Weekly review

There hasn't been too much going on lately. You probably guess that by the lack of posts. My bowling league is coming to a close, which is a bummer, but I think I am going to join a summer league this year. I want to maintain my good skills. I am going to end this year with an average just under 200. A 199 is awesome in my book. I would say that I am probably in the top ten of my league. A 220 average would be nice, because I would be able to joint the PBA, but as far as a local men's league goes, 199 is not shabby.

Spring always makes me happy. I have a LOT to do outside. The garden is the priority, but I also need to spray weeds in flower beds and put stuff on my grass. I keep playing with the idea of hiring True Green, or something like that, to spray my weeds. The pokey weeds get pretty bad in my back yard. I want to put some lattice around my deck so that the dogs can't get under there anymore. I have some already, it is just a matter of putting it up. I also think I am going to add a flower bed in the front. I will put a rock border around it a perhaps plant a weaping cherry tree and suround it with tulips. I don't know for sure. Maybe I will just cut down the ugly tree we have out there now and put the cherry tree in its spot. The tulips are a must though. I had a bunch at my old house. If I had more time and more money, I would put in a munch of flower beds all around my back fence. Now I get to contend with a chronic back issue too.

Remember when I said my back was hurting? Well, I have arthritus (sp?) in my lower back. Let's hear it for an older person ailment showing itself in my 34 year old back. Awesome. There isn't anything I can do about it other than take anti-inflamatories and asprin. Like I said, AWESOME. The pain hasn't been too bad lately. Still, it makes me less likely to want to do things that require me to get up and move around. Still, I always find a way to get done what needs to get done.

Full tilt

I've played poker online before, both on my computer and on my Xbox, but never for money. Well, that has all changed. Today, I opened an account on Full Tilt Poker. I started out safely, playing only with pretend chips, but today I put in $60 just for a little bit of gambling fun. And fun it is! So far, that $60 is over $300. I really don't know how or why. I am not a great card player. I guess I am getting good cards. Plus, insteadof playing people, I just play my hands. If I have a good hand, I bet. I have been doing pretty well. I did have two hands that really hurt though. One hand I flopped a flush but one of my opponents caught a full house. Then it happened again. Only I had a straight. I started playing Texas Hold'em, and I won a little over $100. Now I am playing Omaha, which is a little different. It is played like hold'em, but you get four cards to start out. It is wicked fun. You have to use two and only two of you cards, plus the five community cards, to make your hand. Basically, you look at your four cards and see how many hands you could make. What can draw into a straight, or a flush? If you have enough good combinations, you are usually good to go. I usually play if I have 4 or more good starting hands. For example, if I have A, K, 2, 5, with two hearts and two clubs, I have two flush draws (the hearts and clubs) and four straight draws (A-K, A-2, A-5, and 2-5). It is a lot to keep track of. When people are betting, the pots can get really big. Fun times.

BSG Bummer

Well, BSG is all done. The show finale was this past Friday. I must say, I was a little bummed to see the show end, but am glad that it is over. The last season was pretty weak an the finale was pretty lame as well. The show started out great and sustained for several seasons, but this last season had the feeling like they were just throwing eposides together just to fill up the last season. The last few episodes were full of flash backs that made no sense and seemed pointless to the show. There was one good battle scene in the finale, but then the show just kind of gave up on itself. The questions were never really answered. Oh well. The one thing that I really wanted to know was, what the hell was Starbuck? She died, came back, found her own corpse, and then vanished again. Wasn't she supposed to be lead the human race to their doom? It made no sense to me. I guess if you think about it, the way the show ended,with the flash forward to the colonist's future being our present, maybe Starbuck did lead the people to their doom. If "all this has happened before and all of this will happen again" then the human race must be in some sort of loop that repeats. They advance their technology, build the cylons again, get killed by the cylons again, kill the cylons again, and then start all over. Again. I guess the BSG people wanted to make a statement about how technology would be our doom.

I Bowl With Teenaged Girls

Well, not really, but there are similarities. First, let me tell you a few rules we have as a team:

1. We play poker. $1 ante the first two games, $2 ante the last game. If you get a strike or a spare, you get a card. If you bowl a turkey (three strikes in a row) you get a bonus card. If we all bowl a strike in the same frame, we all get a bonus card. If you bowl a gutter ball on the first ball of your frame, you must put an extra dollar in the pot. The person with the best had at the end of the bowling game wins the pot.

