ugly. :) We'll paint.

Study, another bedroom. We may tear out the built-ins and change some closet layout in this room to give the master extra room... but again, not super high priority.

Hallway. We are going to take off the shutter doors and possibly cut them in half and put shutters on the front windows? Depends on measurements. Probably put in some hardwood for the hallway too.

Back living room. The fireplace is gas and it's seriously wired up for a speaker system. We don't have enough furniture to fill up both rooms so this will be the skating rink for a while. The wicker fan will be replaced with a wicker disco ball.

The 1960's loved to give us desk after desk built in to our homes. I don't mind.
Entry way, looking into back living room. I really like the tile in the entry way. We'll have to tear off the wallpaper and do some paint.
Front living room/dining room. We really like this front window and the floor in here. Just some paint and fan replacement in here.

Front living room sans Natalie.

Master bedroom. We are thinking about making that closet (there are two on that wall that are the same size) all the way across by stealing the closet in the study and then stealing a closet from the hallway to give to the study. Long term project.

Anyway, we are really exciting and are hoping everything goes alright. :)