OMFG!

My company has been moving offices, so I haven't had access to the internet for the last couple of days. I'm dead tired right now, but wanted to get a short post up to say hi.

I will address the shocking, ground-rending trade of Joe Thornton made by the Bruins tomorrow. You'll also have to wait to hear about my visit to the proctologist.

Lost Rules! Invasion is finally heating things up, too, and I love it.

It's...

I said I'd see you on Monday, but I've been kind of busy today and not inspired to write something. But I keep my quasi promises!

T-giving break was great. We got up at 4:30 Fri morning to get some deals, and we got a lot of Christmas shopping done. I put up some lights on the outside of our house. It proved more challenging than I thought it would be, but it was fun. I like doing handy things around the house.

E. McPan inadvertently gave me something to think about today: What's my favorite Monty Python sketch? That sure is a hard one. It's been a while since I've seen a lot of the episodes, so to answer will take a lot of study. Maybe I'll even make a bracket and have a Flying Circus playoff. You can vote between two sketches going head-to-head until only one remains. I reserve the right, however, to overrule a popular vote, seeing as we're trying to determine MY favorite sketch.

Lovely Wife, in a classic example of her infinite generosity, gave me the full Monty Python's Flying Circus DVD collection for Christmas a couple years ago, so I'll have to skim those and get a field of 16 for the bracket. I'll come up with more specific criteria, but I think it will be limited to sketches from the TV show, nothing from the movies (even "Hollywood Bowl" and "And Now for Something..."). I'll have to think about if the show-length piece "Cycling Tour" will be included. Anyone have a suggestion on that one?

Okay, this will be fun. Let's see if I have the stamina to see it through. Reviewing an episode list online, it's going to take a while.

iTunes (left the iPod at home): Brahms' Violin Concerto in D, First Movement, Maxim Vengerov (violin), "Just a Touch" by R.E.M., "New Kid (on the Block)" by Barenaked Ladies, "Ugly" by Pond, "Summer Salt" by Braid, "Are You Experienced" by Belly and "Date to Church" by The Replacements.

Long Holiday Weekend Update

Thanksgiving: Good. Crazy Shopping Day: Bad.

Alma Mater football team rolls: Good. Bruins lose 2 in a row after a win: Bad.

Missed "Lost" and "Invasion" because of DVR glitch: Bad. Bit Lord and torrent downloads: Good.

The movie version of Rent: Good. My hemorrhoid: Worse than before.

See you Monday.

"525,600 Minutes"

"How do you measure a year?" asks the cast of Rent. In my case, you measure it in posts. Here I am at the first anniversary of starting this blog, and I've published 314 posts including this one. That's a pretty good post-to-day ratio: about .86 posts per day. In the past year I've added a second blog to the family, have 20 links on my blogroll, and have gained, much to my surprise, several people I would honestly call friends; even though I have not met most of them. I've talked a lot about why I started blogging, and the reason is pretty much the same: I think I can write things that might make people laugh. But it's grown to a lot more than that. It is an outlet not only for creativity and emotion, but also a social outlet. I write, people respond. Others write, I comment, and an exchange forms. I routinely talk with more people each day through blogging than I do in person.

It's been a great experience. Sure there are times when I don't have much inspiration, or I'm absolutely sure that people either ignore or hate what I write, but it's easier to get through those patches with regular readers who I can count on to either provide inspiration on their own blogs, or to drop me a line in my comments letting me know that something I wrote brought even the smallest, silliest thought to their head. And if that fails, I can always pimp my baby on the site to get positive feedback.

So thank you, any and all that read regularly or momentarily. Let's see how long I can keep this nonsense going.

Now back to the real world, the Boston Bruins FINALLY won a game! And convincingly, too. 5-1 over the Toronto Maple Leafs. That was the good part of the night. The bad part was when my satellite receiver shut off mid way through recording Lost. I turned it back on, and it "said" it was recording the second half of Lost and Invasion, but it was doing nothing of the sort! So I'm looking into downloading those episodes on Kazaa or Bit Torrent. Will that make me a bad person if I do?

Time for bed now. Have a great Thanksgiving to those who are celebrating it. And to the rest of you, have a great day and rest of the week.

Fire In The Hole!!!!