2. We kind of do a beer frame thing, where if everyone but one person gets a strike in the same frame, the person that does not get the strike is supposed to buy the next pitcher. We don't really enforce this because we usually only buy one pitcher each per night. So, if the person that gets stuck already bought a pitcher, we let it slide.

3. (the important on to the story) If you bowl below 100, you must go to the front desk and have your name and score announced over the PA. Basically, we want to you "man up" if you bowl like crap. It's a bit of a deturant. We don't normally enforce this one either. It is something we are supposed to do, but when someone bowls under 100, it doesn't always happen. (I never bowl under 100. I get mad if I am below 150.)

Last week, Rick bowled a 97. It was the last game of the night and after, he went straight to the front desk. It was suprising because, as mentioned above, we usually let it slide. Rick is the weakest link on our team, he has had his poor scores announced before, but we usually have to do it for him (which is why we usually let it slide). Anyway, a minute or so after Rick is at the front desk we hear the announcement congratulating JESSE for his 97. Well, Jesse was not happy by this. Going into the tenth frame, Jesse had 8 strikes out of 9 frames. He had a great game going. As expected, everyone in the league started laughing and poking fun......at Jesse. Jesse got distracted and screwed up in the tenth frame. He blamed Rick. Since I am in the last position to bowl, I missed all of this, but apparently Rick and Jesse exchanged words. No blows were exchanged, but Rick basically quit the team and Jesse was not saddened by this. WHAT???? Are you kidding me? I was very much reminded of some of the tiffs and spats that were common back in my highschool days. I tried to mediate, but to no avail. Jesse won't budge, Rick won't budge. Craziness.

Going Dancin'

Ohio State has made it into the Big Dance. After a pretty good season and a good showin in the Big Ten tournament, Ohio State get the nod as an 'at large' selection into the Men's basketball tournament. The Big Ten tournament was pretty fun to watch. OSU made it to the finals after beating up on favored Michigan State. they lost in the finals to Perdue, but that is OK. They showed they can roll with the big boys by taking out MSU, but won't be too cocky. I don't know how far they will go in the tourney. they should make it past the first round, but will likely meet #1 seed Louisville in the second round. If they play as well as they did against MSU, I think the Buckeyes have a good shot at going pretty far in the tournament. I guess we shall see what happens. All in all I am glad they have done well so far and hope they put on a good showing for the little respected Big Ten.

Who Watched the Watchmen? I did. B+

There may be some spoilers!!!!

I went to see Watchmen this weekend. I was looking forward to the movie, mostly because the trailers kicked ass. I honestly had no idea what the graphic novel was about, other than it was a superhero type story. It is set in the 80's and is in a world where America won the Vietnam war, Nixon never left office, and the Cold War is raging. Oh, and there are masked vigilanties that catch criminals. The story does a lot of flashbacks between the current set of heroes, called the Watchmen, and the original group, called the Minutemen. There are connections between to two groups that are really the catalyst of some of the plots. Also, the 'heroes' are only that because they focus their energies on catching bad guys. In general, some of them are flawed people with violent tendancies and contrast greatly when compared to groups like the X-men or Fantastic Four. I guess what I am trying to say it that they have little regard for the life of the bad guy. One of them is a war mongering psycho and another is a sadist nut job. There are others that aren't as bad, but they clearly have an 'above the law' attitude. It was really a very interesting film. There was a twist at the end that you could kind of see coming, but other than that, the effects were spectacular, the characters were interesting, and the action scenes were bad ass. The one thing I couldn't quite get was, why were these people considered superheroes? Aside from Dr. Manhattan, a blue man with the power to do, basically, anything, none of the Watchmen seemed to have super powers beyond the ability to kick ass. Maybe it was all super speed and strength. Other than that, no one could fly, shoot eye beams, or control the elements. It added a neat demension to the film,in that it seemed like these were normal people that put on masks in order to stop crime. I think I want to get the graphic novel so that I can get the whole effect.

