UngsungBlog: A (fantasy) sports blog

Post-IMBC Entry #1: The Future of UngsungBlog, And Baroid Bonds Visiting LA,

2007-07-30T17:45:00.000-07:00

- It was nice to not have to blog for nearly 36 straight hours. I gotta thank Hank for allowing me to partake in the IMBC, as well as his kind words about my blog (you really enjoyed reading my Michael Vick rants, eh?)

And Amy, don't doubt the Ung-hex! Just because I'm on a "cold" streak lately--the Yankees have been hot recently, and the Dodgers have not--that doesn't mean the Ung-hex is a fluke! Stop doubting the Ung-hex before your negative energies begin to cancel its effects out! :P

- I said I was going to go into detail about what caused me to be eliminated from the IMBC. That will have to wait.

(I promise it won't have to wait as long as my poker story, or my thoughts on Tom Donaghy.)

- So in the next few days, I'm probably going to kick Blogger to the curb, and I'm going to start using Wordpress. Let's hope I don't royally screw up!

Also, I'm trying to figure out a consistent format for the UngsungBlog. Do I want to make it a pure sports blog, or should I keep it the mishmash of random thoughts and random topics that it currently is?

- One other thing before I get to the big topic at hand: it was very sad to hear, this morning, of the passing of San Francisco 49ers HOF coach Bill Walsh to leukemia. He was 75. Walsh won three Super Bowls with the Niners in only ten seasons, and his name is synonymous with the West Coast Offense. Perhaps his biggest contribution to football is the number of current and former coaches linked to Walsh and his 49ers teams:

Even a short list of Walsh's adherents is stunning. Seifert, Mike Holmgren, Dennis Green, Sam Wyche, Ray Rhodes and Bruce Coslet all became NFL head coaches after serving on Walsh's San Francisco staffs, and Tony Dungy played for him. Most of his former assistants passed on Walsh's structures and strategies to a new generation of coaches, including Mike Shanahan, Jon Gruden, Brian Billick, Andy Reid, Pete Carroll, Gary Kubiak, Steve Mariucci and Jeff Fisher.

I was never a 49ers fan; in fact, you could probably go ahead and say that I hated them. However, I could not help but respect the 49ers and what they accomplished during the 80s and early 90s.

- It looks like Baroid Bonds is heading to LA and SD, one home run behind Hank Aaron for the record. Let me be brief by saying this: Grady Little, don't you dare pitch to this guy! He better not break the record here in LA!

Now, this is not a racial issue. Believe it or not, this is not a steroids thing; even with all the "evidence" we have on the guy--the fact that he got better in his late 30s, the rapid increase in size of his body, the lack of neck, etc.--I'm of the opinion that Bonds is probably guilty in the minds of many, but until he is officially indicted, I will consider him the record holder (once he breaks it, that is). This is about Barry being a member of the San Francisco Giants, and a world-class jerk, who only deserves the record because he's been a damn good player for a number of years.

If he does break the record here in LA, I would love to see the Dodger fans in attendance turn their backs on him as he rounds the bases. For some, that could be their way of not acknowledging a record that appears to be obtained via cheating. For me, and maybe some others, it will be my way of respect (of which there is none) of a guy who I really don't want to see break Aaron's record.

Of course, knowing Dodger fans, they're going to boo the living hell out of Bonds, and there's a possibility that some fans might do some really stupid things. I can hope all I want that that does not happen, but I can't help but expect some fan to do something really idiotic to make the other contingent of Dodger fans (those with some class!) look really bad.

I wouldn't mind so much if Bonds get a single home run, but please, please, Grady, don't give him a chance to break the record. I don't care if it's the ninth inning of the last game of the series, and we're up by 10 runs! Do not let Bonds break the record here in LA! Let San Diego deal with the guy.

My IMBC Journey Officially (Finally!) Ends Here

2007-07-29T00:26:00.000-07:00

So apparently my olive branch/three-way-tie plea/cop-out didn't work :P

Yes, after three or four near-eliminations, I am finally officially out. And it was totally worth it.

(Details later.)

Now if you'll excuse me, the food coma is kicking in.

Until then, I'm out (in more ways than one).

BTW, congrats Amy! The Ung-hex ought to kick in sooner or later!

ESPN Insider, An IMBC Plea, And My UPS Guy Is A Comedian

2007-07-27T22:43:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Boy is it hot here! If this keeps up, I'm going to have to start sleeping in a tub full of ice cubes. Or, maybe I should pitch a tent in my patio and start sleeping outside.

- Have I ever told you that Amazon Prime is evil?

(I might have, in an earlier blog or twenty.)

I've now made eleven orders, since I signed up with Prime. And I have about eleven months of service left.

- ESPN must be desperate for subscribers. One day after having my ESPN Insider + ESPN The Magazine subscription auto-renewed for $39.99, I called in to cancel my service (I had intended on doing so a few days earlier, but as the story of my life goes, I forgot to do it).

Immediately after reaching a rep, the guy offered me a subscriber "special": $14.99 to continue my Insider subscription for a year, though I'm not sure if I get to keep the magazine subscription or not. I really don't care for the magazine, though; I don't think I've read a single issue. As long as I get my Insider subscription, I'm good.

- Hey, remaining IMBCers! We've been going on with this competition for ~120 posts now, and I don't know about you two, but I'm starting to get sick and tired of blogging every single day. I mean, it's been fun, but I never expected this competition to go on for nearly four months!

So...anyone up for calling the competition off? I don't have a need for the top prize, and I remember hearing that Amy recently got her own domain and hosting. So why don't we shake virtual hands, and call the whole thing off?

(If you think this is a cop-out, out of fear that I'll probably next to be eliminated from the competition, then you'd be right.)

- So my UPS guy is a comedian, apparently. Every time I see him--and I see him a lot, due to my inability to pass up a hot deal--he has some joke for me. Whether it's a heart-felt "Are you running your own office supply store?" to a "Oh...I wonder what's inside this box," he's always got a quip up his sleeve. Today was no exception: I got a huge box, and he inquired as to what was inside the box (never mind that the box was clearly labeled "Bubble Lined Mailers.")

Of course, I told him that they were, indeed, bubble mailers, and of course, he didn't believe me. Moron :P

(That :P should make it obvious that the last topic was posted in complete jest. Now if only I knew what his name was. And I can't just ask him for his name, because I've already had to twice before. Yes, I'm really really bad with names.)

Happy blogging!

Pizza Hurts, Cover Songs, And Dad Leaves Kids In Car to Play Poker

2007-07-26T20:00:00.000-07:00

Argh! Brad Penny just hurt himself running down first base! Lowe got hurt a couple days ago, and now this?!?!

We're screwed! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

- So I lost the flyer to the best non-chain pizza place around me, forcing me to satisfy my pizza cravings with (ugh) a pizza from a chain restaurant. Fortunately (?) for me, Papa John's had their B1G1 for 99c deal, so I went with a Chicken Alfredo, Spinach, and Tomato Pizza, with a Pepperoni thin crust pizza.

(I like getting lots of extra pizza, so that I can freeze it away and have it on a later date. It comes out quite good, provided you reheat it in the oven, and not the microwave. I also had a Papa John's gift card, so I figured now would be a good time to use it.)

I was pretty happy with the pizza, but not at first. You see, the two pizzas cost $21.xx before tip!!! Among other things, there is a $1.75 delivery charge!

(I know, I know; if I want to avoid paying a tip + a delivery fee, I should just go pick up the pizzas myself.)

Good thing the pizzas were kinda tasty today. For a chain restaurant, I'll take kinda tasty any day of the week.

- I am of the opinion that 99% of all song covers are crap. I'd like to go ahead and modify that statement, after visiting this page (from Digg) of the 100 Greatest Cover Songs of All Time.

My statement, regarding song covers, shall now read as follows: 99% of all song covers done in recent times are crap.

(Notice that many of the songs on that list were remade years ago.)

- Finally, do you suppose this guy has a gambling problem? A 36-year-old Florida man is accused of leaving his two kids in his car while he went to play some poker in a nearby race track:

Police arrested Terrence Davis for child neglect after a passerby spotted the children at the St. Johns Greyhound Park.

Davis said he left the car running with the air conditioner on while he went inside the track. He said he had only intended to peek inside the park, but got talked into playing a few hands of Texas Hold 'Em. He told police that he was only inside for about 15 minutes.

Well, at least he left the A/C on! No word on whether or not the guy got his buy-in back, though. It would be pretty cool (for the other players, at least), if the guy wasn't given his money back, and the casino would just blind him off as the game went on.

Here's my question, genius: what are you doing leaving your kids unattended in the first place?!? I don't care if you went in to the race track for sixty seconds! You went in there to take a peek, and you got "talked into playing"? What did the people around you say? "Oh, go ahead and leave your kids in the car. This will only take a few minutes"?

I sincerely hope this guy got his aces cracked by 7-2 offsuit right before he was apprehended.

That's all I've got for now.

Meals Out Of Leftovers, And I Am A Jinx to Sports Teams

2007-07-25T22:28:00.000-07:00

- It's a sad day here in the ungsunghero household.

We finally finished the corned beef today! *sob*

I chopped up the remaining corned beef, chopped up some of the remaining roasted potatoes, and fried them in a little bit of oil to make a cheap corned beef hash for breakfast. It came out quite tasty, and I served my makeshift-hash with scrambled eggs and buttered toast.

(Damn, I think I'll whip up some pancakes tomorrow.)

Now that I'm all out of corned beef, I guess it's back to my regularly scheduled spaghetti and awesome meat sauce. I'd barbecue sometime in the next few days, but I'll be attending a pig roast this weekend, and two barbecues in a week will probably land me in my usual room at the local hospital.

- The Ung-hex strikes again! A few days ago, I told Krunk that his Seattle Mariners were on fire (and they were; they had recently been only a game back of the Los Angeles Angels somewhere near a huge body of water). Of course, the Mariners have since lost six straight games, and are now 3.5 games behind the Angels.

I also declared that my Dodgers were rolling, and that they will comfortably win the National League West (by 4-5 games, and in the NL West, 4-5 is a pretty comfortable margin). Of course, they have since dropped two consecutive, close, games, both of which were lost by the bullpen. The Dodgers loss today was worsened by the fact that SP Derek Lowe left the game with a groin injury, as if the Dodgers could afford any more injuries to their pitching staff. I can't fathom a potential rotation of Penny-Billingsley-Tomko (shudder)-Hendrickson (shudder)-Houlton/Stults/????? for any substantial length of time.

Assuming Lowe doesn't miss any serious time, I saw screw Mark Teixeira. Screw Octavio Dotel. Screw those crazy ideas of a Jermaine Dye deal. Let's take a flier on a Kyle Lohse or a Jose Contreras! Neither one can be worse than Mark Hendrickson, and neither one is going to cost us much. Granted, Hendrickson's been pitching OK in a starting role lately, but I think his best role is as a long reliever and spot starter.

BTW, I think the Yankees are going to win the next ten games.

(Go Ung-hex!)

Leftovers Are Good, So Is Limeade, And YANT

2007-07-24T20:38:00.001-07:00

This blog entry is going to be all over the place, because the longer it takes me to complete this, the longer it will keep me away from Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s.

(Yeah, I'm a Guitar Hero dork. I also royally stink at it :P)

Speaking of Guitar Hero and my PS2, I can't believe my console still works!

(I should mention that I haven't touched it in months, and it has always been a bit flaky on me.)

I better be careful, or I might just play through the night, and "forget" to sleep.

- There are some foods that are just destined to be leftovers (and I mean this in a good way; some foods just taste almost as good, if not better, the day after). Corned beef is one good example of that.

(Tangent: I can't believe I didn't make myself any cabbage! Argh! I don't care if it's not St. Patrick's Day, and I don't care that I'm not Irish...how could I forget to make cabbage?!?)

I still have some left in the refrigerator, though it may not last much longer *drool*.

Also, day-old roasted potatoes are awesome, especially when used in a breakfast omelet! I had a spinach-tomato-potato omelet--that's all the stuff in my fridge that was omelet-worthy--and damn, that was tasty! If only I had some pepper jack!

(Hmmm...I might make myself one of those, instead of eating the corned beef; that is, if I can pull myself away from Guitar Hero.)

- Who needs a specialized hand workout device when you can get the same workout by juicing citrus fruits?

(Yeah, let's conveniently ignore the 3/4 cup of sugar per pitcher of lemon/lime-ade.)

Sadly, I am now out of limes. Hopefully they'll be back on sale this week, so that I could, um, get another hand workout.

- So I mentioned that I had acquired yet another new toy.

Well, here it is: a Compaq Presario F572US notebook computer. The specs are nice (X2 TK-53 @ 1.7Ghz, 1GB RAM, 80GB HDD, 8x DVD+-RW, 15.4" WXGA, 6.6lb), but it is a Compaq. It was also pretty darn cheap, after a number of questionable rebates; the deal involved buying tons of security software that were better than free after rebate, and hinges on whether or not I actually get all the rebates.

I'd say it's 50/50 that I'm going to "keep" it (by "keep," I mean I'm either going to use it myself and sell my Dell Inspiron 6400, or I'm going to keep it within my family, i.e. sell it to a sibling).

Wish me luck on this deal!

*me rushes back to Guitar Hero*

Dodgers' Trade Rumors, And Corned Beef Is Tasty

2007-07-23T23:01:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- My latest toy, the AMD Athlon64 3200+ + mobo combo, has run into a bit of trouble, and I'm betting it's due to the Windows XP repair I did. Now, I've done OS repairs in the past, generally with good results. This time, I guess a full OS reinstall is in order.

Guess I have something to do this weekend...

- Good to see Jon Lester back on the baseball diamond, pitching six effective innings en route to a victory. For those of you not in the know, Lester was diagnosed with anaplastic large cell lymphoma only eleven months earlier.

In the sports world of Michael Vick, steroids in baseball, refs fixing games, etc., it's good to know that there are still "good guy" stories out there.

- It seems that my Dodgers are front-runners for Royals' relief pitcher Octavio Dotel, according to this source. Personally, I think the Dodgers need a bat more so than a reliever, but as long as don't give up any of our key prospects--Ethier, Kemp, Loney, Billingsley, LaRoche, etc.--I'll be OK with this acquisition.

(Speaking of Billingsley: damn you! One out away from our first complete game shutout since...Jeff Weaver?!?)

The Dodgers could really use a bat, but I don't think Texas 1B Mark Teixeira fits. He couldn't play 1B, unless the Dodgers are crazy (stupid?) enough to part with Loney in a deal to Texas, or if they move Loney. If they move Loney, where would he play?

3B? Not as long as Nomar is there.
LF? Gonzo.
RF? Ethier/Kemp are there.
CF? Damn you, Juan Pierre! *shakes fist*
C? I kid, I kid.

Anyway, if the Dodgers do make a splash before the trading deadline, I'll bet they part with Ethier before any of their other prospects. And if the Dodgers are dumb enough to give up Matt Kemp, they better be getting a superstar NOT in his walk year.

It'll be interesting to see what happens in the next few days.

- Corned beef is damn tasty. I made some today; I found the slab stuck in the back of my freezer this morning, and decided, on a whim, that I would cook it. I made some roasted red skin potatoes--cubed potatoes, skin on, coated in EVOO and Mrs. Dash, baked in the oven at 400F for about 45 minutes--and a salad as my sides. Normally, I'd have steamed veggies with my corned beef, but I decided that it was too hot to have steamed veggies (read: I was too lazy to cut the veggies up and steam them).

The potatoes were a bit bland, so I sprinkled some kosher salt on them, and popped them back in the oven for a few more minutes. The extra kosher salt made all the difference in the world.

(Yeah, I know; my blood pressure is probably infinity/infinity.)

The salad was decent, but the corned beef was absolutely delicious. It might have been a bit too salty, but I didn't care.

Damn, I could go for another plate of food right now :P. And I think it's been long enough since I last barbecued. Drool...

Happy blogging!

Women Ripping Off Little Girls, Do You Know Who I Am?

2007-07-22T21:45:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- My very quick thoughts on the NBA scandal involving referee Tom Donaghy and his alleged fixing of games:

Not that we needed it (*cough* Lakers-Kings Game 6 *cough*), but now we apparently have concrete proof that some NBA officials fix games. Of course, we thought that the NBA was the one responsible for fixing, and not individual referees. So what's the truth? Do refs fix games for their own benefit? Does the NBA make refs fix games for the NBA's benefit? Or do some fans just imagine that some NBA games are fixed?
Now that we know it happens, how do we know which games were fixed? And how do we know what impact these fixes had on playoff games of the last few years?
So what happens next? How does the NBA recover from this black eye? Can we ever take another playoff game seriously again, without thinking, "Is one of the referees fixing this game?"

It'll be interesting to see how the NBA proceeds in this entire scandal, and how much the NBA will suffer in terms of popularity (if at all).

- I love watching Man vs Wild. Yeah, I don't care if it's slightly embellished, or totally set up. I'm pretty sure there's still an element of risk and danger running through the Amazon rain forest, or trekking through glaciers on Iceland, set up or not.

Ewww...host Bear Grylls just drank his own piss, clearly desperate for water

- (from Digg) You can file this story in the "Going Straight to Hell" department: two women in Goodyear, AZ, ripped off kids selling lemonade with a bogus $50 bill. The kids were trying to raise money for a trip to San Diego, CA, when one of the women presumably paid for some lemonade with a $50 bill. The girls handed back $38 in chance, apparently thinking they were getting a huge tip. Unfortunately, they only got scammed. Let this be a lesson to the girls: always carry a counterfeit money detector pen.

But seriously, how low do you have to be in your life to scam some little kids out of ~$40? What's next? Are those ladies going to take up collections outside of a department store for charity, only to pocket the money? Or maybe they're going to dress up as homeless people to get free meals from homeless shelters. People who scam social security and the welfare system think these two women are going straight to hell.

- (also from Digg) This is easily my favorite story of the day: a United passenger was angry that his flight was cancelled, and he threw a tantrum at the poor travel agent, screaming "I HAVE to be on this flight, and it has to be FIRST CLASS!" The agent apologized, and the irate passenger responded with "Do you have any idea who I am?"

(Tangent: I thought only rich and famous people use the "Do you know who I am?" blast. Oh well, I'm just assuming that this guy isn't rich or famous.)

The agent, to put it blunty, uber-pwned the moron:

Without hesitating, the gate agent smiled and grabbed her public address microphone. "May I have your attention please?" she began, her voice bellowing through the terminal. " We have a passenger here at the gate WHO DOES NOT KNOW WHO HE IS. If anyone can help him find his identity, please come to gate 17."

With the folks behind him laughing in line hysterically, the man glare at the United agent, gritted his teeth and swore "F--- you." Without flinching, she smiled and said, " I'm sorry sir, but you will have to stand in line for that too."

Wow...just wow!

Travel agent eleventy-billion, moronic customer PWNED. The guy deserves to have his seat downgraded to the wing of the plane for that outburst.

(Yes, one trillion Stupid Points for that idiot.)

Happy blogging!

Next time: another new toy?

YANT (Yet Another New Toy), Citibank Hatred Clarification, And We're All Sheep

2007-07-21T20:51:00.000-07:00

I'm in quite the foul mood today, so hopefully I can finish this blog entry pretty quickly. I'm sick, I'm tired, and I'm surrounded by (some) stupid people.

- So I got a new (to me) toy today: an Asus K8N-E motherboard and a AMD Athlon64 3200+ CPU.

(Tangent: I also got a ton of other toys, including yet another Logitech keyboard/mouse combo. Perhaps, in the near future, I will give a mini-review of some of these new toys.)

(Tangent #2: Yeah, I realize this setup is quite old, but it was dirt cheap, and was bought as an upgrade for my secondary computer, powered by an Athlon XP 2000+ CPU).

It took a bit to actually hook up the "new" parts--I had to fish out a new PSU, due to some stupidity on my part (no, I did not blow up a PSU!)--and for some reason, I had trouble screwing in the PSU to my chassis. After finally getting everything hooked up, I fired up the new computer, and got some strange error.

Long story short, it was simply user error (yes, 10,000 Stupid Points), and after a WindowsXP repair, the new computer was up and running. I tested out the computer by ripping a movie DVD; on the XP2000+ system, DVD Shrink reported a ripping speed somewhere in the 2.5-3MB/s range. With the new parts, I achieved speeds somewhere in the 7.5-8.5MB/s range, surpassing the ripping speeds on my P4 2.4Ghz system.

Yeah, I realize I'm jumping to conclusions just because one test says that this system is blazingly fast compared to the XP2000+ system. Let me enjoy my new toy!

(And yes, I'm VERY happy to also get rid of that ECS board; the fact that it lasted nearly four years is a minor miracle in itself.)

- It seems there was a little confusion yesterday regarding Citibank screwing me over yet again. First of all, I had a Citibank Dividend Platinum Select card. It was recently converted into this new World MasterCard, that I only received last week.

Because this new card no longer reports a credit limit to the three bureaus, my debt/credit utilization ratio will decrease, assuming I have any credit card debt to begin with (which I do). Fortunately for me, this card has a rather low limit, compared to the other cards I own, so hopefully the credit score impact won't be that great.

- BTW, I got an interesting comment about this World Mastercard yesterday. Read the comment, then read the blog, and then check out this "story" linked from that blog entry:

They’ll know where you go, where you drive, where you shop, what you buy, where you run, where you hide–and they’ll be able to turn you off specifically at any time.

We are no longer human—think animal tags for people—we are now officially SHEEPLE.

Um...

I guess I'm getting Extended Warranty Protection, among other features, in exchange for Big Brother being able to pinpoint exactly where I am via the RFID tag in my credit card.

Fair deal, IMO.

That's all I have for now. I'll deal with the whole NBA "scandal" another time.

Citibank Hates Me, And Some More Michael Vick Thoughts

2007-07-20T21:51:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- What's the worst thing you could do, when you already have a cut on a finger?

Get a papercut on the same finger!

Ouch!

(10,000 Stupid Points.)

- I cooked myself some Pad Thai today, straight out of a semi-instant pack (it came with noodles and seasoning; all I had to do was include the veggies, the egg, the ground peanuts, and any meat I wanted--chicken, in this case). I didn't have any bean sprouts or green onion, though, so I used sliced brown onion instead. All in all, the seasoning was far too sweet, and I tasted a hint of freezer burn in the chicken--it had been sitting in the freezer for a while.

The pack wasn't the worst thing in the world, though, and I may try making it again. Or, I might try to make some Pad Thai from scratch.

- So a few days ago, I finally got my Citibank Dividend World MasterCard. I was excited to start milking the Extended Warranty feature of the card, when I stumbled upon this FatWallet thread.

It seems that this new credit card has one major flaw: Citi does not report its credit limit to the three major credit bureaus!

Why is that necessarily a bad thing? Well, one variable that makes up your FICO credit score is the ratio of your total credit card debt to the total available credit (debt/credit utilization); the smaller the ratio, the better. A decrease in the apparent total credit, therefore, increases your debt/credit ratio, and thus impacts your credit score negatively.

Now, if one have zero credit card debt, then a decreased total credit won't affect that individual much. But, for those that do have credit card debt, like me, this will impact one's credit card score somewhat. In fact, someone in that thread reported that his credit score dropped 30 points as a result of the switch!

(Granted, I won't be buying a new car/house/etc. any time soon, so perhaps a high credit score isn't necessary. But still!)

- More quick Vick thoughts: apparently the NFL, NFL Players' Union, and the Atlanta Falcons are urging Vick to take a leave of absence, to concentrate on his federal indictment for dogfighting. I think Vick should leave the team; his presence is only going to be a distraction to the team. Yes, the Falcons' QB options after Vick are crap, crap, and crap, but for the players' sakes, as well as his own, he needs to leave the team until there is resolution in his case.

Here's what I don't get: Pacman Jones got suspended for a year, despite not being convicted of anything (yet). Tank Johnson got suspended for eight games because he owns too many guns (apparently). So why is Vick getting the chance to take a leave? Why hasn't Goddell come down with the hammer yet?

(And yes, I was amused by PETA's protest.)

As usual, more on this next time.

Next time, you'll also get my thoughts on the really big story of the day: the alleged controversy involving an NBA official, points shaving, and gambling. Again, any time the Feds are involved, you know this is a big deal.

Happy blogging!

More Michael Vick Thoughts, And The World Series of Poker Main Event Champ

2007-07-19T22:02:00.001-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Apparently you need a bottle opener to open up MexiCoke bottles. I had one on my Swiss Army knife, and it didn't work too well.

Just ask my finger, which got cut on the bottle cap while trying to open the stupid thing.

(5,000 Stupid Points for that ingenious move.)

- Ooooh! Poker in HD! I can't wait for the Westminster Dog Show to be shown in HD! Or how about a chess tournament? Anyone know if ESPN showed the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Competition in HD this past July 4th?

- As expected, the main topic on The Jim Rome Show was the Michael Vick/dogfighting indictment. When I started listening, I heard Rome ranting about race; apparently, people were arguing that sports reporters are unfairly treating Vick because of the color of his skin.

(channeling my inner Dan Hawkins)

This is a cruelty to animals issue! This is a horrible judgment issue! It ain't a racial issue!

I guess that I just don't "get it," but how can anyone partake in the world of dogfighting? It's disgusting, it's cruel, and it's totally messed up.

Go play tiddlywinks, brother! Go play tiddlywinks!

Also, I love the argument that Kobe Bryant and the Duke lacrosse kids weren't taking this much flak for their (alleged) actions. Clearly, people don't realize that neither case involved the Feds! Not that I'm suggesting that the CO and NC district attorneys are "easier" to trifle with, but neither hold a match to the Feds!

More on this another time, for sure.

- So your 2007 World Series of Poker Main Event champion is 39 year old Jerry Yang, from Temecula, CA, winner of $8.25 million. During the latter stages of the Main Event, I kept hearing people suggest that Yang would have been the worst champion of all time, if he pulled it off--ESPN Poker columnist Andrew Feldman wrote about a hand where Yang called a raise and a re-raise with A3. Yang also made a huge call of an $8 million all-in by professional Lee Watkinson (blinds $120,000/240,000) with A9, which was a horrible decision IMO.

(If you're at the final table of a poker tournament, and you see pros at the table with decent chip stacks, the last thing you'd want to do is give them more chips, right? Yes, Yang only risked ~20% of his chips for a chance to knock out a strong opponent, but why would you risk that many chips against a pro, knowing that doubling him up is the last thing you want to do?!? Sure, it worked out, but what if Watkinson was holding a premium hand?

And pardon me if I don't buy the argument that Yang had a read on Watkinson.)

Naturally, Yang won the tournament by going runner-runner for a straight (granted, he had the best hand pre-flop, which happened quite often at the final table). Do I consider him a luck-box? Of course? Then again, which recent WSOP Main Event champ didn't have a huge string of luck en route to the title?

All things considered, there's one reason why I really was rooting against Yang to win, and it had nothing to do with his cards or his play: did anyone see his act after winning pivotal hand after pivotal hand?

(I'll update this post if I can find a video of what I'm talking about, but for now, let me describe it below.

Also, let me preface the rest of my rant by saying that I'm not a religious person, so if anything below is offensive to you, I do apologize in advance).

Listen, I know moving up in the cash structure, especially in the Main Event, is awesome, but you do not have to scream like a school girl seeing her pop star idol after EVERY hand! Also, what was with the prayers?!? I'm OK if someone says "Dear God, please give me an ace on the river!" Most of that stuff is done tongue in cheek. This guy was going on with minute-long prayers, asking his Lord and savior for help!

(You really need to see the video to understand what I'm talking about.)

I wonder what would have happened if an atheist at the table complained to the Tournament director that Yang's prayers were offensive to him. Just wondering...

Happy blogging!

MexiCoke Rules, And Quick Vick Thoughts

2007-07-18T19:59:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Despite getting some really really sweet (read: icky!) tomato sauces last night, I threw a few cans together with my usual mix of ingredients: one onion, chopped and browned; a few cloves of garlic, ditto; some olive oil; a bit of black pepper; some dried basil and oregano; and ground turkey meat--I was out of beef--the sauce came out pretty damn good.

(Drat! I forgot to put spinach in the sauce! Oh well, it's not too late!)

Anyway, why do some tomato sauces insist on putting corn syrup in their product???

- Speaking of corn syrup: I forgot how awesomely good MexiCoke (Coke imported from Mexico, sweetened with sugar instead of that high fructose corn syrup crap) is! It tastes crisper than its American sibling, and it seems to go down a lot smoother as well.

I bought a couple bottles yesterday ($1 each), thinking I was getting 20oz bottles. It turns out that I bought 12oz bottles instead. Oops! Still, even at $1/bottle, it was kinda worth it.

Why, oh why, must we Americans suffer with HFCS-sweetened sodas?

(Don't answer that; I'm aware of, at least somewhat, the reasons why.)

- I'm not sure of all the facts surrounding the whole Michael Vick/dogfighting indictment situation, but here are my quick thoughts on the situation.

I don't know if Vick deserves to be kicked out of the league indefinitely, as some people have suggested. Yes, an indictment spells huge trouble, but last I checked, he hasn't been convicted yet. Don't forget, a felony conviction will take care of Vick's NFL career anyway.
Should Atlanta take this opportunity to cut Vick? I say yes! Ignoring this entire legal situation, Vick is nowhere near worth the huge contract he signed a few years back (I believe the contract is in the vicinity of $130 million over seven years). Yeah, he's probably the most electric QB in the league, and yes, he's easily the most popular athlete in Atlanta today. But he's not producing, and does Falcon fan really think Michael Vick can lead them to a Super Bowl title? Yes, the Falcons' options after Vick are crap, but I hear there's a QB on the market that was recently released from Miami...
I wonder what Vick's teammates think about the whole situation. If I were a player, I don't know if I could deal with the distraction of Vick's indictment during the season. All the questioning that is bound to happen, all the "what ifs?" surrounding Vick's fate during the season...and what about the fact that Vick may have to leave his team during the season to stand trial?

You'll have my thoughts on the 2007 World Series of Poker Main Event tomorrow.

Happy blogging!

Grocery Store Fun, And How To Deal With Poor Cellular Service

2007-07-17T21:18:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters, Grocery Store edition:

- I really hate leg injuries. I always find myself compensating for the leg injury by stressing out my left leg, and, of course, I end up hurting my left leg as well. It didn't help that I had to carry a five-gallon bottle of water from the parking lot to my place.

Oh, the humanity! Maybe I can find a wheelchair I can commandeer. Or a Radio Flyer.

(Actually, I've always wanted a Radio Flyer, for those trips to Costco. Have I ever mentioned that Costco was evil?)

- In my continuing quest to find the perfect canned tomato sauce to use in my spaghetti sauce recipe, I dumped about four different brands of sauce into my shopping cart.

(Tangent: I realize that "perfect canned tomato sauce" is a probably an oxymoron. You'd be surprised, though; with a few added ingredients, even a crap can of tomato sauce can be made edible. Adding some $1.99 Chuck Shaw white wine--yes, from Trader Joe's--also helps to add a distinct flavor to otherwise crap sauce.)

Anyway, the problem with some of these crap tomato sauces is that they add corn syrup (!!!!!!). Why on Earth they'd do that is anyone's guess. I found some decent Hunt's tomato sauce a few weeks back, and that actually made quite a good sauce; unfortunately, I couldn't find that exact sauce today.

One of these days, I'm going to find the perfect canned sauce!

- Limes were on sale at three pounds for a dollar, so I got a whole bunch of limes to make limeade. My recipe:

One cup lemon or lime juice (about 4-5 lemons, or closer to 10 limes)
Simple syrup: 1 cup cold water and 3/4-1cup sugar, heated slowly until all the sugar is dissolved
Cold water (6-8 cups will do), ice, and lemon or lime slices, if desired

I've got some frozen strawberries in the freezer, and some ice as well. Maybe I'll make myself a strawberry limeade.

- I saw this article a couple days ago, and am still laughing about it today. What do you do when you're dissatisfied with your cellular phone service? Commandeer a military vehicle and destroy cell phone towers, of course! No word on whether or not he was let out of his existing contract.

Then again, the article made no mention that the guy even had cell phone service. Maybe he was high, and he was one of those tinfoil-hat wearing conspiracy theorists who think cell phones are a means for the government to spy on citizens. Or maybe he really really hates the Verizon guy.

(Yes, I realize this incident happened in Australia. Sorry, but I don't know what the mobile phone carriers are there.)

Here's my question: how the hell did he get a hold of an APC in the first place?!? Did an army soldier leave the keys in the vehicle when he stopped to get some coffee? Did the driver leave the emergency lights on to go into his apartment really quickly, because he forgot something? Or is Australia that dangerous, that people are now buying APCs to protect themselves?

Well done, sir.

Random Thoughts, And A Beach Story, Continued

2007-07-16T22:00:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Well, I'm no longer sore all over. A very good night of sleep, and a handful of Tylenol, will do that.

Unfortunately, I woke up this morning with serious knee pain. It hurt so much that I could barely walk on it. And I don't have any pain relief ointment!

Woe is me...

- Damn, I love dried apricots!

I really, really hate Trader Joe's. Such an evil store...

- I'm even richer! Another three clicks and another $2 via Google AdSense today!

Only $87 and I can request a check!

(Maybe I should put up a running tote board of my Google AdSense earnings, kinda like a telethon! We'll call it the "UngsungBlog Webspace Fund.")

I hope I'm not violating any Google AdSense rules by openly discussing my earnings :P

- Continuing with my beach story, from yesterday: Unlike Saturday, we actually arrived at the beach at a decent time (1:00pm). The water was really nice; if I recall correctly, the water temperature was an awesome 66F.

(Now you see why I could spend hours in the water.)

After getting pounded by the brutal waves for an hour, taking a stroll across the beach (the sand was HOT), and repeating ad nauseum, I got a chance to take a short break. Then, we jumped back in the water for a while, strolled across the beach again, played some frisbee, lathered, rinsed, and repeated.

(Tangent: Of all the projectiles out there, why is it that I cannot throw a frisbee??? I can throw a football, I can throw a baseball--I have a mean slider, and a wicked changeup--hell, I could probably throw a javelin well. But there's something about a frisbee that absolutely befuddles me!

I hate frisbees.)

We spent a good four hours at the beach, of which three and a half were spent doing something other than chilling out. Now you see how I woke up in as much pain as I did this morning.