I seem to have developed a hemorrhoid. It's... uncomfortable.

iPod: Hey Mercedes shuffle.

Husband of the Year

After years of Lovely Wife enduring my subtle and not-so-subtle proclamations of admiration and attraction to several famous women, I did her a solid last night while watching late night TV. I DVRed the interviews of George Clooney on Letterman and Wentworth Miller on Leno. I'm totally with her on Clooney. That is one handsome, charming man. And funny to boot. I'm not so sure about Miller. He looks kind of scrawny and young to me, but mine is not to reason why, mine is just to give the guy. Next up: a smoldering picture of David Krumholtz.

And in the news: did you hear about the rapidly falling mercury in Hell? Apparently on December 1, demons will be playing a spirited game of ice hockey on the River Styx when Oprah Winfrey appears on David Letterman. I'm sure the questions will be even more scripted than they usually are, but hopefully Dave will find a way to make it fun, and Oprah will have a sense of humor about it. Dave's much harsher on Dr. Phil, and Dr. Phil goes on the show a lot.

Crazy Shopping Day is almost upon us, and thankfully we don't actually have any money this year to go hog wild during it. Phew!

That's it, I guess. I should do some work today.

iPod: Idlewild shuffle.

Oh, the innocence of a 5 year old

I was using our relatively useless leaf blower this weekend while my 5 year old son was playing in the yard. As he ran past me, I pointed it at him, making the leaves swirl around him. He really enjoyed it, and after I stopped, he came up to me and yelled:

"Blow me! Blow me!"

The weekend was very good. I passed my test, the right football teams won, and some good ones lost, too, giving The Ohio State University Buckeyes a good chance at an at large bid to a BCS bowl game. Fingers crossed.

I don't know if Camo Girl will be reading this week, but I want to let her know that there will be no trash talk or condescending "good game" talk from me. The truth is I was pissed at Ohio State for most of the second half, scared shitless in the fourth quarter, and thought the game was over when Michigan had a 6 point lead with 1st and goal deep into the fourth. It was an exciting ending, but I think that the Buckeyes proved they are the better team. If it weren't for some horrible mistakes (fumbles and special teams gaffes) and two questionable penalties against Buckeye defenders in the end zone, the game would not have been nearly as close as it was. Alma mater football team won their game, and are ranked 1st in the nation for Div 1AA. Hopefully they can do better in the playoffs this year. And lastly, Reggie Bush should definitely win the Heisman this year. Vince Young is a great player who means more to his team than anyone else, but if the award goes to the best player in college football, not the most valuable player, then it has to go to Reggie. He does things people shouldn't be able to do. He's absolutely incredible.

Hockey, on the other hand, did not go well this weekend. The Bruins lost two one-goal games to bring their losing streak to six games. (Six games!!) It's very bad, and I don't know what to think. They have one win in games against division opponents. They're a much better team than their record, but something's not clicking. It's very frustrating, let me tell you.

iPod: "Spoddies and Birits" by Thanks to Gravity, "Driven to Tears" by The Police, "Featherweight" by Braid, "The Television Set Waltz" by Michael Penn, "Riot Act" by Elvis Costello, "Soon Forget" by Pearl Jam, "Last Night I Missed All The Fireworks" by Idlewild, "Summer of Drugs" by Soul Asylum, and "Frozen in Time" by Athenaeum.

Ewww!

The headline for this article sounds dirty.

(You have to click on the link, I'm not going to give it up here.)

The news is giving me lots to blog about today.

iPod: "Something Against You" by The Pixies, "I Want to Vanish" by Elvis Costello

Interesting articles from the Boston Globe

First, am I clairvoyant, or what? Nancy Marapese-Burrell, covering the Bruins, opened her piece with this sentence:

Maybe the Bruins could petition the National Hockey League to make one more
change to the game -- shorten it to two periods.

Actually, I'm sure she just read my blog late last night and stole the idea from me!

Secondly, the allegations described in this article, if true, would be VERY disturbing. I'm linking to the article, but you might have to register to read it, so here are some excerpts:

Online daters sue matchmaking sites

NEW YORK --It's not easy finding love in cyberspace, and now some
frustrated online daters say they were victims of fraud by two top Internet
matchmaking services and have taken their complaints to court.