Aside from the general goodness of the movie, Watchmen had one of the sexiest love scenes I have ever seen in a movie. Silk Spectre II and Nite Owl II go out and do some crime fighting and after, they hook up in their ship. The Silk Spectre II is probably the hottest superhero ever to grace film. I think it is a combination of her hot latex outfit and my latent teen superhero sex fantasies that made the scene so hot. (sorry for that glimpse into myself that may have made you all throw up in your mouths a bit.)

My one beef about the film: Too much blue dong. Dr Manhattan was turned blue in the acident that gave him super powers, and apparently, he no longer feels the need for clothes. When out in public, he would wear a suit or a cod piece, but in general, there was a lot of blue dong when he was on screen. It was CGI blue dong, but still, blue dong. A great update to the movie would have been to make Dr Manhattan a woman! :-) (Sorry. more latent teen perviness!)

BSG Bye Bye

Well, there are only a few episodes left of one of my favorite shows, Battlestar Galactica. The show has been great over several seasons, but I think it is a good thing that it is coming to an end. The edgy, exciting, high speed, kickass show has crawled to a crawl-like funeral march. It's sad really. I have enjoyed the show SO much and now I am looking forward to it being over. I'm not too sure when BSG jumped the shark. Maybe when all of the remaining Cylons turned out to be main characters in the colonial fleet. Last Friday's episode was almost a 'goodbye' episode. Galactica is falling apart and is projected to be useless sooner rather than later. Friday's episode had Adama walking around lovingly carressing the inner supports in a drunken stuppor. I'm really not too sure how the show can end to my satisfaction. Earth was a bust and I don't see three or four episodes being enough time to resolve all of the show's conflicts. Well, I am hoping for the best.

New Glasses, Back Pains, and Guy's Night

I went to the eye doctor last week to order some new glasses. I mostly wear glasses now rather than contacts because I work from home and glasses are easier. I have eye insurance, so it is pretty cheap for me to get new glasses. I think the pair I am getting is $70, including the exam. Without insurance, they would have been over $400. This is the one insurance that is actually worth what I pay. It is a good thing because the glasses I have are all scratched.

My back has been killing me the last two days. I am not sure why. The only thought I have is that I pulled something bowling Thursday. It seems to be getting worse though. Maybe I slept on it wrong or something. I have been trying to stretch and have been taking pain pills, but nothing seems to be helping. Hopefully one more night will make it better.

Tonight it going to be just me and the boys. One of Jessica's co-worker-s mothers passed away and Jessica wanted to go to the funeral in Toledo. So, she is taking Ally up to T-town tonight where they will be staying with my parents. Then, Ally will spend the day with my parents while Jessica goes to the funeral. My parents and Ally will enjoy it, at least. As for me, I wanted to go bowling, but my back (see above). Maybe I will take my .38 and do some target practice. I haven't done that for a while.

Do People Really Do That?

I was playing around with Face Book a little bit just now and I came across something interesting. I have received and sent flair and other things to friends, but today I tried to send something to Jessica and came across a snag. I was going to send an "I love you" bear to her (I know, I am sweet) and I saw it cost 100 gift points. Thinking that gift pioints were something that I would just have, I proceeded only to find that you have to buy gift points. This is new to me because I have received paranormal gear and flair, as well as other free gifts, so I thought that all gifts are free on Face Book. Usually, when you send things, you get the ability to send things yourself. Anyway, you really need to pay money for gift points. Weird. Face Book is fun and all, but I am not going to pay money on a social site. Is that weird?

A Sci Fi Summer

OK. I admit it. I am a sci-fi geek. I am not as bad as some people who may dress up in Star Wars garb, but I enjoy sci-fi TV, movies, and books. The next few months are looking to have some high quality sci-fi movies coming out. I am looking forward to:

Star Trek: JJ Abrams is taking a crack at the Star Trek franchise. The trailers look great. I just hope Sylar as Spock does not cause too much of a distraction for me. Due out May 8th

Watchmen: I have to be honest, I don't know much about this comic book/ graphic novel. However, the trailers look terrific. The effects look good and the story line sounds intriguing. The TV has been flooded with Watchmen trailers, so I hope it is not one of this movies that sucks beyond the trailers.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine: Wolvie is my favorite X-man. I am not totally in love with Hugh Jackman and Wolverine, but the trailers I saw for the movie so far look good. Anyway, It is about Wolverine origins, which is always interesting. It looks like they are trying to make out Wolverine and Sabretooth as brothers or something. We'll see how they adapt this story to film.