That being said, I wouldn't mind going to the beach again next week.

I had more to talk about, but my knee is still hurting, and I'm sleepy.

Happy blogging!

UngsungB-Day Fun: Can't Stand The Heat? Get Out Of The Kitchen (And Go Eat Out!)

2007-07-15T11:16:00.000-07:00

- If there's one thing I hate about my parents' place in Monterey Park (and trust me, there are a lot!), I hate how hot it gets here!

I should mention that the MPK house is a West-facing house, which is nice in the late morning/early afternoon. Around 2-3pm, though, it gets unberably hot, as the sun shines directly on us. It also makes television watching difficult to enjoy, due to glare.

At around sunset, the entire house gets extremely hot, as the heat absorbed by the walls starts being released. My sister's JVC RA-P10 said that her room temperature last night was 88F, and I thought it was lying; it felt a heck of a lot hotter than that!

The combination of the ultra-hot room, the shut windows--the neighbors around here don't understand what common courtesy is--and my sore legs after yesterday's excursion to the beach caused me to get very little sleep.

Too bad for me; we're heading out to the beach AGAIN today. I better be careful, or I might get sick of the beach eventually.

(Eh, not likely.)

(EDIT: I am so sore from the trip to the beach. Between the constant beating I took from the waves, to the trips across the beach numerous times, I'm hurting. Where the heck is my BenGay?

At least it was very nice and warm there, until 4pm, when the sun finally hid behind some clouds.)

- Ugh, I'm in a serious food coma AGAIN. Trader Joe's is evil, and so is Korean BBQ!

After the trip to the beach, we stopped by Trader Joe's. I walked in, telling myself that I wanted only a single item: a bag of veggie chips.

(Tangent: Veggie chips are chips made out of potatoes, tomatoes, spinach, and I forget what other veggies. I absolutely love these things!)

As usual, I walked out with a few other things: a bag of dried apricots, a bag of banana crisps (think banana chips, but thinner, crispier, and a tad sweeter), some caramel popcorn, those veggie chips, and a bottle of Arizona Green Tea with Ginseng and Honey.

*shakes fist at Trader Joe's*

After the trip to Trader Joe's, we had dinner at Manna Korean BBQ, for the umpteenth time. As usual, we all ate way too much meat, and paid the price for it afterwards. It got so bad that, on the car ride home, everyone nearly fell asleep (driver included!).

I'm sore, in a food coma, and really really tired all over. Zzzzzzz...

I'm Rich, I Love The Beach, And The Creation of Stupid Points

2007-07-14T21:35:00.000-07:00

- So I got an email today, saying that an urgent package was en route to me via DHL Express.

(Before you assume that this is some scam, it is not. It's a package that I was expecting for some time.)

That was nice of the company in question to send me an email regarding the status of my package. Too bad that I had received said package two weeks ago!

It was the thought that counts, right?

- I'm rich! My site is finally making some money, thanks to Google AdSense! W00t!

(Ok fine, so I had a mere two clicks, out of thirteen impressions, which paid a cool $1.91. However, considering that I had earned $6 since I signed up, back in October of last year, I have nothing to complain about. Hey, I just increased my AdSense income by 33%! At this rate, I'll be at a hundred bucks in no time!

I need the money to pay my domain + webspace bills!)

- I love the beach! I could stay in the ocean for hours on end, frolicking (sp?) around, especially when the water is nice and warm.

(Yes, readers, you can totally disregard what I wrote last week. I hate to admit it, but I love the beach.)

It's a shame we got there so late, though; we left the house at almost 2:00pm, thanks to somebody *peers over at the guilty party*. Unlike last week, there was hardly a cloud in the sky, even though it seemed a bit cooler than last week was. The water temperature was absolutely perfect.

We must be crazy, because we're probably going to go back to the beach tomorrow. And there's a possibility that we'll be having some Korean BBQ tomorrow. No word yet on whether or not there's an available bed at my local hospital, for the angioplasty that I'm certainly going to need tomorrow.

- If you've ever watched Whose Line Is It Anyway?, you've seen Drew Carey (or Clive Anderson of the UK series) award points to the players, pointing out that the points don't matter. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I had a particularly bad day, screwing up just about everything I did. It got to the point where I started awarding myself "Stupid Points" (SP) for every foul up I had.

Since then, I have found myself liberally offering SPs to people left and right.

Case in point: I just awarded myself 5,000 SPs because I came home (MPK) with my laptop, sans laptop charger.

Does that mean I hang around stupid people all the time? Definitely not!

Anyway, just like the points in Whose Line...:

The points are just a gag and don't really matter
At the end of the day, the person with the most points wins nothing
The points are completely arbitrary; if one event scores more SPs than another, that doesn't mean the former event is necessarily more idiotic than the latter.

Why did I come up with Stupid Points? Because I live a sad, sad life.

(That last line was not meant to be taken seriously. If you did take it seriously, you just earned 5,000 SPs.)

Happy blogging!

(I nearly misspelled "Happy," which would have been worth 10,000 SPs.)

Self Birthday Present, And I'm Sick of Craigslist

2007-07-13T14:16:00.001-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Have I ever mentioned how evil Amazon Prime is? I've now placed six orders on Prime since signing up!

- So my poor mom had some teeth pulled out earlier today. My sister called me up to let me know that she wasn't feeling too well.

I started sympathizing with her, and then my sister dropped this line on me:

"Yeah, she's worried that she won't be able to go out to eat this Sunday."

Moms...can't live with them, and it's awfully hard to be alive without them.

- So I think I found my self-birthday present: a pair of Oakley RazrWire glasses! I've got a pair that look similar to these, and am pretty happy with them.

(Tangent: I don't recall ever getting an actual gift for my birthday when I was younger; I'd usually get loads of cash, though. It took me a while to realize that, if I wanted a gift, I'd have to purchase one myself. I coined the term "self-birthday present" a few years after coming to that realization.)

Unfortunately, I've got a big head, and my glasses aren't the most comfortable pair for my frame. I only got them because they were dirt cheap (yeah, bad purchasing strategy, I know).

I tried the RazrWire out at the mall a couple weeks ago, and was impressed with how lightweight they were, even with the BlueTooth headset built-in. Most importantly, they felt very snug on my face--the pair I have tend to move around a bit every now and then. I could not believe the MSRP on these glasses, though: $285?!?

$94.99 after a $15 coupon for these glasses? I'm game! The best thing is, even if the BlueTooth headset turns out to be absolute crap, it is also removable.

So...anyone wanna pitch in for my self-birthday gift?

- Craiglist is really starting to piss me off.

(The users, not the site itself, though an unnamed individual might disagree with that statement.)

For the past couple of weeks, I've been getting tons of lowball offers, promises to meet to purchase an item (and not following through), and morons that obviously can't read (I thought eBayers are the only ones that can't read). I long for the days of the different flavors of the 419 scam, such as:

I'll send you a cashier's check for $1000, and you send me $500 back, with my item.
I use this escrow site, and it's SAFE!
I'll send you a Western Union money order (followed by a fake WU money order confirmation).

I wouldn't mind a pathetic "oh, my [relative] is sick, and I need the part! Can you sell it to me for [10% of cost]?"

Stupid Craigslist.

(No, this is not list-worthy.)

Happy blogging!

Logitech Z-4i Speaker Mini Review, And Won Ton Soup Is Delicious, Even In The Summer

2007-07-12T22:32:00.000-07:00

I know, I mentioned Rashard Lewis in yesterday's blog, and never got around to the topic.

My apologies.

(A heads-up to my non-sports-fan readers: the next few blogs will be spent discussing NBA free agent signings, the MLB trading deadline, and tons of other sports topics.

I'll try to sprinkle in a blog about a barbecue every now and then :P)

- So I got a new toy a couple days ago: a Logitech Z-4i speaker system.

I bought these speakers with the intention of reselling them, but after finding out how little of a market there is for these speakers, I decided to try them out. I have not yet regretted the decision.

I should point out that my current speaker system is this cheapy Altec Lansing 2.1 setup, with a paltry 35W RMS (the Z-4is sport an 80W RMS). These Z-4is absolutely blow them away. The Z-4i's subwoofer puts the Altec Lansing's to shame, and I love the wired remote. The wired remote has an on/off switch, a volume control knob--as opposed to up/down volume control buttons on the Altec Lansing--and a number of features absent on the Altec Lansing remote: a bass knob, a headphone jack, and an auxiliary input jack.

If there's one thing to complain about, it's the fact that these speakers are white. I would have preferred black speakers. Oh well. For $29.99 after a $40 rebate, I shouldn't be complaining at all.

In any case, I finally get to get rid of my super crappy 2.1 system--which will be replaced with the Altec Lansing speakers--which probably spits out 0.5W of power :P.

- I made some Won Ton soup today. The broth was made with powdered chicken bouillon, garlic, chopped onion, ground black pepper, and a touch of soy sauce (yes, soy sauce and chicken bouillon seem redundant in the salty department, I realize). The meat was just ground pork, black pepper, and soy sauce.

(Tangent: My mom insists on using ground pork tenderloin for the filling. I don't care to use $3/lb meat, especially if it's going to be ground up and used for soup. Every time I see her approach a butcher, order a cut of pork tenderloin, and then ask the butcher to ground it up, I cry a little. I'm sure the butcher agrees with me.)

Anyway, the one thing I hate about making Won Ton soup is the preparation. Someone (Ron Popeil?) needs to invent an automatic Won Ton maker!

Damn...I could go for some more soup right about now.

Happy blogging!

Dangers of Refilling a Laser Printer Cartridge

2007-07-11T19:32:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Apparently lots of people found my blog via a Google search of "Pat Benatar" and the "Alhambra Summer Jubilee."

(It wouldn't surprise me if my sister was responsible for all of those hits.)

This saturday, Kool & The Gang will be performing. I haven't yet decided if I'm going to attend.

- We've had two straight overcast days here in Tarzana. I can't believe I'm going to say this, but I miss the hot weather!

- I don't know what's worse: the stupid dog that keeps barking outside my window, or the idiot neighbor that has never heard of an "indoor voice."

- About a year ago, I refilled the toner cartridge in my Samsung ML-2010 laser printer.

(Tangent: It's actually a piece of cake to refill this cartridge. All you have to do is remove two screws, pop off a plastic cap, and pour the toner into the cartridge. Fill, cap, re-attach the screws, wait a few minutes, then run a couple test prints, and you're done!

It's very difficult to screw this up, but as you shall see, I found a way to screw up.)

Unfortunately, while finishing up the refill, I dropped the cartridge, denting the drum in several places. I kept using the printer, anyway, because it still printed well (if I ignored the white spots where the dents on the drum were).

Today, I got an empty Samsung ML-2010 printer cartridge in the mail, with the intention of pouring in the toner from the dented cartridge into this brand new one. I had a plan: I would use a paper funnel (made out of a 24#, 8.5x11" sheet of paper, heavily taped to make sure that the toner wouldn't spill anywhere), latex gloves, and I would do this all in my bathtub, in case of a major spill.

Needless to say, my idea was disastrous. I got toner dust all over my bathtub, and the paper funnel didn't work nearly as well as I expected it to. The transfer also took a heck of a lot longer than I expected it to (those ML-2010 cartridges sure hold a lot of toner!). Oh well, I needed to clean my bathtub anyway.

After the transfer of toner and the reassembly of the cartridge, I gently shook the cartridge back and forth a few times to loosen any stray toner. I also had to very gently clean the drum, as some toner dust found its way there. After all that, I did a few test prints, and to my utter amazement, it worked quite well! There are still a couple minute spots on the printouts, but it was not nearly as bad as the old, dented cartridge.

By the way, is it bad that I'm coughing up black powder? Someone please remind me to wear a mask the next time I even consider refilling another cartridge.

I had another topic I wanted to get to (unfortunately, it was sports-related), but I'll save it for tomorrow. Happy blogging!

iPod Shuffles Are Ridiculous, Interesting "Scam," and People Should BBQ Everyday

2007-07-10T19:52:00.000-07:00

So I've got half a watermelon in front of me, and a big spoon.

Who wants to bet that I'll finish off the watermelon by the end of this blog entry?

(The watermelon has been refrigerated, making it even more tempting to finish.)

- I got a brand new toy in the mail today!

(Brand new to me, that is.)

It's an iPod Shuffle!

(It's really my sister's, but I get to play with it first.)

It's pretty interesting how Apple integrated the dock connector into the headphone jack, which also serves to charge the Shuffle. Also, the on/off and shuffle switches are located on the bottom of the Shuffle, while the headphone jack is located on the top. I would have liked a scroll wheel on the Shuffle, but then I realized how unnecessary that would be (considering that the Shuffle does not have a display on it).

I am amazed at how ridiculously small the Shuffle is! Clipped on, I could barely feel the Shuffle on my shirt.

(Off topic: I just got started on that watermelon. I probably won't come anywhere close to finishing it by the end of this blog. Maybe that's a good thing.)

I'm wondering when Apple will create the iPod pico. I can't wait for them to release an iPod that is embedded into your skull, powered by intracellular reactions, and with built-in WiFi for transfer of music.

- (from Consumerist) Here's a typical "scam" that's out there today: you cash a check, which enrolls you in a trial membership with some discount membership/credit protector/etc. After xx days, if you don't cancel, you get charged a monthly fee.

(I say "scam" in quotes because, most of the time, the companies make it fairly obvious that you will be charged after the free trial period. It's up to the consumer to cancel the subscription before the trial ends.)

So what's so interesting about this particular "scam?" Well, it costs $119 for the first year, and $129 thereafter. For your money, here's what you get:

2% cash back on up to $5,000 in purchases ($100)
$40 in "seasonal" coupons for use on gas and groceries ($10 each)
"Prearranged deals and discounts," which are essentially useless these days (with all the deal sites out there)

So for $119 in year one, and $129 every year thereafter, you have the privilege of earning up to $140 every year! And check out the wording on the cash back refund: "You can look forward to receiving a check for up to $100.00 each year you keep your refund privileges." Sounds like you only get the check if you keep the service active for at least one year...

If making $20 off your $120 (and $10 off your $130 after year one) is your idea of a hot deal, then by all means, go ahead and sign up!

(Oh yeah, I completely forgot about the $9.25 check you get when you initially sign up @@).

- Last night, I grilled rib eye steaks (what else is new?), roma tomatoes, and had a tossed salad and some mashed potatoes and gravy. Unfortunately, my steak was a tad overcooked, and by a tad overcooked, I mean it was medium instead of medium-rare. My sister's steak was perfect, though; a pretty reddish-pink interior, and extremely juicy.

(Off topic: All-Star game color commentator Tim McCarver just said that, if anyone needs a big bat in their lineup, it's the San Diego Padres, because their pitching staff is excellent. Hey moron, what about the Dodgers?)

(Off topic #2: I just found this site, via a Google search for "Tim McCarver." LOL!!!)

The tomatoes were unbelievably tasty too.

I plan on BBQing again, later this week; I've got tons of chicken wings and beef short ribs in the freezer. All I need is some asparagus and some more tomatoes, and I'll be set.

If only I could BBQ every day.

That's all I've got for now.

Google Analytics Fun, I Hate The Beach, and ESPN's Coverage of The Home Run Derby

2007-07-09T12:10:00.000-07:00

- Time for some Google Analytics fun!

For the previous week (July 1-July 7), the #1 keyword hit on my site was "Kevin Hain."

(For those of you that don't know who Kevin Hain is, he's the "Escalations Supervisor" of CrapUSSR. Here's my rant on Mr. Hain and CompUSA from almost two weeks ago.)

I wonder if Mr. Hain actually Googles his own name and reads what people are saying about him. If he is, hello Kevin! *waves*

Other common keywords from the past week:

Tammie "I am not a monster" Garlin
Time Warner (naturally)
Citibank (naturally)
BigCrumbs.com

- I hate the beach. I really do. I'm not even sure why I keep going back.

Maybe it's the temperatures in the mid 70s. Maybe it's the warm sand, or the crisp, lukewarm water. Or maybe it's the sights and sounds of the beach (emphasis on "sights," if you know what I mean).

Anyway, I hate the beach. If there's even a little bit of sunshine, I'll get sunburned, no matter how much sunblock I use. I could probably use an entire bottle and still end up medium rare. And don't get me started on the waves; they were absolutely brutal yesterday.

(Yes, yesterday's return trip to the beach was much better than the day before. The sun was out, even though it was still pretty cloudy, and the water was very comfortable.)

I hate the beach. That being said, I think I'll go back next weekend...

- ESPN aired the MLB Home Run Derby today, and Vladimir Guerrero took the crown in an anti-climatic final round against Alex Rios. A few thoughts:

I picked Prince Fielder to win. Nice job showing up.
My sister picked Albert Pujols to win. I thought he was going to win for sure, watching him effortlessly smack homers in his second round. Too bad he ended up a single homer short.
Hey ESPN, next year, how about more Erin Andrews, and less Peter Gammons?
Speaking of ESPN, their coverage of the Derby was awful. If you're going to interview Bonds and A-Fraud, could you have the decency to do so between hitters, and not during a hitter's round? By the way, why did ESPN need six hosts for the Derby (the three at the stadium, and the three on the Baseball Tonight studio)? Last I checked, this was the freaking Home Run Derby!

Eh, who am I kidding? The Home Run Derby is still leaps and bounds better than any pre-all-star game event that the NBA or NHL showcases.

I BBQ'ed again today, and yes, I'm in a food coma. Details tomorrow.

Happy blogging!

Day At The Beach Ruined, And Pat Benatar In Concert

2007-07-08T11:06:00.000-07:00

- So we decided to head out to Dockweiler Beach today, in an attempt to escape the valley heat.

Bad idea, but not for the reason you might have expected.

As soon as we reached LAX, the sun decided to disappear behind a slew of clouds. When we finally arrived at the beach, the winds and the lack of sun made the weather unbearable. Never mind the fact that the water was COLD, so much so that we didn't spend more than a few minutes in the ocean itself. To keep warm, we started jogging back and forth in the sand.

(Tangent: I forgot how hard it is to run on the beach, and it doesn't help that I'm not exactly at a high fitness level.)

We only spent a couple of hours on the beach--most of us were napping or reading a book--before we decided to pack up and leave. That was money well spent, eh?

So what does one do when a trip to the beach gets ruined by a lack of sunshine? Easy! One goes to the beach again the next day! No word yet on which beach we will be going to...

- After the trip to the beach, we went to Alhambra's Summer Jubilee to see Pat Benatar in concert! In short, the concert was quite an enjoyable experience*.

* - except for the following:

the idiots occupying two rows in front of me, tossing popcorn at each other, crying because the ushers were only doing their job, talking and giggling throughout the concert, and basically not giving a damn about people around them. Did I mention they had two little kids with them, who did nothing but squirt water and toss popcorn at each other, and the adults? By the way, the adults were also throwing popcorn at each other.
one woman in said group that wore a backless shirt, when she really shouldn't have (if you know what I mean)
another, ahem, "heroically portly" woman who kept leaning backwards, jabbing my knee every five seconds
the #1 Pat Benatar fan screaming "Sing Heartbreaker!" after every freaking song, and then screaming "Sing Heartbreaker!" even after Benatar sang it.

Benatar sang a bunch of songs I've never heard of, but she also sang Invincible (awesomely good, btw), We Belong, and Hit Me With Your Best Shot.

(Tangent: I should mention that a song can only be considered "awesomely good" by me if I've actually heard it before.)

Of course, at the end, she sang "Love Is A Battlefield" to the delight of the crowd. Yes, that was awesomely good too.

With regards to the morons in the stands: all we needed was a beach ball, a fight in the stands, overwhelmed security guards, a USC v UCLA debate, and a "Joan Jett sucks!" chant, and the experience would have matched that of an LA Dodger game in the cheap seats. Any true Dodger fan knows exactly what I'm talking about.

(I know, what should I have expected from a free concert?)

That's all for today. Happy blogging!

Time Warner Rant, More Overused Word Discussion

2007-07-07T11:16:00.000-07:00

Yep, another scorcher today. I think a trip to the beach is in order.

(I have to fill myself up with coffee before I leave, though. I was up until 4am this morning, playing random songs on my Winamp playlist, and singing to them. I started this "game" at about 11pm, and didn't realize that five hours had passed until I looked up at my living room clock.

Oh, how time flies when you're having fun!)

- Citibank still sucks. I am still without my brand new card that I was promised three weeks ago. Usually, Citibank sends me a new card BEFORE I get the welcome kit, so I wonder what the delay is.

I need a new TV, dammit.

(This card, as I stated before, includes Extended Warranty coverage and a Price Protection Guarantee. Knowing the high fail rates of lower-tier TVs AND how precipitously they drop in price, both benefits would be nice to have on the purchase of a brand new TV.

Besides, this Sceptre TV is really pissing me off. I know, I know, why don't I just go return it NOW? If I did that, what would I do in the meantime sans TV?)

- This Time Warner packet shaping is getting ridiculous.

(Yes, I know I mentioned that it had not yet affected me. Clearly, it has now.)

I was downloading podcasts of The Jim Rome Show last night--a perfectly legitimate use of my bandwidth, no? With a 5Mbps download rate, it would not be unreasonable for me to expect a download speed somewhere around 300-400kB/s. Yet, I was lucky to reach 70kB/s, and this was at 11:00pm (not exactly peak hours)!

I'm here in Monterey Park right now, using AT&T DSL, and even on a 1.5/384 connection, I'm getting nearly 250kB/s down! In fact, I'll let the Speedtest.net results speak for themselves:

(Tangent: I believe this is the first picture I've ever included in a blog entry! Hooray for me!)

I can only dream of seeing these speeds on Time Warner during "peak" hours, if by peak hours, I mean from 12:01AM to 11:59PM, of course.

Thank you, Time Warner, for making me a more satisfied customer by packet shaping the hell out of my internet connection. You're still #1 on the list, for sure!

- So the "most overused word in English" discussion prompted more of a debate than I originally anticipated. A few bonus thoughts on the topic:

One thing that I really tried to emphasize is that I wanted the most unnecessarily overused word in the English language, which is why I ruled out articles, pronouns, and most verbs. I was looking for a word that is too often inserted into written and spoken English, often unnecessarily. That's why the word "that" came to mind. For example, I could have rewritten a previously written statement like this:

I was looking for a word too often inserted into written and spoken English...

Doesn't that retain the original meaning of the sentence, even without the words "that is?"

Hank's got a good point with the word "and," though. I'd agree that "and" is pretty overused (especially in lists, e.g. "I like cake, and pie, and cheesecake, and..."), but probably not to the extent that "that" is horribly overused.

Maybe more on this later. For now, keep the suggestions coming!

Happy blogging!

UngsungBlog, Random Thoughts Edition: Heat Sucks, Amazon Prime is Evil, And The Most Overused Word In English?

2007-07-06T18:11:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm aware that I still have not yet posted part 2 of my poker story. No, it will not appear in this blog.

I'm pretty sure it'll show up somewhere between now and 2009, though. :P

- I called my mom earlier today, and got her voicemail. She returned my call, and shouted "Happy Birthday!"

Too bad my birthday is still nine days away. It was the thought that counts, right?

- Accuweather.com says that it was about 85F today.

The RealFeel temp, though, was a crisp, cool, 99F.

I think it's time to go visit my relatives in Vancouver. Or maybe I should spend the weekend at a bookstore or a library. Free A/C + literature + (in the case of a bookstore) iced coffee FTW!

(Tangent: I went to Borders a couple days ago, and while I was there, I ordered a "ColdBrewed Vanilla Latte." Two complaints: one, the "ColdBrewed" coffee seemed to be nothing more than a pitcher of coffee stored in their refrigerator, leading me to suspect that "ColdBrewed" meant "instant coffee mixed with water and refrigerated"; two, my receipt, for some reason, was about two feet long, for one cup of coffee! Circuit City thinks that Borders is wasting paper with that long of a receipt.

(Sub-tangent (?): Why is the shortened version of refrigerator fridge? I'm going to revolt, and start spelling it "frige" from now on.)

Ooooh...my first ever tangent-within-a-tangent! One day, I'm going to have a blog entry full of nothing but sub-tangents. I suspect that it will go about five levels before I either finish the thread, or pass out from the headache.

- Amazon Prime is absolutely evil, in the same way that Costco is evil.

(Tangent: For those of you that don't know, Amazon Prime gives you free second-day shipping on any item that is offered by Amazon. It costs $79 a year, but you can share the subscription with up to four people in your household. Assuming it costs $10 to upgrade each order you make from free Super Saver shipping to second day, you'll get your money's worth with just eight orders.)

At the rate I'm going, I'll blitz through those eight orders in the next two weeks. I've had the service for about a week now, and I have already placed three separate orders. And I'm about ready to place a fourth one. And I almost placed a fifth.

(Did I mention that I've had Amazon Prime for about a week?)

Damn you, Amazon *shakes fist*!!!

(Actually, damn the unnamed individual who wanted to share his Amazon Prime account in the first place *shakes fist*. I wonder if I can file a lawsuit, citing "psychological and financial pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, and emotional suffering.")

(Warning: the following may contain grammar-like substances. You have been warned.)

- Over my lunch of spaghetti and homemade meat sauce, I was thinking to myself, "What word, that is often used, is the most overused word in the English language"? I figured that I would rule out all pronouns and articles (a, an, the). Then I started slashing the list down considerably; I figured that the most overused word in the English language could not be a verb; even though "to be" and its conjugated forms are quite often overused, I could not say that "to be" is the most overused word out there.

After kicking some words around in my head for a few minutes, I arrived at the answer that I'm going to stick to. The most overused word in the English language? The word "that." Just look at how many times I used it in the last two paragraphs! The word "thing" would probably have come second, but I'm sticking to my answer.

I did an awful lot of research on this subject matter, by the way, browsing through lots of grammar-related sites. By the way, I am not a grammar Nazi, if that's what you're thinking.

(Oh look! I just used "that" again!)

Happy blogging!

Name All The U.S. Presidents, Hot Dog Eating Championship

2007-07-05T20:44:00.000-07:00

- Apparently BigCrumbs.com charges a 2% "processing fee" when sending commission payments out to members. From the FAQ:

Yes. A processing fee of 2% of the payment amount with a $1.00 cap will be deducted from each payment that we send to you.
This is the fee that PayPal charges BigCrumbs.com. We do not make money from this fee.

I never knew that it costs money to send money via PayPal. Drat! There goes $0.16 off my commission payment! :P

At least BigCrumbs.com is quick with crediting me for a purchase. The longest they took to credit me for a transaction was a week. I can't say that about the other cash back sites I currently use.

- (from Digg) Can you name all 43 U.S. Presidents?

I didn't come close. I got 28 correct out of 43--even less, when you consider that typing in "Adams" or "Bush" earns you two points each--and there were a few gimmies I completely missed (how in the world I forgot about Dwight D. Eisenhower is beyond me).

I'm ashamed of myself. Either that, or I didn't care to remember the names of every freaking President. In fact, I don't recall ever having to do this in school!

Now, if the test was to name all fifty states and their capitals, that's a different story. I could probably do THAT in ten minutes.

- USA! USA! USA! The reigning six-time Nathan's Hot Dog eating championship, Takeru Kobayashi, has gone down to American Joey Chestnut! Chestnut downed a record 66 hot dogs and buns en route to the title of "Biggest Glutton."

In a gut-busting showdown that combined drama, daring and indigestion, Joey Chestnut emerged Wednesday as the world's hot dog eating champion, knocking off six-time winner Takeru Kobayashi in a rousing yet repulsive triumph.

Well written, I must say. No, I did not get up early this morning to watch the event. And no, I don't know if it aired on ESPN-HD. All I know is that we can put this victory alongside the USA Hockey team's triumph of 1980, Kirk Gibson's home run in the 1988 World Series, Michael Jordan's "Shot" in 1998, and New England's upset victory over the Rams in the 2002 Super Bowl.

(Tangent: Ugh, that last statement made me throw up a little in my mouth.)

I have a feeling that the author of the article had lots of fun writing it; just check out the last paragraph:

The two gustatory gladiators quickly distanced themselves from the rest of the 17 competitors, processing more beef than a slaughterhouse within the first few minutes. The two had each downed 60 hot dogs with 60 seconds to go when Chestnut, the veins on his forehead extended, put away the final franks to end Kobayashi's reign.

The writer makes the event sound more exciting than the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl! Damn, now I wish I woke up early enough to catch the event live! Oh well, that's what SportsCenter is for, right?

(If it isn't painfully clear, I have ZERO interest in watching the highlights, or a taped broadcast, of the "event.")

That's it for today. Happy blogging!

NBA Free Agent Talk: Rashard Lewis, Chauncey Billups, And The Lakers' Big Signing

2007-07-04T02:15:00.000-07:00

(This blog entry needs to be posted now, for I don't know when I'll have a chance to post it on Wednesday. I'll probably be out late, or in a serious food coma, or a combination of both. Lunch time BBQ + dinner time BBQ + snacking on leftovers in between = certain death!

Gluttony on holidays FTMFW! What can I say? I'm "heroically portly" [thanks Hank].)

Happy Fourth of July!

Accuweather.com reports that the RealFeel temperature will be 95F tomorrow in Agoura Hills, and a cool 100F in Monterey Park. It's a good thing I won't be doing any of the actual cooking tomorrow. Although...maybe I could sweat off a few pounds before each meal.

(Time for some NBA talk, with the official start of free agency right around the corner!)

- Rashard Lewis will leave Seattle, after agreeing to a 5-year deal worth somewhere between $75 million and $85 million. Fifteen million a year for Rashard Lewis? Not to mention, signing Lewis probably costs Orlando the services of Darko Milicic. Yeah, Lewis a nice player--you can't teach 6'10", right?--with a nice shooting stroke, but does a Jameer Nelson-Rashard Lewis-Dwight Howard core get Orlando close to championship contention? I'd say no. I can't see Lewis or Turkoglu playing SG (replacing Grant Hill, who will probably go to Detroit), and the Magic have a woefully thin bench. Lewis should, however, cause teams to double team Howard less, and Howard's gotta be happy with that.

One other concern: will Orlando be willing to extend both Howard and Nelson? Of course Howard will get a max extension. But will they be able to extend Nelson, and have enough cap space to get veteran help for the Nelson-Lewis-Howard trio? Also, is Orlando really ready to give up on Darko after one year and a lost draft pick?

Clearly, Orlando is overpaying for Rashard Lewis, and I'm not sure how happy Orlando will be with their investment.

- An earlier report stated that Chauncey Billups and the Detroit Pistons had agreed to a 5-year deal worth $60 million, but Billups' agent called the report a "vicious rumor."

(Tangent: Wow! I didn't know that "invalid" was a synonym for "vicious." There goes my rant asking about how vicious a $60 million contract signing could possibly be!)

That being said, Detroit has to get this deal done. Personally, I think $12 million a year is too excessive for the guy--he's still living off his performance in the 2004 Finals, after all. However, the Pistons absolutely need Billups, if they plan on contending for a title next year.

As an aside, I don't see how Grant Hill helps this team that much. He's not going to crack the starting rotation, unless Rip Hamilton leaves the team, and I'm not sure I'd pay the mid-level exception for a sixth man with injury risks.

- Finally, Kobe Bryant is getting help, as the Lakers made a huge free agent signing!

(Ok, ok, Luke Walton isn't huge at all :P)

Has Kobe bought a house in another major city yet?

Thank You Chase, And Pillaging Rite Aid

2007-07-03T21:53:00.000-07:00

So I got a nice, big, bubble mailer yesterday. It was a package shipped from Buy.com.

Nothing special about a bubble mailer, right? You're right. Unless that bubble mailer arrived to me unsealed.

Yes, somehow, some moron at Buy.com forgot to seal the envelope, which contained a pair of software titles. The only thing holding the bubble mailer together was a piece of USPS "This parcel arrived damaged and we're not responsible for any damage to the packet" tape.

Well done, Buy.com. You have cemented your spot on my list.

- We have a new addition to my list! Congrats, Chase!

(Background: I like to my off my credit cards as soon as possible. Sometimes, I'll make the payment the same day that the online statement is released. I'd rather pay a credit card really early than risk missing the due date and incurring a late fee.

When paying off a Chase card online, you have four options: paying the statement balance, paying the minimum payment, paying the current balance [statement balance + any charges made after the statement closed], and paying some other amount.)

Yesterday, I logged into my Chase account to pay my Chase Freedom Visa card. I went over the online statement, and noticed a finance charge!

(It was a $1 charge, but still!)

I quickly glanced over the statement, and noticed that the amount I paid was exactly the same amount as the statement balance of the previous statement, not the one that was due. I then clicked on "Pay Card," and noted that the listed statement balance was equal to last month's statement balance!

I called Chase to report this site error, and was referred to Chase's Internet Services department (or something like that). All they told me was that I should wait 3-4 business days after the statement is due before paying my statement. Fantastic...instead of fixing their problem, I have to inconvenience myself by waiting to pay off the credit card each month on their terms.

I know, I know...what a weak rant!

- I love Rite Aid. Single Check Rebates + coupons FTW! Having two addresses to file SCRs? Even better! I went there with my sister, and we picked up a whole bunch of cheap stuff. I got two tubes of Crest toothpaste for MMAR (Make Money After Rebate), two bottles of hair gel @ BOGO (buy one, get one free), and two bottles of Pantene for a buck a bottle.

(Tangent: I have no problem using "women's" shampoo. Aside from the smell, as long as it does a good job, I don't care. And Pantene's a good shampoo, is it not?)

Ice cream was also $1.99 a box, so I couldn't refuse. I got some mint chocolate chip, and a box of cones to go with it. My sister got some FAR deodorant, a bottle of some shampoo, and a bottle of some conditioner. She couldn't pass up ice cream either :P

All that junk for $20 and change, after the rebates. Not bad!

Excuse me while I go take a shower...

Food Coma-tosis, Take Two (Part Two): Hot Pot Goodness, And The Thieving Aunt

2007-07-02T23:03:00.001-07:00

Wow, the Accuweather RealFeel temperature today was supposed to be 99F.

It sure as heck felt a lot hotter than that! And it's only early July!

Is it safe to sleep in a bathtub full of ice cubes?

