Two months have passed... And what an exciting two months it has been!

     It has been just over two months since my last entry (I'm sure folks were wondering around in a state of panic over this) so I figured I would touch on some of the exciting things that have happened.  The first was the Panama City Ingress Anomaly.  This event was organized by +Richard Gibbens and we were honored to have some Ingress celebrities by the names of +Joe Philley and +Kira Kroger attend!  This event put the Resistance up against the Enlightened to see who could control the most portals and also link to predetermined sites in Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Gainesville, Atlanta, Tampa/St. Petersburg, Columbus, Montgomery, Mobile, Birmingham, New Orleans, and Pensacola.  The event was based out of Martin Theater and it was fully catered, including some Ingress swag.  The battles were intense and the weather went from hot and humid to raining, back to hot and humid (which is normal for Florida).  It was fun to meet people from all over the south-east that all shared a common love for Ingress and to chat about the game without getting strange looks like you are crazy for trying to stop (or help if you are a toad) aliens from invading the Earth with mind control.  The Enlightened deployed their usual sneaky tactics and covered a large area of the battle grounds with a slimy field which was quickly taken down by some Resistance in Alabama I believe.  With this field down we were free to begin the battle of portal and link control.  After three random measurements the Resistance came out on top with a score of 33k to 4k (or something very close to this).  While we wished the Enlightened had a better turnout than they did, we all still had a good time!

     Next on the list was my name change.  When I first started Ingress I used my email address (Jerniganc) as my agent name and never thought anything about it.  Well with the state of the game in the area I thought it might be a good idea to apply for a change.  After thinking long and hard I settled upon "TheWeaponX"!  Anybody that knows anything about me knows I am a fan of Wolverine so the name was a no brainer... plus it just sounds cool as hell when I'm blowing stuff up.  I now proudly sport the name and have the little guy on the left currently making an appearance on my phone.

     Next on the agenda was the building of Esca/Rosa Resistance L8 farm in Milton (the 2nd successful farm for the Resistance in the area).  It was a spurt of the moment plan (we discussed it very briefly at the Panama City Anomaly) and had a blast.  I always enjoy when my fellow Ingress folks gather, hang out, drink some Hint water, and build some level 8 portals.  We were able to construct 10 level 8 portals and get a good hour and a half of hacking in before the +Shaper Slaves and @BlackXantus showed up and began to lay waste to our hard work :(  While we would like to think we gave them a run for their money, sadly two level 8's can lay waste to just about anything (which I hope +Ingress fixes one day).  None the less it was a good time had by all and I was glad to see everybody!  A big thanks to everybody that came out (and in no particular order) +Theta Ashing +David Ashing +Nathan Harris +Brandon D. +Darryl Boudreau +Ty Hutcheson +Craig Anderson +rodney fettinger +aura f +Chris Jernigan 

     Now on to a garden update (I know, enough about the +Ingress already).  I am sad to say that the garden is doing horrible although it is making a come back.  The non stop torrential down pours every other day (and some times everyday) and severe lack of sunlight took its toll.  The cucumbers withered back almost to the ground, the squash is pretty much dead, we lost all the ears of corn we had (but the stalks are starting to grow again), the 'maters and jalapenos stopped producing but they are finally picking back up again now that the rains have past... for now.

We finally did it! And we have tomatoes :D

     It's a few days short (I doubt anybody was waiting at their PCs for my next installment) but here ya go!!!

     Well if you read my blog from a week or so ago you caught wind of my rant on a mole in our resistance community (here's the link in case you didn't Another Week Gone by And a Mole in the Garden).  Why do I bring this up?  We finally caught him... sort of.  We got intel from a fellow community that Shaperslaves an enlightened agent) was also Jameswrek  (a resistance agent).  The story is that he changed factions and failed to tell us (on purpose), while at the time James just said he was going inactive.  This was a great shock to many of us (myself included) as he was part of the community before I was in it.  He was promptly removed after owning up to it when called out so now we can move on and get back to keeping the population safe from Shaper influence.  I would like to say what kind of person takes joy in being an ass like that and taking joy in ruining other folks plan... That says alot about that persons character.