Terminator Salvation : I've like the Terminator seeries since the beginning and really like the TV show (Sarah Connor Chronicles) so I was pretty psyched about Salvation. I think Christian Bale is John Connor (also plays Batman). I like him, but am not really a fan of one actor taking on more than one major icon in movies. Much like I am not thrilled about Syler and Spock being the same actor. Still, Salvation is about the story after Judgement Day. The machines are running amuck and the human resistance is starting to fight back.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - What do I need to say about this? If you haven't read the book, DO IT!!!

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - Michael Bay again. Ungh. I liked the first movie, but am not looking forward to Revenge of the Fallen. I guess I will watch it, but the trailer I saw looked like a bad Roger Rabbit knock off. You remember Roger Rabbit? The live action mobie with cartoons added in? Well, the Transformers trailer I saw looked like a cartoon with real people thrown in the mix. I don't mean ILM kick ass animation, I mean old school cartoons with prople thrown in. It may suck.

I want to catch all of these in the theater. Terminator can wait until DVD, but I think that the rest should be seen on the big screen. What else do I need to see this summer?

Xbox Revisited

So, lately I have been getting a little tired of the same old same old Xbox games I have been playing. Mostly because I play shooters online non-stop. I played Halo 3 for the longest time, then moved on to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and lately Call of Duty: World at War. I played the solo games, of course, but my main game was the multi player action. Fun times. I guess I am getting tired of the multi player stuff. So, I am taking a bit of a break. I went back to Halo 3 and played the solo game on Heroic, which is one step higher than the normal difficulty level. I guess I am better at shooters now because I breezed through it. Now, I am going through Bioshock again. It is another shooter. Fun times. I don't know what I am going to do if a new game doesn't catch my attention soon. I was thinking about getting Guitar Hero or Rock Band , but I don't if I would like them. I may play Dead Rising again or Fable 2. It's weird, I have Left 4 Dead and Quake Wars, but they really don't seem to be doing much for me. Any new or cool games I should check out?

A Night of Near Superhero Proportion

Bowling was pretty fun Thursday. Granted, bowling is usually always fun. I enjoy it more whn I roll 600+ series, which I have been doing lately. My average is 196, which is probably the best I've ever maintained through a whole year. I would like to see it pop up to 200, but I doubt it will happen this late in the season. Anyway, back to Thursday. I was having a rough go at bowling in the first game . I was rolling where I wanted to roll and everything felt good, my ball was just coming up a little soft in the pocket. This means I was too far right of the head pin. In the 7th frame, I think I has a 115, which is about 30 pins behind where I need to be to hit my average. My team was struggling too. We were down about 60 pins. I made a quick change and nailed five strikes in a row and ended up with a 190+ helping my team win by 20. The second game I hit a 200, we won again. The third game I was doing pretty well, but my team was struggling again. We were down significantly. I rolled five more stikes to finish off my game and we ended up losing by only two pins. Damn. A near superhero performance. Still I ended up with a 616 series again, which always makes me happy. We bowl the first place team in our league this week. We are only down 11 points in the standings, so winning would be huge for us. They ae all good bowlers though.

Should I worry?

I have been getting all sorts of magazines lately. Only I don't order magazines. I used to, but I am letting my subscriptions run out. I always would order a magazine, thinking I would read it, but I would get bored or the content would not be very interesting, so I decided to give up on magazines. However, I have been getting several magazines lately. Specifically, Rolling Stone and Spin. Maybe a few others, but I am not sure of all of the titles. Really, I just get them and then throw then in the recycling. My concern is that I may be charged for these somehow. I have not received a bill or any other verification that I would be getting a new subscription. I suspect that Noah may be ordering them under my name thinking that I would just throw them out or give them to him. He never asks about them or for them, so I could be wrong. has anyone ever had problems with magazine subscriptions? Would there be any reason for them to be sent to me without my asking for them?