- Before I get started, prayers need to go out to Derek Fisher, his young daughter, and his family. Fisher requested, and was subsequently released, by the Utah Jazz, in order to seek medical care for his 11-month-old daughter. If you recall, his daughter has retinoblastoma, a serious, and rare, cancer of the eye.

Good luck, D-Fish, and let's hope you are able to return to the league real soon, after your daughter beats this horrible disease.

- One other note: that Russell Martin guy is pretty good, no? Four more hits today! M-V-P!

- So after sweltering through the Wat Thai, we went to 99 Ranch, to get some stuff for a Hot Pot.

(Tangent: Why, oh why, did we have a Hot Pot on such a hot day? Because we're stupid?)

99 Ranch, btw, has an awesome drink bar. Their watermelon juice slushie-thingy is to die for! We spent a good hour and a half at the supermarket--grocery shopping when it's really hot is always fun--picking up all the ingredients we needed for the dinner: thinly sliced chuck steak, enoki mushrooms, beef meatballs, shrimp, spinach, watercress, rice noodles, tripe (ewwwwww), bean curd, and the soup base.

The food was good, as usual, though we were all sweating by the end of the meal. We had the A/C on full blast, and that didn't help much. It also didn't help that we all badly overate--we're a bunch of gluttons, I know! As usual, we bought way too much stuff; there was probably enough food to feed ten more people!

When my sister, mom, and aunt were ready to leave, I demanded that they take some of the groceries back. My mom took a couple of items, and my aunt didn't want anything. I insisted that most of the food would be tossed eventually--we were never going to be able to finish it all--and said to just take whatever.

Big mistake...my aunt decided to take just about everything she got her hands on. She ended up filling about three grocery bags full of stuff she didn't really want (so she said). At that point, I started cracking jokes about her wanting to take my wallet, my laptop, my sister's cell phone, etc. She ended up talking about 2/3 of the leftovers we had!!!

An hour after they left, I then realized that she didn't even pay for any of the groceries!!!

Damn my family...full of freaking freeloaders!

It's really hot, and I need some ice cream, assuming my aunt didn't take that too. Happy blogging!

Food Coma-tosis, Take Two (Part One): Burning Heat, And Street Signs Are Suggestions

2007-07-01T22:07:00.000-07:00

So, today was quite an event-filled day. I've got (yet another) food coma, so let's hope I can get through this blog entry.

(Yeah, the poker story is going to have to wait another day.)

- My sisters, my mom, my aunt, and I had lunch at the Wat Thai, where we enjoyed skewered pork and chicken, papaya salad, noodle soup, and I ordered a plate of Pad Thai, which was a bit dry. As you shall see later, I should probably have passed on lunch.

(Tangent: My sister bought a couple bags of noodles that could be best described as "Pad Thai-in-a-bag": noodles with a Pad Thai seasoning packet. I hope it makes a decent dish, even though I don't have any bean sprouts.)

By the way, Accuweather.com reported the RealFeel weather for today at 92F. There is no way that it felt like 92F today. It had to be at least 100F today, if not higher. It was HOT.

- On the way out of the Wat Thai, I noticed a bunch of cars trying to park on Coldwater Canyon Blvd. There was a single "No Parking" sign there, and a bunch of workers (named Wat Thai Monitors) were on the street, notifying people of the sign. One moron, apparently, argued with a Monitor over the validity of the sign. Although I didn't hear their conversation, it was pretty clear that the guy was intent on parking there; after a five-minute discussion or so (we're slow walkers), we noticed that the moron went ahead and parked there anyway.

This got me thinking: Is there a more black-or-white street sign than "No Parking?" I mean, you could argue with a cop if you ran a red light, saying that it was yellow when you went through the intersection. But other than "oh, I didn't see the sign, because it was blocked by trees," how else could you argue a No Parking sign? Last I checked, the sign didn't say "No Parking, please." I'm now convinced that all street signs/lights/indicators in the state of California have an implied "please" at the end of them (Stop, please; Yield, please; Speed Limit 65, please; etc.).

My head hurts, so this story will continue tomorrow. One quick rant, though: Diet Pepsi is absolutely disgusting! I thought it would taste pretty good--I like Pepsi more than Coke, so I figured that Diet Pepsi would be better than Diet Coke. Boy, was I wrong!

(Note to self: avoid buying Diet Pepsi again, at all costs!)

Tomorrow: no poker (:P), Hot Pot goodness (why we were eating this on such a hot day is anyone's guess), and my freeloading aunt (:P)...as well as whatever else I happen to stumble upon.

Happy blogging!

Hours Wasted for Little Gain, And Do You Make These Mistakes When You Write?

2007-06-30T19:52:00.000-07:00

- Quick thought: does it count as "found money" (you know, like when you find $20 in your jeans pocket right before doing the laundry) when you receive a rebate check for an item you purchased, but you completely forgot that you filed in the first place?

I think so. I just "found" a $10 rebate check today! W00t!

- Don't you hate it when you spend hours trying to get something to work, and then you realize that you're not going to get anywhere close to a full return on investment once the darn thing works?

Yeah, me too.

I've been trying to get this K-World PVR-TV2800U working on any of my four computers. I got this thing working before, about a year ago, but that was on a laptop that I no longer own.

(Tangent: Why am I doing this? To tell you the truth, I'm not sure. In fact, I forgot I had this thing until I dug it out of my junk computer part drawer. I guess I couldn't resist the challenge...)

To put it bluntly, getting this thing to work was an absolute nightmare. First of all, the K-World drivers are known to be awful; they crash a lot, and that's assuming you can even get the drivers properly installed. Even with the drivers installed, it seems that there's a good chance that the hardware won't even start up properly (which is exactly what happened to me).

I used four different versions of the driver for this piece of crap...er...hardware: the version included with the item (it took me a while just to locate the CD), and three others I found online. I tried all four versions, even uninstalling and rebooting before I installed a new version, and I got nowhere!

Several HOURS later (5,000 points to me for being stubborn enough to stick to the project), I ran into some trouble with an installation step; at this point, I had no idea which version of the driver I was using. I was forced to reboot, and somehow, someway, the darn thing worked!

(Of course, right?)

Several hours invested, and I'm not 100% sure why I wanted to install this piece of garbage in the first place. All I know for sure is that I'm never going to get enough utility out of the device to warrant investing as much time as I did trying to get it to work.

- (thanks Krunk) Here's a list of seven "nasty" grammatical errors that commonly befall bloggers.

(This is actually the second list; the first list can be found here.)

The errors:

- Loose v. Lose: I can't stand it when people screw this up!
- Me, Myself, and I (using I instead of me): Guilty. I've done this on occasion.
- Different than vs. Different from: Ditto.
- Improper Use of the Apostrophe: Jim Lampley, guest hosting on The Jim Rome Show, said it best, in regards to the misuse of apostrophes. Paraphrasing, he said that if the misuse of apostrophes might as well lead to anarchy and the total destruction of society.

(Yeah, a bit of a stretch there...)

- Parallelism (verb forms/tenses): Guilty. All the freaking time, at that.
- i.e. v e.g.: Guilty, though I try to minimize my errors using these terms simply by not using them whenever I can.
- Could of, would of, should of: I cannot believe people actually make this mistake! These errors rile me up more than the rest of the list combined!!!

In poker, when you go hand after hand without getting much, you're considered card-dead. I guess you can say I'm word-dead.

Until next time.

Citibank Nearly Screwed Me Over, Hours Wasted For Little Utility, And Some NBA Draft Thoughts

2007-06-29T22:53:00.000-07:00

- Citibank notified me, about a month ago, that they were upgrading my existing Citibank Dividend Platinum Select (1% cash back, 2% at supermarkets, drugstores, gas stations, convenience stores, and utilities including cable) to a Citi Dividend World MasterCard (same as above, but with Retail Purchase Protection, Extended Warranty, and Price Protection). To do this, they had to close my existing account and issue a new card, with a new account number.

That was all fine and dandy, but they closed my account on the same day that my cell phone bill was to be auto-paid! Fortunately, I found that out early enough in the day to make a payment with another credit card.

Worse, Citi told me that I would get a new card within two weeks of the closure of the old account. Two weeks passed, and I got a package in the mail from Citibank. It was my "welcome kit," containing a ton of documentation, but no credit card! It turns out, the welcome kit said that I would be getting my card in another week or so! Of course, I find this out one day before my cable bill was to be auto-paid.

Thanks, Citibank.

- So the NBA Draft was held yesterday, and there are some clear winners, as well as clear losers. Since I'm in a bit of a food coma--Korean BBQ, again--here are my quick thoughts about the draft results.

Even though I predicted it a couple of days ago, I was a bit surprised that Atlanta took Horford and Law at #3 and #11, respectively. That being said, I don't blame Atlanta for not trading these two picks for Amare Stoudemire, as rumored. I'd take my chances with Horford, who should be a double-double machine, and Law, who should be the Hawks' starting PG for years to come.
Boston, what were you thinking? You'd rather have a 32-year-old, injury prone shooting guard (even if it IS Ray Allen) than the #5 pick (Brewer? Noah? Yi?)? Yeah, you got Seattle to take Wally off your hands, but you also threw in Delonte West?!? At least you guys also got Glen Davis, right?
I like the Zach Randolph trade...for Portland. They needed to clear the logjam up front, they got rid of a locker room cancer in the process, and they got Channing Frye as well! Yeah, they had to take on Steve "Chemistry Killer" Francis as well, but they could just buy out his deal. Meanwhile, I thought Isiah was done taking on bad contracts and poisonous (to a team's chemistry) players.
The Jason Richardson to Charlotte deal is great for Golden State. I thought it was terrible at first, but the more I thought about it, the more impressed I was by the deal. They get an interesting prospect in Brandan Wright, they no longer have to (over)pay for Jason Richardson, and they get a $10 million trade exception! Could a KG-to-GS deal be in the works? Not likely, but one can dream, right? Meanwhile, at least Charlotte now has a big time player on their roster otherwise filled with young players.
I can't believe the Clippers got Al Thornton. I can't believe Julian Wright fell all the way to New Orleans.
I can't believe Aaron Afflalo actually got drafted in the first round. Same with Alando Tucker.
I can't believe Gabe Pruitt, Marcus Williams, Nick Fazekas, and Glen Davis dropped into the second round. I also can't believe some GM didn't pick Josh McRoberts in the first round.

Of course, the really BIG draft story is the Los Angeles Lakers! They got a superstar guard in the making, a superstar Chinese player, and Gasol!

(OK, so that superstar guard in the making is years away from doing anything, AND he can't shoot. In addition, the Chinese player is NOT Yi, and the Gasol is Pau's younger, fatter brother, Marc.)

How has Kobe not issued a YouTube-exclusive video, totally trashing the entire Laker organization? Why didn't the Lakers take a flyer on Jason Smith in the first round? How about Chris Richard out of Florida instead of Sun Yue? And Marc Gasol? They might as well have gone for Aaron Gray.

The Lakers better hurry and trade Kobe, or they're only going to get 30 cents on the dollar in any Kobe trade.

More draft thoughts to come later, as they come to me. Damn food coma.

That's all for today.

A Nine Day Weekend, (I've Got) Too Much TV On My Hands, And A Competitive Eating Injury

2007-06-28T22:27:00.000-07:00

It looks like the second half of my poker story might have to wait another day, as well as my NBA Draft Thoughts.

Hell, that could be two separate blog entries.

(I suppose my readers that aren't sports fans will like that.)

BTW, I just realized that the Fourth of July is going to be on a Wednesday this year! I can't wait! Barbecues, fireworks, booze, tons of food, and family (I guess).

Also, since the Fourth is going to be on a Wednesday, that means employers will have to deal with seven straight business days of little or no productivity:

* We all know nobody does any real work on Fridays.
* The same goes for Mondays.
* Next Tuesday precedes the Fourth, so workers will treat that as a Friday.
* Thursday follows the Fourth, so that is like a Monday.
* Then, of course, there's Friday, and the following Monday.

In that case, enjoy the nine-way "weekend" :P

- I've got so many TV shows to watch! In no particular order, here is the list: CSI Season 7, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit (yeah, one day, I plan on watching ALL episodes of this show), The Riches, and Psych. Worse, that list will probably grow as I continue to find shows to add.

Too many shows, and not nearly enough time to watch everything. Maybe I should just stop sleeping.

(It IS a nine day weekend, after all...)

- So the reigning Nathan's International Hot Dog Eating Champion, Takeru Kobayashi, is doubtful with an arthritic jaw (or, if this was a for a football game, his injury would read Kobayashi (doubtful, jaw)).

I don't know what the best part of this story is. Is it the fact that there's speculation that Kobayashi is ducking his biggest "rival," Joey Chestnut? Is it the fact that the six-time hot dog eating champion is in danger of not even being able to defend his crown? Or is it the fact that ESPN is comparing this injury to "like Tiger Woods tearing his rotator cuff, or LeBron James blowing out his knee"?

I wonder where the "sport" of gluttony...er...competitive eating now ranks in terms of popularity here in the States. It sure sounds like competitive eating has passed hockey. Has it passed baseball as well?

I'm sure many people have already covered this, but how is an American, being part of the fattest nation in the world, not the champion of competitive eating??? And how are there not more big-boned Americans involved in this sport? When will colleges start offering scholarships to individuals that want to pursue competitive eating?

If this idea hasn't been patented yet, I'm going to create the World Series of Competitive Eating: a 14-day affair, being held in a Vegas buffet, with each event involving a different food. Or how about the World Competitive Eating Federation? We can break it down to different weight classes, and even introduce Tag Team Competitive Eating. Like in wrestling, you could tag in your partner whenever you need a break! How is this not a good idea?

Does anyone have Vince McMahon's phone number?

Until next time!

Three Left In the IMBC, AnandTech Access Problems, And Quick NBA Draft Thoughts

2007-06-27T22:42:00.000-07:00

- Yes! One of my comments finally got posted on an ESPN chat:

Matt (Las Vegas): What are the chances Portland takes Durant over Oden? I live in Vegas and plan on betting on this (since gambling IS legal... here). Can we consult Janet Gretzky?

Bill Simmons: (4:59 PM ET ) I'd put the odds like this:

Oden (-150) Durant

Bill Simmons: (4:59 PM ET ) Last week before their workouts, it was Oden (-350) Durant.

......

Peter (Tarzana, CA): Oden (-150) as the #1 pick, huh? Can I parlay that with Atlanta not taking a PG at #3 or #11 (-200)?

Yes, I know. VERY unimpressive!

- So there are only three of us left in the IMBC, with the shocking elimination of Finley. When we were down to four entrants, I figured that he was going to win for sure. I guess you can say I jinxed him.

(In my circles, this phenomenon has been dubbed the "Ung-hex"; if I pick a player/team to win anything, they undoubtedly find a way to lose. This partially explains why the New York Yankees have not won a championship in years, why the UCLA Bruins didn't win an NCAA Basketball championship, and why the Indianapolis Colts didn't win a Super Bowl until last year. It also explains why the LA Dodgers lose just about every game that I attend.

So, if you want a particular sports team to win anything, tell me to root for the other team!)

So of the three of us that are left--myself, Amy, and Hank--who's the favorite to win now? Or, who is next for me to Ung-hex?

To stick with the theme of gambling and sports odds, here are the odds that each of us remaining will win (in order from most likely to least likely to win):

Hank 2:3
Amy 5:2
Me 15:1

Ok, the Ung-hex should eliminate Hank from contention, and I don't expect myself to win. So congrats Amy!

- I could not access the Anandtech Forums for about a week on three of the four computers in this house (my laptop excepted).

That's when I noticed, while surfing AT on my laptop, this little message near the top of the Forums main page:

Clear your cookies... - 06/24/2007 01:17 PM
We recently updated our forum software to fix a number of issues. As a result, some users are having problems using FireFox on the forums.

The fix for this is to delete your forums.anandtech.com cookies.

We recommend that all members delete their forum cookies, though we haven't run into any technical issues with this in other browsers.

Thanks for your patience while we continue to improve the forums.

In my defense, had my laptop not been able to access the forum, how would I have known to do this? Also, I did not clear my forum cookies on my laptop, and I was able to see the forums just fine.

The least AT could have done was to send out a mass e-mail to all forum users, so that I could ignore it and still wonder why I couldn't access the forums :P.

- So the NBA Draft is tomorrow! We all know that Oden and Durant will be the top two picks, and I expect them to be picked in that order. But who will go after those two?

I think the following will happen tomorrow:

Atlanta will not take a PG at #3; they'll probably take Al Horford.
Boston should take Corey Brewer, but they'll probably take Yi Jianlian.
The three Florida players will be drafted in this order: Horford, Brewer, Noah.
Atlanta won't be stupid and trade #11 for a point guard. They'll draft one here (despite what I said above).
The Lakers make a stupid pick and take a project, and Kobe Bryant will be all over the news, critiquing that pick.

And one long-term prediction: Kevin Durant will prove to be the best player in this draft.

(Yeah, I know. Talk about going out on a ledge!)

I would have predicted Al Horford to be the best player in this draft, if not for the fact that he'll be stuck in Atlanta for the first few years of his career.

I'm too tired to talk about the end of my poker tournament. That will come tomorrow or the day after, depending on whether or not I blog about the NBA Draft results tomorrow.

Until next time!

Add CompUSA to "The List," And A Poker Story, Part 1

2007-06-26T22:00:00.000-07:00

- Well, I can add CompUSA to my list of horrible customer service experiences.

Background: I bought a copy of Kaspersky Antivirus 6.0 back in November 2006, advertised with a $60 and a $40 rebate. The $60 rebate went through OK, but the $40 rebate disappeared. When I inquired about the $40, I was told that the rebate was posted in error, and that it would not be honored.

I was aware that some people got the rebate honored anyway, so I pressed forward. I filed complaints with the BBB, and later, my state attorney general. In March of 2007, I got a letter from Mr. Kevin Hain, Escalations Supervisor of CompUSA. He said that the rebate was posted in error, but he would see to it that I would get the $40 rebate as an "accomodation."

I heard nothing from CompUSA again, so I filed a second complaint with my state AG. I got another letter from Mr. Hain yesterday, saying that I would not get the rebate after all; the letter claimed that my purchase was made outside the original dates of the promo. This was not true, by the way; the original promo dates were 11/5-11/11, and I had placed the order online--for in store pickup--on 11/5, and picked up the item on 11/11 (this becomes important later on).

I phone Mr. Hain's office, and got my call returned this morning. He told me that the date in which I picked up the item was my true order date. Had I known that this was CompUSA's policy, I would have picked up the item on that day (I know, I know; ignorance is not an excuse). He also said that the true promotion dates were 11/5-11/6, and 12/2-12/3, regardless of what my receipt said.

I explained to him that I was unaware of that policy, and began searching through CompUSA.com for similar language. I wanted to inquire as to why I was sent a letter back in March, saying that I was going to get the rebate as an accomodation, and why the valid promotion dates on my rebate receipt said "11/5-11/11." Before I had a chance to do this, though, Mr. Hain began speaking in a menacing tone. He explained that I had already filed three separate complaints, and that I could continue to file complaints if I wanted to, but CompUSA was not going to pay me the $40. He then said "Thank you" and quickly hung up.

I guess his returning my phone call caused him to be late to his tee time at the local golf course.

Congrats, CompUSSR, for shooting up to second place of my list, which now reads:

Time Warner
CompUSSR
Buy.com (thanks Krunk)
...
(tie) Parago/USPS/etc.

(As bad as this latest fiasco was, it pales in comparison to the way Time Warner has jerked me around in recent months.)

Non-poker players, feel free to stop reading here.

- So I played in a No Limit Hold'em poker online tournament yesterday, with a buy-in of $5+$0.50 ($5 goes into the prize pool, and $0.50 goes to the site as an administrative fee). A little over 100 players took part in the tournament, and there was a special prize for first place: not only did the winner earn the biggest piece of the prize pool (~$200), but he would also win $1,000 to spend on tickets to an NFL game, transportation, hotel, and spending cash! Second place would get only ~ $100, a slight drop-off. Fifteen places paid out, starting at $11 for 15th-11th place, but with such a big top prize, most players were gunning for the win. In fact, the bubble--the part of the tournament where just a couple more eliminations need to happen before everyone left earns money--lasted all of two hands; sometimes, the bubble could last 20-30 hands, if not longer.

I should preface my story by mentioning that not only have I never won a big online poker tournament before, I have never even made the final table (usually, the final 10 players). In the early stages of this tournament, it didn't look like I'd come close to sniffing the final table; I had 62, 82, 82, and T2 as the first four hands of the tournament. In fact, it was several hands before I actually played a pot. I had AQo and won a nice pot when I made a pair on the flop. A few hands later, I picked up QQ and beat a guy who had 22, getting all of his chips in the process. At that point, I had about 2200 chips--we started with 1500--and I was slightly ahead of the average chip stack.

A few hands later, I picked up AKs, and raised. A guy re-raised me all-in--he had more chips than I did--and I was thinking about calling, when something weird happened. For some reason, my hand got folded! Usually, in an online tournament, you are given 15 seconds to make a decision. Should you exceed that, you start using extra time from a "time bank," which usually has 60 seconds in it. For some reason, though, my time bank didn't kick in, and my hand was folded. I lost 25% of my chips due to that mistake!

I won a couple small pots to stay afloat, as the blinds got huge really quickly. I also reluctantly folded a couple of hands that I could have logically raised with. In both cases, I got really lucky, as my opponents had hands that had me in big trouble! However, I was soon left with 1300 chips and blinds at 100/200 with a 25 chip ante.

(Anybody will tell you that if you're down to less than 10 big blinds--in this case, 10x200 = 2000--you're in real trouble).

After a guy with 400 chips went all-in, I reraised all-in myself, and got very quickly called! I figured I was in big trouble, but the two guys showed A-x (where x is less than ten) and Q-x. I was the favorite to win the hand, but was deflated when the flop had a queen in it. Needing an ace to survive, a third heart hit on the turn, giving me the only flush draw--I had the ten of hearts. When the Jack of hearts hit the river, I knew I got lucky, but I reminded myself that I had the best hand before the flop.

(As you will see, this will be a recurring theme throughout the tournament.)

I went from 1300 in chips to 3000, a much more comfortable position at that stage in the tournament.

I'll finish up the story tomorrow. Until next time!

BigCrumbs Credits Me, SportsCenter's My Wish Series, and Kevn Garnett to the Lakers (WTFBBQ???)

2007-06-25T17:06:00.000-07:00

- I've already earned $5.94 from using BigCrumbs.com! I'm rich!

(I talked about BigCrumbs.com in a blog entry last Monday.)

Now let's see if I actually get paid.

- SportsCenter started their My Wish series yesterday! For those of you that don't know what this is, ESPN has teamed up with the Make-A-Wish foundation to grant five kids their sports-related dreams, and each night (Sunday-Thursday), SportsCenter will devote a few minutes to each story.

This is the second year of the My Wish series, and some of the stories last year were absolute tear-jerkers.

(Yes, I will admit that I shed a tear or two; stories that reflect on the human spirit always get to me, especially when they involve children.)

- I was going to start talking about the poker tournament that I played in on Saturday, but I couldn't resist this little tidbit of news this afternoon: Kevin Garnett could be moved to the Lakers in a four-way deal?!?

Chad Ford of ESPN offered this trade scenario (ESPN Insider subscription required):

The Wolves send Kevin Garnett and Marko Jaric to the Lakers.
The Lakers send Lamar Odom and Andrew Bynum to the Pacers and the No. 19 pick [and Kwame Brown] to the Wolves.
The Pacers send Jermaine O'Neal to the Celtics.
The Celtics send the No. 5 pick, Theo Ratliff, Gerald Green and Sebastian Telfair to Minnesota.

Ford touched on the potential impact of these deals for each team involved; I'll expand on his thoughts below.

Lakers: Kobe gets his superstar that he needs to contend for a championship, at the expense of their salary cap (unless KG or Kobe opt-out of their contracts early). Plus, they have to swallow Marko Jaric's horrible contract, lose Kwame's expiring deal, and give up on Andrew "Big Project" Bynum.

Assuming they re-sign Walton, does a Jaric/Kobe/Walton/KG/??? starting lineup (with a Farmar/Vujacic/Evans/Turiaf/Mihm?/Cook or Head bench) contend for a championship? Probably not. Would they be better than last year? Absolutely. And no, Laker fan, just because Chauncey Billups is now a free agent, don't expect him to come to the Lakers. How would they get him? Sign-and-trade? For what? Mid-level exception? Not a chance.

Pacers: The Pacers get the two players they wanted in a Jermaine O'Neal deal--Odom and Bynum--but they don't get the #19th pick that they also wanted from LA. I still think this is a pretty good deal for Indiana, because Odom's deal expires one year earlier than O'Neal's. They didn't really expect the Lakers to give up Odom, Bynum, Kwame AND the #19th pick for Jermaine O'Neal and the rights to badly overpay Troy Murphy, did they?

Celtics: So what if Boston doesn't get KG? They are still getting a big, AND they don't have to part with Al Jefferson (the centerpiece of any KG-to-Boston deal)! In the (L)Eastern Conference, I'd go to war with Pierce, O'Neal, and Jefferson, even at the expense of the #5 pick and Theo Ratliff's expiring contract. The only problem with this deal is, re-signing Jefferson after next season puts the Celtics close to luxury tax territory.

Wolves: Minnesota will get tons of cap space in this deal: Kwame's $9 million deal and Ratliff's $11 million deal come off the books next year. Also, Ricky Davis and Eddie Griffin come off the books; that's almost another $10 million. They also get three top-20 picks: #5, #7, and #19, which they could use to draft two top prospects from the Noah-Green-Horford--if he were to still be on the board at #5, Minnesota would take him in a half-second--Yi-Brewer group, and a guard (Pruitt? Crittenton?). Conley could fall to them at #5, but it looks like Minnesota wants Randy Foye at the point. Yes, the Wolves would be in super-rebuilding mode, with Gerald Green, Randy Foye, and their three picks probably seeing major minutes.

Ford says that this deal may not appeal to Minnesota. I don't see why it wouldn't. Two draft picks, one intriguing player--Gerald Green--and tons of cap relief after next season has to be a better offer than anything the Knicks can offer, right? As long as Phoenix doesn't chime in with a package revolving around Amare Stoudemire...

If I had to pick a winner in this deal, I'd pick the Lakers. Indiana gets Odom and Bynum, but their team probably won't contend for a title unless the entire team overachieves next year to a great degree. Boston could be stuck in cap hell for a while, with Pierce and O'Neal's deals and the pending pay raise to Al Jefferson. Minnesota gets tons of young talent and cap space, but cap space doesn't do you any good unless you can use the cap space efficiently. And who knows how many of those draft picks will pan out? The Lakers, on the other hand, get a super-duperstar to pair with Kobe. And I don't want to hear how KG's on the downside of his career. He's only 31, for crying out loud! If I had to pick a loser in this deal, yes, it would be Minnesota for the reasons mentioned above.

EDIT: So much for this trade rumor. Apparently the Los Angeles Times has reported that the deal will be a two team deal, between only LA and Minnesota. More on this tomorrow.

Next time: I'll begin talking about the poker tourney, unless something else comes up.

Over/Under Quandry, and Lunch At Wat Thai

2007-06-24T21:08:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow's blog will be spent talking about an online poker tournament that I took part in last night. First prize of the tournament was ~$200 plus $1,000 to be used on two tickets to a National Football League game, transportation, hotels, and spending cash. Second place was $100, and third was $50. There were a number of other prizes, but I was definitely aiming to win the tournament.

Did I win? Will I be taking a trip to an NFL game this fall? Tune in tomorrow to find out.

- One quick-hitter: I enjoy betting on the over/under of a game or event (ex: Over/under of the number of hot dogs Kobayashi will eat during this year's Nathan's Hot Dog eating contest: 50. I think he'll eat more than that, so I'd bet the "over." If he eats more than 50 hot dogs, I win!).

That got me thinking: say I made a bet that some guy will finish "over" fifth place in some contest. Am I betting that he will finish better or worse than fifth place? In this case, I believe that "over" means "better," so I say that betting the over means that I am expecting the guy to finish first, second, third, or fourth.

Apparently, the exact opposite is true, to the best of my knowledge: if I bet on the over, I'm predicting that the guy will finish worse than fifth. That makes no sense to me! I know Krunk has my back on this one; does anyone else agree with me?

- We spent the morning at the Wat Thai (Thai Temple) of Los Angeles, located in North Hollywood. My sister likes to go there every now and then, and she especially felt the need to go today to pray. I, on the other hand, enjoy going there for the food: skewered chicken and pork, duck noodle soup, spicy papaya salad, beef and pork meatballs, and a delicious dessert made with tapioca, water chestnuts, jack fruit, coconut, coconut milk, and a simple syrup (sugar + water). They also serve sweet sticky rice and fresh mangoes, which are to die for.

I noticed something strange at the Temple today: banners were all around the place, asking people to not take food off the premises; I forget what the actual wording of the sign said. I thought that was weird, and especially so after ordering some food, when the servers asked if I wanted the food to go. If they didn't allow food taken off the premises, why could I opt to take the food to go?

We thought nothing of it, took our food, and sat down to eat. Maybe it was just me, but the food was exceptionally good today.

(Tangent: It's a good thing that it wasn't terribly hot today! Another mid-90s day, and I would have just stayed home.)

Afterwards, we went back to get some food to go, again wondering why the servers let us order food to go if the signs said otherwise. Of course, nobody stopped us as we got to the exit, and we were on our way.

That's all I've got for now. Apologies if the blog entry sounds rushed; it was :P

Starshine Flash Game, Murder/Torture Suspect "Not A Monster," and Miguel Cabrera to the Dodgers?

2007-06-23T19:23:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Losing when you have a full house hurts. Losing when you have a full house to four of a kind really hurts. Losing when your opponent flops quads, and you "catch up" by hitting your full house on the turn, REALLY hurts.

(No, Krunk, I was not involved in that hand.)

- According to accuweather.com, it was only in the mid-80s today. Hopefully it stays this cool for the next couple of weeks.

- I saw this game originally on Newgrounds, and I immediately got hooked on it: Starshine (link from Digg). Fun little game; you gotta fire a shooting star to start a chain reaction; the goal being to light up all the stars on the screen. The music's pleasant, and the gameplay is very simple. Some of the levels are much tougher than the others, though, and it can get aggravating when you set off a huge chain reaction and miss a single star. On those levels, I just started randomly clicking, and eventually I was able to stumble upon the solution :P.

Also courtesy of Digg, here's a cheat sheet if you should get stuck on a certain level.

By the way, Desktop Tower Defense 1.5 has been released (also from Digg)!

- A Madison, Wisconsin woman implicated in the murder of a woman and the torture of the victim's 11-year-old son declared that she was "not a monster." This passage speaks for itself:

[Candace] Clark denied involvement in the killing of 36-year-old Tammie Garlin, whose body police found buried in the yard.
As for the other charges she and three others face, Clark said, "No one's innocent in this."
All four -- Clark, Sisk, Michaela Clerc, 20, and a 15-year-old girl -- are charged with first-degree murder, child abuse, mutilation, hiding a corpse, false imprisonment, aggravated battery, three other felonies and a misdemeanor. The three adults are also charged with contributing to the delinquency of a child.

So let's see...you say you're not a monster, yet you all but admitted you were involved in all those other charges? I guess you're definition of "monster" ever so slightly differs from "mine." Actually, you're right; you're not a monster. Monster isn't good enough to describe you.

Oh wait! Apparently she wasn't abusing the kid! It was only discipline! "Others in the group took turns beating and torturing the boy, Clark said, calling him unruly. He would bite, kick and punch, and even Tammie Garlin said he had to be disciplined." Beating, torturing, and burning a kid; is that what constitutes discipline nowadays?

What an absolutely sickening story.

- If the Florida Marlins' star Miguel Cabrera would be made available in a trade, the Dodgers would be one team interested. The price seems to be a bit steep, though:

Figure three from the Dodgers' group of Chad Billingsley, Jonathan Broxton, Matt Kemp, James Loney, Andre Ethier, Tony Abreu, Andy LaRoche and Clayton Kershaw.

Yikes! As much as I love Cabrera, that's an awfully expensive price to pay. Then again, I've heard comparisons that he might be the next Manny Ramirez; if that's true, then we must have him! If I can't have the real Manny, I'll take the second coming of him, as long as Cabrera starts picking up Manny's antics: cutting off throws from the center fielder, hiding behind the wall (maybe Cabrera can hide in the Dodgers' bullpen), listening to an MP3 player built-in to his sunglasses during play, and, most importantly, insisting that he needs to be traded every year, only to forget that request and mash the hell out of a baseball.

I love most of those players on that list, but we must go get Cabrera!

That's all for today.

LAPD Crime Map, And The Doug Christie Autobiography

2007-06-22T20:43:00.000-07:00

Yet another Kobe Bryant-free blog entry today. Let's get started!

- So it was a cool 102 degrees today...nothing I can't handle, though.

(My kidneys, on the other hand, feel otherwise. Also, 102 was the "ReelFeel" temp; it was really only about 92 today. I know, I know, I should stop whining.)

Accuweather.com says it's only 74 degrees right now; it sure doesn't feel that cool.

- Yesterday, I had a McFlurry for the first time in my life. For those of you that don't know, a McFlurry is nothing more than vanilla soft serve topped with M&M minis or Oreo cookie bits. Anyway, for some reason, I found the dessert to be extremely tasty.

(Might it have something to do with the heat?)

What was really fun was seeing the colors off the M&Ms bleed into the ice cream. Yes, simple things like this entertain me.

(Hmmm...it's not too late to get another McFlurry, is it?)

- So apparently I don't live in a very safe neighborhood, according to this LAPD Crime Map. In the past week, there were 35 serious crimes within a 5 mile radius of my residence (nine violent robberies and seven aggravated assaults; fortunately, there were no homicides). No reports on how many stolen barbeques, welcome mats, or car registration stickers, though.

Good...I have yet another reason to move out of this damn residence.

- OMG! The Doug and Jackie Christie autobiography, entitled "No Ordinary Love: A True Story of Marriage and Basketball," is out! I must go get this book! I hope they covered how Jackie started designing purses, and how she enlisted Doug's "help" with the business (and by help, Doug actually helped Jackie design some of the purses!). I hope the book also went over what was going through Doug's head as Jackie chased and beat down Rick Fox with her purse during that one Lakers-Kings exhibition game. Now THAT's a sign of true love, is it not? Chasing an opposing basketball player, screaming obscenities and going whack-a-mole with your purse just screams dedication!