   On a brighter note I have tomatoes in my garden!  I planted the garden 3 weeks ago and everything is just rocking along.  We did have a green onion starting to sprout but a mischievous child of mine decided to pick it a tad early.  I'm hoping in a few weeks I can finally eat some freshly grown maters.  I planted a few tomatoes last year but it was late in the season and the bugs got to them before I could so I was unable to enjoy them... not this year though!  The one thing I am having issue with is the corn.  When you plant a square box garden it is suggested that you plant 3 seeds of each type then trip the weakest 2 sprouts back leaving the strongest to go on and produce.  Well my corn sprouted every seed I planted, that's 16 locations, 3 seeds

each location for a whopping total of 48 stalks.  I have trimmed back the extra stalks twice now and the little fellas just keep coming back.  While some say let them grow, I'm note sure that the garden would be able to handle that much in such a tight spot so I will keep up the good fight and show them who's boss!  Oh, about the whole pulling up the onion early thing... how could you get made at them with a face like this.

Another week gone by, a mole in the garden, and some crops foiled... Ok that may be backwards.

     Well another week has passed, and what a week it was.  I finally met a new Ingress player in my area which is always cool and talked to a childhood friend who I haven't seen in 15 years thanks to Ingress.  I've met alot of cool people through that game and hope to keep in touch long after it is gone.  Which brings me to this weekends in-game activities!

     The Gulf Coast Resistance had originally planned to host an online meet-n-greet to see some of the new faces, talk strategy, and b.s. in general.  This changed at the last minute to an onsite gathering at Eglin AFB Armament Museum in hopes of building the panhandles first Resistance level 8 farm.  Well we saw some comm activity early on and when we started to arrive on site found that they were there waiting and had no intentions of letting us build our farm.  While our overall goal of a giant farm was not achieved we had a few agents level up, gain a ton of AP, and we did manage to build a few level 8 portals.  Which brings me to wonder, how in the hell did they find out about this?  Why would somebody in our community share intel with them to spoil our plans?  Why would the other team want this intel?  You would think that showing up and spoiling other folks plans wouldn't be fun (this makes the second time) but different strokes for different folks I guess.  I had a pretty good time, met some new folks, and overall had a good time... so that made up for the 2 hour drive and gas I reckon.

      Nothing exciting happened on Sunday, woke up, piddled around the house.  Took the kiddos over to the grandparents house to play while I went grocery shopping, etc.  I wish I had the energy of my kids.  They were outside at the house playing all morning.  After a short lunch and nap I took them over to visit the grandparents.  Not only did they ride their bikes all over creation but managed to con my aunt into dragging them to the park where they played as well.  Oh to be young and go all day without stopping.  The good news is at 20:00 they were in bed and knocked out and even managed to sleep in this morning which I'm sure Melissa enjoyed.  The garden is doing great, I must have some awesome dirt because the seeds I planted last weekend are already several inches tall.  The jokes on them though.  Now that they are sprouted out I select the weakest 2 of the 3 seeds planted and cut them off.  Only the strongest shall prevail!

A weekend full of excitement!

     Well this weekend found the Jernigan clan very busy!  Saturday we had tickets to the Blue Wahoos game so we decided to head downtown a few hours early so we could walk around downtown Pensacola for some exercise (and so I could hack some portals in Ingress).  It had been awhile since they had gone downtown and they had a blast.  I showed them around a few of the historic sites and they learned a little bit about their cities history.  From hanging out at the cannons surrounding the square, checking out the old location of the fire station, to the huge clock in front of the court house.  After seeing those sites we headed downtown so they could see the huge freighter that was in port and take a few more pictures.

     Once our trek (and my hacking) was complete we loaded up into the car and headed to the Wahoos game.  This was our first game of the season so we were stoked to attend.  Melissa and myself were looking forward to the heater baskets (a bacon cheese burger topped with heater sauce and onion rings) and the kids were ready to chow down on some hot dogs.  The Wahoos fought hard but they ended up falling 4-1 to the Mobile Bay Bears.  The kids had a blast though, Melanie caught a ball and the kids got their pictures taken with Kazoo and Maverick, the Wahoos mascot and announcer respectively.  After the game they enjoyed the awesome fireworks display (kudos for them putting this on every Saturday) and then headed home.

     Sunday found us up early and heading to Lowe's.  Last year we built a square foot garden (ALL NEW Square Foot Gardening - 2nd Edition) and finally got around to planting a new one this year.  I went all out this year planing (2) tomato plants, (2) cucumber plants, (4) jalapeno plants, (1) squash plant, (16) stalks of corn, (1) bell pepper plant, (1) habanero plant, & (16) green onion (chalets) plants.  The kids enjoyed helping refill all the dirt they "borrowed" during the off season and then counting the seeds as we planted.  After a good watering (both the kids and the garden) the garden is ready for the coming season.  Later in the afternoon we found ourselves over at my grandparents house for an afternoon of walking and the kids riding bikes.  We are hoping to make it back over there next weekend so we can work on removing those pesky training wheels so that should be an adventure in of itself.