27 April 2013: Baby Shower!

Off to a friend's baby shower!  Completely forgot to take off the jewelry for this picture, but it's all good.  First day carrying the Mooshbot Minion coin too.  :D  

Congrats to M and J on their first baby!!!

Steel Flame Tags

I had a request to put up a photo of all of my Steel Flame tags so far.  :)  All of the Steel Flame ones were gifts from friends except for the Crusader/Wings one.  The Crusader/Wings one I had bought because of all of the designs that Steel Flame puts out, anything crusader, wings, or bushido related ones are my favorites. I've been looking around to see if I could score a bushido/snake one.  :)  'Cause I love all things bushido, snake (Year of the Snake!!!), and dragon.

The two to the right are handmade tags that my friends made and gifted to me.  I had them make the tags to be roughly the size of Steel Flame's so that I could keep them on the same keyring, comfortably. The top one represents a youth group that I know (Mustard Seeds) and the bottom is my user tag.

Mooshbot Minions: Challenge Coins, Ahoy! + Updates

The challenge coins have landed!

Thank you one and all for helping get this project off the ground.  :)  They came out great!  I couldn't have done this without your support.

Now to tackle the rest of the stuff, Minions!

Finals are coming up for me here in a couple of weeks, so I'll be in and out of the Interwebz.  After that,  my focus will be on starting up a Tumblr or something of the sort so that y'all can start sharing RAOKs with one another.

I had meant to order the plastic Mooshbot tokens a few weeks ago but it slipped my mind as I was in "midterm mode."  I'll order them tomorrow now that my weekend has started.  :)

Cheers!

24 April 2013: Purple and Green

Purple and Green.  It's a winning combination.  :)

23 April 2013: Pre-Lunch PocketDump

Did a quick pocket dump at work today before heading out to lunch with a friend.  :)  Really diggin' my new patch that I got in the other day.  Thanks, friend!

20 April 2013: First Time @ the Range By Myself

Went to the range all by myself today.  :P  It was a pretty good day.  Went with the Glock 19 this time around and the guy said I was ballsy.  hahaha  Nice guy.

I had over (under?) compensated on my sighting like the first 2/3 of my shots.  I would always sight over the target in archery because of the parabolic firing line so I ended up sighting much too low.

But hey, no stray bullets at least.  :)

18 April 2013: Steel Flame Reppin'

Go, Team KillboX!

hahaha!  I love that my photos are always (with the exception of 1 at this point) are with food or puzzles.  :P  I was craving Tastea fries like no other today.  I wonder what's in it that makes it oh so delicious?  I have an inkling it's Asian 5 Spice, but I really don't know.

16 April 2013: Noodle-y Goodness

haha Went out to lunch with one of my girls and started to do a pocketdump... but it didn't happen.  :P

15 April 2013: May the Odds Forever Be in Your Favor - Time For Midterms!

The time has come for midterms.  Let's do this!

13 April 2013: New Tokidoki Headwear

Got some new hats today.  :)  Came in for the Avengers, came out with Avengers and the Tokidoki CA bear.  I actually had wanted the "cute" Batman one, but I guess they don't make it anymore.  :(  So sad. But these are cute anyhow.  :D

Pinterest Find: Good Guy Compilation

Love finding these compilations on Pinterest.  :D  These were a nice way to end the day.

11 April 2013: Bunkerin' Down for Midterms

Midterms on Monday.  This will be my basic carry for the weekend.  Vape and sharpen Izzy in between studying.  :)

Monday's gonna suck... I'm not looking forward to it!

10 April 2013: Dinner with the Bro

Went to dinner with the Brother tonight at Boudin's.  I got sick afterward - no more clam chowder for me!  Brother also took me to get my first vape setup.  I got a minty e-liquid (no nicotine) to go with it.  Not bad.  :)

Not shown:  iPhone, Pilot Vanishing Point, USN Fisher Space Bullet Pen.

09 April 2013: Sweet Perfection

Not exactly a pocket dump, but still pretty sweet.  ;)  Went to Paris Baguette with one of my girls tonight 'cause she wanted to talk.  Nothin' but pure perfection right here.  :)

Freehand Sharpening :)

Went ahead and tried my hand at freehand sharpening again.  I think I'm getting a lot better - I had put it aside for a while when I got the Spyderco Sharpmaker.  But I really didn't like it and decided to go back to practicing freehanding.

First 4 shots were taken after taking it to a sharpening stone that I'd gotten about a year ago from the Japanese market.  :)

Front.

Back.

Looks nice, no?  :)

This final shot was taken after polishing up the edge with automotive sandpaper (1.5k and 2k).  I didn't have a strop.

Polished her up a bit and she cuts like buttah!  :D

07 April 2013: Dolla Fifty Polish!

It was actually $1.62 after taxes.  :(  Om nom noms!  :D  Missing my Skagen 'cause I forgot and the iPhone 'cause I was using it to snap the pic.  :)

06 April 2013: Adventure Time!

Going on an adventure with some friends today.  :)  I'm super glad I found the gold topped Bics, y'all have no idea!  hahaha :P

04 April 2013: Just Loungin'

Love is...