(I'm guessing the purse that was used in the beat down was a Christie original, or whatever the brand of purses was named.)

I'm actually surprised there wasn't a purse on the cover of the book. Maybe there's a 10% off coupon on the inside flap of the book, good on the purchase of a Christie original.

I love the People Magazine quote, by the way. Role models for young people? Role models for women who want to utterly dominate their men, maybe. Maybe there's a how-to guide on how to accomplish this, with visual aids included.

That's all I've got for now. Happy blogging!

A New (Albeit Broken) Toy, Ten Reasons to Put Off Retirement, And Tower Defense Games Destroy Productivity

2007-06-21T20:04:00.000-07:00

Let's see if I can get through today without talking sports.

By the way, why is it so hot?!?

- So yesterday, I got some "as-is" computer parts: an Athlon64 3000+, an Abit KV8 Pro motherboard, and a new Cooler Master heatsink/fan (the latter from Newegg.com). The seller told me that he had sold the board to someone else, and that the parts wouldn't boot up, so I figured I'd take a chance on them. At worst, I was only out the $35 or so in parts, and I could always try to resell the parts as-is to someone else.

Unfortunately, I could not get the parts to work, and I'm pretty certain that the board is toast. Oh well, guess I'm stuck with my Athlon XP 2000+ for a bit longer.

- (from Krunk) I thought this list was a bit peculiar, especially since it was found at IRS.gov: 10 Reasons to Put Off Saving for Retirement. Assuming this is not a joke, what the heck is this article doing here? I'm guessing this is one IRS employee's way of killing some time, by going David Letterman with a "Top 10" list. Anyway, I love the first three reasons, especially #3:

Maybe I won't live long enough to retire. Life is so uncertain. Why should I miss out on the high life now when I might not even need to have money put aside for my old age? (If married, change pronouns in this reason to the plural.)

and #4 made me LOL. I've heard of 5-8, but I've never heard anyone seriously say #9:

I might get lucky. You never know, I may win the lottery. Or I may be remembered in the will of a long lost relative. Or I might find that my house is right in the middle of a diamond field.

or #10:

Taking care of me financially will provide wonderful character-building opportunities for my children. And so many chances for me to feel warm gratitude toward them.

though #10 was damn funny!

- Talk about a Time Waster: Desktop Tower Defense (TD) has been played, according to this article, 12 million times in April and May! For the record, I have played it a couple of times, and still have not been able to beat the game on Normal difficulty. I remember the first flash-based tower defense game I played--Flash Element TD, based off a Warcraft III map--and immediately got hooked on to that game.

According to the article, the game has "brought in more than $12,000 in ad revenue and donations...even though the hand-sketched game started as a hobby project with few costs." And the guy's got cubicle geeks all over the world to thank!

Damn, my blog queue is so full...one of these days, I'll get around to clearing it out, before finding new stuff to talk about :P.

IMBC Drag, And Unfortunately, Even More Kobe Bryant Talk

2007-06-20T20:26:00.000-07:00

- Hank said it about a week ago, and Amy said it last night. Now it's my turn: I'm starting to get sick and tired of blogging every day. I really wanted this blog to be a four-to-five times a week blog, consisting of 3-4 shorter entries and a longer weekend commentary.

(I know, I know...why don't I just quit? Because I wanna win, dammit!)

I think next year--assuming there is a next year--the IMBC should increase the minimum word count to 500 or so, and give every blogger one "pass" (in case s/he should forget to blog one day, or just didn't feel like blogging that particular day).

Sometimes I wish Hank didn't reinstate me back into the contest, after that little "technicality" :P

- Ok, I gotta make a couple quick comments about the latest wrinkle in the Kobe Bryant/Lakers saga, if only because the story is too ridiculous to not talk about for a second straight day. Ripped from SI.com, here is the transcript of that amateur video I referenced in my last blog entry, where Kobe ripped the Lakers and Andrew Bynum:

"Andrew Bynum? What the f---?" Bryant says in disgust. "Are you kidding me? Andrew Bynum? F---ing ship his ass out. Are you kidding me? We're talking about Jason Kidd. But they didn't even want to do that. Now we're here in this f---ed up position."

Wow. This is something I'd expect to hear from an out-of-control teen on the Maury Povich show, right before it is announced that s/he has been sent to teenage boot camp.

Back when the trade demand was first announced, I had Kobe's back. I said that I wanted to see Kobe leave with guns blazing:

When Allen Iverson whined his way out of Philly, he did so while insisting that it was best for everyone to go their separate ways. I hope Kobe doesn't offer the same BS; I want him to demand a trade, pointing fingers at Kupchak on the way out the door!

but never would I have expected this whine-fest! Cursing about the Lakers brass and your young center behind their backs? And what, exactly, is Kobe going to get out of this? What team is going to be interested in taking this baby off the Lakers' hands?

(Probably fifteen teams or so...)

Talk about completely obliterating all your bridges! Couldn't Kobe have waited until after he got traded to start taking shots at the Lakers? Randy Sklar, forum panelist on Jim Rome is Burning, made an awesome suggestion today: he said that the Lakers should trade Kobe to the Clippers. A trade to the Clippers accomplishes the following:

A Lakers-Clippers swap will keep Kobe in LA, to face the wrath of angry LA fans 43 times a year.
Such a trade will send Kobe to another awful team--once the Lakers gut the Clippers for talent in exchange for Kobe--forcing Kobe to eventually whine and cry about another franchise.

Of course, this will never happen, since Kobe has a no-trade clause, and I doubt he'll go to the Clippers.

What's really stunning about this whole situation is the fact that he had to spend years to rebuild his image after the rape trial in Colorado, only to obliterate it again! The guy's image restoration was remarkable; he was labeled one of the NBA's good guys, he was able to reconcile with Phil Jackson, and he finally seemed to have grown up. And now this? Paris Hilton's whine in court thought Kobe was acting childish.

I couldn't say it any better, JT the Brick. The headline and the sub-headline say it all. Kobe, don't let the door hit you on your way out.

Tomorrow, I swear I will not blog about sports :P

Domain Registry of America, Diabetics Avoid Insulin to Lose Weight

2007-06-19T17:17:00.000-07:00

- I really really want to talk about the whole Kobe Bryant/Lakers situation, especially with the news that there is amateur footage of Kobe ripping the Lakers and Andrew Bynum.

(Tangent: What is it with famous people and "amateur videos?" And when are we going to find amateur footage of a political figure doing something stupid?)

(Tangent #2: Not that I'd care for it, but where's the amateur footage of Paris Hilton crying in prison?)

Alas, I will try to avoid the subject today (you're welcome, non-sports fans).

- So I finally beat Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars yesterday. It only took me two months to do it :P.

(And it's not because I suck at the game, even though I do. I installed it about two months ago, played it for a couple hours, and didn't get around to it again until only recently.)

I have no idea what's next on my gaming queue. Hell, I don't even know if there is a queue to begin with.

- A few days ago, I got a letter from the Domain Registry of America--I refuse to link to their site; you'll see why soon enough. It was a courtesy "Domain Name Expiration Notice."

(My domain name expires in November 2008. Close enough, I suppose.)

Check out the first paragraph of the notice:

As a courtesy to domain name holderse, we are sending you this notification of the domain name registration that is due to expire in the next few months. When you switch today to the Domain Registry of America, you can take advantage of our best savings. Your registration for: ungsunghero.com will expire on November 01, 2007. Act today!

Now, all three domains I own were registered via namecheap.com with WHOISGuard protection (basically, it anonymizes the WHOIS information, keeping it away from potential spammers and/or scammers). So how the heck did DRoA get my mailing address? Well, I had initially registered ungsunghero.com via Microsoft's Office Live Basics Beta, and transferred it to namecheap a month or so later. During that time, DRoA must have harvested my information.

Here's the great thing about this DRoA letter: they want $30 to transfer and renew my domain with them!!! Compare that to namecheap's $8.88/yr domain name registration/renewal, and I have to wonder what these guys are smoking. However, if I transfer my domain and renew for five years, it's only $95!

I'd call these guys an outright scam, but I wouldn't want this to happen to me (click on the "cease-or-desist" link found in that blog entry.) I'll let the Google results for "Domain Registry of America scam" speak for themselves.

Here's an FTC article about the DRoA.

One aside: while reading up about this company via a Google search, I stumbled upon the WHOIS information for techtv.com (now G4tv.com). Please tell me that techtv.com got their domain registration for free in exchange for advertising DRoA on their programming!

- Some Type I diabetic women have avoided taking their insulin shots (seriously endangering their health) in order to lose weight. The process, known as "diabulimia"--named so because the mass exodus of glucose in the blood resembles what happens to someone with bulimia--may cause many of the same problems as uncontrolled diabetes: organ failure, loss of limbs, a coma, etc.. The most chilling statement:

One expert who has studied the phenomenon estimates that 450,000 Type 1 diabetic women in the United States -- one-third of the total -- have skipped or shortchanged their insulin to lose weight and are risking a coma and an early death.

Wow...scary stuff. It's sad that these women would rather look good than care about their long-term well being.

That's it for now. Happy blogging!

UngsungBlog, Random Thoughts Edition: Froot Loops, Cash Back on eBay

2007-06-18T20:52:00.000-07:00

Oh man, I got sunburned pretty good yesterday! Where's my aloe-vera-anti-sunburn lotion?

- I mentioned to Krunk a couple weeks ago about how I only recently--a few years back, maybe--was informed that Froot Loops were spelled with four O's instead of two. It was during a grocery store trip in college that I realized that "Froot" was spelled as such.

To my surprise, Krunk didn't realize this at all, until I pointed it out! In fact, he told me early this morning that a couple of his friends weren't aware of that fact either! LOL!

I'm snacking on some right now, and I forgot how ridiculously sweet these things are!

- So I noticed that FatWallet Cash Back now offers 1% cash back at eBay (1% taken from the final bid price before S&H). I don't buy much on eBay anymore, but I think that's pretty cool.

Earlier today, I stumbled upon BigCrumbs.com, another Ebates/FW Cash Back clone, it appears. One thing quickly caught my eye about this place: they offered 36% cash back on eBay purchases!

I looked further, and sure enough, it was too good to be true. BigCrumbs pays back 36% of the seller's fees for any auction you win. That is just slightly better than FW's 1% cash back, if you do the math:

If you buy an item that costs between $0.01 and $25, the seller's fees will be 5.25% of the final price. By buying through BigCrumbs, you'll be getting 5.25% * 36% = 1.89% back. On a $25 item, your cash back would be ~$0.47.
If you buy an item that costs between $25 and $1,000, the seller's fees will be $1.31 (5.25% of $25) + 3.25% of the excess. For example, a $100 final bid results in seller's fees of $1.31 + 3.25% of $75 = $3.75, and your cash back would be ~$1.35 (1.35%).
I won't bother going into items that are over $1,000, as I've never spent more than $150 on a single eBay transaction.

(I know, I know...all this for what will probably amount to be a few cents here and there.)

Anyway, these guys have a pretty decent selection of stores as well, seen here.

I'm going to go ahead and give these guys a try. (Warning: the following may contain a shameless self-promotion!) If you're going to sign up for this service as well, please sign up using this link.

I've got lots more to talk about (surprisingly, not about sports), but I'll save them for another day.

UngsungBlog: SoS Edition: Father's Day Cookout Fun

2007-06-17T23:04:00.000-07:00

Ok, Hank, I'll try to go sports-free today :P

(BTW, "SoS" = "Sick of Sports," because I'm kinda tired of blogging about this whole LA Lakers ordeal too.)

Oh crap...fifty-five minutes, and I haven't even started on this blog entry! Let's hope I make it!

(Being in a food coma, and researching the effects of a bee sting on WebMD.com at the same time can't help, either.)

- Our Father's Day BBQ had so much food, we had to refill the BBQ with additional coals! And since we were using Match Light charcoal, we couldn't have just added the coals as we were cooking. I know some people out there think that Match Light coals are blasphemous, and only original Kingsford charcoal is acceptable. To that, I say shush. It still grills a damn fine piece of cow.

(I should point out, if I hadn't mentioned it in an earlier blog entry, that my weapon of choice is a Weber 18.5" One-Touch Silver charcoal grill. We were cooking for six people with big appetites, so I wasn't that surprised to have to use a second load of charcoal to finish all the cooking.)

We grilled spare ribs, chicken wings, and drumsticks with both a simple marinade--soy sauce, garlic, green onion, and a bit of sugar--as well as some cheapo BBQ sauce. I'm not really a fan of liquid marinades--I prefer dry rubs, and good ol' kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper over liquids--but you really can't go wrong with such a simple marinade as soy sauce. And you really can't go wrong with barbecuing meat; even a steak cooked to the consistency of shoe leather still tastes OK when cooked on a grill.

We also had beef short ribs marinated in teriyaki sauce, beef meatballs, and BBQed corn. Because we had to change the coals once, I ended up in front of the grill for almost three hours, sneaking a bite of meat, salad, or a quick sip of Diet Sierra Mist every now and then.

(Tangent: Diet Sierra Mist is pretty damn good! In fact, there are a number of diet sodas I can drink that taste close enough to the original to satisfy me: diet root bear [diet root beer floats FTW], diet citrus sodas, and Coke Zero, which is tremendous.)

By the time most of the meat was cooked, and we were ready to sit down and eat, we were all stuffed!

We started cooking at around 6PM, and didn't finish until nearly 9:30. And yeah, we were pretty much eating the whole time; hence the food coma.

I've got enough leftovers to last two or three more meals, and I took only about 25% of the leftovers. I can't wait for next-day BBQ; it tastes almost as good as fresh-off-the-grill meat, IMO.

Sorry, Hank...no pictures :(.

(praying that this blog contains over 300 words)

Kobe Bryant Un-Undemands a Trade, and The Jermaine O'Neal Deal May Be Dead

2007-06-16T22:04:00.000-07:00

- Tomorrow is Father's Day, of course, and we're celebrating with a BBQ! Ribs, chicken, beef short ribs, two types of sauce, mixed greens, potato salad, and French bread...I can't wait!

(There's a 50/50 chance that I will not be able to blog tomorrow, due to the impending food coma.)

- So, the big story of the day involves the circus that is the Los Angeles Lakers and their star player. According to an anonymous report, Kobe met with Dr. Jerry Buss in Spain, and reiterated his request to be traded from the Lakers. According to the source,

Buss wanted to appeal to Bryant, reassuring him that winning remains the team's focus and that trades take time to engineer, but that Bryant remained concerned about the team's direction and did not budge from his desire to leave L.A.

The Lakers still do not plan on trading #24, but if he keeps pushing, they may have no choice.

What a disaster for the Lakers! If they break down and decide to trade Kobe, there's no way that they'll get close to equal value for the guy. Chad Ford (ESPN Insider subscription required) discussed two possible three-way trade scenarios for the Lakers. Either Gilbert Arenas or Paul Pierce goes to the Lakers, Chicago gives up Ben Gordon, Tyrus Thomas, P.J. Brown, and the #9 pick (only the pick goes to the Lakers; the rest go to the third team involved), and Kobe goes to Chicago.

Setting aside the huge impact that Kobe will have on Chicago, the Lakers aren't going to get anywhere close to equal value in either trade. Both players are shoot-first guards, neither of which match the explosion and dominance on the offensive end as #24. Also, neither one is a particularly good defender, a characteristic that is often overlooked when people talk about Kobe's game.

If I was forced to take one of the two, I'd take Arenas. He fills a need (PG), he's five years younger than Pierce, and I'd argue that he's a more marketable player than Pierce.

- What might have triggered Kobe to once again demand a trade from the Lakers? Perhaps it's the Pacers' insistence that Andrew Bynum AND Lamar Odom be included in any deal for Jermaine O'Neal. In fact, the Pacers want Bynum, Odom, and Kwame Brown for Jermaine O'Neal and Troy Murphy! That trade is absolutely ridiculous, in my opinion; Indy can't realistically expect the Lakers to give up their two tradeable chips and a big expiring contract, AND take on the mammoth contract that Troy Murphy has.

(Troy Murphy, of course, only got badly overpaid after a pair of double-double seasons, when his Golden State teams were full of players that were allergic to rebounding.)

The Lakers have to give up on a Jermaine O'Neal deal, and try to look elsewhere for help. Meanwhile, the longer they wait to pull a deal, the angrier #24 will get. Boy, what an absolute mess the Lakers are!

(Hey Minnesota, are you sure you don't want to trade Kevin Garnett?)

More Time Warner Fun, All Your RAM Are Belong To Us, and Ways to Waste Electricity

2007-06-15T21:50:00.001-07:00

- Yes, I have even more Time Warner news to share. No, this time it is actually good news!

Starting 6/19, ESPN-HD and ESPN2-HD will be free HDTV channels, with an HDTV digital cable box rental (which I already have)! Woohoo! Sunday Night Baseball and SportsCenter on HDTV!

Just kidding, of course...at least about the SportsCenter part.

I can't wait for Monday Night Football on ESPN-HD! Speaking of which, can you believe football season is less than three months away?!? That means one thing, of course: fantasy football season is upon us!

- A Federal judge in Los Angeles ruled that computer RAM can be turned over in a lawsuit, in the fight against the piracy of films. The ruling stemmed over a battle between the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and TorrentSpy, a popular torrent site. One major concern of this decision is the potential for invasion of privacy:

"I think that people's fears about a potential invasion of privacy are quite warranted," said Ken Withers, director of judicial education at The Sedona Conference, an independent research group. "The fear is that we're putting in the hands of private citizens and particularly well-financed corporations the same tools that heretofore were exclusively in the hands of criminal prosecutors, but without the sort of safeguards that criminal prosecutors have to meet, such as applying for search warrants."

Of course, there's another glaring issue with this ruling: what good, exactly, will RAM be, in the hands of a prosecutor? Last I checked, data in RAM is lost once your computer is turned off:

But on the technical side, Dean McCarron, principle analyst at Mercury Research, said the judge erred by defining volatile computer memory as "electronically stored information."

Oops! I saw this article on Slashdot, and there were some really funny comments. One guy said something to the effect of "oh no, once TorrentSpy gives up their RAM, the prosecutors will bust them for unlawful destruction of evidence!" :P

Oh well, at least the MPAA attorneys seem to be satisfied with the ruling: "'The courts have long considered computer RAM as "electronically stored information,' [MPAA lawyer Lauren Nguyen] said." Also, "to prove that TorrentSpy was making it easier to share files, the studios told Chooljian that it was necessary that they obtain records of user activity. They convinced her that the only way to do this was to obtain the data from RAM."

I'm guessing the judge and the lawyers meant "Hard Drive" when they said "RAM."

- I found this article really interesting: there are certain devices that drain much more energy--even when idle--than you think! Of course, most people know that a personal desktop computer is a big culprit of wasted energy; even if a PC draws 100-150W on idle, running said computer 24x7 sure adds up.

Some figures in the article, though, were really astounding: according to the author, a TiVo uses 30W when idle; a Comcast digital set-top box draws 40W; and an audio system uses 47W. This statement summarizes how wasteful of energy we can be, without even knowing it:

Indeed, the Department of Energy estimates that in the average home, 40 percent of all electricity used to power home electronics is consumed while the products are turned off. Add that all up, and it equals the annual output of 17 power plants, the government says.

I always thought that most energy was used to power absolute essentials: the refrigerator, lights, the stove top (for those who use electric burners/ovens), and heating/cooling (for those that live in extreme temperatures). I'm so glad our electricity bill is somewhere around $60-80 every two months; my parents' bill approaches $100-120 per month, but they have electric burners and an electric water heater.

My main desktop computer needs a reboot, anyway. I guess I can go ahead and shut it down.

Next time, I'll chat about how the Pacers are trying to rip off the Lakers in Jermaine O'Neal trade talks.

Gift Certificate Glut, Spurs v Cavs Game 4 Thoughts (aka "The Sweep"), and The Future of The Cavs

2007-06-14T20:23:00.000-07:00

- I have $125 in Dell Small Business gift certificates to use, assuming they're stackable, and I have no idea what to buy with them! I do need a new computer--if by "need," I mean I haven't had an upgrade since 2003--but I don't think I'm going to buy one from Dell, unless the deal is very hot.

Maybe I can find a person who needs a new computer, and purchase it on their behalf. Or maybe I should just buy myself a nice toy, and then resell it a couple of months later. Or maybe I should just sell the GCs for 80-90% of face value, and treat myself to a nice dinner at Ruth's Chris.

Speaking of gift certs, I don't recall the last time I've had this many of them that weren't given to me as gifts: $30 in Walmart GCs, $30 in Staples GCs, $125 in Dell GCs, and $80 in Symantec/Visa debit cards.

Geez. Did I just complain about having money to spend? I expect Krunk to reply to this post with nothing more than "*rubs fingers*."

- Congrats to the San Antonio Spurs, for winning their fourth championship in nine years! Cleveland fans, at least you have this going for you: there wasn't a singular moment that defined this series. I was hoping for this to play out: Cavs down 1 with seconds to go, LeBron drives past Bowen for a dunk to force Game 5, but NO! He hits the back iron on the dunk attempt! Then we could call that play "The Brick," and put it up there along with the other Cleveland sports heartaches: "The Drive," "The Shot," and "The Fumble."

I suppose we can call this one "The Sweep." Come on, who expected the Cavs to get swept?

(BTW, what the f**k was with that stupid McDonalds/Filet-O-Fish commercial??? I don't think I'm going to get any sleep tonight.

Can I sue?)

Tony Parker might have won the MVP, but Tim Duncan was absolutely unstoppable down the stretch. The diving save of a loose ball, the strip of LeBroom (yeah, that one's going to stick for a while), and that killer offensive board with under two minutes to go probably clinched the game.

(Tangent: Speaking of offensive boards, how about that sequence where the Spurs got four possessions in a row! For the love of rebounding! And how about Fabricio Oberto, of all players, to score on the fourth try, plus the foul?!?)

And where's the love for Manu Ginobili? How about that killer triple over LeBron? Can we just give all three of them--Duncan, Manu, and Parker--the MVP?

Some other thoughts:

Robert Horry now has SEVEN (7!!!) rings! Is he trying to fill his other hand?
I'm sure the boos that came when Parker was announced as the MVP was as much for his performance as the fact that he's going to marry Eva Longoria in a month.
What took so long for the NBA to advertise Spurs championship memorabilia? Didn't they used to run these commercials right after the final buzzer?
Congrats to Michael Finley, for finally picking up a championship ring.

- The Cavs, despite getting their butts kicked in this series, actually have a very bright future (it helps to have LeBron, doesn't it?)

They're probably going to re-sign Anderson Varejao and Sasha Pavlovic, which will push them into luxury tax territory.

(Tangent: It's a shame that Cleveland has so many contracts that expire the year following next year.)

If they can find a taker for the somewhat tradeable Donyell Marshall, or sucker a team into taking the otherwise untradeable Damon Jones or Eric Snow, they could either get immediate veteran help or cap relief for the 08-09 season. Ira Newble's $3 million contract will come off the book by then as well, as well as David Wesley's contract.

It wouldn't really surprise me if the Cavs get back to the NBA Finals next year; they sure have the core to do so, with LeBron, Z, and Gooden on the front line. However, the health of Larry Hughes is going to be a concern--the contract the Cavs gave him is still a head-scratcher--and who knows what Daniel Gibson gives the team in the future? If the Cavs can find a perimeter defender, a true point guard, and/or a consistent shooter, they'll be in great shape for next season.

I'm in a food coma right now--I BBQ'ed some burgers, and they were damn good--so that's it for now.

$54 Million Pants Reaction, Jermaine O'Neal to Lakers Snags, Johnny Buss Mistakens MySpace for the AP

2007-06-13T17:33:00.000-07:00

- If you haven't already, check out Krunk's commentary on the judge who wants a ton of money over his missing pants that he loved so much, he cried over the loss in court!

Also check out the 19 (!) replies that came in this morning. I'd like to think that my quip:

I hate to imagine what would happen if he had a non-matching pair of socks.

had something to do with the influx in traffic.

- I can't believe there is controversy regarding Dodgers' Pitcher Hong-Chih Kuo's HR last night, and his subsequent bat flip (video link inside). Look, the bat flip didn't look intentional; so what if he got a bit excited? Not only did he hit his first bomb of his career, but it came at the tail end of a back-to-back-to-back! I mean, it's not as if he stood at the plate for five seconds, admiring his shot.

That being said, would I be surprised if the Mets retaliated tonight? Not really.

- So the big story in the NBA--other than the crap-fest that is the Finals--is the Jermaine O'Neal to Los Angeles rumor. I talked about this possibility in an earlier blog entry, but now that talks between the teams seem to be heating up, let me delve into this topic in more detail.

I offered this possible trade scenario to Indiana:

How about Jermaine O'Neal, Jamaal Tinsley + assorted garbage for Odom, Brown, Farmar, Evans, and [the 19th pick]?

The salaries are close enough to matching: O'Neal and Tinsley make a combined total of $26 million, and Odom, Brown, Farmar, and Evans make a combined total of about $25 million. The Pacers get a pair of expiring contracts (Brown and Evans), a young PG, and a star with a relatively manageable two years and $28 million left on the deal. The Pacers also get to dump a pair of huge contracts.

(Edit: I had previously mentioned here about trading Jeff Foster for cap relief, which was a really foolish statement. After all, an expiring contract, by itself, provides cap relief at the end of the season. In an earlier blog entry, I said that the Pacers could try to trade Foster's expiring contract for veteran help; that's what I should have said in this spot.)

As for the Lakers? They go further into cap hell, pushing all-in with Jermaine, Kobe, Bynum, Tinsley, and a slew of garbage. Even if Radmanovic returns 100%, and Walton is re-signed, the Lakers will still be lacking a consistent shooter, a perimeter defender, and a reliable big off the bench (Chris Mihm?). Not to mention, the trade puts the Lakers at ~$58 million, and that's not including Walton. We know the Dr. Jerry Buss are adverse to paying the luxury tax, and if we assume the luxury tax threshold next year will be close to this past year's amount--$65 million or so--that doesn't leave the Lakers much room to fill out the remainder of their roster. Therefore, I see a 0% chance that this trade will happen.

Some people have suggested "offering" Radmanovic in a package for O'Neal. I think Indy has enough overpaid white guys on their roster (Murphy, Dunleavy Jr.) with totally untradeable contracts. Sure, Odom, Vlad, and the #19 for O'Neal works numbers-wise, but what does Indy get out of the deal? They'll see zero cap relief for two years! And people are talking as if the #19th pick is some gem. Yes, this year's draft class is really deep, but the #19th pick is in the Nick Young-Daequan Cook-Josh McRoberts class. Not exactly jaw-dropping talent, would you not agree?

Laker fans are screaming for the team to not trade Odom and Bynum in any deal for O'Neal, and I gotta agree. Paraphrasing Bill Simmons here, you shouldn't trade two assets (or stars, or a combination) for one asset, unless you're getting a super-duper star. And no, Jermaine O'Neal does not qualify as a super-duper star.

The only trade that makes any sense for both teams is Odom, Brown, and the #19 for O'Neal and David Harrison. The Lakers get their established post-presence, and young player on the last year of his deal, while the Pacers get an expiring contract and a draft pick. The Lakers would be at $52 million for eight players, and have enough room to re-sign Walton and get some veteran help. Most importantly, they would also keep their one remaining bargaining chip--Bynum--for another possible deal.

Does this get the Lakers to the NBA Championship? No. Does it make them much more competitive? Yes, if O'Neal stays healthy, and if they can get veteran help.

- One more bit of Lakers news: apparently Johnny Buss--son of Dr. Jerry Buss--has mistaken MySpace for reputable news sites such as the AP, Reuters, etc. Johnny, on his MySpace page, had this message for Laker fan:

If you've been following the Kobe drama, I want to let you know it's not really drama -- sometimes we all need to make a change in our lives and that's all it is. Popular or unpopular, when it's time, it's time. Good luck Kobe wherever you go!

How old is this guy? Seventeen? I'm surprised he didn't write up a rap or a poem, or respond with "Bye Bye Kobe LOLZZZZOMGWTFBBQLMFAQ!!!!!!!1111111eleventyoneoneone!!!!"

(That last "word" took me about five minutes to come up with.)

If I were Kobe, this ludicrous message would be enough for me to demand a trade. I always thought MySpace was used for friends to keep in touch with each other, local bands to advertise their music, and for people to deceive others by pretending to be celebrities.

(Then again, I do get most of my news from Digg, Consumerist, etc., instead of CNN, MSNBC, etc.)

By the way, to prove Johnny Buss' credibility, he was President of the WNBA's Los Angeles Sparks!

(I'm just sayin'...)

Spurs v Cavs Game 3 Thoughts, Home Depot Return Fraud Accusation

2007-06-12T20:44:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Am I reading the Mets-Dodgers box score wrong, or did the Dodgers hit back-to-back-to-back home runs? And is that the pitcher that hit the third one??? LOL!

(Nice...Fox Sports Net just showed the replay of the trifecta.)

- I told Krunk that I was done with poker, for the rest of the week. Let's see if I make it to Wednesday...

- I can't wait for the NBA Finals to end. I am sick and tired of seeing those stupid David Blaine commercials. John Mellencamp thinks David Blaine is seen on TV too much these days.

- Ok, can we stop calling LeBron James "King," at least until he wins a championship? Heck, if he gets the Cavs back to San Antonio, I'll let him keep the nickname! The Cavs are now on the brink of elimination, after losing a heartbreaker in Game 3. Was it just me, or did it look like the Spurs were trying to let the Cavs win the game? Talk about wasted opportunities! Manu finished with three points--all on fourth quarter FTs--Tony Parker didn't shred the Cavs D, and even Tim Duncan was slowed down, and the Cavs still couldn't pull it out?

(Tangent: Was that not the most unwatchable half of basketball ever? Twenty-seven points in the third quarter, combined? Second-lowest scoring Finals game ever? It looked like somebody greased both rims with Crisco.)

(Tangent #2: During the game, I noticed a bunch of flashing red lights. I thought my TV was on the fritz--Yes! A legitimate excuse to return my TV to Costco! Alas, it seems the fans were wearing these clip-on flashing red LED thingies.)

Some other thoughts:

Going 3-19 from beyond the arc isn't going to win you many games.
Boy, do the Cavs need a PG! Daniel Gibson just isn't equipped to handle the point. Too bad Larry Hughes is completely untradeable for the next two seasons.
That was some pretty awful officiating! LeBron got fouled late a couple of times, and no whistle was blown!
I should have figured the game was over when the Cavs decided to go to Eric Snow (see bullet #2) down the stretch.

Do I dare pick against the Spurs in Game 4? Hell no. Bring out LeBroom!

(Of course, I've been wrong in Games 2 and 3; what makes me believe that I'll be right here?)

- (from Consumerist) A Home Depot employee accused a woman of bringing in an empty bag + receipt, picking up an item listed on the receipt, and then trying to return the item. First of all, the item was packed in that nearly impossible to open plastic, and the woman said that she "just threw all the parts along with the plastic case into the Home Depot bag along with the receipt and went to the return counter." Pray tell, how did she manage to open the blister packaging, to set up this elaborate scam, inside the store? She must have had some sharp fingernails!

(Never mind the fact that that sounds like an awful lot of work to defraud a company out of a hundred bucks.)

More importantly, I thought Home Depot deemed it illegal for an associate to accuse a customer of shoplifting! I better hear that this kid got fired by HD for his heinous act!

(Also from Consumerist) I'll leave with this little gem: it will be one year ago tomorrow that this (in)famous AOL cancellation attempt was made by disgruntled customer Vincent Ferrari.

Next time: I gotta talk about the Jermaine O'Neal to LA rumors.

Man Amputates Self to Save His Life, and An Unfair Sentence Overturned

2007-06-11T16:37:00.001-07:00

- Not long ago, I noticed the clock in my bathroom stopped ticking. I popped the AA battery out of the clock, and went searching for a new one. It turned out that I didn't have a spare, so I just popped the battery back into the clock, and noticed it started ticking again. I put the clock back up on the wall, and thought nothing of it.

That was a month ago...the darn thing has worked since. The next time the clock should stop working, remind me to swap the "dead" battery with one from my TV remote control (we all know how long those things go without needing new batteries!).

- Not that I was doubting Amy, but the guy who screamed "NOOOOOOOOOOO!" when it was announced that Paris Hilton was going to have to serve her entire 45-day sentence has been identified as Jake Byrd, real name Anthony Barbieri, of Jimmy Kimmel Live fame.

- I hate poker. I really do. So why do I keep playing? Because I love losing an entire buy-in against the mother of all hands: the dreaded four-deuce.

- A 66-year-old in Iowa City, California, used a set of pocket knives to amputate his leg, in order to free himself from a felled tree. The man "had been cutting trees last Friday when one fell on him. After freeing himself, he cried out for help, and a neighbor passing through this sparsely populated area heard him." The guy was pinned under the trees for eleven hours!

I remember a similar story, where a guy cut off his arm--pinned under a rock, IIRC--to escape as well. I don't want to know how the guy pulled this off, but I don't think I could ever amputate myself, no matter the situation. And how the heck did this guy chop off a limb with a pocket knife? I better get a chain saw, or a machete, or maybe one of those ginsu knives. All I know for sure is, If I had to choose between amputation to save my own life, or certain death, give me death!

- A man who was sentenced to ten years in prison for consensual oral sex he had with a 15-year-old when he was 17 was ordered to be released by a Georgia judge on Monday. The sentence handed down on Genarlow Wilson, which came with mandatory registration in the sex offender registry, was widely criticized by many for being unfit for the crime. Although the judge has requested that the sentence be reduced to aggravated child molestation--a misdemeanor--without having to register as a sex offender, the Georgia Attorney General has filed an appeal. The A.G. argues that "Georgia law does not give a judge authority to reduce or modify the sentence imposed by the trial court."

I don't want to hear any of the "rules are rules" arguments; the fact is, the guy had consensual sex, and he did not deserve ten years in prison. Mr A.G., I do hope you get the "expedited" ruling you asked for, and I hope the Georgia Supreme Court rules in favor of Mr. Wilson. Then I hope Mr. Wilson is able to get his life back on track, once he is released.