Match.com, a unit of IAC/Interactive Corp., is accused in a federal lawsuit
of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic
e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends,
people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a
marketing ploy.

In a separate suit, Yahoo Inc.'s personals service is accused of posting
profiles of fictitious potential dating partners on its Web site to make it look
as though many more singles subscribe to the service than actually do.

Wow! I can't imagine Match, with it's millions of members, would care so much about a few to pay people to go on sham dates. The Match suit stems from some guy who said his date confessed to him she worked for Match. I think she just didn't like him and that was the excuse she used to ditch him. As for Yahoo, there a A LOT of fake ads there, from using pictures found on the internet to grudge ads placed by an angry ex. I don't see why Yahoo would have posted the fake ones I've seen. It will be interesting to hear what evidence comes out, but I'm sure both suits will settle with no admission of any wrongdoing, and no evidence made public. What a great legal system we have.

iPod: "Roulette Systems" by Hey Mercedes, "When Will We Fall" by Toad the Wet Sprocket, "Drown" by Smashing Pumpkins, and "Jesus Doesn't Want Me for a Sunbeam" by Nirvana.

Just Plain Weird

I found some old CDs with mp3s I downloaded a few years ago, and put some of the songs into iTunes. The songs were by Wheatus (of "Teenage Dirtbag" fame) and Lisa Loeb (shut up!). Anyway, I was filling in some info on the Lisa songs to index them, and the "Genre" field was already filled in on one of them. It classified her song as "Porn Groove".

WTF?

iPod: "Fourth Place" by Thanks to Gravity

Aaauuugghhh!!!

I'm going to start a petition to send to the NHL. The petition will demand that games be two periods long instead of three, because the Boston Bruins SUCK in the third period, either giving up leads or tie scores and then losing games on a routine basis. Who's with me?

I'm mad on the outside, but crying on the inside.

Is that Rat Tart?

Disgusting!

And so is this story!

Stewart to Marry 'Laguna Beach' Star

Not so much the marrying part, but WHY THE FUCK ARE KIDS ON A PSEUDO REALITY SHOW ABOUT OVER PRIVILEGED TEENS FAMOUS ENOUGH TO WARRANT COVERAGE LIKE THIS!?!?!?!?!?

At least cradle-robber Kim Stewart has done some modeling, so it is with a grimace and sigh that I acknowledge her "fame", but this Laguna Beach show has really flipped my lid. The degeneration of The Real World was bad enough, merely giving attractive college students a platform to make the TV audience feel bad about their image, drink too much, be promiscuous, and generally over-dramaticize EVERY FUCKING SITUATION IN THEIR LIVES. But now MTV has done the same thing with HIGH SCHOOL KIDS!! Makes me sick, and I haven't even watched the show.

I didn't start the day angry like this. I was wondering if I had anything to blog about today, stumbled across this story, and out came a rant. It's high time MTV got added to the Corporate Evil Empire.*

"I predict a riot."

*The other members being, of course: McDonald's, Coca Cola, and Disney.

iPod: "Star" by Belly, "Ode to Joy" by Thanks to Gravity, "Brick" by Ben Folds Five, and "Requiem" by Foo Fighters.

A true friend is...

One who goes on a bike ride with you so you can buzz by a bike shop and look at the bike mechanic you hooked up with. Apparently you will be so moved by that act of true friendship you will be inspired to flash that friend while on a sidewalk along a busy street.

Just wanted to give you guys some context for that "bike mechanic" comment left yesterday.

It seems that last night I had something I wanted to write about, but I can't remember what it was now. Oh well. I love "My Name is Earl". Last night's ep started out a bit slowly, but they really brought it home.

And I'm so proud of myself! I scooped Gorilla Mask on that "idiot kid falling through a skylight" video! That guy's JOB is to surf the net for content. Nice work if you can get it.

iPod: "Scientific" by Jimmy Eat World, "I Didn't Understand" by Elliott Smith, "Mr. Jones" by Counting Crows, and "Hear You Me" by Jimmy Eat World.