Love is seeing your baby boys for no more than a few minutes in the morning while you're getting dressed for work, being away from each other for half the time the sun is out...

And yet, when you come home, they're waiting for you by the door, tails wagging, so happy to have you return home.

That's true love.  :)

Lighters, Galore!

Finally found some 40th Anniversary gold topped Bics today!  I had gone to like seven 7-11 shops and a couple of CVSs and liquors before I found any gold tops!

This finally came in the mail today.  :)  Tossed a Thunderbird insert in there and I was ready to rock.  :D  This was part of my mini retail therapy shopping spree last week when SHTF.

An Open Letter to Joe Le - May You Continue to Rest in Peace

Joe,

It's been 2 years today since you left us.  So much has happened in these two years.  Firstly, I hope you're proud of what your SAR team has done in your honor.  Your sister has been doing one hell of a job keeping it alive - keeping you alive, in our hearts.

I hadn't written to you in a long while, and I apologize.  I never forgot you though.  You taught me to "shut up and live," and to find a reason to smile, each and every day.

In the past year, plenty has happened.  I got accepted to CSUF, majoring in Criminal Justice.  I'd always wondered what it would be like to go to school with you again, since we went our separate ways after high school graduation.

The SAR team helped out with Hurricane Sandy in December 2012.  That was an amazing experience and I'm really glad that I got to be a part of it.  I'll never forget the gratitude shown by the lovely couple at the first house that we helped to rebuild - to have a group of strangers from across the county come to help rebuild their home after such an incident... your SAR team was a blessing to them.  I can still remember how happy the older lady was that I had saved a piece of the wall mural that she was working on - I didn't have the heart to take it down and fought to preserve that memory for her.  It was a family tree that she was painting on the wall in the back room.

Remember back in middle school and part of high school when you were my mediator?  haha Well, I did finally, truly fall in love this year.  Shortly after, I also went through my first heart break.  I know you'd have been there to get me through it all, just as you always had.  I'm glad that when you left us though, that you were experiencing the feeling of love with your girlfriend - it's a wonderful feeling, isn't it?  Every time I go to Huntington Park and see those benches... they remind me of you and your love for your girlfriend.  You tried to keep it a secret, but I was told that that painting you did of those benches... that was where you told your girlfriend you loved her.

Remember our last meeting the weekend before you left us?  We were talking about our futures.  While I didn't go the military route nor pharmacy, I did follow my dreams of going into forensics.  I'm on that career path right now, Joe, and I couldn't have been happier with that choice - I look forward to going to work each day.  I wear that badge with pride and am honored that I am able to do so.  I now understand what it feels like to wake up each day and look forward to doing what you love to do.  I wish you could have been doing the same right now, with your graphic arts design work.  Your work was just simply amazing.  I can only imagine all of the neat things you'd have done by now.  Your imagination, creativity, and skills are rivaled by no other.

haha I also remember planning to go out for drinks with you when you turned 21.  Too bad that was 2 months after you left... It would have been nice to grab a drink with you, Joe.  I still can't believe it's been 2 years since I'd last seen and talked to you.  I wish I made our last meeting more memorable somehow.  Then again, I wouldn't have traded that casual Saturday night out for anything - going out for boba and just sitting around, chatting with good company has always been one of my favorite things to do.  So I'm glad that our final moments together was just that.  And it was definitely nice to share it with ABCCDDD.  I think that was the last time that the whole group was actually together.

I take your ideals to heart, buddy.  I'd started a little project called, "Mooshbot Minions," in an effort to spread the love of committing random acts of kindness and paying it forward.  Holy cow... what's it been, like 8 years since I went by Moosh?  In late 2012, I'd also started an ongoing project, making "care bags" for the homeless that we see around town.  To date, I've given away 20-some bags; close to 30, if I counted correctly.  I'd lost track.  Some of my friends have hopped on board with this project as well - we keep the bags in our cars and will give them when we see someone who needs it.  They're filled with small necessities; water, snacks, hygiene items...

I've made some amazing friends on EDCF and USN.  You were never on those forums, as far as I knew, but you did like those sort things.  Maybe you were - I actually never thought about trying to look you up... you always did find out about resources further ahead than myself.  I wish we could have talked gear together.  I think you'd be the only one in our group of friends who would know what I was talking about.  :P  You always liked the most interesting things.  :)  I know you liked the Keyport slide - they came out with a new one recently.  I think you would have loved the Kickstarter program.  I'm sure you would have had some crazy ideas of your own for it too.

Joe, please continue to look after your friends, family, and SAR team.  May you continue to rest in peace.  We'll continue to carry out your love of life from here.  12 years of friendship, and counting.  The "phyre" burns on.