That's all I've got for today.

Spurs v Cavs Game 2 Thoughts, Time Warner Still Sucks, and A Sub Didn't Really Show Her Students Porn

2007-06-10T22:06:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- I woke up this morning, and went outside to my patio, when I noticed a ton of bird poop all over the place! Apparently, a couple birds have now taken control of my patio, and marked their territory accordingly.

- Law and Order: Special Victims Unit is an awesome show. USA Networks has had an SVU marathon, starting from 11am this morning, and yes, I've seen every episode since then.

- I inserted a DVD-ROM into my DVD+RW today, and absolutely nothing happened. The drive wouldn't read the disc, and it wouldn't even eject it! I used a paper clip to manually eject the drive, and that didn't work either! I tried restarting the computer, and the drive tray eventually ejected.

I found a small piece of Play-Doh stuck to the bottom of the disc, and the tray itself...

- So after two games of the NBA Finals, some people are already calling for "LeBroom" (as in sweep, heh), as the Spurs demolished the Cavs. I only caught a little bit of the game--thanks, SVU marathon--but when I first tuned in, it was something like Spurs 33, Cavs 17. I did catch the fourth quarter, up until Manu hit that killer four-point play to put the game on ice.

I'm not convinced that this series is over, though. Lebron spent a bunch of the first half on the bench, saddled with foul trouble, and the Spurs blew out the Cavs during that stretch. Would it be that far-fetched to see Duncan, Parker, Manu, or Bowen, to be saddled with foul trouble in Game 3?

(Of course, I'm not suggesting that the referees are going to go out of their way to fix Game 3 in the Cavs' favor...)

That fourth quarter push by the Cavs against an obviously bored Spurs team has to be encouraging for the Eastern Conference champs, who now get the next three games at home. I'll pick the Cavs to win Game 3, with Lebron having a huge game.

(Of course, I also picked the Cavs + 7 here in Game 2, and that obviously worked out well...)

- According to a poster at DSLReports.com, Time Warner is announcing a plan to start "packet shaping" on their Road Runner HSI service. Packet, or traffic, shaping, is defined (via Wikipedia) as "an attempt to control computer network traffic in order to optimize or guarantee performance, low latency, and/or bandwidth. Traffic shaping deals with concepts of classification, queue disciplines, enforcing policies, congestion management, quality of service (QoS), and fairness."

In other words, we can slow down your internet connection whenever we damn well please! As for "peak hours," what's to stop TW from deciding that peak hours start at 12:01AM and end at 11:59PM?

In all seriousness, I can understand why TW would want to attempt this; by slowing down bandwidth hogs, they can ensure that non-hogs will get decent speeds during peak hours. Here's the problem I have with the new policy:

"Packet shaping" technology has been implemented for newsgroup applications, regardless of the provider, and all peer-to-peer networks and certain other high bandwidth applications not necessarily limited to audio, video, and voice over IP telephony. Road Runner reserves the right to implement network management tools for other applications in the future.

What does that leave? Text-based sites and web mail? Will TW only allow online tic-tac-toe and pong? By the way, TW does sell their own VoIP service; will they be throttling that as well?

- Remember the substitute teacher that was accused of "expos[ing] seventh-graders to pornography on a classroom computer," and was threatened with up to 40 years in jail? Apparently, new evidence "presented belatedly by the state that suggested jurors received erroneous information" has come about, and now a judge has overturned the conviction.

Hooray for justice! In fact, in this sue happy world of ours, where just about anyone can sue for "mental anguish, loss of enjoyment of life, defamation of character, etc.", I would not mind if this woman countersued for damages. And if she does countersue, I hope she wins, or at least gets a fat settlement.

Until next time...

Roger Clemens is Back, Death By Overdose of Muscle Cream

2007-06-09T17:47:00.000-07:00

- Roger Clemens (OH MY GOODNESS!) is back! He got the win today against the mightly Pittsburgh Pirates, going six innings while giving up three runs and five hits.

(Yeah, I don't care either. That pic in the YouTube video scares me, by the way.)

- Scary story here: a 17-year-old female track star died from an overdose of methyl salicylate, the active ingredient in muscle creams:

Arielle Newman, a cross-country runner at Notre Dame Academy on Staten Island, died after her body absorbed high levels of methyl salicylate, an anti-inflammatory found in sports creams such as Bengay and Icy Hot, the New York City medical examiner said Friday.

Newman had been using at least three products--a cream, a pad, and an unidentified third product--containing methyl salicylate, and apparently it was the chronic overuse of these products that led to her death.

What a frightening story! I have, on a couple occasions, used way more than the recommended amount of a product, and far more often than the 3-4 times daily as suggested. I have even used expired medication in the past, without batting an eye. I wonder how often she was using these pain relievers; usually they say to stop using them after 10-14 days and consult a physician if the ailment persists (a warning I also find myself ignoring).

The article also says that she was using anti-inflammatory pads. I wonder if she was using them at the same time as the creams; the creams specifically say not to bandage or wrap tightly.

I wonder: was there someone pushing Newman so hard, that she had to rely on the pain medication to get through her races? I always hear stories of overbearing parents, mentors, coaches, etc. pushing their athletes far past the point of exhaustion (or worse). I don't want to suggest that this is what happened, but one can't rule out that possibility.

- Today's TotD sounds like fun:

A giant enemy crab approaches. What do you do? There is only one right answer.

Correct, there is only one right answer.

(By the way, how do we know it's an "enemy" crab? Most crabs I see are pretty neutral, until I attempt to throw it in a pot of water, that is.)

What would I do? I'd take a stick, stab both its eyes, then take a huge rock and smack the hell out of the crab's exoskeleton. When I'm sure it's dead, I'd go to my local grocery store to get a bunch of lemons, some butter, and fresh peppercorn, and have a feast!

(That is the correct answer, is it not?)

BTW, Cavs +7 over Spurs tomorrow.

Paris Hilton Is Back In Hot Water, Amanda Beard to Pose for Playboy, What to Do Without Internet/Cell/Cable?

2007-06-08T17:39:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- AK is truly an evil hand. I lost three buy-ins today with AK: first against 77, where the flop came K7x; second against T8, when he flopped a flush and I had a chance to draw a better flush; and third against AQ, where he spiked a Q on the river (naturally).

- For some reason, I cannot stop following the Paris Hilton story! What outrageous twist will come next? Maybe the Governator will finally offer a pardon...

By the way, this picture is traumatizing me.

I don't know what was the best scene of the day: there was that guy holding a "Liberate Hilton" sign outside her house, there was that guy screaming "NOOOOOOOOOOO" when it was announced that Hilton will have to serve the entire 45-day sentence (as if that is going to stick), there was a guy holding a "Obama-Hilton 08" poster, and there was the usual scene of rabid paparazzi members chasing the police car as it drove away from her house.

Why do I have the feeling that Hilton's fans (how she has fans to begin with, I do not know) will be outside the facility she's being held at, offering her a standing ovation once she's released from prison? If people did that during the Wacko Jacko case, why not this?

- Olympic swimmer Amanda Beard bared all in this month's issue of Playboy, citing this as a "once in a lifetime opportunity." While there are lots that are happy for her decision--I mean her own family, not the thousands of Playboy subscribers!--she also expects to get some criticism, specifically from mothers of younger swimmers.

I can understand both sides of the argument; would you blame the mother of a young female swimmer if she took offense to Beard--a role model for many swimmers today--posing in Playboy? Also, I can understand how this decision only serves to further demean female athletes. There is such a disparity of respect between male and female athletes as it is; why further this disparity by doing something like this?

Personally, I don't see what the big deal is. For one thing, I commend Beard for seeing this as an opportunity to build a career outside of swimming:

Beard is trying to position herself for a career away from the pool, and she sees the magazine spread as a way to attract nonswimming fans.
She envisions developing her own business empire, similar to former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Kathy Ireland’s line of apparel and home furnishings.

She's 25, probably going to call it quits after the 2008 Olympic Games, and is already thinking ahead of her next phase of life. What is wrong with that? Sure, maybe she could have thought of a better way to advertise herself, but in this day and age, is Playboy really that big of a deal any more?

Do I believe her decision to pose in Playboy will only serve to further demean female athletes? No; she wouldn't be the first female athlete to pose for Playboy. If anything, I agree that this will bring more attention to Olympic swimming. Unfortunately, I also expect the attention for the sport to wane once she retires.

- Today's TotD:

What would you do without internet access? A cell phone? Cable television?

I should point out that this topic was shamelessly ripped from a thread over at the Bargainshare Forums. I will briefly answer all three questions below:

I'd probably keel over, or end up in the fetal position for eternity.
I could live without a cell phone; nobody calls me, anyway, except for these voice recordings in Spanish (I found out that these recordings are scams, trying to get unsuspecting people to pay fines they never knew they owed).
Without cable television, I'd be in a bit of trouble (no ESPN? AHHHHHHHHHH). However, if both cable television and cable internet are taken away from me, one might as well end my life now.

(Ok, I'm not totally serious about that last statement.)

Spurs v Cavs Game 1 Thoughts, and A Pair of TotDs

2007-06-07T22:10:00.001-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Freaking Dodgers. 5-1, 9th inning, about to beat the best pitcher in the National League, and then they decide to play like a Pee Wee league softball team. Damn I'm pissed.

- You know you're in pain when it hurts just to sit down. I'm probably a pair of Tylenol away from being classified as an addict.

- Did I mention, freaking Dodgers?

- So after Game 1 of the NBA Finals, I can safely say that the Cavs are in a little bit of trouble. They played well for a half, but apparently the Cavs couldn't answer the bell for the second half. A few thoughts on Game 1:

The Spurs are NOT boring to watch! Watching Tony Parker carve up the Cavs' PGs, and watching Duncan operate down low, are works of art.
Less Larry Hughes, more Daniel Gibson!
Hey, Lebron, if your shot isn't working for you, it's probably not a good idea to continue throwing up fadeaways.

By the way, did anyone see that weird home video (aired during halftime) of Spurs coach Gregg Popovich visiting Tim Duncan at the Virgin Islands? Am I the only one that thought that the video was kinda creepy, especially the scene where the two of them were on the beach together?

Anyway, the Cavs need to give more minutes to Daniel Gibson, and they might want to think about playing Eric Snow for a few minutes. The first half of Game 1 had to be encouraging for the Cavs, but the Cavs better get that third quarter out of their system as soon as possible. That first half illustrated my belief that the Cavs might, in fact, have a shot at winning the series.

I still think they'll come up short, however. I expect the Spurs to win Game 2, using the same blueprint as they did to outmuscle the Cavs in Game 1.

- Silly me; I finally provided some TotDs for the IMBC, and I went ahead and skipped yesterday's topic. I will now go ahead and answer both of them here. Yesterday's TotD:

Describe how you came up with your blog name/username.

I remember watching my local NBC news one day, when they were handing out that week's "unsung hero" award. I stuck an extra "g" in there--my last name is Ung--and presto!

(Tangent: People on online forums frequently leave out that "g" in ungsunghero. It used to really bother me, but not so much any more.)

(Tangent #2: Once, a guy on an online forum insisted that my name had a typo in it. I assured him that that was not the case, and he insisted that I was the one mistaken. That's kinda like the guy that calls your phone number, asks for [insert name that you don't recognize], and then after you tell him that there is no one by that name, he insists that you have the wrong number. And yeah, that has happened to me on more than one occasion.)

I don't need to explain UngsungBlog, do I?

As for today's TotD:

What is/are your favorite cereal(s)?

My current favorite has to be Raisin Bran Crunch. I absolutely love that cereal, though it is a bit too sweet for my tastes. If I don't have any Raisin Bran Crunch, I'll settle for some Honey Bunches of Oats, no matter the variety. Both cereals are so good that I can eat them as snacks, with or without milk.

Next time: some fun poker hands I've seen in the last couple of days, among other things.

NBA Finals Thoughts, Wiiitis, and 100 Words Every High School Graduate Should Know

2007-06-06T19:53:00.000-07:00

First, a quick-hitter:

- The Anaheim Ducks are your 2006-7 NHL Stanley Cup Champions!

Yeah, I don't care either.

(Raise your hand if you even knew that the NHL season started.)

- The NBA Finals is finally upon us! Duncan, Manu, and Parker versus Lebron! Will the Spurs cement their dynasty with their fourth championship in nine years? Will the Cavs be able to ride their superstar to a title? Will the refs, once again, prove to be the deciding figure in who wins the championship (I'm not suggesting that the NBA and their refs fix games, by the way *whistles*).

So, who do I think will win? Here's a better question: how can I pick against the Spurs? This matchup seems to be a bigger "mismatch" than the 2004 series between the Lakers and Detroit (of course, we know how THAT turned out!). Actually, I can see a couple of ways the Cavs can upset the Spurs:

If Bowen gets into foul trouble--definitely a possibility, considering that Bowen will have to guard Lebron--forcing the Spurs to use Manu to defend Lebron.
If Duncan gets into foul trouble--also possible, considering that Big Z, Gooden, and Varejao could be used to defend him--forcing the Spurs to use some combination of Oberto, Elson, Horry, et al., or go small.
If Big Z, Marshall, Gibson, Pavlovic, Gooden, et al., all play out of their minds.
If David Stern has something to say about the result (kidding!)

That being said, I don't see the Cavs being able to stop Tony Parker on the perimeter, nor will they be able to stop Duncan on the inside. Yeah, Lebron is a super-duper-star, and he could carry his team past the Spurs, but I just don't see it happening this year. It wouldn't surprise me at all, though, if he wins a title sometime in the next five years. Spurs in six games.

- A Boston doctor has coined a new injury he developed after playing too much Wii tennis. The name? You guessed it: Wiiitis. As the story goes, Dr. Julio Bonis woke up one morning with a sore shoulder, and determined that the injury was due to too much Wii tennis. "The variant in this patient can be labeled more specifically as 'Wiiitis,'" declared the doctor.

Will this open the door to a huge Wiiitis-related class action lawsuit against Nintendo? Maybe this will lead to a huge increase in the sales of pain medication. Or maybe, this will be the start of a worldwide Wiiitis epidemic, causing millions of hours of missed work/school time and billions of dollars of health care to be administered!

Or maybe the doctor should have realized that several consecutive hours of just about any activity probably isn't a good idea...

- Finally (from Digg), I leave you with this list of the 100 words that every high school graduate should know. I am proud to admit that I do not know, or have forgotten, the definitions for most of the words on that list :P. In today's world, lacking in self-accountability, I would like to blame my high school for my not knowing most of these words.

Or maybe I should go read the dictionary...

Catching Shoplifters Is Grounds For Termination, and Credit Card Debt Signs

2007-06-05T19:49:00.000-07:00

Some quick-hitters:

- Drat! While moving my old CPU heatsink/fan from my secondary computer to my DOSBox--I picked up this heatsink/fan (FAR at Buy.com; I might post a mini-review about this product in the future), and I needed to replace the hs/f in my DOSBox--I somehow broke the blue LED in the fan! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I so wanted the cool blue LED in my otherwise crappy DOSBox! :P

- One quick blurb about Billy Donovan: Jay Bilas wrote that Donovan's handling of his contract situation with the Magic was "unprofessional" (ESPN Insider subscription required). I could not agree more. Why Donovan is getting so much support is beyond me; the most common defense that I've seen revolves on the "He made a mistake!" theme. If that's the case, then why the hell did he sign the contract in the first place?!? And don't give me that "he was pressured to sign the contract" BS.

- (from Consumerist) Four Midwest City, OK, employees of Home Depot have been terminated for (get this) helping the police catch suspected shoplifters! According to company policy, "associates cannot accuse, detain, chase or call the police on any customer for shoplifting." Home Depot responded, saying that they have "standard operating procedures in place for situations like this."

I'd really like to know what these standard operating procedures are. If employees aren't allowed to identify shoplifters, how exactly is the store going to stop the guy? Maybe the "loss prevention" guys at Home Depot just pray that the shoplifters have a change of heart, and willingly return the stolen goods. That's about as plausible as a store policy to fire any associate for stopping a suspected shoplifter. Or maybe, Home Depot fears that a store associate will wrongfully accuse a person of shoplifting, only to have that person file a harassment lawsuit?

In any case, yes, rules are rules, and yes, this rule is stupid.

- (also from Consumerist) According to Bankrate.com, you've got too much credit card debt if:

1. If you can't remember the last time you had zero balances on all your credit cards.

2. If your FICO score is below 650.

3. If you don't remember what you bought on your credit card last month.

4. If you don't really know how many coffees, teas, soft drinks or snacks you buy every week.

5. If you use your credit card for utilities, food, snacks and so on, and you're not doing it to earn frequent flier or bonus points.

6. If you have money in a 401(k), but you have to live on your credit cards in order to put it there.

7. If you have no money in any sort of general savings account.

8. If you're still paying for restaurant meals you can't remember eating.

9. If you have to take a cash advance from one credit card to make a payment on another one.

10. If you ever held a garage sale to raise money to make credit card payments.

I suppose some of these make sense, but a couple of them are garbage. For instance, #1 applies to me, only because I have a huge balance on one CC at 0% for investment purposes. Also, #3 and #4 apply to me, but that's probably because I put just about everything on my CC, including $2 purchases at a fast food restaurant. #10 applies to me, too, but replace "garage sale" with "eBay/Amazon," whenever there is a series of hot deals that I just can't resist :P. #2 isn't necessarily true, either; I personally know someone with a low credit score and zero credit card debt. That person got his low score from delinquencies on his student loan payments.

I totally agree with #6-9, though.

That's all I've got for now.

80s Music Fun, Billy Donovan Can't Make Up His Mind, and The Yankees Are Back

2007-06-04T17:49:00.000-07:00

So I've spent the last hour (as of 1:20AM) chatting with Krunk about 80s music, sparked by my discussion of the Survivor concert I attended on Sunday. That was kinda fun, considering that we usually talk about tech stuff, hot deals, Heroes, and other geeky topics.

- So apparently Billy Donovan cannot make up his mind. Apparently Billy has had a change of heart, and wants to get out of the $27.5 million deal he signed literally hours ago, citing that it was the wrong decision to join the Magic. In fact, the Orlando Sentinel has reported that he will be let out of the contract, pending a discussion between lawyers representing both parties.

What took so long, Billy? Why didn't you tell the team immediately after signing the contract that you had second thoughts? The sad thing about this whole story is that, while Donovan may never be offered a contract by another NBA team again--some team probably will, eventually--he's going to be beloved by Gator fans once his return is official.

(Actually, I wouldn't mind if a really bad team gave him another chance. That way, he could coach for a couple years and compile some pathetic record, before running back to the college ranks.)

I gotta feel for Virginia Commonwealth coach Anthony Grant, who was rumored to be the lead candidate to replace Donovan at Florida, and for the Orlando Magic, who now have to go with Plan B (Stan Van Gundy?) to fill their coaching vacancy. Imagine if Donovan and Van Gundy were both candidates for the job, and Van Gundy had gone to another team before Donovan announced that he was backing out! I hope Orlando does everything they can to penalize Donovan for quitting (yes, quitting) on the Magic.

Yeah, I have a little Billy Donovan hatred, due to the fact that his Florida team beat my Bruins two consecutive years in the Tournament. Still, what he's doing is reprehensible, and is possibly setting up a dangerous precedent.

(By the way, it wouldn't surprise me if Donovan negotiated a new contract with the Gators for more money than the original extension. Maybe that was his plan all along!)

Maybe there is a silver lining in all of this. Maybe Donovan's decision will spare Orlando a few underachieving seasons (similar to the way that many other college coaches-turned-pro have failed in recent years). Maybe Stan Van Gundy works out, and for less money!

- The Yankees are back! After beating the Red Sox twice in three games--one of those wins punctuated by an A-Fraud HR off Jonathon Papelbon--the Yankees are now only 12.5 games back of their rivals!

(BTW, awesome "Where Is Ro-ger!" chant at Fenway Park!)

No, I'm not myopic enough to think that the Yankees are done, despite all their injuries. Yes, I believe Roger Clemens will win a few games for them. But, can we save the "Yankees are back!" declarations for when the Yankees actually get within a couple of games of the BoSox? Let's see them gain a few games on Boston before the All-Star break, and then we can talk about Boston possibly choking away their huge lead.

By the way, the Yankees are planning on making one huge trade soon, right? I wouldn't mind them adding another overpaid superstar or two to their rapidly sinking ship.

Sorry, non-sports fans, but the Billy Donovan story was too compelling to pass up.

NorCal Trip, The End (Old Town Sacto), and Survivor In The Park

2007-06-03T22:01:00.000-07:00

(As promised...)

- So Day 3 of the NorCal trip started off with my waking up two hours before my alarm clock was to sounds (thanks, Mom). We left our hotel and headed to my cousin's donut shop, where I loaded up on about four cups of coffee, a donut, and a ham and cheese croissant.

(Tangent: If I were forced to eat one breakfast item for the rest of my life, a ham and cheese croissant might be that item.)

After fueling, we loaded up my cousin's van, and our party was joined by a family friend/tour guide, Jerry. We first dropped by a farmer's market, and bought a ton of fruits and veggies. We bought some roma tomatoes, asparagus, and a bag of snow peas, among other things. The prices were pretty nice; $2.00 for six roma tomatoes, e.g.

After that, we drove to the state Capitol building in Sacramento, where my sister and mom continued to embarrass me by acting like tourists: they took tons of pictures, ooooh-ing and aaaaah-ing as they took each shot. Worse, my cousin--she lives up there, btw--had her camcorder with her. I declared that we were visors, cheap sunglasses, and city guides away from reaching full tourist status.

(Oh yeah, my sister was still wearing her LA Dodger sandals. Also, both my sister and mom were woefully underdressed; they complained of the winds all day [Thanks, Krunk, for pointing out that severe over- or underdressed people are also possibly tourists]. )

After that, we drove a few miles to Old Town Sacramento, where we had a late lunch at some cheap Italian buffet--the food was awful, but damn cheap. After that, we walked around and browsed through a couple of stores; I bought $12 worth of salt water taffy at one of the candy shops.

(Tangent: Peppermint taffy used to be my favorite flavor, until I tried some caramel apple and orange cream taffy. Peppermint is now, at best, #3 on that list, and I still haven't tried a ton of other flavors I bought.)

(Tangent #2: Thanks, Krunk, for pointing out that groups of people that congregate into souvenir shops are also possibly tourists. I may have to make a blog entry about how to spot a tourist, based on my own experiences.)

We also visited the Sacramento River--much nicer than the Los Angeles "River"--and did a lot of walking around, snapping pics. Soon after, we left Old Town and headed for my cousin's house, where we grilled up a ton of those veggies (and damn, were they tasty!). I also had a real thick London Broil, that I grilled medium rare. I should have cooked it a bit longer; tougher cuts of meat, like London Broil, need to be cooked a bit longer, IMO.

Day 4 of the NorCal trip involved us going back to the donut shop, fueling up again--3 cups of coffee, a couple donut holes, and then a quick stop to Carl's Jr. for a burger--before we took off for SoCal. We said our goodbyes, left at around 1:15pm, and despite a couple of stops, we got back in town at around 7pm (not bad for 300-350 miles!).

- Today, we dropped by Warner Center Park in nearby Woodland Hills, because Survivor was in concert! I was only familiar with a couple of songs they wrote--Eye of the Tiger and Burning Heart, of course--but then I found out that they also sang Search is Over (this song was AWESOME, live). The concert, as a whole, was great; of course, they ended with Eye of the Tiger! There were some sound problems at the beginning of the concert, but for a free concert, I can't really complain. I didn't appreciate the knuckleheads that kept standing up during the concert--the pavilion has no seating, so people sat on chairs or the grass--and I really didn't appreciate the older woman that sat on my right, and lit up a cancer stick. Another woman came up to her, scolded her about the cigarette, busted out her wooden fan, and starting waving the smoke towards the smoker; too bad most of the smoke was sent right towards me. Eventually, the woman got a clue, put out her cigarette, and left.

By the way, did I mention that "Search is Over" is an awesome song?

Next time (maybe in a few minutes), I'll be talking about Billy "John Kerry" Donovan, the Yankees, and a few older stories that I haven't gotten to for some time.

A Nice Bad Beat, Billy Donovan Is Rich, and Roger Clemens Is Hurt

2007-06-02T17:11:00.000-07:00

- Now THIS is one sick beat. I've had full houses lose to four-of-a-kinds, but never on the flop!

Seat #6 is the dealer
Seat 6 - PLAYER 1 ($515 in chips)
Seat 8 - PLAYER 2 ($403 in chips)
Seat 9 - VILLAIN ($151 in chips)
Seat 1 - HERO ($41 in chips)
PLAYER 2 - Posts small blind $3
VILLAIN - Posts big blind $5
*** POCKET CARDS ***
Dealt to HERO [9c 9s]
HERO - Raises $10 to $10
PLAYER 1 - Folds
PLAYER 2 - Raises $12 to $15
VILLAIN - Calls $10
HERO - Raises $10 to $20
PLAYER 2 - Calls $5
VILLAIN - Calls $5
*** FLOP *** [5c 5s 9h]
PLAYER 2 - Bets $5
VILLAIN - Calls $5
HERO - Calls $5
*** TURN *** [5c 5s 9h] [Ah]
PLAYER 2 - Bets $10
VILLAIN - Raises $20 to $20
HERO - All-In $16
PLAYER 2 - Folds
VILLAIN - returned ($4) : not called
*** RIVER *** [5c 5s 9h Ah] [2h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
HERO - Shows [9c 9s] (Full house, nines full of fives)
VILLAIN - Shows [5d 5h] (Four of a kind, fives)
VILLAIN Collects $115 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total Pot($117) | Rake ($2)
Board [5c 5s 9h Ah 2h]
Seat 1: HERO HI:lost with Full house, nines full of fives [9c 9s - P:9s,B:9h,P:9c,B:5s,B:5c]
Seat 6: PLAYER 1 (dealer) Folded on the POCKET CARDS
Seat 8: PLAYER 2 (small blind) Folded on the TURN
Seat 9: VILLAIN (big blind) won Total ($115) HI:($115) with Four of a kind, fives [5d 5h - B:5s,P:5h,P:5d,B:5c,B:Ah]

(Names changed to protect the innocent, of course.)

It's a damn good thing that the Hero only had $41 in chips when the hand started. Incidentally, that was his last $41 he had (not just at the table, but at the poker site altogether).

- Poor, poor Billy Donovan. Weeks after supposedly negotiating a contract extension to remain the Florida Gators' head coach, Donovan found 27.5 million reasons to go back on his word and become coach of the Orlando Magic. The best part? Apparently, Donovan "agonized" over the decision to leave Florida, as if it was that hard to accept the $27.5 million contract to jump ship.

(Yeah, I know, I will never be in this position, so I will never know how difficult this decision really was.)

You can stop the argument that you wanted a new challenge, and "the right opportunity" happened to present itself; if by "the right opportunity," of course I mean "exorbitant amounts of money." In fact, the next time a player/coach/exec/etc. says he left one organization for another because of the money will probably be the first to do so. Look, $27.5 million is a ton of money; it'll set you, your wife, your family, her family, and their families for their lives (ok, slight exaggeration). So please stop trying to convince people that you went to Orlando for a challenge; if you wanted a challenge, why not wait for the Bobcats' job to open up?

- As if the Yankees needed any more bad news, their savior, Roger Clemens, will skip his expected start against the Chicago White Sox due to a groin injury. Fear not, Yankee fans! Kei Igawa will most likely take Clemens' spot on Monday. Quoted from the article:

Clemens believes he needs an extra four to five days to recover, keeping him out of the four-game series at Chicago, and that this is not a major injury.
That timeframe would put him in line to face the Pirates in Yankee Stadium next weekend.

I'd be lying if I said I was not laughing when I saw this news. I have a feeling that ESPN won't bother showing Monday's Yankees-White Sox game now. Also, how convenient is it that he now gets to start against a bad Pirates team, instead of a contending team like the White Sox? Hey Roger, why not push back your return against the Royals or Devil Rays.

Oh wait, the Rays might actually beat you.

I was going to post about Day 3 of the NorCal trip, but my BBQ is ready to go, and I have a couple nice, juicy ribeyes ready to go. Until next time!

IMBC News, A Bit More Kobe, The Yanks Might Be Cursed, Steve Kerr = Suns GM

2007-06-01T00:58:00.000-07:00

(Day 3 of the NorCal trip will have to wait until tomorrow...)

So what's the big news story of the day? I've been invited back to the IMBC! What does this mean?

I can, at least for now, no longer root for Amy to win. I imagine that I will be rooting for her to win again soon enough :P.
If I somehow win this thing, it'll be a tainted victory. I'll have to ask Hank to put an asterisk next to my name in the IMBC record books.
I better make a note (mental or otherwise) to check the timestamp on all future entries.

- Here's the latest in the Kobe Bryant saga: Kobe and owner Dr. Jerry Buss had spoken to each other, and Dr. Buss promised Kobe that he would "'pursue every avenue possible' to improve the team." Quoted from the article:

"I talked with Kobe this morning and assured him that I share his frustration and, more importantly, I assured him that we will continue to pursue every avenue possible to improve our team with him as the cornerstone," Buss said in a statement. "I told him that we will keep him apprised of our progress and we agreed that we will talk again in the very near future."

Wait a second...didn't Kobe just whine about being misled and back stabbed by the team, angering him to the point where he needed a change of scenery? Didn't he just say that there was nothing the team could do to make him change his mind about wanting a trade? Also, why would be want to stay with a team that apparently pissed on the previous three seasons of his career? Here's a better question: how did I not see this coming? How was I not able to figure out that everything would be OK once Kobe and Buss started talking to each other?

It appears that Kobe will be staying in LA. Let's see if he actually gets the help he needs, starting with a point guard not named Smush Parker.

- The Yankees' Jason Giambi will miss, at the very least, the next three weeks of the season with a foot injury. He could, potentially, miss the entire season. At least the injury occurred on the playing field, although I'm guessing the team would have been happier if the injury didn't occur while he was celebrating a home run trot. The foot was already injured, and it appears that the trot aggravated the injury. In a season where the Yankees are currently a billion games out of first place (to the hated Red Sox, no less), and where a 44-year-old six-inning pitcher is labeled your savior, what else could possibly go wrong (other than a pair of scandals involving a certain player, on successive days, one of which I must talk about tomorrow)?

(By the way, as a Yankee hater, I am seriously enjoying this.)

Line of the night: hearing an ESPN personality (it might have been on SportsCenter, I forget) saying that "at least" the injury occurred to a position player, and not a pitcher.

- The other big news story of last night? Steve Kerr, TNT and Yahoo! Sports personality, and minority owner of the Phoenix Suns, will be named the president and general manager of the team, according to a source familiar with the negotiations. This is horrible news, as far as I'm concerned. Why? It's because I always enjoyed reading Kerr's articles on Yahoo! Sports, as well as listening to him and Marv Albert doing play-by-play on TNT. Kerr might be my favorite NBA color analyst out there today; he's very insightful, articulate, and has a sense of humor, without trying to be over the top (you hear me, Stu Lantz?).

Until next time!

Kobe Brings Down The Hammer...Then Reverses, and NorCal Trip Day 2: (Burnin' Bridges)

2007-05-31T00:14:00.001-07:00

One day after I busted out of the IMBC, and now I feel like replying to a TotD.

Oh well, off to more pressing matters!

One quick hitter:

- After "typing" out a comment on my blog entry for (what was supposed to be) Tuesday on my cell phone, I was tempted to enter a full blog entry via my cell. Then I crunched some numbers. Assuming a blog entry is 400 words; at 5 characters/word (I believe that's how wpm is measured), I'll need to "type" about 2000 characters. Also, since I don't have a QWERTY keyboard on my cell phone, I'd have to hit certain keys multiple times to get the letters I want; never mind the capitals and punctuation. At that rate, I better hire the girl who won that texting competition, if I ever want to complete a blog entry via my cell.

So, Kobe Bryant finally demanded a trade from the Lakers, only to reverse position later in the day. When the story first broke out--I first heard about it on The Jim Rome Show this morning--I was fully in support of Kobe. If everything that has been alleged is true (a Lakers' "insider" saying that Kobe pushed Shaq out of town, which was followed by Kobe's adamant denial of the story and finger-pointing at Dr. Jerry Buss, exacerbated by Shaq agreeing that Dr. Buss was at fault, and topped off by the allegation that the Lakers planned on a slow rebuilding process of the team after the Shaq trade, without letting Kobe know of their plans), then Kobe has every right in the world to want out of Los Angeles.

That being said, it's pretty clear that Kobe is badly overreacting, and judging by how quickly he backed off his trade demands, I don't believe he was ever seriously considering leaving the Lakers. Clearly he was frustrated; wouldn't you be if it appeared that your team pissed on the previous three seasons of your career?

Rome brought up an interesting point today: given how badly the Kobe-Lakers relationship has deteriorated, can you bring the guy back and act as if nothing happened? What if you make a bunch of deals, and he's still not satisfied? What if he asks for a trade again, a couple of weeks from now? What if he changes his mind again tomorrow? Clearly, the entire situation is a huge mess (and Shaq's siding with Kobe definitely cannot help), and it should be interesting to see if the situation resolves itself in the upcoming weeks.

I'll definitely have more on this in the coming days.

- Day 2 of the NorCal trip was highlighted by visits to the SF/Oakland Bay Bridge, the Golden Gate Bridge, and a huge detour to Santa Rosa, CA, site of the Charles M. Schultz Museum and Research Center. The coolest part of the museum was a gigantic mural of Peanuts comic strips that, when seen from afar, show the image of Charlie Brown trying to kick a football being held by Lucy. Of course, anyone who knows anything about Peanuts knows what happens when the kick is attempted...

We made it to Elk Grove--where my nephew lives--at around 6:30pm, and we ate dinner there. Fast forward to right now, and I'm on my laptop, about ready to sleep at another hotel. At least this one has free Wi-Fi internet!

Next time: Day 3 of the NorCal trip!

(BTW, to answer the IMBC TotD, it would have to be New York Strip steaks, IF I am permitted to age them, and cook them with butter, kosher salt, and fresh cracked pepper.)