Only because she's new to my links

E. McPan tagged me for a meme that I had been seeing around, and until now avoided. And it goes a little sump'n like this:

1. Go into your archives.
2. Find your 23rd post.
3. Post the fifth sentence (or closest to it).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.
5. Tag five other people to do the same thing.

I'm not really sure what the difference is between #3 and the first half of #4 is, but whatever. Here it is, the text of the 5th sentence of my 23rd post.

"I've been reading one blog for over a year, but only recently have I started exploring and finding more."

This is the post, titled "Blogology".

I won't tag anybody, but feel free to take it up if it tickles your fancy.

That wasn't so bad, but not very interesting, either. It's pretty fun to read those old posts when I was just starting out on the blog. Astute observers will see that I'm rapidly approaching my first blog-iversary. And even those astute observers won't care.

iPod: "Dancing Gold" by Belly, "Feelin' the Time Pass By" by This Is Me Smiling, "Gepetto" by Belly, "Go On Drone" by Hey Mercedes, "Don't Stand So Close To Me '86" by The Police.

Reason # 56 Why I Love the Internet

56. Religious Epiphany

How could I have been laboring under the religious and metaphysical ideas implanted into me by parents, church, school and mass-media for so long? Why wasn't The Truth made available to me earlier? I feel like a newborn, seeing things for the first time, barely understanding my surroundings but excited about taking in more and more sweet revelation each day. It is my soul's joyous duty to spread The Word too you all about The One Source of existence, both physical and spiritual. That source is:

The Flying Spaghetti Monster



Luckily for you all, the Flying Spaghetti Monster has a website. Click on the link, cast down the chains of ignorance and falsehood that enslave you. Come to the Light, Children!

You should also visit and thank the Prophet who revealed The Truth to me: Anonymous Coworker. (Now on his own domain. Not too shabby, huh?) Thanks, ACW!

iPod: "Ballad of Big Nothing" by Elliott Smith, "Election Day" by The Replacements, "The Fez" by The Dead Milkmen, "Tim" by Fossil, and "Eroded" by Jimmy Eat World.

It's hee-eeere!

Winter, that is. Not technically, but this morning there was thick frost on the car, and my thermometer read between 29 and 31. It's sunny and beautiful, though. Better than yesterday, windy and rainy all day. Blech! The last couple years here we've had a snow before Halloween, so winter held off a little longer this year. I actually like cold weather, so it doesn't bug me, but I've been forced inside to run now. We have a pretty good treadmill, but it was rather unsightly in the house, so I run in the garage. No TV in there, but I brought in a boom box and all was good.

I better start losing weight soon, because I'm feeling pretty fat. Not enjoying that. The running is going fine, but I'm not loving it. I used to love it. When I lived in Denver I LOVED it. While training for the marathon I merely loved it. Now I don't like it, but make myself do it.

Not much else going on. No movies seen, not even watching much TV because I'm studying for a test on Sunday. What test, you ask? Not telling, I reply. Never know who's reading. (I'm not that paranoid, but not everyone in my life knows about it, and I would hate for them to find out here.)

CBK Jr. is doing great, and usually sleeps most of the night. Lovely Wife is doing a great job handling the late-night stuff. I'm getting off pretty easy. She's staying home with the little angel, so she lets me sleep because I go to work, but I know that her days can be more exhausting than my days at the office. No issues with health, or jealousy from the big brother. Everyone is doing great. I may post a new pic of the baby soon, so look out for that.

Work is also good, no trauma there.

That's my boring, content life. Here's where you ask yourself, "Why the hell do I read this site, anyway?" I don't know, maybe because I show you stuff like this. I love the Super Mario music they used. UPDATE: and this T-shirt! It's so wrong, but so awesome. Get ready for the Holidays.

iPod: "Grace Car (live)" by Braid, "Little Volcano" by The Dead Milkmen, "Someone Take the Wheel" by The Replacements, "Country Death Song" by Violent Femmes, "Time Stand Still" by Rush, "12" by Tanya Donelly, and "Quality Revenge at Last" by Hey Mercedes.

Some Friday fun

Traffic on Friday is usually slower than other weekdays, and this being Veterans (or Remembrance, for you Canucks) Day, it's even quieter. For you lonely souls that have wondered here, I thought I'd share some fun things from two of the sites linked to the right: Spamusement and Gorilla Mask.

