ben lowery

So, like, hi.

Things have changed a lot recently and life has been way hectic. Here is a summary:

• I left FactSet to become an independent consultant / contractor. I’m now
  working with these guys who are working with these guys who are working on a project for these guys. It’s not as complicated as it sounds.
• I have a new cell phone number.  If you need it, give me a call.
• Mandy and I are no longer going to be on boarding in August due to fall-out from the Greece trip.
• It looks like we will be getting housing however, which is awesome.
• I still havn’t posted any pictures from Greece because of the first bullet point.
• I’m probably starting an S-Corp, as I’m now an independent consultant. I need a company name. Help?
• I’m now an independent consultant available to do your bidding at an hourly
  rate.  That’s still sinking in a bit.  More on that later.
• I’m getting married in 12 weeks. Not a change really, I was totally planning on getting married in 12 weeks, but holy crap.
• My parents are meeting her parents over Memorial Day weekend.  On tap: renting Meet the Fockers.
• HttpCompress is most likely moving into the DotNetNuke incubator so it can get the love and attention is so desires.
• I have a photo-thingy over on flickr, all taken with the crappy camera in my new Nokia 6230 cell phone. You too can follow along as I take bad pictures of random crap.

I told you I really liked bulleted lists.

Hi.

I’m still here. I’ve just been hiding for a while.

I recently upgraded the latest and greatest dasBlog, which seems
quite nice. Now I just have to make a skin for it and I’ll be quite
happy.

Things that happened recently:

• Valentine’s Day! My first and last with a fiancee! Dinner at Chiboust was excellent.
• Wedding invitation proofs arrived!  No, you can’t see them.
• Mandy and I are headed for Nashville this weekend for wedding counciling and other assorted wedding-related activities.
• We saw some bald eagles up near Bear Mountain.
• The stock at work split, 3-for-2
• Jack the cat continued to be a giant pest. His love of pens is eternal.

Yes, I made a bulleted list. I am an engineer.

Over the holiday break down in Nashville, I worked up some new code to run a photoblog, and you can see the results over at irreversibleprocess.com. I’m going to post my daily photos over there from now on. I havn’t decided what blowery.org will become going forward; it may remain a never-updated journal, but I’d like to do something more interesting with it.

Mandy and I are down in Nashville, visiting with her family for the holidays.  We celebrated a very merry Christmas at her folks’ place, opening presents on Christmas morning and enjoying quite an amazing feast that evening, a standing rib roast with Yorkshire pudding and all the trimmings.  Good times were had by all.

Merry Christmas to all, and have a happy upcoming New Year!

I purchased a gift card from Victoria’s Secret today, and I noticed I was charged sales tax on the gift card.  This has never happened to me before, as tax is usually taken at the time of redemption for the gift card, not when the gift card is purchased.  I also purchased gift cards from American Eagle and Simon’s Mall today, and neither charged me sales tax on the card.  I’ve got an e-mail in with Vickie’s; I guess we’ll see what happens.

Has this happened to anyone else?  Is it normal?  Taxation and internet sales are often odd bedfellows, but I’m pretty sure this is wrong.  Anyone know for sure?