My IMBC Fate Sealed On a Technicality, How to Spot a Tourist, and NorCal Trip, Day 1 (Burn, Baby, Burn!)

2007-05-30T20:33:00.000-07:00

D’oh! What a way to bust out of the IMBC! Darn Blogger and their timestamps!

Oh well, I’m rooting for fellow newcomer Amy to win!

- How do you spot a tourist? Well, if you’re a NorCal’er, and you see the following:

A woman wearing a pair of LA Dodger sandals
An older woman constantly whining that “It’s colder here than in LA”
Said women holding maps, hotel guides, etc.
Said women declaring “yeah, we came up from Los Angeles today, and it was a LONG drive!”
A guy, walking slowly behind them, shaking his head

then you could be fairly certain that they are tourists, and the guy behind them is about ready to kill himself. All we needed were the visors, huge sunglasses (oh wait, my mom did wear those), disposable cameras, and stupid grins, and we would have been 100% tourists.

(Tangent: My sister just realized that she also brought her LA Dodger T-shirt. If I make it out of here alive, that would be a minor miracle.)

- So Day 1 of my NorCal trip ended with a whimper, and a ton of snoring, mostly from my mom, who proceeded to wake us all up at 7am (hotel check out time: 12pm). The trip got off to a horrible start, as Hertz screwed up our car rental. We wanted a “premium”-sized car (~a Toyota Camry), and were only offered a “standard” (~a Corolla). Angrily, my sister stormed out of Hertz, and went to Enterprise instead, where we got a Toyota Avalon for about the same price as the Corolla would have cost us at Hertz!

So we—my mom, my sister, my nephew, and I—loaded up the car and took off from Monterey Park at 1pm, already running an hour late. I tried to find the cigarette lighter jack in the car, and found that there were two: one in the center console, between the front seats, and one in the “rear” console (which should really be named the center console). Also, the jack in the center console was angled, making the DLO Transpod we brought—if you’ve ever driven up from SoCal to NorCal, or reverse, you know there are huge stretches of nothingness, and scattered radio reception throughout—tough to plug in. I removed the power adapter from the Transpod, and tried to attach that to the center console jack. It went in, but I could not find a way to hook up the Transpod itself, so I yanked the power adapter from the cigarette jack. At least, I tried to; most of the adapter came out, but the metal tip and some surrounding plastic remained in the jack.

Frantic, I stuck my finger into the jack to try to remove the broken-off pieces—smart, I know!—and quickly felt a white-hot burning sensation. I removed my finger, to see a bit of skin burnt right off! I eventually was able to remove the pieces, and found the tip intact, with a bunch of plastic melted off. Worse, neither cigarette lighter jack worked (I tried plugging in both my and my sister’s cell phone charger in both jacks, and neither turned on). I hope I didn’t ruin the jacks…

We pulled off the 5 Freeway around Santa Clarita to go find a cassette adapter for the iPod.

(Tangent: Yes, it was imperative that my sister and I had something to listen to for the trip. Either that, or we would have to listen to our mother…)

We found a Kmart, hopped in, and then I remembered that my sister brought her iPod FM transmitter as well. I also remembered that it could be powered by either the cigarette adapter OR by AAA batteries! We ran into Kmart, grabbed some AAA batteries—fortunately, they were on sale—and were on our way. At this point, it was already 2:30, and we hadn’t made it out of the Valley yet.

Not much happened during the remainder of the trip; my mom fed my nephew some doubly disgusting cereal (doubly disgusting because it was horribly sweet stuff, so much so that the kid didn’t go to sleep until almost midnight, and also because it smelled nasty), we had dinner at Denny’s, and we ended up in (believe it or not) Berkeley, to spend the night at the Golden Bear Inn.

(Tangent: I knew a bunch of people from high school that came up here for school, and yet this is the first time I’ve ever been up here.)

Tomorrow: Day 2 of the NorCal trip…and I gotta make another post about the whole Kobe/LA Lakers situation.

Kobe Bryant Trade Drama

2007-05-29T01:00:00.000-07:00

(Note: the timestamp of this post has been changed to reflect the fact that it was supposed to be posted on Tuesday; I had completed the post at around 1am on Tuesday, but as mentioned in the comments to this blog entry, Blogger reports the time the post was started, not the time the post was completed.)

- The big news here in the Los Angeles sports scene, of course, is the news that Kobe Bryant wants Jerry West back in some capacity for the Lakers. Obviously frustrated by three years without making it past the first round of the playoffs, and fueled by the lack of help he's been getting--unless you consider Chucky Atkins and Smush Parker "help"--Kobe clearly is going to drastic measures to get himself some help. The ESPN article also says that Kobe will seek a trade if he doesn't get the help he wants; I don't see a direct quote suggesting that, though.

Now, I was one that bashed Kobe back in 2004, when he "chased" Shaq and Phil out of town. I called the Lakers "the LA Kobes." I was screaming that Kobe was the GM, and not Kupchak, and that Kobe was ruining the team I cheered for.

(As an aside, I also hate it when NBAers whine about wanting to be traded, as if they are the ones in charge, not the GM. They demand the big bucks, then quit on the team, forcing the team to trade the star for fifty cents on the dollar. The star then gets exactly what he wishes, while leaving his old team in a heap.)

All that being said, I'm on Kobe's side. Call me whatever you want, but the Lakers' front office has had three full years to get the guy help, and all they were able to do is sign superb athletes like Aaron McKie, Vlade Divac, Vladimir Radmonovic, and then compound the pretty awful trade for Shaq by trading Caron Butler and Chucky Atkins for Kwame Brown. Then, they had a chance at Jason Kidd, but decided to keep superstar-in-waiting (maybe) Andrew Bynum, ignoring the fact that you no longer need a true center to win in this league.

When Allen Iverson whined his way out of Philly, he did so while insisting that it was best for everyone to go their separate ways. I hope Kobe doesn't offer the same BS; I want him to demand a trade, pointing fingers at Kupchak on the way out the door!

People who say that Kobe chased Shaq out of town--myself included--need to stop. If Dr. Jerry Buss had given Shaq the huge extension he wanted (I believe it was somewhere in the vicinity of $25-30 million/season), the Lakers would probably be in worse shape than they are now. Never mind the fact that his contract would have become absolutely unmovable (as opposed to tradeable for fifty cents on the dollar, which is exactly what the Lakers did get); does this look like a player worth a max contract today? Worse, if the Lakers had extended Shaq, would they have re-signed Kobe? Probably not; we would probably have had to overpay a second-tier free agent, not anyone even close to #24.

(Yeah, I know...the Lakers replaced Shaq with Odom, Brown, and Vlad, if you do a strict comparison via salaries. Am I suggesting that Shaq is less valuable than Odom, Brown, and Vlad? Maybe.)

(EDITED due to some strange errors)

So what do I think will happen? I think the Lakers will be mediocre next year, playing for a lower playoff seed. If they make the playoffs, they'll be another first round exit. They'll then re-tool in the following offseason, and maybe Kobe will finally be surrounded by players he can trust.

Or, maybe Kobe will never sniff another championship again, until he leaves the team to ride the coattails of an up-and-comer, kinda like a former Laker did...

Hope this all makes sense. Until next time!

Shoe Leather Goodness (aka A Well Done BBQ), Barry Bonds Won't Share, How to Blow an Interview

2007-05-28T19:32:00.000-07:00

- So, for the third straight day, I had BBQed food. Visiting my dad--we came to Monterey Park so that my mom and sister could pack for our trip to NorCal--he decided to cook roast beef. He bought a huge beef roast into his trusty Ronco Rotisserie, similar to this one. Unfortunately, he badly undercooked it (he threw in a 6lb. roast for about an hour, when beef roasts generally take 18min/lb. to cook), so he decided to slice it up and finish the roast on a small, portable grill.

Unfortunately, he proceeded to cook the hell out of most of the remaining slices--nobody in my family, save for my sister, likes their beef with even a hint of pink--and he enjoyed his delicious shoe leather for dinner, along with the rest of the family. I salvaged a couple of slices, grilled it for a few seconds, and enjoyed my medium-rare roast beef, with some salad, bread, and this delicious feta cheese spread.

- Barry Bonds may not share mementos of his historic home run chase with the MLB Hall of Fame. Oh noes! It's not as if Bonds already has few people actually cheering for him; is he on a mission to be booed by the entire MLB, outside of San Francisco? " "I'm not worried about the Hall," the San Francisco slugger said during a recent homer drought. "I take care of me," " whined Bonds. This is exhibit A as to why Bonds is hated; it's not a race thing for me, it's a jerk thing.

Then again, maybe Bonds doesn't really owe the Hall of Fame anything, not with the witch hunt the MLB has employed in order to bust people for using performance enhancers. Yes, we have no concrete evidence that Bonds cheated--his growing melon and the fact that he got much better as he got older aren't concrete enough, apparently--but I wonder how many people out there really believe that he did not cheat.

Anyway, Barry, you're in desperate need for some positive PR. Do the right thing, and at least offer that gigantic piece of armor you wear on your arm to the HOF, when you finally hit the record-breaker. Just don't expect many people outside of San Francisco to cheer.

- Finally, here's a list of ten ways to blow a job interview. Browsing quickly over the list, is there anything there that is surprising? Don't be rude to the receptionist? Don't use inappropriate language? Don't be late to the interview? Did this article really need to be drafted?!?

Maybe someone should write an article entitled "How to make a sandwich" and put in such important rules as "Put your meat, veggies, and condiments between the bread" and "Never cut your sandwich horizontally."

Later tonight, I will blog about this entire Kobe Bryant/LA Lakers situation. That will serve as Tuesday's blog entry. As for the rest of the week, we'll see if I have a chance to blog, or if it's bye-bye for me and the IMBC.

Leftover BBQ Goodness, Russell Martin = MVP, Sleuth Hired to Find Missing Dog

2007-05-27T14:06:00.000-07:00

One thing I love about barbecues is the leftover food. Leftover BBQ is nearly as good the day after, as it is fresh off the grill. We had some leftover chicken, spare ribs, and some extra steak that was abused from a couple days ago.

Today's getaway day; I leave for my parents' place in Monterey Park for a couple of days, and then it's off to NorCal. I just hope I don't get any sicker!

- Call it West Coast bias, or call it LA Dodger bias, but Russell Martin is my early favorite for National League MVP.

(Whoa! What a catch!)

.315 batting average, 33 RBI, 31 Runs, clutch hitting, and don't forget the fact that he's a second year player manning one of the best pitching staffs in baseball! Of course, because he's playing in Los Angeles, he'll get zero consideration for MVP. Congrats, Carlos Beltran.

(Ok, I'm not serious about giving Martin the MVP. Sure, he's playing out of his head, but even I wouldn't really give him the MVP...at least, not unless he starts hitting for power.)

- A rare, valuable dog has gone missing, and now his owners have hired a detective to locate the missing pooch, as well as a publicist, presumably to get the word out about the doggy. The owners have also put up a $2,500 reward for information about the whereabouts of the pooch. The dog was lost on a routine walk, and the owners believed the dog was either stolen or killed by coyotes.

(By the way, I find it hilarious that the dog has his own agent, and now his own publicist. I'm guessing he also has his own masseuse, and a weekly appointment at a doggy spa.)

One question, though: if the dog is so special, why such a small reward?!? $2,500? Come on, that dog should have a reward worth at least $10,000, right? By the way, I think it's time for me to go down a new career path; I bet there's lots of money to be had in the doggy detective field. If doggy spas, doggy water, and doggy hotels, people are gonna pay for doggy detectives, right?

Actually, this gives me a great television idea! CSI: Pooch!

That's all I've got for today.

A Memorial Day BBQ Delight, and My IMBC Future More Defined

2007-05-26T15:44:00.000-07:00

- So we had our Memorial Day BBQ a couple days early, and I am stuffed from all the food. I'm also a bit tipsy from the red wine *hic*.

New York Strip steaks, coated with a bit of oil, with black pepper and kosher salt; italian squash, seasoned the same way; pork spare ribs and chicken wings, marinated in soy sauce and garlic; roasted corn; and potato salad! Ugh...and after that, we went out to get some ice cream!

- Speaking of my New York Strip, I bought myself four thick, juicy New York Strip steaks from my local supermarket on Wednesday, and was planning on freezing them overnight--yeah, I know, that's a sin in itself. On Thursday, I pulled the steaks out of the freezer, to find one steak intact, in a zip lock bag!

I asked my mom (who's up here, visiting for the week) about the steaks, and she said that she had "prepared" them for me. By prepared, I found out that three of the steaks were cut up, fileted (sp?), and frozen. Some of them were even already marinated! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

(Fortunately, I had a couple extra steaks, but they were in the freezer for a while. They still came out OK, though.)

Also, I had purchased a rack of pork spare ribs, which I planned on slow-cooking (a la baby back ribs). I had also found those cut up and marinated.

- My mom, stubborn as she is, kept insisting that the best way to cook with a charcoal grill is to cook with the lid off.

For the record, I have this Weber grill; I'm pretty sure the lid is included for a reason :P.

After scorching the first batch of food that she was in charge of--I was responsible for the steaks, and boy, did my piece turn out excellent--and subsequently blaming me for putting too much charcoal in the BBQ, I insisted that she needed to cook the food with the lid on. She claimed that I was insulting her intelligence, and proceeded to scorch another batch of food, shouting once again, "you put too much charcoal in the grill!"

A few minutes later, after cooking the third batch of food--I told you we had a lot of food, didn't I?--she walked back into the house with a slight grin on her face. She told me, "if you put the lid on the grill, it cooks better!"

(me bangs head on wall)

Yes, being the childish person that I am, I enjoyed my moral victory over my mother for the remainder of the day. And yes, that third batch of food was quite tasty.

- A little non-BBQ related item: it appears that I will be going out on a trip up to NorCal starting Tuesday. Whether or not I'll be able to blog every day during my trip remains to be seen. If I can't do it, I've enjoyed my run!

Food coma's kicking in...zzzzz...

Another Buy.com Update, G4TV Hotness, How to Tick People Off, Cell Phone Cameras = Weight Loss?, and Really Thin TVs

2007-05-25T16:10:00.000-07:00

- So Buy.com continues to impress me. They emailed me back today, saying that the $18 credit was a "courtesy" to me, and they would continue to process my RMA once the item was received. A little problem with that, though; they received my item on the 21st. A few hours later, I got another email from Buy.com, saying that they received my return, and will process the RMA within 5-7 business days.

I have since started a dispute with PayPal (how foolish of me, I know, to pay via PayPal instead of a credit card!), and will escalate it to a claim, assuming I don't see the rest of my money back in my account by next week.

- Damn, talk about doing Princess Leia's bikini costume justice!. Too bad I don't get the G4 Network, and no, I'm not paying $15 a month for access to that channel.

BTW, check out picture #5. LOL @ the Storm Trooper!

- (stolen from somewhere) Here's a nice, compact list of ways to tick people off. I have personally done #2 to friends a number of times, as well as #8 over the phone. I've also done #14, and #24, and I used to do #32 while working in a lab, except I said it was for "research."

- Japanese patients at risk for diabetes, obesity, and those with heart problems are using their cell phone cameras to photograph their meals, sending them to health experts for analysis and recommendations. Talk about a novel way to use existing technology! Quoted from the article:

Osaka is using a system developed by Asahi Kasei Corp., a Tokyo-based chemical and medical equipment manufacturer. The system is operating at about 150 health care providers and local governments around the country, company official Naoki Yoshimura said.
Nutritionists can work with photos from one day's meals to several weeks' worth, he said. Results come back in three days. Participants also can log onto a Web site to get further dietary information and upload photos from digital cameras.

I gotta ask one question, though: do these guys really need a physician to tell them that a slice of banana-cream pie is unhealthy? Is it really necessary to send a doctor a picture of that fourth slice of pepperoni pizza, so that he could tell you what you already know? And whatever happened to the taste test for healthiness of foods: if it tastes good, it's probably bad for you, and vice versa?

(Tangent: Yeah, I know, there are a number of healthy, good tasting foods.)

Actually, maybe the Japanese have something here. They should work on making all doctor visits done via telecommunication. I'm sure lots of people out there can't stand the annual visit with "Dr. Jellyfingers."

(That last sentence made me curl up in the fetal position, by the way).

- Sony is in development of a new television screen that is so thin that it's flexible. Sony has yet to decide what to do with the technology: ""In the future, it could get wrapped around a lamppost or a person's wrist, even worn as clothing," said Sony spokesman Chisato Kitsukawa. "Perhaps it can be put up like wallpaper.""

I wonder if people would pay for a TV screen on one's sleeve. If people pay for TV-quality video on cell phones and iPods, why wouldn't people pay for displays on clothing? Of course, I wouldn't want a coaxial cable running down my clothes, hooked up to the display on my shirt sleeve :P. Actually, the idea of using this stuff kinda like wallpaper would be a great idea; projector-sized displays without the need of a standalone projector, with television-like quality. If they could implement touch-screen technology with this super-thin display, now THAT would be incredible!

(I know...me, pimping that evil company, Sony? I must be crazy!)

That's all I've got for today. Happy blogging!

Going Down Memory Lane: Weekday Afternoon Cartoons and Trading Cards (Upper Deck Buying Out Topps?)

2007-05-24T18:47:00.000-07:00

Today's blog will take me on a trip down Memory Lane. Pardon me if I get a bit emotional *sniff*.

- (from Krunk) Here's CRACKED.com's list of 15 (Painfully) Unforgettable Cartoon Theme Songs. My thoughts on this list:

Haha, I completely forgot that Steven Spielberg is the genius behind Tiny Toon Adventures and Animaniacs. I may be in the minority here, but I actually liked Tiny Toon Adventures more than Animaniacs.
Speaking of Tiny Toon Adventures, why is that at the beginning of the list?
The second and third comments are spot on! How are Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers and Darkwing Duck not on this list? And what about Conan the Adventurer?

I remember, back in elementary school, coming home every day to catch The Disney Afternoon; more specifically, Duck Tales, Rescue Rangers, and Darkwing Duck, as well as Tiny Toon Adventures and, eventually, Animanics on FOX. I recall never starting on my homework until 5pm.

(Yeah, as a kid, I watched too much TV. Don't get me started on how much TV I watch now.)

And yes, I'll admit it; when the show first came out, I watched Power Rangers. What can I say? Lots of my friends watched the show too!

(Wow, I never noticed how ridiculously cheesy the intro to that show was! Actually, what's really sad is that I remember a show similar to Power Rangers, called VR Troopers. Now that was a cheesy intro!)

In my defense, the only reason why I watched Power Rangers was because of the Pink Ranger. Didn't every adolescent male around that time watch the show for the same reason? Didn't they???

- Trading card company Upper Deck is trying to buy out the last major trading card company out there, Topps. This is terrible news for an already dying market; dying because trading cards have gotten so unaffordable, only adults could afford packs these days. Back in the early 90s, I would often visit this card shop with my cousins--I forget the name--and usually spent $10-20 per visit there. I remember getting a whole assortment of stuff; some cheaper $1 packs, and a couple of the "premium" packs that went for $3-5 each. I remember opening each premium pack as if it was a Christmas present, being careful not to harm the foil packaging.

(Of course, I had to open the packs carefully, for fear of damaging the fancy cards that were stuffed inside.)

I remember back in 1993, buying a pack of Fleer Ultra Basketball for $3--Shaq's rookie year--and pulling out an insert card of Shaq. That card was worth $75 at the time, and it's still one of the top five insert cards I've ever pulled out of a deck of cards. I still have the card today, even though it's probably not worth $5, just because of the sentiment behind it. In 1998, when my interest in trading cards was waning, I pulled a Ken Griffey Jr. card numbered to 100 (there were only 100 copies of that card in existence). That card, valued at $100-150 at the time, was probably the coolest card I've ever pulled out of a pack, and it was nothing more than a regular card with the letters in gold-colored foil, with a stamped number on the back (also in gold).

I stopped collecting as a hobby years ago, when the prices of premium packs got ridiculous; premium packs now range anywhere from $25-100 each. Back in the day, a rare card was a limited-print, glossy looking card. Today, only cards have a piece of memorabilia or an autograph on it--swatches of jersey, pieces of ball, shoelaces, nets, sticks, etc.--have any value in the market. What made getting rare cards back in the day so much fun were the improbable odds of getting one; the odds of getting one card similar to the Shaq card I pulled in 1993 was 1:72 (if there were 10 cards in that set, that would make the odds of me pulling Shaq's card itself 1:720). Nowadays, with these expensive packs, the odds of pulling inserts are sometimes 1:1. What fun is that to guarantee yourself a card with a piece of memorabilia on it in every pack?

(Tangent: Between 1999 and 2001, I realized that trading cards was an affordable investment, rather than just a fun hobby. Between Yahoo! Auctions and eBay, I made about $2,000 during my senior year in high school (1999-2000) buying and reselling trading cards. While I don't regret making that kind of money, I do have to point to that time period as the time when I stopped looking at trading cards as a hobby.)

I'll still buy a pack every now and then, but I won't touch those ridiculously expensive packs with a ten-foot pole. I hope, if Upper Deck does acquire Topps, they use the Topps brand to reintroduce affordable, marketable packs for the collector (in the form of $1-2 packs), while keeping the Upper Deck brand for the investor (the more expensive stuff). Bring back the days of holograms, parallel sets, and fancy (non-memorabilia) inserts for the casual collector!

I have the urge to swing by Target and pick up a box of cards, just for fun.

NBA Draft Lottery Thoughts: Big Winners, Celtics Got Screwed (?), and Possible Lottery Tweaks

2007-05-23T22:30:00.000-07:00

One quick rant: Buy.com finally issued me a refund on my order! I'm still not through with them, though; instead of crediting me $29.98, they came up with the idea of refunding me $18 instead!

I gotta contact their "support" yet again tomorrow.

- Anyway, the NBA Draft Lottery happened yesterday, and three prevailing themes arose from the proceedings in Secaucus, NJ:

Portland, Seattle, and Atlanta (even though the Hawks missed out on the top two picks) are the big winners.
The Celtics got screwed! If you don't believe me, go ask a Boston Celtics fan.
The lottery system needs a fix. If you don't believe me, go ask a Boston Celtics fan. However, perhaps the system can be tweaked slightly.

Portland gets to add Greg Oden to a lineup including this past year's ROY (Brandon Roy, who was fleeced from Minnesota last year), skilled big man LaMarcus Aldridge, Zach Randolph, and Jarrett Jack. Even in the loaded Western Conference, I wouldn't be surprised to see this team contend for a title in the next few years. Yes, Greg Oden can be that good in the pros, assuming he develops a consistent offense.

As for Seattle, not a bad consolation prize in Kevin Durant, eh? First of all, Durant allows the Sonics to let F Rashard Lewis go. Also, Durant may be the big name that will keep the Sonics from leaving Seattle. Atlanta wins as well, even though they will miss out on Oden and Durant. By landing the third pick, they get to keep the pick (had the pick dropped outside the top three, it would have gone to Phoenix). Also, they get Indiana's pick, giving the Hawks two top-15 picks. Hopefully Atlanta doesn't blow these picks, the same way they have blown their high picks in recent years.

By the way, Celtics fans, YOU DID NOT GET SCREWED BY THE NBA JUST BECAUSE YOU DID NOT GET A TOP TWO PICK! A lottery is just that; a lottery. There is an element of luck involved! Just because a coin is supposed to land on heads as often as it is supposed to land on tails doesn't mean you can always expect one of each result with two coin flips. And no, just because you guys got "screwed" by the NBA lottery doesn't mean the lottery needs to be fixed next season. More on fixing the lottery later...

If anything, the fact that the Celtics tried to intentionally lose games this year, only to miss out on a top-2 pick, is simply a case of bad karma (please don't deny the tanking your team did, Celtics fan). All is not lost, though, Celtic fan; just because Oden and Durant are clearly the two best prospects in this year's draft, they're still nothing more than prospects. Who says Oden and Durant will pan out? Besides, you still have the #5 pick; you are still likely to get a nice player (Horford, Brandan Wright, Jianlian, etc.).

Don't worry, Celtic fan: Bill Simmons feels for you.

(As an aside, thanks Bill for realizing that the announcement of Milwaukee picking #6 sealed your Celtics' fate at #5, unlike some people who wrote that the Celtics' nightmare was made official when the Celtics were announced at #5).

Personally, I think the NBA Draft Lottery doesn't need to be changed; people whining that it's unfair and stupid don't offer enough compelling reasons for me to change my stance. One idea that's floating around is to give the worst team in the league the #1 pick, the second worst #2, and so on. That's nice and all, but how does that prevent tanking? In fact, I see no feasible solution that will prevent tanking.

That being said, I think the lottery could be tweaked a bit. Right now, the lottery is weighted in favor of the worst teams; I think the NBA should weigh it even more in favor of those bad teams. Yeah, this won't prevent teams from tanking, but it'll give the worst of the worst a better chance at getting the help they need.

Another suggestion I was kicking around is to have two different lotteries for all non-playoff teams. The first lottery could be held for, say, the first five picks, and the odds of winning could be heavily weighted in favor of the teams with the worst records. A second lottery could then be held to determine who picks 6-14, again heavily favoring the worst teams. This will add a bit more excitement to the lottery, as well as offer the best of the worst teams (the teams that didn't tank) a chance to get a better draft pick. As it stands now, the best of the lottery teams has only a 0.5% chance of winning the lottery; with my suggestion, the best team has a decent shot at any pick from 6-14.

I'm feeling a lot worse than I have felt in the past couple of days, so I'm going to go to bed early tonight.

Happy blogging!

Heroes Season Finale, and Why Being "The Computer Guy" Sucks

2007-05-22T19:24:00.000-07:00

- After seeing the season finale of Heroes a second time, I can safely say that the finale was a pretty big letdown. It didn't help that I was thinking the episode was two hours long (and it turns out, I wasn't the only one that thought so).

(Warning: Spoilers to follow.)

To see the big confrontation between Peter and Sylar consist of nothing more than a couple punches was downright disappointing. Couldn't they have had one long, extended, fight? And, assuming Sylar was able to crawl down the manhole, how the heck did he survive the stab by Hiro?

"Save the cheerleader, save the world" happened alright, but not necessarily the way I expected it to. I (and probably many others) believed that Claire's survival ensured that Sylar could not become immortal, but one can argue that it was Claire that finally convinced Nathan that what he was doing--allowing NYC to get destroyed for his own benefit--was wrong.

Speaking of the Petrelli family, something tells me neither Peter nor Nathan is dead. I'm thinking that Peter did not actually explode; he just radiated an immense amount of energy. I'm also thinking that Nathan had escaped before Peter went off. It would surprise me if they were both dead after this episode. By the way, I wonder if Nathan and Peter's mom is under the influence of a darker individual. I wouldn't be as surprised, though, if either Officer Parkman or D.L. were dead at the end of the finale.

I wonder who this guy that's "worse than the Boogeyman" is. Maybe it's the Haitian! Most likely, though, he will be a new character.

All in all, the finale seemed rushed, and somewhat disappointing. I think they spent entirely too much time on the Petrelli family back story that it just didn't leave enough for the resolution. If anything, the producers should have split this last episode into two. The first one could have ended with Claire's jumping out of the window, and the second could have built up towards the final battle. If only the producers were given a full two-hours for the finale!

Don't get me wrong; I love the show as a whole, and I'm definitely going to watch next season's episodes. The season, as a whole, was quite excellent, and it really picked up speed in the later episodes, especially starting with "Five Years Gone." The finale, though, left quite a bit to be desired.

- One non-Heroes topic: check out this list of the 10 Reasons It Doesn't Pay To Be "The Computer Guy." One major reason seems to be left out: the fact that, if you fix someone's computer, and something goes wrong later (even if it's completely unrelated to whatever you fixed before), you conveniently become the scapegoat. Reasons #3 and #4 sorta touch upon this, but I feel that this should have its own entry on the list.

Reason #8 is another favorite of mine; I hate having to give product recommendations! And I'm not talking about comparisons that actually require me to do research--the Intel Core 2 Duo E4320 v the E6600, e.g. I'm talking about those horrible apples and oranges comparisons, like "Should I get the 4GB iPod Nano or a Creative blah blah 60GB player?"

Also, I LOLed at reasons #5 and #7.

Korea Reacts to Starcraft 2, Buy.com Still Sucks, and The RIAA Needs Money

2007-05-21T21:01:00.000-07:00

I slept for about a good five minutes last night, after coughing non-stop. I'm high on cough syrup right now; I hope I don't fall asleep as I type up this blog entry.

Ooooooh...the season finale of Heroes just started! I better not doze off!

(Actually, I don't even know why I'm bothering with this blog entry right now; I know I'm not going to finish it during the show.)

- Korea's reaction to the Starcraft 2 release is a bit over the top, don't you think? I can't make up my mind as to which panel is the funniest. 3v3-BGH? Record sales of pants? North and South Korea reforming into a giant hard on? LMAO!

(Fifty minutes into the Heroes finale, and I barely got this far! :P)

- My RMA with Buy.com is going smoothly (of course, by smoothly, I mean I'm getting a headache). Apparently USPS attempted to deliver my package to Buy.com on Saturday, but no one was available to accept delivery. A pickup notice was left, however, at Buy.com's "doorstep."

I fired off an email to Buy.com support, letting them know that there was an attempted delivery of my RMA request. I also gave them the tracking number, in case they wanted proof of what I said. Their response? Something to the effect of "Sir, as of yet we have not yet received your shipment."

No freaking duh! I only said the package hadn't yet been delivered!

The folks at Time Warner think that Buy.com has horrible customer service.

(Hmmm...I could've sworn that the Heroes finale tonight was supposed to be two hours long!)

- (from Consumerist) The crazies that make up the RIAA want radio stations to pay royalties, because it's not good enough for the RIAA to get free promotion for their music labels. Says Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Valley Village, sponsored by the RIAA):

Given the many different ways to promote music now that didn't exist as effectively when this original exemption was made," he said, "the logic of that I think is more dubious.

I can't say I disagree with the guy; it's not hard to fathom that online advertising can be more effective than TV or radio advertising (users of Firefox's Adblock might argue otherwise). That being said, I wonder what would happen if these royalties have to be paid, and radio stations were forced to close up shop because they couldn't afford the royalties. How bad would the RIAA look if they were involved in destroying their major source of advertising?

Go RIAA! Bury yourselves!

That's all I've got for tonight. I'm coughing like crazy!

Online Word Count, My IMBC Future, The Dodgers Got Pwned, Turning $10 Into A Million, and Baby in A Microwave,

2007-05-20T19:30:00.000-07:00

I get sick frequently, and usually, the symptoms last for a day or two. Whatever pathogens are taking residence inside me this time, however, refuse to go away! I'm so drugged up right now that I'm not sure what I'm typing...hopefully, I am able to get through this blog entry, to remain alive in the IMBC.

Damn immune system of mine! I think it's time for my body to start unleashing the immunological equivalent of nuclear missiles.

- Speaking of the IMBC, my survival in the contest may only last for another week, as I may be taking a trip up North to visit some relatives. If that's the case, I'm going to need to pray for a hotel with free WiFi, or find an open WiFi connection somewhere. Hey, if Hank can do it, so can I, right?

(Of course, Hank has the luxury of wardriving in familiar territory; I've got to do it without a "home field advantage." Either that, or I gotta figure out how to use my Sanyo Katana as a dial-up modem.)

- As an aside, I usually check the number of words for every blog entry I complete using MS Word. I've since been informed, by Krunk, that online word count tools like this one exist. I should have known such a tool existed; heck, there are even online coin flippers!

- The Dodgers finished a series with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim near Disneyland, and the Boys in Blue got swept. Ouch. Does that mean I have to issue a self-moratorium on insults about the Angels of Anaheim in Orange County?

- A gas station attendant found a $10 bill in her store, and used it to buy a lottery ticket. She ended up winning a $1 million prize:

Kristina Schneider tried to persuade a customer at the BP station where she works to buy the last ticket on a roll of the Magnificent Millions lottery game.
"I always joke that the last ticket is the winning one, but he said he only had enough money for three tickets," Schneider said.
This time, her advice was no joke.

I wonder what the guy who passed up the winning ticket is thinking right now.

Ms. Schneider took the 20 annual payments at $50,000 a year, claiming that she would have been "broke again within five years" had she taken the lump sum. While I understand the reason, I gotta say, taking the annuity is a horrible decision. Take the lump sum, hire a financial advisor, and make the money work for you! Life insurance, retirement accounts, even mutual funds; any half-decent investment vehicle will serve you better than taking an annuity!

(And no, the fact that my sister is a financial advisor has zero bearing on my opinion above.)

By the way, I've heard of lucky pennies, and even lucky $1 bills; I've never heard of a lucky Hamilton. I did find a $5 bill at a gas station once, and I used it to buy 5 Lottery tickets. All I won is a single free ticket :P.

- Days after a 19-year-old man was indicted on charges of injuring a child by putting his baby in a microwave, the baby's mother blamed the devil and not her husband. Quoted from the article:

Eva Marie Mauldin said Satan compelled her 19-year-old husband, Joshua Royce Mauldin, to microwave their daughter May 10 because the devil disapproved of Joshua's efforts to become a preacher.
"Satan saw my husband as a threat," Eva Mauldin told Houston television station KHOU-TV.

As strange as the above passage sounds, it pales in comparison to this gem: "Police said Joshua Mauldin told them he put Ana Marie in the microwave because he was under stress. Eva Maudlin denied it."

I was planning on commenting on this article, but instead, I'm going to pass. After all, I do not have a kid, and I am not a religious man, so I can't possibly understand what was going through the mind of the husband as he microwaved his kid, and the mind of the wife for defending her husband. I'll leave this topic with a single comment, though: in no way should the couple be allowed anywhere near their kid again.

Finally, I leave you guys with this video. The ending is hilarious!

A Blogger Technicality, Starcraft 2, More Brett Favre?, MORE Roger Clemens???

2007-05-19T01:48:00.000-07:00

No thanks to my two-year-old nephew, everyone in this house is horribly sick, including myself. I've slept all day--tons of medication will do that to you--and I just woke up a few minutes ago.

I shall be making this post while munching on my dinner of Ritz crackers, slices of American cheese, and sliced turkey breast.