1. This is the funniest Spamusement in a while, although the Eggplant Mike series was pretty darn good.

2. I never imagined this happening. It's equally amazing, heartbreaking, and hilarious. You've got to see it.

3. Cool brain game. The only instructions are "Click, drag, and type your way to the next puzzle." That's it. You just have to figure out what to do. My favorite is the second one.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

iPod: "Barrel of a Gun" by Guster, "Kiss Me on the Bus" by The Replacements, "Carbon Scoring" by Jimmy Eat World, and "Red Mosquito" by Pearl Jam.

They Killed "Arrested Development"!

You BASTARDS!

And we were just getting to know attorney Bob Loblaw! (Say it three times fast.)

How long could it have gone on? Who knows, but those precious few who watched are all the better for its brief existence. There's always DVD, I guess.

Sniff.

Real Beautiful Women - Maryland Edition

It's been a while since I've done one of these, and Maryland yielded a lot of worthy candidates, so I've included more than usual. Enjoy.

Real Cutie
1


2




Real Pretty
1


2


3



Real Hottie
1

2




I probably wouldn't have used the last one if she hadn't also used the relatively unglamorous photo. That made her fit the "real" requirement.

Reason # 34 Why I Love the Internet

Camogirl, remember a couple weeks ago when you talked about seeing some very unattractive and blue man boobs during the Michigan-Northwestern game? And I mentioned seeing some more pleasant mammaries on the Florida State-Maryland game?

Well lookie what I found:


It was bit more dramatic watching it live (and, um, again on DVR) seeing as the poor girl almost gave herself a concussion while jumping up and down.

I swear, I wasn't trying to find this. I innocently followed a link at Gorilla Mask to an FSU forum posting pics of Seminole women at football games, and lo and behold, someone posted this one. I don't know where he found it, or how someone got it off TV, but the fact that you can find something like this on the internet, when it was broadcast for less than 10 seconds, is just amazing.

Frankly, you wouldn't be reading this if it weren't for this kind of thing. As I mentioned before, I discovered blogging when I found Bumptious during a search for screen caps of a large-breasted Fear Factor contestant. Only good can come of using the internet this way, people. Embrace it!

Oh, and did you notice the guy on the bottom right?


He's barely celebrating the touchdown! I wonder where his attention is?

Men. Whaddya gonna do?

iPod: "Puberty" by Belly, "Out of Routine" and "American English" by Idlewild, "San Tropez" by Pink Floyd, and "Velouria" by Weezer.

Here Comes Another One

When will it ever end?*

Remember a couple weeks ago I was surfing some new blogs and lamenting the fact that they were good and mine sucks? Well I'm now linking one of those that I found. Say hello to Marisa (pronounced ma-ree-sa, buddy!) aka Inconspicuous Attack Toad from The Lemonade Diaries. She's a first class smart ass, with almost no respect for decorum or rules, likes to vociferously rant, and is an exceptionally rare specimen in the US because she's a female fan of Formula 1 racing. Those are all good things, BTW.

If you aren't familiar with Formula 1, it's simply the best auto racing on the planet, with the best drivers and most unimaginably powerful cars. It's insanely popular in pretty much every country except the US and Antarctica, but the tour has added an oval track (yawn) race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in the last couple of years. She also just got married, but that won't keep her from jumping Michael Schumacher's bones given the opportunity. Stop by and say hi.

I may have mentioned a few weeks ago that I started running again, reluctantly getting out of bed at 6 am Monday through Thursday and running about 3.2 miles everyday. Well, I'm still doing it, but not actually getting faster or better at it, and I'm not losing any weight. I need to change my eating habits, but I don't understand why the running hasn't gotten easier. I've been taking two short walk breaks during the run, usually after stopping at traffic lights, and my body is used to it now. I've pushed myself the last two mornings to shorten them, and hopefully that will break me out of my lazy rut. I'd really like to run a marathon again this spring, and improve my time from the last one. We'll see how that goes.