- So apparently Blogger timestamps each new entry based on the time the entry was drafted, not the time the entry was actually published. Case in point: the blog entry that I created on Thursday, which did not go live until Friday (because of the review of The Office) was initially timestamped Thursday ~8PM. Had I not woken up a few minutes ago to check my blog, I would never have noticed it, and would have been eliminated from the IMBC.

To remedy this, I changed the timestamp on the blog entry in question to Friday. You can check the RSS feed to verify that the entry for Friday was indeed posted AFTER the entry about The Office.

Nevertheless, Hank, if you're reading this, I'd like you to administer a ruling on whether or not what I did was kosher. If it's not, then I guess my run in the IMBC is over at 57 blog entries (and, personally, that would be 30 entries or so more than I would have anticipated).

- In the worst kept secret of the week, Blizzard has announced production of Starcraft 2: The Fight for More Money.

(Tangent: Yeah, I watched Spaceballs a few days ago, for the 25,000th time.)

In other news, nerds everywhere are already lining up in front of EBGames, Gamestop, etc., waiting for the release of the game. I'm surprised these stores aren't already taking preorders.

One interesting passage from the article above: "As for initial StarCraft 2 impressions - the game looked very similar to SC1 - nearly identical user interface - graphic styles and unit proportions nearly the same - more flashy lighting effects but it seems like Blizzard didn't want to mess with SC's underlying formula very much." On the one hand, why change what worked for one of the biggest and best RTS (Real Time Strategy) games of all time? On the other hand, StarCraft was released in 1997; I would have expected some sort of major graphical changes between the original and the sequel (kinda like the difference between Warcraft 2 and Warcraft 3).

I just hope Starcraft 2 turns out a heck of a lot better than Command and Conquer 3. C&C3 was pretty abysmal, IMO; I just recently played the original C&C, and thought the storyline AND gameplay in the original were a heck of a lot better than C&C3. I only played the GDI campaign in C&C3, and have no real motivation to play the NOD campaign. C&C3 was better than the second iteration of the series, though, but that's because Tiberian Sun was complete and utter crap.

- Yeah, Brett Favre is yapping again. And yeah, Roger Clemens is getting way too much media attention. Rather than talk about either of these attention whores, I'll leave you with this article, and remind sports fans around the country that, as bad as your team may be, your team isn't the Royals (ripped from Bill Simmons' blog).

Until next time!

Hold'em Fun, Screwed Are The Suns, More Time Warner Fun, and Wrongfully Accused

2007-05-18T23:30:00.000-07:00

Here is what should have been blog entry #100; it was pushed back only after I watched the season finale of The Office.

- The term "bad beat" is a poker term referring to a hand won by a player despite a holding a terrible hand, and then making the best hand by the turn or the river. There are bad beats, and then there some absolutely sickening bad beats (which I shall, from now on, refer to as "donkey sh!t").

Case in point, from a hand I saw a couple days ago (I am player Quintaces):

Hand #1135011766000819: Munich 11766
Seat 2: MCRAIGA (6.25 in chips)
Seat 3: Vatson (25.15 in chips)
Seat 4: Quintaces (8.40 in chips)
Seat 5: GivMeDaMoney (25.52 in chips)
Seat 6: slick sammy (46.55 in chips)
Seat 7: SkunkEBuds (7.40 in chips)
Seat 9: TL1127 (21.49 in chips)
Vatson: posts small blind $0.10
Quintaces: posts big blind $0.20
Dealt to Quintaces [ Kh Ks ]
GivMeDaMoney: raises to $0.40
slick sammy: calls
SkunkEBuds: folds
TL1127: folds
MCRAIGA: calls
Vatson: folds
Quintaces: raises to $1.50
GivMeDaMoney: calls
slick sammy: calls
MCRAIGA: calls
*** FLOP *** [ 9s Qc As ]
Quintaces: checks
GivMeDaMoney: bets $5.80
slick sammy: calls
MCRAIGA: is all in
Quintaces: folds
*** TURN *** [ Qd ]
GivMeDaMoney: is all in
slick sammy: folds
GivMeDaMoney: returns uncalled bet $18.22
*** RIVER *** [ Tc ]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
GivMeDaMoney wins $2 with Two Pairs, Aces and Queens
*** SHOW DOWN ***
MCRAIGA wins $19.35 with Straight, Queen high

MCRAIGA held a jack and an eight. Calling before the flop was a horrible play enough, but then he called an all-in bet with just an inside straight draw (needing a ten to make his straight)!

There were a couple other horrendously bad beats, like the guy who flopped three queens and lost to four deuces on the river, or the guy who went all-in with absolute crap and got help on the turn and river to make a flush.

Online poker, it's FAN-tastic!

- The Suns ran out of gas last on Wednesday, and lost to the Spurs to go down 3-2 in the best of seven series. As if that wasn't bad enough, noted dirty player Bruce Bowen hit the game winning shot: a 3-pointer from the corner. Think the Suns could have used Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw yesterday? If the Spurs go on to win the NBA Championship, some votes have to go to Robert Horry, right? The Suns were totally gassed at the end of Game 5, and they had only a single off-day to recover for Game 6, AND they have to win tonight or go home (and it's not looking good)!

I am praying for this series to go to a Game 7, for the following reasons:

I can't rule out the possibility of a Suns' retaliatory cheap shot, this time on the Suns' home floor (I kid :P).
I want to see how the Suns' fans treat Robert Horry. Maybe a fan will throw a towel at him.
Most importantly, this is the most compelling NBA Playoffs series to come around in years. I'd like it to go the distance.

- (from Consumerist) I should really stop complaining about how much Time Warner sucks. I don't have it nearly as bad as these guys do. My favorite story is this one; ghetto-rigged "repairs" are nice if you're doing it for yourself or for a friend, but not when you're a technician for a major cable company!

(Tangent: I love the pictures that Consumerist uses in their articles, like the guy smoking crack in the first article linked above.)

- Finally, a Harford, CT, man will be paid $5 million nearly a year after he was released from prison, when DNA evidence proved he did not commit a rape he was convicted of in 1988:

Tillman, who was 26 when he was arrested, was sentenced to 45 years in prison after being convicted of raping and beating a woman in Hartford in 1988. The victim identified him, but Tillman was exonerated last summer after DNA tests showed he could not have been the attacker.
Tillman's lawyer, Gerard A. Smyth, said his client believes the $5 million is fair compensation.

I hope I don't hear that this guy has agreed to a book/TV movie deal in the next couple of weeks. In all seriousness, I hope the guy is able to life a normal life after being (wrongfully) imprisoned for so many years. Sure, $5 million would probably be enough for the guy to retire on, but is any amount of money enough to pay the guy back for losing eighteen years of his life?

Kudos to the guy for being so humble, and kudos to the CT legislature for their decision as well as their subsequent standing ovation to the guy.

The Office Season Finale!

2007-05-17T21:20:00.000-07:00

Well, I had an entire blog entry typed up for today, but after watching the season finale of The Office, I just had to share my thoughts on the episode.

(Warning: Mega spoilers to follow!)

This episode (entitled The Job) was at least as good as last season's finale (Casino Night), if not slightly better! Ok, who am I kidding? The ending alone makes this finale a heck of a lot better than last year's!

(Call me sappy, but seeing Pam's smile at the end of the episode was great.)

From Jan's "big" surprise--LITO reported that Melora Hardin, in an interview, said there was going to be a "big" surprise between Michael and Jan--and her subsequent actions after finding out about her pending termination (was it just me, or was Jan acting a lot like Michael once she found out that she was going to be fired?) to Dwight's taking over the branch for a day, to Michael's usual hijinks, to Ryan's acceptance of the corporate job and his subsequent breakup with Kelly, the episode was probably the best Office episode to date.

(Of course, there was also that little storyline about Jim and Pam.)

Some thoughts about tonight's finale:

I really wish the producers of the show ended the episode before the scene where David Wallace formally offered the position to Ryan. It would have left us wondering if Jim got the job or not; for all we know, he could have asked Pam out on a date just to break the news to her (not likely, I know).
What will happen to Karen? It's pretty clear that Jim and Karen are through, but is it safe to assume that she will quit her job? Again, had the producers cut out the very last scene, it would have left open the possibility that Karen got the corporate job, and who knows what would have happened? Maybe she could have screwed around with Jim.
HTH is Ryan qualified for a corporate job? My sister thinks that Ryan wasn't offered Jan's old job, but another job at the corporate office. Assuming that she's wrong, I hope that doesn't mean Ryan will be written out of the show. I love his character, and I hope he still appears on the show, even if it's in a limited capacity. Maybe he'll start getting back at Michael (remember Business School?) By the way, the way he non-chalantly broke up with Kelly was absolutely hilarious.
With the members of the Scranton branch unchanged (save for Karen?), Jim and Pam can now go back to picking on Dwight. I hope we also get to see more Office-related "functions" that involve the whole cast, like the gambling that happened in Safety Training.
The best thing about this episode is that it leaves so many avenues that the show can move on to for next season. I've always said that one of the great things about The Office is the fact that the show is so open-ended; this episode ends one storyline (now that Jim and Pam are together), but it leaves so many other possible storylines. Will Karen return? Will Jan remain in Michael's life? How long will Jim and Pam last? What about Dwight and Angela?

(By the way, I love seeing Angela's character develop in recent episodes; I wonder how she took Dwight's "demotion").

The one major drawback of the finale? I gotta wait four months for the next episode!

(By the way, reports have it that The Office will be moved to 9PM starting next fall. WTF is NBC thinking, putting up The Office against CSI and Grey's Anatomy????? I hope this doesn't lead to the eventual end of The Office).

Suns v Spurs, More Brett Favre, Wendy's, and Baby's Got a Gun (Permit)

2007-05-16T14:05:00.000-07:00

- Quick thoughts on the Suns v Spurs series:

The suspensions to Boris Diaw, Amare Stoudemire, and Robert Horry were correct; in no way were they fair. The rules state that one can't leave the bench during an altercation, and that's exactly what the two Suns' players did. Therefore, the suspensions were properly levied. However, this sets a dangerous precedent; why can't more teams send out thug players with the sole intention of baiting the stars on another team to get themselves ejected/suspended? Robert Horry could easily have been suspended for the remainder of the series, by the way.
I've seen the video of the foul, and the subsequent actions of Diaw and Stoudemire, and although "rules are rules," it appeared that the two Suns were running towards Nash to make sure he was OK. Sure, we don't know what their true intent was--the fact that Stoudemire suggested that he went to the scorer's table to check back into the game was ludicrous--but it didn't look like they were going to do anything flagrant.
The Spurs no longer have a squeaky-clean image, says Yahoo! Sports writer Adrian Wojnarowski. I wouldn't be surprised to see neutral fans rallying against the Spurs as the playoffs continue.

(Slightly off topic: I never believed Bruce Bowen was a dirty player, but after seeing his actions during this series--a knee to Nash's calf, among others--I can no longer agree with that sentiment).

Bill Simmons agrees with most others that the decision was correct, but not fair. I love the soccer comparisons!

Long story short, no thanks to a thug move by Robert Horry--a guy who was very classy when he was a Laker, but is also the same guy who once threw a towel at former Suns' coach Danny Ainge--the Suns v Spurs series has definitely tipped in the favor of the Spurs.

- Brett Favre will skip the Packers' mandatory minicamp this weekend, and part of the reason is because of his daughter's upcoming graduation. I guess that's not a big deal; at least, it wouldn't be a big deal if his daughter's graduation was this upcoming weekend! Quoted from the article,

"They were going to have me sit out anyway," Favre said, in a story that appeared on the paper's Web site on Tuesday. "To be honest, we have [daughter] Brittany graduating in two weeks. Instead of going up there and not doing anything, I will be better off being at home because of graduation parties and banquets."

And I thought Roger "It's not about the money" Clemens was a primadonna. Sounds like there's going to be tons of partying at the Favre home leading up to the graduation! Better off at home? I think you need to spend more time at home; it's not too late to announce your retirement! In Favre's defense, he's not attending minicamp not because of the frustrations he has with the team:

Favre said the move is not related to his frustration with the team's unwillingness to complete a trade for wide receiver Randy Moss.
"I am frustrated," Favre told the paper. "But being frustrated and not going are not related."

As if anyone in the world, outside Packer nation, is supposed to believe this.

Brett, go away!

- (from Consumerist) Wendy's topped Zagat's Fast Food Study in two categories: Top Burger and Top Overall of the "mega-chains." Here are other results:

Mega-Chains:
Top Food

Wendy's, Subway, Pizza Hut, Dairy Queen, KFC

Top Overall

Wendy's, Subway, Pizza Hut, Dairy Queen, McDonald's

Large and Small Chains:

Top Food

Panera Bread Co., Chick-fil-A, Chipotle, Quizno's Sub, Wendy's

Top Overall

Panera Bread Co., Chick-fil-A, Chipotle, Sonic Drive-In, Quizno's Sub

Chain Restaurants:

Top Food

Outback Steakhouse, Red Robin, Cracker Barrel, Chili's Grill & Bar, Olive Garden

Top Overall

Outback Steakhouse, Cracker Barrel, Red Robin, Olive Garden, Chili's Grill & Bar

A few thoughts:

What the hell are Outback Steakhouse, Chipotle, Pizza Hut, and KFC doing on this list??? Of those four, Chipotle has to be the absolute worst, with KFC and Outback Steakhouse a close second (worst).
As much as I hate McDonald's, I'm not surprised to see its inclusion on the list.
If In-N-Out was a national chain, would it make the list?
I could go for a Classic Double or a Spicy Chicken Sandwich right about now.

- And finally, a 10-month-old Illinois baby has his very own a gun permit. Apparently, his father applied for a gun permit for his son, not actually expecting to get one (there is no minimum age requirement to obtain a card). My favorite part:

The card lists the baby's height (2 feet, 3 inches), weight (20 pounds) and has a scribble where the signature should be.

What's even stranger is that the dad's father--the baby's grandfather--bought the kid a Beretta shotgun as a gift! Now that I think about it, why didn't my dad buy me a gun when I was a toddler? I know I would easily have been the coolest kid in my play group! And no bully would dare mess with the kid with his own shotgun, right? Come to think of it, my nephew's third birthday is coming up soon...

In all seriousness, WTF? I guess the possession of the gun permit isn't that bad; it's not nearly as bad the gift of the shotgun! How the heck does a parent think any of this is a good idea???

Tomorrow is blog entry #100!

Inspiron E1505/6400 Thoughts and More Bad Luck with Customer Support (Buy.com's Turn!)

2007-05-15T21:59:00.000-07:00

Some quick-hitters:

- While standing in line at the Post Office, a creepy woman sat (yeah, sat) next to me in line. As the line moved on, she would slide herself forward, each time nearly kicking my legs with her feet.

- We dropped by Costco today, and somehow, we walked out with a $35 bill!!! All we had in our cart were some bread, some bananas, a box of croissants, a bag of potato chips, and some juice. I expect a call from Costco tomorrow, asking me what's going on.

- Man, I love this new laptop. Dual-core goodness, 2GB of RAM running in Dual Channel mode, 15.4" WXGA+ screen (1440x900 resolution), and this thing runs a heck of a lot cooler than my old Inspiron XPS M140. A more thorough review will come in the near future.

(By the way, I noticed my XPS, and now my 6400, has a MediaDirect button. I never did touch the button, until last night, when I learned what the button actually does. With the laptop powered off, hitting the MediaDirect button fires up a Media Center-like application that gives you access to your multimedia files. It also gives you access to an Outlook-type program, as well as a Powerpoint-type program. Neat idea, I must say, but probably not something I'd ever use again.)

- Another day, another fiasco with a company's customer service. This time, it's Buy.com. About a week ago, I purchased an item with two rebates advertised. I found out that I could not claim both rebates that same day, so I attempted to cancel my order. The cancellation didn't go through, and I was forced to accept delivery of the package (I couldn't refuse it, because USPS left it at my doorstep).

I called Buy.com today, asking them for a refund on my order. They rep I spoke to gave me an RMA number (the RMA number wasn't correct, as an email I got from Buy.com had a different RMA# from the one given to me), but refused to give me a prepaid shipping label for the return. I demanded one, citing that I only placed the order because of the two advertised rebates. The CSR wouldn't budge.

The CSR said that she would give me a credit for one of the rebates if I could procure a receipt showing both rebates, which was impossible, as one rebate was pulled at around the same time I completed the order. I asked if a screenshot of the item page would suffice, and the CSR said she would accept it. I found the screenshot, and then asked the CSR where to send the picture. The CSR then backed up, saying that she could only accept the receipt.

She then told me that I had to pack the item up and write the RMA# on the outside of the envelope. She made no mention of what else I needed to do to process the RMA: include the original packing slip, and ship using a trackable shipping service. I only found out about what I needed to do when I got an email from buy.com, confirming my RMA request (that's also when I found out that the RMA# the CSR gave me was incorrect).

I sent an email to buy.com support, explaining every way the CSR screwed up. I also mentioned that I shouldn't have had to pay for return shipping on an order for a misadvertised product. Buy.com's response was classic: they never acknowledged the errors the CSR made, and reiterated that I would not be getting a return shipping label. I angrily fired back, asking the next CSR to please acknowledge the screwup of the phone rep. This was their reply:

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused to you. We work hard to ensure satisfaction. We look forward to helping you with all your shopping needs in the future. We are sorry you had this experience and want you to know we share your concern. Consumer satisfaction is most important to us, and we sincerely regret your recent experience with Buy.com product or promotion.

Gee, thanks!

(Argh...I just realized...I never wrote the RMA# on the package!!!)

I had lots more to say today, but I'm tired. Happy blogging!

Baby Carrots, Cingular Still Sucks, NBC in 07-08, and Brett Favre, Meet Terrell Owens

2007-05-14T18:11:00.000-07:00

- (From Consumerist) Did you know that baby carrots are nothing more than whittled-down carrots? Apparently, the inventor of the baby carrot, Mike Yurosek, stumbled upon the idea while mulling over what to do with tons and tons of carrot culls--carrots that are deformed, twisted, or otherwise unsuitable to sell. With an industrial green-bean cutter and an industrial potato peeler, Yurosek created the baby carrot that we enjoy with dip, peanut butter, or plain out of a bag (all of which I enjoy).

And yes, I used to think that baby carrots were a different species of carrot than a "normal" carrot.

- (Also from Consumerist) Cingular still sucks, it appears. A customer had his Blackjack replaced with warranty replacement. Unfortunately, Cingular/AT&T never received the phone, and wants either the phone back or MSRP ($349.99). It seems that Cingular promised a refund, then reneged, then offered to charge the customer for the phone, only to get the money back in two months. While I can understand the customer's anger with Cingular for providing contradictory information, how can you NOT ship a new cell phone--defective or not--without tracking information and/or insurance?

- NBC's TV schedule for 2007-2008 has been released, and The Office has been canceled! (EDITED 5/17: Link added)

(Just kidding, Hank.)

This quote from the article, however, does alarm me:

The network took a risk by keeping its Thursday night comedy lineup intact. NBC has drawn strong critical praise but few viewers for shows like "30 Rock" and "The Office," leaving the network faltering on a night it once dominated.

I was aware that The Office didn't draw as strongly as I would expect a show that good to draw. I have to wonder, though, how much longer NBC will put up with their Thursday night ratings. I'm hoping this is a case, simply, of other networks dominating Thursdays, and not because shows NBC's Thursday night shows are actually detracting viewers.

I can't stomach the possibility, slim as it may be, of The Office being canceled in the near future.

(Off topic: My mom and nephew are staying here again. My nephew is already driving me insane; it seems that he somehow got his hands on a spindle of DVD+Rs--some of which have data written on them already--and emptied the whole thing. Anyone want some "like new" DVD+Rs?)

Warning: The following topic may contain sports-like substances.

- Brett Favre continues to speak, and I'm really getting tired of it. In his latest whine, Brat Favre (typo intentional) insisted that he never "wanted to be traded" from the Packers, despite speculation to the contrary. I don't have a problem with him insisting that he never wanted to be traded, but he apparently did have his agent issue a trade demand a month prior. In response to this, Favre claimed, "sometimes when I get frustrated, I let my emotions got the better of me." What? No claim that someone took your comments out of context? Weren't you going to deny the comments for months, and then mention, right before the season starts, that you had "conversations" with the front office?

Enjoy an uneventful 8-8 season, Brett. I look forward to hearing you waver over your future once your team gets eliminated from post-season contention.

- Terrell Owens REALLY needs to shut up. In T.O.'s latest outburst, the temperamental wide receiver claimed that he got absolutely "nothing" out of his one season with former Cowboys' coach, Bill Parcells. Easily the best part of the article:

Parcells isn't missing Owens either.
In a New York Daily News column published over the weekend, Parcells said the Cowboys signing Owens last year "was not my decision. I had to do the best I could with him, which is what I tried to do."
Owens said it doesn't matter what Parcells is saying now, and that it doesn't bother him.
"It's funny, people can say a lot of things when they're gone," T.O. said. "It's really not surprising, but why would he say it now? I'm pretty sure you guys asked him that question before."

Clearly T.O. forgot about what he said about one Donovan McNabb, even after T.O. got left on the doorsteps of the Cowboys. Let's see how long T.O. goes before he has something else to say about Parcells. I'll give it five days before he has the need to drop another bomb on Parcells.

(By the way, is it bad to wish a big hit on T.O. every time he comes up the middle of the field to make a catch?)

Somehow, someway, I hope that Brett Favre and Terrell Owens end up as teammates next year. Maybe T.O. will drive QB Tony Romo insane, causing Romo to quit the NFL and play in Canada. Maybe Favre will suck again (hell, this is pretty much a certainty, isn't it?), and the Packers, as a gesture of good will, ship him off to the Cowboys. Who would win that attention-whoring Royal Rumble?

Somehow, someway, this MUST happen!

Google Analytics Fun, IMBC Thoughts, Mother's Day Food Coma, Brett Favre Whining

2007-05-13T02:30:00.000-07:00

- I love the avatars in the banner at the top of the LITO (Life In The Office) forum.

- Some random thoughts about Google Analytics:

As stated before, doing a review on the Logitech MX3200 Cordless Desktop Laser was the smartest thing I could do to drive traffic to my blog. Unfortunately, my blog is no longer the #1 hit for a search of "Scroll Lock MX3200."
Easily the strangest keyword hit ever (all one word!): "a2ccb71d04d513df9c9202755c95975f 215c775b4e27dad6b85126cd83435119." Other fun searches include some combination of "Time Warner" and "sucks," searches for a review on the JVC RA-P10 portable boombox (for iPods), and another strange keyword hit: "2007 warren buffett vs. champion female ping pong player."
This past week was the first week in which the number of hits via Google was greater than or equal to the number of hits via the IMBC.
My blog seems to be quite popular east of the Mississippi, and in Washington and California, of course.

- I can't believe we're nearing 45 days in the IMBC. I was also very happy when I found out that Hank is a big Office fan , and Amy loves Eddie Izzard's Dress to Kill standup routine. The latter warrants a spot on my Links section on the strength of that fact alone :P.

(Of course, Hank's blog is already on my list.)

Now if only I could find a poker blog worth subscribing to; one written by a peer would be preferable. William Springer, are you reading this?

- Mother's Day started with a Mother's Day Brunch for my sister's friend at Marie Callender's. Pretty good food--the omelette bar was damn good--and not terribly pricey--$15 per adult. I had to remind myself not to each too much because, for dinner, we're taking my mom and my aunt out to a Korean BBQ place in downtown LA.

If I make it through today, without lapsing into a food coma, consider it a minor miracle.

(Seems like my oldest sister and my mom have already lapsed into food comas. If only my darn two-year-old nephew would fall asleep too...

- One sports topic, if you don't mind: Brett Favre continued to whine and cry about the state of his team, saying this time that he was disappointed that the Packers weren't able to acquire Randy Moss from the Oakland Raiders (Moss was traded to the New England Patriots during the NFL Draft). In full "I'm not saying, but..." mode, Favre stated,

"The last thing I want to do is start any [controversy]...But I think he would have been a great addition. You throw Randy Moss, you throw [current starters] Donald Driver and Greg Jennings on the field at the same time, and go three-wide receiver set ... and I think it's pretty intimidating. And we lost out on that, and I think that it's a shame, because I know we could have had him."

And with that, Brett Favre just lept ahead of Roger Clemens in the "overrated, middle aged, no longer relevant (but likes to think he is), attention-whore" athlete competition. First of all, if you were so ticked with your team's inability to make a move during the Draft, why did you wait so long to say anything? Second, if you wanted Moss so badly, why didn't you make a fuss any time between the end of your season and the weekend of the Draft? You're a Hall of Famer with a Super Bowl ring; I think you earned the right to go to the Packers' brass and demand help. Third, when are people going to realize that saying "I'm not _____, but ______...." is basically an admission that you are (trying to) [blank #1]?

(As an aside, I told my sister yesterday that I'd rather hear Terrell Owens whine than Roger Clemens. I swear, I didn't mean that!)

Until next time, Happy Mother's Day!

The Two-Hour Dinner, Another Idiot CSR, and A Frozen Yogurt Dilemma

2007-05-12T20:55:00.000-07:00

- So it took me a bit over two hours to finish dinner tonight, no thanks to my family interrupting me several times.

(Yeah, I'm back home in the 626 for Mother's Day. I wish I could cook about 10% as well as my dad can.)

I was interrupted several times, mostly by my mom and my sister, and I probably got a good 20 minutes of actual eating time during the two hour period. Food was damn good, though: rice, soup, fried eggs, and some really stinky dried fish that was awesome.

During my two hour dinner, I had to watch over my nephew (he's been causing general mayhem more so than usual) help my sister locate a credit card that seemingly vanished into thin air (it turns out that the card, silver in color, ended up besides my sister's desktop computer, also silver in color), and help my dad with some random stuff.

- Speaking of my sister, it was her turn to deal with an idiot CSR today. She had to activate a new credit card, and the CSR she spoke to tried every trick in the book to get her to sign up for a Credit Protector-type service. She even resorted to repeating, nearly verbatim, the same sales pitch again. My sister got so flustered with the pitch that she lept out of her chair, and demanded that the CSR quit trying to sell her anything. Apparently, during that fit of rage, the credit card that was in her hand shot out (Chris "Jesus" Ferguson would have been proud of the effort), and it ended up wedged between a book and her (silver, mind you) computer case. It took us nearly half an hour to locate the stupid card.

The fact that I still had an appetite after that entire ordeal was a minor miracle.

- Which one is worse? Lying about the content of your product, or being in violation of state law? That's the dilemma that trendy California "fro-yo" stand Pinkberry is facing (from Consumerist).

(Tangent: Who in the heck refers to frozen yogurt as "fro-yo"???)

Apparently, there is debate on whether or not Pinkberry's frozen yogurt contains any actual yogurt. Pinkberry has to contend with a lawsuit alleges "that the frozen treats don't have the bacterial cultures that make yogurt good for you." Retorted manager Jamin Katz, "It is yogurt. It's made with non-fat yogurt. It's healthy for you."

Well, if Katz provides evidence that Pinkberry's frozen yogurt is, indeed, made out of yogurt, Katz would have another problem to deal with. Apparently, it is illegal in the state of California to manufacture yogurt anywhere other than a state-licensed dairy facility; Pinkberry manufactures their "yogurt" at each individual store.

So either Katz is a liar, or in violation of state law. If you were Katz, which one would you rather be?

Until next time, happy blogging!

Dual Core Goodness, The Office Fansite, Adolescent Beatdowns, Sat Navs Turned Evil, and Chores

2007-05-11T13:58:00.000-07:00

- I opened up the newspaper this morning to see the following deals at Fry's:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ & ECS K8M890-M motherboard for $99.99
300GB Seagate SATA Hard Drive for $79.99
EVGA 7600GS 256MB PCI-E Graphics Card for $69.99 AR

Somebody needs to remind me that my wallet is still bleeding from the purchase of my laptop.

(Speaking of my laptop, Dell finally completed the build, and it's going to be shipped Next Business Day via Fedex. Of course, since Fedex doesn't deliver on the weekends, except in certain situations, I won't be getting my laptop until Monday, or a full two weeks after I initially placed the order.)

Oh man, the motherboard has two IDE connectors--I no longer need to buy a new HDD--and integrated graphics--I don't really feel like/can't afford a graphics card now! With the plumetting prices of DDR2 memory, and the fact that I have a crisp, new 600W power supply en route, I'm having a real tough time passing up this deal. Argh!

- I just stumbled upon this Office fansite, and I gotta say, I love the content! I've gone ahead and added a link to this blog in my "Links" section (which has been re-done, for my pleasure). Speaking of The Office, last night's super-sized episode was, IMHO, the best episode of the season.

(spoiler alert) Michael's line to Stanley about moving to the back of the bus, and Stanley's reaction, were both absolutely priceless, as was Stanley's face when he ran over Jim in the Sumo Wrestling competition. However, nothing beat Toby's reaction when he handed Pam his sunscreen, and Pam mentioned that she was wearing a two-piece swimsuit. I nearly spit water all over my laptop when I saw Toby's face!

EDIT 5/13: How the hell did I leave out the scene where Michael is being interviewed, and you can see Andy floating away in the distance?

Now that Jim, Karen, and Michael are all vying for the corporate job, and now that Pam has finally told Jim about what caused Pam to break off her marriage with Roy, I can't wait for the season finale--an hour long episode, 8pm on Thursday!

(end spoiler alert)

- A 10-year-old boy was convicted of beating up a homeless Army veteran. The kid, another 10-year-old, and a 17-year-old were all involved in injuring the 58-year-old veteran, John D'Amico, with a concrete block and (presumably) punches and kicks. Feel free to chalk this up as example #10,000,000,000 of why our society is going to hell in a handbasket. It'll be interesting to see what the punishments are for each kid in the attack; it wouldn't surprise me if the 17-year-old got the worst of it.

- A 20-year-old woman was going to visit her boyfriend, when a satellite navigation system she borrowed from a school mate somehow led her onto train tracks. Quoted from the article:

She was trying to cross the line in the dark when she heard a train horn, realised [sic] she was on the track, and the train smashed into the car.

Fortunately, the woman was not in the car when the train crashed into her car; she had left her car to open a gate to cross the tracks, and got out again to close the gate when the train arrived.

I gotta ask one question: how did the woman not realize she was on train tracks the second she got out of the car to close the gates? I understand that it was probably pitch-black at the time--why wasn't the railway lit, by the way?--but I would imagine her car would have given off enough light to illuminate the train track that her car was sitting on.

Once again, technology is great, until it screws us over.

- Today's IMBC Topic of the Day interested me, so I think I will respond to it.

What chore do you absolutely hate?

My least favorite chore is dish washing, and cleaning the bathroom is a distant second. I'm a fairly big and tall guy, and every sink I've ever used forces me to lean over quite a bit in order to avoid splashing water all over myself and the countertop. Not to mention, I'm the only one in the family that requires a pair of XL latex gloves to wash dishes; for some reason, everyone else in the family can fit a M-sized pair. So when it's time to replace the gloves, my family buys M-sized gloves, and I have to go buy my own pair (yeah, I know, I could always wash dishes sans gloves).

I should mention that both of my parents are in the mid-five-feet range in height, and I'm nearly six feet tall. I must have an overacting pituitary gland, or something.

Next time: more Google Analytics fun!

(Hey! I went sports-free without even thinking about it!)

Some NBA thoughts, MX3200 Review Addendum, Now Parago Sucks, Smart Parking Meters, and Donating Pizza As a Last Meal

2007-05-10T01:50:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters, the NBA version:

- I really want to see Golden State beat Utah and make it to the Western Conference Finals--Utah is now up 2-0 in their best-of-seven series--but after hearing about Derek Fisher's ten-month old daughter, who recently underwent emergency surgery to treat Retinoblastoma (a cancer of the retina), I can't help but root for the Jazz. The crowd's standing ovation to Fisher, when he entered the game for the first time--after flying from New York Presbyterian Hospital earlier that day--was very cool, as well as the reception he got from not only his teammates, but also the Warriors.

Great article by Adrian Wojnarowski, by the way.

- Cleveland's up 2-0 on the Nets, and I'm not terribly surprised by that. Detroit being up 2-0 on Chicago? I'm a bit surprised by that. Suns-Spurs tied at one game apiece? I hope that series goes seven games!

- An addendum to my Cordless Desktop MX3200 Laser review, the most popular subject (according to Google Analytics) on my blog: One thing I hated about the Logitech SetPoint software--the driver package for Logitech peripherals--is the fact that I had seemingly lost the ability to open/close new tabs in Mozilla Firefox via a click of the mouse wheel. After a few minutes, I discovered that I could open/close tabs using the mouse wheel only if I double-clicked the wheel. I don't know about you, but I have enough trouble clicking the mouse-wheel one time, especially with a mouse wheel that tilts.

That's when I stumbled upon this review on Amazon.com! In order to open/close tabs in Firefox with a single click of the mouse wheel, you have to assign the "generic button" option (the default is Universal Scroll, I believe) to the wheel button in the SetPoint software. No other functionality of the mouse wheel seems to be lost with the "generic button" setting.

Of course, you could also not install the SetPoint software :P

- So my "lost" USPS package was finally delivered to my buyer today! I'm so glad to finally get the transaction over with!

That being said, I am now 0 for 4 with customer service representatives in the last few days. This time, Parago--a rebate processing company that deals with rebates, mainly from Staples, as well as companies as McAfee and Symantec--has screwed me out of $40. Long story short, their CS promised me that I would qualify for a pair of rebates ($20 and $40)with the purchase of an item, and I found out that I could only qualify for one. Also, since I had already opened the item in question, I could not return it, so I was out $40.

I called Staples to witch about Parago's misleading me, and it only took about five calls for someone to finally offer me some resolution: a $20 concession coupon. He said he was willing to go up to $30, but then reneged on that offer, so I accepted the $20.

By the way, my laptop is still not complete yet. Looks like I will not get it until next week.

- Some cities in the US, such as Pacific Grove, CA, are employing high-tech parking meters in the hopes of reducing costs related to ticketing of vehicles: reduced number of "meter maids" and increased ticket accuracy. These high-tech parking meters employ GPS capability to determine exactly how long a car has been parked in a given spot. Some also have the capability of charging a higher rate for longer parking stays, and some have remote sensors that reset the parking meter when a car leaves the spot. One could imagine the costs of the meters themselves: "'Today's meters are little computers,' said Ross Hubbard, a former Pacific Grove city councilman who advocated for the switch. The city now leases 100 meters for $45,000 per year from Duncan Parking Technologies Inc."

And I thought cops hiding behind bushes, billboards, and under freeway overpasses were ridiculous. If a person paid for an hour, and only used half of the time, why shouldn't the next person be allowed to use those minutes? After all, they have already been paid for!

I would love to see figures as to how much extra revenue these new, high-tech parking meters produce. I wonder if those who pushed for the new parking meters took vandalism and maintenance costs into account.

- A Tennessee man requested, for his last meal, that a vegetarian pizza should be given to a homeless person outside the prison in which he was housed. The prison refused, stating that they do not donate to charities. A woman heard about the request, and proceeded to raise $1,200 between herself and her friends to purchase 150 pizzas for Nashville's Rescue Mission, a shelter that services more than 800 homeless people per night. Even PETA got involved: "The president of the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals read a news story about the prison denying the inmate's last request and ordered 15 veggie pizzas sent to the Rescue Mission Wednesday morning." I must admit that this is a pretty cool story, and props to all those involved with the donations.

USPS Still Sucks, Genius Parents, and A Mile-High Felony

2007-05-09T00:41:00.000-07:00

It's too hot to sleep! Time for another blog entry!

Quick-hitters:

- Hey Amy, thank you for providing me with yet another piece of evidence that bowling is not a sport. Bowling can't possibly be considered a sport if alcohol serves as a performance enhancer :P

- I'm happy to hear that I'm not the only one getting reamed by Time Warner Cable. Check out this story over at Consumerist.

- Gosh, I missed the last two episodes of Heroes and The Riches! Does that make me no longer a fan of either show?

- Papa John's is offering a large 1-topping pizza for 99c when you purchase one large specialty pizza at regular menu price! Spinach alfredo, chicken, and tomato pizza + a pepperoni thin crust pizza FTW!

(Did I mention that it was really hot?)

- A bit of an update to my USPS story, from yesterday: after calling back the Lafayette, CA post office a number of times, they were finally able to tell me that the package was "most likely" on its way back to me. It better be "most likely" on its way back, as much as I am "most likely" really upset at USPS for the snafu.

I called USPS' general hotline about possibly getting my money back for the postage on the misdelivered package. Here's a transcript of our conversation:

Me: Hi. [spiel about the mess up]. Would it be possible for me to get my money back on the postage, since it was no fault of my own?
CS: Normally, what we do is try to forward the package to the correct address.
Me: Ok. Well, what if the package does, indeed, get sent back to me?
CS: Normally, what we do is try to forward the package to the correct address.
Me: Well, the Lafayette, CA post office said that they returned the package to the sender, and I am the sender!
CS: Normally, what we do is try to forward the package to the correct address.
Me: (at this point I'm seething) You're not answering the question! Will I be able to get my money back on the shipping, if it comes back to me, as the Lafayette, CA post office said it would?
CS: You can take it up with your local post office! Thank you for calling!

Why didn't the rep say that at the very beginning???

And no, the first three lines the CS told me were not meant to be a joke. She nearly said all three lines verbatim.

- Check out this video, of a baby playing with a cobra. That video is absolutely sickening; I would never let my child play with a cobra; at least, I wouldn't let him play with a cobra unarmed. The parents should have given the baby a gun to defend himself, like any responsible parent would do in that situation. Seriously, how the hell is this a good idea? "Most likely," the parents deserve to be sterilized for this act.

- A man was convicted of a felony for interfering with flight attendants and crew members on a Southwest Airlines flight, and could face up to twenty years in prison. Apparently, he and his girlfriend were getting too affectionate with each other, and that made the other individuals on the plane uncomfortable. The man was asked to stop, and he allegedly threatened a flight attendant twice. On the one hand, twenty years in prison for lots of kissing on a flight? Are you kidding me? Drug trafficking, manslaughter, and assault charges probably don't add up to twenty years combined! On the other hand, in this post-9/11 world, how stupid can the guy be to threaten flight attendants?

Actually, this story gives me a great idea. The next time a kid throws a major temper tantrum on a flight, and acts threateningly towards a flight attendant (we could be real generous with the definition of "acting threateningly"), he should be eligible for jail time. First of all, I'd much rather deal with an affectionate couple for an entire flight than one PITA brat. More importantly, what if a kid was arrested for such an act, and given jail time? Parents all across the country could threaten their kid, saying "if you keep acting up, you could end up in prison!"

I'm genuinely excited at the (miniscule) possibility of something like this happening. Maybe this is what the country needs for our youths to start shaping up.

"Most likely," I'm going to bed. Happy blogging!

Heat Sucks, Sick for Other Reasons (USPS, Dell), and Laptop Mice Whoring

2007-05-08T13:18:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I'm still sick, and it's HOT!

On to the quick-hitters:

- Gotta love it when your room temperature is 82 degrees...at midnight! I love my place in the winter--I hardly have to turn on the heater to stay warm during the winter months--but I can't stand the heat of the spring/summer.

(And I don't want to hear anyone complaining about how cold it gets in the winter where you are. You get to suffer extreme cold in the winter; I get to suffer extreme heat in the summer. So there.)

Temps were in the high 70s-low 80s last week, which were very enjoyable. I fired up Accuweather.com today, and look at what I saw! I should be happy, though; last night, when I went to Accuweather, they said it would be 99.

I should have listened to Krunk and ran down to AM/PM for an Icee, even at midnight.

- I was going to save this blog entry for a quick, "first look" at the Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop that I was supposed to get today. DHL's website says that my package, which is coming from Sparks, NV, has been in the "shipment acknowledged" phase--basically, Dell printed out a DHL label--and it's been there since the fourth of May. At the very least, the package should be en route to CA, and not stuck in Nevada!

(At least DHL's IVR (Interactive Voice Response; those automated menus you hear over the phone where you have to speak to it to navigate through their menu) works quite well.)

- As much as DHL is pissing me off, USPS is pissing me off even more. For some reason, they decided to ship a package that was supposed to go to Lafayette, CO (800xx), to Lafayette, CA (9xxxx)! I called the USPS annex near Lafayette, CA, this morning, and spoke to a woman who was utterly useless. She kept asking where in Lafayette, CA, the package was supposed to go to. I kept telling her that the package wasn't even supposed to go to CA. She put me on hold, and then explained that the seller probably made a typo on the To: field of the label. Never mind that 1) I'm the seller, 2) I printed out the label electronically, and 3) I had the shipping receipt, with proof of the correct address, right in front of me!

The woman told me to call back within two hours. When I called back, she said that she hadn't looked into the matter, and gave me the phone # for the Lafayette, CA, post office! She gave me a person's name that I had to speak to, so I called that number, got the person on the line, and she told me that she couldn't research the matter today because she had to go to class. However, she would be more than happy to look into the matter on Thursday (???????????).

I told her flatly, "Look. I've been calling phone number after phone number. Get someone to research this matter!" She said she would look into it, and call me back within a few minutes.

That was at noon.

(Apparently DHL may not be at fault after all; according to the DHL rep I just spoke to, Dell never handed DHL the package! Now I get to speak to Dell's CS *shudder*)

- I'm a laptop mouse whore; there's no other way to say it.

(YAY! The Dell CSR told me that somebody had stolen my laptop from their Nevada plant. A new one is now in-production, and even though Dell was nice enough to upgrade me to next-day delivery, I probably won't get it until next week, at the earliest. Not to mention, next-day delivery isn't that much of an upgrade, since the laptop only has to traverse the distance from NV to CA; that would have taken one day via Ground shipping anyway. On top of that, it appears that they removed the 3 year warranty upgrade I ordered. Freaking Dell.)

Anyway, I went ahead and bought this laptop mouse yesterday from Amazon.com. This would make the fourth different laptop mouse I've ever owned; the previous three either broke down after a couple months of use, or were given away because they sucked. It's a good thing that the combined cost of all four mice was somewhere in the $10 range :P.

Hopefully this one works out better than the previous three. It is, after all, a mouse for Macs, so it must be good, right?

Well, Dell decided to be "nice" and give me a $50 concession coupon for my troubles. I guess that's better than their first offer to me: the rep was going to take "special care" in tracking my shipment for me.

Until next time!

MX3200 Review Update, Chase Freedom Rewards, Swimming in Rebates, Time Warner Still Sucks, and Roger Clemens Redux

2007-05-07T13:54:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting here, sick as a dog, on about five minutes of sleep, and I've already downed two Pepto shots (TMI?).

- You'll remember, in a previous blog entry, that I did a review on the Logitech Cordless Desktop MX3200 Laser. That review seemed to generate quite a bit of traffic to my blog; several visitors found my site, according to Google Analytics, via keyword searches involving the MX3200 keyboard. Primarily, people were looking for the location of the Scroll Lock button (if you search for "scroll lock mx3200" on Google, my blog is still the first hit).

(Tangent: When is the last time you, or anyone you know, used the Scroll Lock key?)

Anyway, I have updated my review with the location of the Scroll Lock key! Also, I found out that the context-click key hadn't been removed from the keyboard; it had just been moved elsewhere. For those of you interested in the location of both keys, I'll refer you to this edit I made in my review:

The context-click key can be accessed by hitting the Fn key and the Print Screen key at the same time. Scroll lock can be accessed by hitting Fn + Pause/Break. I bring up the latter because I have received a lot of hits on my site from people, apparently, looking for the location of the scroll lock key.

- The Chase Freedom Rewards card--"I'm free...to do what I want..."--is awesome! 3% cash back on gas/grocery/fast food, the last of which is the primary reason why I wanted this card (for grocery purchases, I prefer my Chase Cash Back Rewards card, which gives 5%). I also have 250 other reasons why I applied for this card.

(Off topic: WTF is this mouse "for Mac" only, as the title suggests? Last I checked, a USB port is a USB port.)

- No thanks in great part to a person who shall remain nameless, I now have over several hundred dollars in rebates due to me. At the beginning of April, that figure was a manageable $70. Now, it has ballooned to over $600, and rising! Nameless one, thanks a bunch :P

(Of the $600 or so I'm owed, about $300-400 are coming from Computer Associates rebates alone!)

- Time Warner is funny. I finally got a reply today to the angry email I sent them, after the first phone call I made to their CS that day. Their email was one of the best "nothing" emails I've ever seen!

Thank you for your inquiry. We're committed to providing the highest
quality of products and services to all of our customers, so your
feedback is very important to us. I apologize that you experienced
concerns with our pricing and packaging as well as customer care.

Our records indicate you called to address these issues prior to our
receiving your email. If you need any further assistance, please call
our 24 hour customer service center at 1-888-892-2253. I apologize for
any inconvenience this may cause.

I applaud TW. I don't recall the last time an email so eloquently said nothing! I plan on sending them another nasty email. Let's see how little they say when they get around to replying to that message.

- Roger Clemens is now officially the Antichrist, as ESPN went deep into their archives to dig up this article by Bill Simmons. I knew that Clemens was a money-grubbing attention whore, but I didn't realize how much of one he was, until I read that article. Oh well, I'm looking forward to another Yankee choke this fall; I can't wait for the "geez, even with Roger Clemens, you can't win sh!t" taunts from Yankee haters!

Until next time!

Online Poker Freerolls, Roger Clemens is a Yankee (no, really?), and more Kobe Bryant talk

2007-05-06T13:59:00.000-07:00

(Disclaimer: The following blog entry may contain sports-like substances)

So I'm sitting at a Texas Hold'em Freeroll tournament with 138 other entrants. The prize pool is $1,000, with a top prize of $260, and even 20th place earns $14. I normally don't play well in freerolls, because there are always a bunch of nutjobs moving all-in with any two cards, doubling or even tripling up, and then bullying the table with their big stacks.

Hopefully I get some nice hands today. So far I've seen T9o (ten-nine offsuit, or of different suits), 82s (eight-two suited), and 63o, not exactly premium hands.

Ooooh...I finally got to see a flop...with a mighty 62s!

- So Roger Clemens is going to be a Yankee, and what a way to announce his "comeback": by showing up at a Yankees game, during the seventh-inning stretch, and feeding his massive ego by making the announcement from the owner's box. My thoughts on the story:

No freaking duh! Anyone who thought Clemens was going to Boston or the Astros must have been smoking something. Besides, he has (a prorated) twenty-eight million reasons to rejoin the Yankees. Anyone who thinks he's there for anything else other than the money couldn't be more wrong. Think about it: if family--his son is a catcher for the Astros, and he lives in Texas--were so important, then the fact that the Astros stink this year wouldn't have dissuaded him from playing in Houston this year.
I love the mudslinging between Yankee fan and BoSox fan. Yeah, as if the cesspool that is NY or the whining babies that make up BoSox Nation (paraphrases, by the way, not my own opinions!) are relevant in the discussion. And if I hear one more suggestion that Roger Clemens and BFF Andy Pettitte should go to San Francisco and get married, along with Derek Jeter and A-Rod, I'm going to puke.
What, exactly, are the Yankees getting for their $20+ million? A 45-year-old pitcher who had a very low ERA the last two years--it helps to pitch in the National League, and who still has dominating stuff. They're also getting a 45-year-old with recurring hamstring problems, whose last memorable pitching performance was one where he had to leave early in the game with an injury. Oh yeah, did I mention this was going to cost the Yankees $20+ million?
Then again, what else could the Yankees have done? They certainly didn't need another bat, and what pitchers are available in the trade market that is of the caliber of Roger Clemens?

Enjoy NY, Clemens. I'm glad you finally chose a team; now I no longer have to see your mug on my TV, as you struggle to decide with which team you are going to join. Just admit that you chased the money, then pack your bags and move quietly to NY, pitch up to your abilities, and let's see if you were, indeed, the missing piece to get the Yankees back to the World Series. Of course, asking the guy to shut up and NOT feed his massive ego is a tall order, I understand.

I should mention that I'm making this post not as a Yankee hater, but as a "Roger Clemens, GTFOMTV (Get The **** Off My TV)" fan.

(Hey, I actually saw a face card this time! My gosh, I'm so card dead right now!)

(OMG! I actually won a pot! And I won it with J3o!)

- Jason Kidd to the Lakers? Why the Lakers didn't make the deal for Kidd during the season was puzzling; I just don't think Andrew Bynum is going to develop into a superstar. Now that there is speculation that Bynum is on the trading block, it begs the question: why weren't they willing to trade Bynum during the season, but now they're willing to deal him? I understand the inclusion of overpaid C Jason Collins--actually, the terms "overpaid" and "center" are almost redundant nowadays--was also a big reason for the trade not happening, but Jason Kidd would have been perfect for the Lakers. He's a big guard, can shoot (not well, but he does shoot well in the clutch), and would fit very well in the triangle.

(I love freerolls. I had QQ and went all-in, and was called by KQ, 87, and AK. The idiot with KQ won with a straight on the turn.)

Not to mention, have you seen the guy in this postseason so far? He's playing out of his mind! With his family troubles, the pending move of the Nets to Brooklyn, and Wince Carter's pending free agency, now would be as good as time as any for the Nets to consider rebuilding. The likelihood of a Kidd-to-LA deal looks bad, though, since the Lakers lost one major bargaining chip (Chris Mihm's expiring contract), and it sounds like they're going to have to include Lamar Odom in any deal for Kidd. How about Lamar Odom, Kwame Brown, and Andrew Bynum for Kidd, Jason Collins, and a draft pick? No way can the Nets expect to get a draft pick from the Lakers, if the Lakers have to take on Collins' albatross of a contract. The only other trade, which I can't see the Nets taking, would be Kwame, Vlad Radmanovic, Bynum, and Evans (or a pick) for Kidd.

Sounds like a third team must get involved for Kidd to join the Lakers.

That's all for now. Until next time!

DOSBox Fun, Parago Rebates Are Fun, and Kobe Bryant revisited

2007-05-05T13:09:00.000-07:00

Quick-hitters:

- Check out this news story, then click on "Read Related Blogs and Articles."

(Yes, little things like this amuse me.)

- Time Warner continues to piss me off. My connection has gone down twice this morning! I refuse to call them, though, because they'll probably "fix" my problem and somehow jack up my bill by another $20/month.

- My DOSBox is already giving me problems. Frequent BSODs, auto-restarts, and a whirring noise--sounds like a dying CPU fan--occur virtually every time I fire up the system. Of course, I only invested a grand total of $22 for all the parts, so I could care less if the damn thing stopped working tonight.

(Well, maybe not, since I'm playing Chrono Trigger for the 20,000th time.)

- Lately, there have been a number of great deals on Computer Associates (CA) deals, most of them of the Make Money After Rebate (MMAR) variety.

(Tangent: I gotta find my "me-FAQ," a collection of terms I frequently use while chatting/emailing/blogging.)

One "fun" thing about CA rebates is that their rebate processor--Parago, aka Parasuck or Paraslow--likes to reject valid rebate submissions for BS reasons: invalid UPC, invalid receipt, invalid email (???), invalid phone number, etc. Lately, I've gotten multiple reasons for rejection; case in point, I had a rebate rejected yesterday for "invalid UPC, invalid receipt, and invalid email."

(One funny thing about the "invalid email" error message is that they are able to email me a rejection notice. How could they do that if my email address is invalid?)

What's really stupid about Parasuck is that a phone call usually remedies the situation immediately. In fact, here is a transcript of my call to them this morning.

Me: Hi, I'm calling about rebate ID [ID number]
CS: Hi. [spiel about the rebate being rejected for whatever reason] . As a one time courtesy, I went ahead and validated your rebate for you. You will receive the check in 4-6 weeks.
Me: Cool. Thanks.

Why do I continue to deal with Parasuck? How can I pass up MMAR deals?

- How about Jermaine O'Neal possibly going to the Lakers? If you recall, last time, I talked about KG joining the Lakers, and now I'll talk about the Pacers' forward. How about Jermaine O'Neal, Jamaal Tinsley + assorted garbage for Odom, Brown, Farmar, Evans, and a #1. Come on, Larry Legend, how can you pass up this deal? So your team becomes total garbage next year! So what? Play Odom at the point-forward, try to trade Jeff Foster's expiring contract for veteran help, and rebuild the following year! You'll get a top-15 pick next year, as well as the Lakers' #1 this year and your own. Hey, it's not my fault that you accepted that horrible trade with Golden State to get Troy Murphy and Mike Dunleavy Jr. (Golden State sends many thanks, by the way). Chances of this happening? Not much, unless Indy can couple this deal with another one. Should it happen? I think so. The Pacers need to rebuild, and the Lakers desperately need an established post-scorer while they wait for Bynum to develop. Plus, Tinsley is a decent PG, though his contract is an absolute albatross.

Speaking of PGs, how about Jason Kidd? I'll save that for next time!

Time Warner Sucks!

2007-05-04T18:33:00.000-07:00

No, the title is not meant to be facetious. It's the truth.

I had hinted about how much I hated Time Warner in an earlier blog entry, but I never did go into any detail about what happened. And then, the sh!t hit the fan today. But before I get into what happened today, let me discuss what happened on April 3rd. I promise you, this will be relevant to my story today.

(Sorry for the really long rant!)

(Background: A few months ago, my cable bill was a tad under $50/month for cable, Road Runner Basic high speed internet service (HSI), and a digital box rental. Recently, I've added HBO to my contract at $15/month, pushing my total bill to about $60-65/month. My basic cable is free of charge; it's paid for by my landlord as part of his HOA dues).

I had acquired a Motorola SURFBoard cable modem to replace my POS RCA modem that Time Warner gave me. I called in to TW HSI support to get the new modem provisioned. The idiot rep, for the life of her, could not get my modem working. At the end of the call, she told me that my old modem would work just fine.

(FYI, in order to "provision" a new modem, a HSI company needs the MAC address of your modem--a 12 hexadecimal key. You give them the key, they punch it in their computer, and the change is usually quick.)

I asked her, "Wait a second. How would my old modem still work? Didn't you punch in the new MAC address?"

Her response? Something like "It should work just fine." Of course, it did, leading me to believe that she never correctly provisioned my modem.

Later in the day, I had another rep provision my modem, and he was able to do it within minutes. I thought I was in the clear, until I noticed that my speeds are pathetically slow. I called TW again the next day, and the rep insisted that slow speeds were perfectly acceptable (I was getting about 1 Mbps, when Road Runner Basic advertises 4-5Mbps). Eventually, the tech found out that one of the earlier techs had provisioned my modem for the Road Runner Lite plan (RR's low-end plan, providing 1.5Mbps down)! He quickly corrected this, and I had my higher speeds again!

Fast forward to today: I checked my Citibank credit card statement earlier today, only to see an ~$90 charge on it from TW! I understand that companies need to raise their rates every now and then, but a $25 increase in a month???

I checked my TW statement, and spotted a couple extra charges to my bill: a charge of ~$16 for Broadcast Basic (what I'm supposed to get for free, or so I thought), and a "partial month" charge for $5.66. There was also a credit for a cool $0.24!

Mildly ticked off, I called Customer Service and spoke to an individual who insisted that the charges were all correct. When I inquired about the "partial charges," the rep told me that these partial charges stemmed from a subscription to Road Runner Lite (remember that I was put on the Lite plan for one day). Never mind the fact that I was still being billed for Road Runner Basic--TW's standard HSI service. I explained that there is clearly a problem here. The rep's reply? Something to the effect of "oh, yeah, the system can add those [charges] at any time." You could imagine how happy I was to hear that TW could charge me at random at any time.

Totally livid, I threatened to cancel all my services. The rep coldly told me "ok." On top of that, he mentioned that there is a $1.99 convenience (read: bullsh!t) fee for each service removed from my's contract! At that point, I asked him if he really wanted to lose a customer. He replied with "go ahead." I had him remove HBO from my plan, and incurred the $1.99 charge.

Before I hung up on the guy, I asked him if I was going to be charged $1.99 for this call. In all seriousness, he answered "no, sir, we will never charge you for a phone call." I told him "you guys probably will next month" and hung up before he could get into his "thank you for letting us rip you off...have a nice day" spiel. I fired off a nasty email to TW's email support, and have yet to hear a reply.

(Yeah, I know, I can act quite childish at times).

After an hour of cooling off, I decided to call TW again. I got a really nice guy, who looked at the partial charges and thought I was getting screwed himself (insert big grin here). He forwarded me to another department, and I finally got resolution.

The rep agreed with me that I shouldn't have been doubly charged for the RR Basic + Lite plan, so I got a few cents refunded to my account. I then inquired about the rest of the partial charges, as well as the Broadcast Basic charge of ~$16. The rep put me on hold for a bit, and came back with good news. Apparently, when I was bumped down to Road Runner Lite, that triggered a charge for Broadcast Basic service. It seems that I am supposed to get "sub-Basic" cable service free of charge, which is identical to Broadcast Basic except for the price (~$16, compared to $0). It turns out, that charge + the partial month for Road Runner Lite, added up to $5.66.

The rep credited me for the partial month of Broadcast Basic that I never subscribed for, as well as the $16 I was billed for Broadcast Basic this month. I asked to have HBO re-added on my account, and he did that, but he wouldn't remove the $1.99 convenience charge. That was ok, though; somehow, he ended up lowering my total bill by $5/month as well!

I can't wait to get next month's statement, to see even more bogus charges on my account.

Moral of the story: apparently, I gotta speak to Time Warner twice to get a desired result.

Kobe Bryant? What'cha gonna do???

2007-05-03T21:35:00.000-07:00

How do you call a $40 bet ($20 no limit) with K-9 offsuit, when you and your opponent have each only contributed $2.50 to the pot? When you know you're going to make a king-high straight!

I don't have the hand history, but here's the hand, to the best of my knowledge:

Blinds $0.10 and $0.20.
Psycho raises to $0.60.
Victim raises to $1.50.
Psycho raises to $2.40.
Victim raises all-in to $40.
Psycho calls for $40.

Psycho shows K-9 offsuit; victim shows a pair of eights (the victim will win this hand about 55% of the time).

Board: QJTxx

Psycho ends up with a King-high straight (KQJT9); victim ends up with just his pair of eights.

Online poker...it's FAN-tastic!

(By the way, if Dirk Nowitzki ends up winning the MVP award, can the award be taken away from him for a piss poor playoff performance? By the way, cool alliteration, no?)

- Sorry, IMBCers, but I just have to give my thoughts about this story on the Los Angeles Lakers. It appears that Kobe finally snapped, demanding changes to the Lakers for next season. This quote sums up Kobe's feelings quite succinctly:

"Do something," Bryant told reporters in Phoenix, "and do it now."

Clearly Kobe is sick of playing with the likes of Smush Parker, Mo Evans, Jordan Farmar, and Andrew Bynum. No disrespect to any of these guys--well, maybe to Smush--but these role players don't exactly resemble Horry, Fox, and Fisher.

(Tangent: Would anyone have a problem with my lumping Mark Cuban in with the likes of players such as Malone, Stockton, Barkley, et al., and coaches such as Jerry Sloan, in the "won't ever win one [a championship]" Hall of Shame? To think, the Mavs were six minutes away from winning a championship last year, and now they're about to be kicked to the curb by former Mav coach Don Nelson and the Golden State Warriors [!!!!!!])

Three marquee names are floating around with regards to the Lakers and trade possibilities in the offseason: Kevin Garnett, Jermaine O'Neal, and Jason Kidd would all make the Lakers better immediately. But at what cost? And would any of the three even make the Lakers contenders?

(Tangent #1: I hope the Warriors play Houston in the next round. I think the Warriors have a good shot at beating the Rockets, and I really want to see a Suns-Warriors Western Conference Finals!)

(Tangent #2: If a sportsbook gave 10:1 odds on Golden State winning the West, I'd have to seriously consider making that bet...that is, if online gambling were legal.)

Kevin Garnett, eh? Despite what T-Wolves GM Kevin McHale says--that he's not trading KG--could he resist a first round pick or two, Andrew Bynum or Lamar Odom, and a bunch of garbage (Kwame Brown, e.g.)? While we're at it, McHale could toss Mike James into the mix. Chances of this deal happening? Not much; it's not likely that Minnesota would give up KG for that package. However, Minnesota has to think about it this way: they get a draft pick or two, expiring contracts, an established star, AND the good publicity that comes with finally allowing KG to leave Minnesota.

I'm sleepy, so next time, I'll talk about Jermaine and Kidd. Until next time!

I Could Be A Two-Time Felon...

2007-05-02T21:19:00.000-07:00

(Does anyone know if breaking and entering one's own house is considered a crime?)

(And no, I will not elaborate.)

(Let's move on, shall we?)

So my new laptop will be here any day now, and I gotta get rid of this POS HDTV--a Sceptre 32" LCD HDTV with a couple slight problems, and by slight, you know what I mean. I gotta find a smaller (~26"), and more importantly, a cheaper alternative.

Random thought:

- Krunk and I (well, I, really) talked about what it means to "tangent" from one topic. We agreed that the definition is to change direction about a topic at hand, by switching to a related topic. For example, if I talked about Las Vegas, and then talked about the television show CSI, I would have made a successful tangent; since CSI is based in Las Vegas, there is a connection between the two topics.

Merriam-Webster.com seems to disagree with our definition. It defines a tangent as "an abrupt change of course; a digression (ex: the speaker went off on a tangent)", which is more severe, in my opinion, than a change to a related topic; in other words, m-w.com seems to define a tangent as an off-topic remark.

I think I'll continue using "tangent" the way I have it defined, even if it may be incorrect.

Anyway, this blog was going to be titled "Reading Comprehension FTW (For The Win!)," and you shall see why below.

- I'm having printer troubles at the moment, and a friend who shall remain nameless tried to help me out last night. I quit asking him for help after this exchange:

Me: I think my laser printer is having an identity crisis
Him: wth are u using a laser poitner for?
Me: um
Me: i'm using a printer to...um...print
Him: haha
Him: i so misread that ;p

(No prize if you figure out who the friend was).

(Disclaimer: The next topic is not meant to poke fun at the two studies mentioned, nor is it meant to elicit a debate over perceived race-based bias between NBA officials and black players. It is just merely to gloss over how important reading comprehension really is).

- An academic study, published in The New York Times, determined that black players are whistled for fouls more often than white players. The study, "conducted over a 13-season span through 2004, found that the racial makeup of a three-man officiating crew affected calls by up to 4½ percent." The researchers also found

"Player-performance appears to deteriorate at every margin when officiated by a larger fraction of opposite-race referees," Wolfers and Price wrote.
But the key finding was in regard to foul calls, saying "black players receive around 0.12-0.20 more fouls per 48 minutes played [an increase of 2½-4½ percent] when the number of white referees officiating a game increases from zero to three."

(The second paragraph is important to note, for the scope of my discussion below.)

The NBA was quick to denounce the study, pointing out that the study used data collected on officiating teams--each game is refereed by a three-person team--and not on individual referees. Also important to note is that the original study was not yet submitted for peer review as of the date The New York Times published their original article.

What brought my attention to these articles were not the stories themselves, but the comments left by ESPN readers. Take a look at some of these comments:

This article is ludicrous. One of the most idiotic article ever written. They called themselves graduate students? Anyone can figure that there are more black players in the NBA than white, so of course black players get called on more.

You can't be serious. The NBA is 95% black.

Agreed - Most Rediculous Study EVERS! This study would have some kind of basis in reality if a) the league was 50/50 black/ white; and b) refs were 50/50 black/whiteReality is that the NBA is a "black man's league", and without accurate figures, i'd venture to say that over 70% of the STARTERS (ie those who play the most minutes!) are black!

(That last one gave me a headache just copying and pasting it...I might pass out if I cho0se to try to decipher the whole thing).

Anyway, clearly these guys can't read! Look back at the second paragraph I quoted above, especially this part:

"But the key finding was in regard to foul calls, saying "black players receive around 0.12-0.20 more fouls per 48 minutes played"

This post pretty much sums up my feelings.

Dear Idiots complaining that since the NBA is 95% black...,The percentage of black/white players and black/white referees is factored into the statistics within the study, hence the "greater rate", not "greater number of fouls". Please do not focus on the fact that most players are black and instead focus on the fact that this is a ridiculously worthless study REGARDLESS!

Finally! Someone that can actually read! Let's not focus on the outcry of racism in the NBA. Let's focus on the fact that this study has little to no merit whatsoever, due to the fact that the study did not take into account individual referee performances. How can people allege a racial bias without knowing if the trio were all black, two and one, or all white? Also, one could argue that any study should also take these factors into account:

The size of players: bigger players tend to draw more fouls than smaller players. Teams dominated with bigger players should draw fouls at a higher rate than teams that rely on smaller, quicker players.
Home/road advantages: teams at home generally get the benefit of the doubt more so than the road team. Also, teams on the road have to deal with the hostile crowd, which may cause them to play more sloppily, and potentially incur more fouls.
Breaks. Some teams just get more breaks than others. Some players (superstars mostly) get the benefit of the doubt more so than others.

Of course, with any statistical analysis, you hope to get a large enough set of data to rid yourself of some errors. On the other hand, one can always try to "mold" their data to fit a desired conclusion. Now, I'm not alleging that either scenario is occurring in this situation, but it's worth mentioning the problems with statistical tests (especially when the data-gathering methods appear flawed).

By the way, reading comprehension FTW! Also, kettle corn FTW! And sleep too!

Anandtech Special

2007-05-01T21:16:00.000-07:00

Today's blog will be dedicated to topics I browsed through over at ATOT.

(By the way, boy, this Warriors-Mavs game is exciting! Can the Mavs stave off elimination?)

- To nobody's surprise, Los Angeles is the worst polluted city in the nation, according to a study based on 2003-2005 data. No kidding. What's next? A study on which country has the highest rate of obesity? If people want to commission a study that would actually impact people, I have a proposition: let's commission a study to determine why food tastes better after midnight!

(Wow. I thought Jason Richardson got fouled on that shot attempt. And that was a real tough call on Baron. Ouch! Golden State just fumbled a missed FT. Looks like Dallas will survive to fight another day.)

- A Washington, D.C. judge is suing a local dry cleaners for $67 million over a lost pair of trousers.

Plaintiff Roy Pearson -- himself a local judge in Washington D.C -- says in court papers that he's been through the ringer over a lost pair of prized pants he wanted to wear on his first day on the bench. He says in court papers that he has endured "mental suffering, inconvenience and discomfort.''

Are you freaking kidding me?

(Wow...I didn't think Jackson deserved to be tossed for THAT.)

Mental suffering? Discomfort? Once this case gets laughed out of court, can the owner of the dry cleaner countersue for the same thing? I know that, if I were being sued for a huge chunk of money, I would be sick to my stomach over the prospect of spending thousands and thousands of dollars in legal fees!

It's morons like this that give lawyers and judges a bad name. I hope the presiding judge puts this idiot through the ringer (apologies for the pun). Damn...I kinda want to sue the guy myself for "mental suffering, inconvenience, and discomfort" for reading about this dumbass.

Let's see how long it takes for this guy to sue me for libel.

(Freaking Dodgers. They had numerous chances to extend a 1-0 lead, and now it's 1-1.)

- New studies in the "science of resuscitation" show that the widespread death of cells in a "dead" individual occurs when cells are reintroduced to oxygen, a process caused "reperfusion" (EDITED 5/11: link added). According to research studies on oxygen-starved heart cells, "once the cells have been without oxygen for more than five minutes, they die when their oxygen supply is resumed." Apparently, reperfusion triggers apoptosis--abnormal cellular suicide, for lack of a better term, used typically as a defense mechanism; an abnormal cell would rather kill itself than propagate and potentially become cancerous. According to the Dr. Lance Becker of the University of Pennsylvania,

"It looks to us as if the cellular surveillance mechanism cannot tell the difference between a cancer cell and a cell being reperfused with oxygen. Something throws the switch that makes the cell die."

Incredible! The idea that CPR on a victim could potentially kill a man, as opposed to possibly saving his life, is remarkable! How counterintuitive does it sound that a better approach to saving a heart attack victim is to reduce his oxygen uptake, as Dr. Becker suggests?

I hope to hear some more advances in the "science of resuscitation" in the near future.

(Freaking Nomar! Popped up with the go-ahead run at second! Now it's 1-1, in the top of the ninth).

That's all I've got for now. I missed Heroes and The Riches last night, so I gotta watch those before I head off to bed.

Happy blogging!