And lastly, here's a neat new game to play: Escapa! Found it on Sugar, Mr. Poon?, who allegedly lasted over 35 seconds. My best so far is 17.66 seconds, but I'm determined to break 30, which means I won't be getting much work done today, either.

iPod: "Another Moment" by Tanya Donelly, "Wake Up" by The Replacements, "Canary" by Liz Phair, "Iris (live)" by The Breeders, "Clobbered" by Buffalo Tom, "They Might Be Giants" by They Might Be Giants, "Zep Song" by Weezer, "Hitchhiker" by Pearl Jam, and "Song for the Deaf" by Queens of the Stone Age.

* E. McPan, you have astounded me with your Monty Python knowledge, so I expect that you will get the title reference.

Grrrrrrr!

eXcite email scheduled maintenance

We are currently conducting unscheduled maintenance on eXcite email. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you, and thank you for your patience. We expect to have service restored in a few hours.

- The eXcite Team

Well, which is it, you fuckers?!?! Scheduled or unscheduled? Give me my email!

I know I have email there, and it's probably a lot of spam, but I've gone through the blogs several times, read Gorilla Mask's links, and read about the Bruins' horrendous last-9-minutes-of-the-game performance last night. I need something else to do online. I don't like visiting blogs too much during the day because I don't want the authors to see me in their visit trackers and think I'm some kind of freak. When all I really am is super bored. I guess I can try to finish up Maryland for the Real Beautiful Women Project. Or, you know, do some work.

iPod: "Moonbeam Monkey" by Tanya Donelly, "Cock Pushups" by Tenacious D, "Break Your Heart" by Barenaked Ladies, and "Homecoming King" by Guster.

The Countdown Meme

from Bliss

Meant to do this last week, but wasn't feeling up to it:

10 FAVORITES
Favorite Color: Blue
Favorite Food: Italian
Favorite month: September
Favorite Song: “The Frowning of a Lifetime” by Hey Mercedes, among a few others
Favorite Movie: The Wedding Banquet
Favorite Sport: Hockey
Favorite Season: Autumn
Favorite Day Of the week: Friday
Favorite Ice Cream Flavor: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
Favorite Time of Day: 5 pm

9 CURRENTS
Current Mood: Bored
Current Taste: Chocolate covered raisins
Current Clothes: Short-sleeved polo, khakis, brown casual shoes
Current Desktop: Physical and Virtual: lots o’ crap
Current Toenail Color: Not good. I should be in those commercials
Current Time: 3:40 pm
Current Surroundings: Office
Current Thoughts: Nothing, really

8 FIRSTS
First Best Friend: Christopher Lawton
First Kiss: Ever - Shannon Goode or Tracy Smith (spin the bottle); “romantic” - some girl in a frat house basement
First Screen Name: cbk97
First Pet: Lollipop
First Piercing: My wit ;-)
First Crush: Elizabeth Scott (1st grade)
First CD: Thanks to Gravity (before I had a CD player)

7 LASTS
Last Cigarette: N/A
Last Drink: Water
Last Car Ride: This morning
Last Kiss: This morning
Last Movie Seen: Wallace & Gromit
Last Phone Call: With our Philly office
Last CD Played: Michael Penn - Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947

6 HAVE YOU EVERS
Have You Ever Dated One Of Your Best Guy/Girl Friends: No
Have You Ever Broken the Law: Yes (speeding)
Have You Ever Been Arrested: No
Have You Ever Skinny Dipped: No
Have You Ever Been on TV: Yes (walking behind weather woman while on air)
Have You Ever Kissed Someone You Didn't Know: Yes (see above)

5 THINGS
Thing You're Wearing: Socks
Thing You've Done Today: Played Tobby
Thing You Can Hear Right Now: Feedback at the end of a song
Thing You Can't Live Without: Music
Thing You Do When You're Bored: Watch TV

4 PLACES YOU'VE BEEN TODAY
1. Home
2. Car
3. Son’s school
4. Office

3 PEOPLE YOU CAN TELL ANYTHING TO
1. Daisy
2. Jade
3. Mark

2 CHOICES
1. Black or White: Black
2. Hot or Cold: Cold

1 THING YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE:
Visit Antarctica

"We Three Kings" with Camel Toe

A full hour of Arrested Development is almost too much to take. Thank goodness it's usually just a half hour. So funny! I love Super Dave Osborne as the surrogate, too.

Looking forward to tonight's Office, to see if there's still tension between Pam and Jim, and the inter-management hookup between Michael and his boss.

And, umm, that's all I guess. I'm over my little Patriots rant. It all comes down to the defense. It's just not that good this year.

iPod: "I Never Thought" by Thanks to Gravity, "Getting Even" by Guster, and "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" by Van Halen (Are there any other three-apostrophe songs in the whole world?)

The Fix Is In!

It's late in the third quarter of the Patriots-Colts game, and I'm convinced someone has paid off Bill Belichek to throw the game!

Going for it on 4th and 2 in the first quarter, down 7-0, deep into Colt territory on a fast-moving drive makes sense, and it paid off. Going for it on 4th and 4, at midfield, late in the third quarter down 31-14 MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER!!!! And what the fuck was up with that ONSIDE KICK with 5 minutes to go in the third right after you scored to make it 28-14?!?!?

I smell a big rat!

[grumble grumble]

JuicyA - The Meeting

As mentioned, I had the pleasure of dining with Certified Bloggin' Hottie JuicyA, of the Intersection of 13 and 13.


We had a great time just chatting about our lives and such, but I must confess that it was weird knowing things about her without ever meeting her; things that she wrote about, but that she never really told me. It got comfortable pretty quickly, though, and it was just like catching up with a good friend.


Unfortunately her partner in premarital cohabitation, Jer, couldn't join us. He had a youth hockey game to coach. Too bad, because I'm sure we would have got along like gangbusters talking about hockey.


She puts up kind of a wild and crazy image on her site, but I assure you that she's quite charming and personable and a pleasure to talk to. If I'm ever up there on a weekend, I'll have to drink with her and her boyfriend and see some of that legendary wild side.

This is the end...

My only friend, the end.


Another Halloween has come and gone, and now my spooky/pleasantly surprised jack o' lantern resembles a nursing home resident excited for his nightly pudding. Here's a picture of the Boy's pumpkin he painted by himself.


The Boy had his last soccer game of the fall and he played great! He scored two goals with iron determination, broke up some scoring chances by the other team, and (most impressively) ran around the gaggle of kids swarming around the ball to the other side of the goal to set up for a pass. It was the most awareness of strategy I had seen from him. I was so proud of the whole effort, I got a little misty after the second goal. His team lost 5-3, but it was a well-played game, with a stellar performance by our son.

Other weekend sporting events were similarly encouraging: the Ohio State Buckeyes won big, alma mater football team came from behind to win, three teams ranked ahead of Ohio State lost (except for Penn State, dammit). The Boston Bruins also won their last two games convincingly, but the real test will be when they play the seemingly invincible Ottawa Senators soon.

Lastly, I made a very shocking discovery this weekend. I was reading the article about Sarah Silverman in the newest Rolling Stone, and guess what! She's not Jonathan Silverman's sister!!!! I always assumed they were brother and sister, or at least cousins, but apparently not. Here, look for yourselves.


Am I crazy, or is there not a resemblance? My world has turned upside down.

iPod: "Time Turned Fragile" by Motion City Soundtrack, "Nobody Fails Like" by The Dead Milkmen, "On My Mind" by Athenaeum,"4 People Do Good" by Idlewild,"Pulsar" by Thanks to Gravity, and "Forever Got Shorter" by Braid.

Operation Meeta Blogger a Success!

I met a blogger tonight. In person. It was great. I'm too tired to go into the details, though. I've got to get up early and pack, but Booyah! The ironings already done.

Try and guess which one I met! (JuicyA, you're excluded from guessing.)


Doh!

Just saw a commercial for the movie version of Rent. I've never seen the show, but heard the songs on CD. Looks good, I'm looking forward to it.

More Ugh!

Feeling kind of miserable. I'm in Calgary, roped into helping on another case. I feel all ache-y and tired, especially in my back, as if I'm sick, but I have no other symptoms. Also woke up this morning and my rental car was covered with snow. (O Canada!) The Bruins keep losing one goal games. Both "Lost" and "Invasion" were reruns this week (Motherfuckers!). Wah wah wah.

In good news, I'm finally going to look into this Sudoku thing. I've also found out what my next career is going to be: sports agent! Anyone know how hard it is to break into the industry?