Lovin' Those Brits

I am seriously starting to enjoy British television a lot lately. I have been a huge fan of Doctor Who ever since the new version of the show has been airing. I also watched a BBC series called Robin Hood, which was pretty good. Recently I found a BBC series called Jeckyll, which was a modern day Jeckell and Hyde story and was pretty good as well. I now have a new BBC infatuation in a show called MI-5. In a nut shell, MI-5 is a spy show. James Bond is a member of MI-6, which deals with international spying and MI-5 focuses only on internal matters in the UK. It has been highly entertaining. The seasons are not very long, only about 7 or 8 shows per season. The stories have been very interesting and there have been some pretty well known guest stars. Giles, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dr. House, from House, and the doctor from Star Trek DS9.

Probably one of the most interesting things I have seen is the show's treatment of America. There have been a few shows regarding visits from Prez Bush and each visit from Dubya had lead to protests by the British people. Granted, I don't like our ex prez either, but I found it a little suprising that protests of our ex president have been central in this show. It makes me wonder if everyone in Europe hates all Americans or just our dumb ass ex prez.

Anyway, if you are looking for a new show to watch, MI-5 has been great fun for me.

Test

I am looking at my blog and I can't see any of the posts. What the?????

Bathroom remodel

We are working on changing around one of our bathrooms this weekend. Actually, Jessica is doing most of the time consuming work while I am working this weekend. I am just planning on taking credit. Just kidding. I am doing the tool work and she is painting. She actually did a pretty good job taking down the old mirror, the old lighting, and the HUGE towel bar mounted to the wall. The job really isn't all that big. It is our half bath that we are fixing up. The towel bar was a little extreme. It was one of those that you could use as a shower towel holder. We bought a new one that is for a hand towel as well as a new shitter paper holder that matches. My biggest thing I wanted was a medicine cabinet. Most of our medicines are in one of our kitchen cupboards, which irritates me beyond belief. I try to get some thing out of the cupboard and five pill bottles fly out at me. Well, not any more! Is it silly that I am excited by nothing more than a medicine cabinet?

BSG Revelations and the Dollhouse

So, last night's BSG episode was pretty informative. We learned a lot about the Cylons and their origins. It turns out Tigh's wife, Ellen, is also a Cylon, which we learned last week. The most interesting thing to me is that Cavil, or a Cavil model, knew all of the final five Cylons. When Ellen resurrected, a Cavil was there with a centurion in a room that looked like a cell. It is my guess that only one Cavil was designated to know the truth about the final five in case one of them died and they resurrected. Kind of like a caretaker. Otherwise, it would have implied that all of the Cavils knew who the final five were and still allowed Saul to be tortured and still fracked Ellen while watching the other five lead the resistance. I have to believe that only one Cavil knew of the final five's identities, or the show would lose a bit of credibility for me. I guess it is not unreasonable that all of the Cavils knew who the five were, because he was quite vocal about the others not learning their identities, but again, if Cavil knew that Ellen and Saul were Cylons, his actions on New Caprica would not make much sense.

We also learned that, apparently, the final five were the first five in the Cylon family tree. They created models one through seven. This being the case, if Cavil knew about Ellen, it would be like he was fracking his mom. Iew. Anyway, we learned a lot about the 'skin jobs' last night. It was not an exciting episode, but it was informative.

I also watched Dollhouse last night. I am undecided about my feelings towards Joss' latest attempt at a TV show. I LOVED Buffy, Angel, and Firefly, so I think my expectations about Dollhouse may be a bit high. The show has an interesting concept. People enter the program, get their minds wiped clean of all but the most basic memories and thoughts, and basically become puppets that can have any memories and skill sets downloaded into them. At first, I thought it would be some government project, like creating super spies, but it is more like a high tech whore house. If you want a hot woman for the weekend that has all of your likes, dislikes, sexual preferences, and is basically your ideal, you can rent one. If you need someone that can kick ass and be the perfect bodyguard for a specific situation, you can rent one. Anyway, the pilot was entertaining and interesting, but I am not sure how long Dollhouse will last. Joss' main problem is that he pushed the boundaries of TV and doesn't just make different versions of CSI. So the typical TV watching American sheep don't seem to get him. I do though and I hope Dollhouse stays around for a while.

Posting Pics

I added some new pictures to my Flickr site. There are some of my team's bowling shirts. We wore them last night to some pretty good reactions. Some of the other teams made fun a little because we were all wearing the same thing, but I think they were just jealous. Some strangers, including a VERY cute girl, said they liked them. We didn't bowl great, but the shirts added some fun to the evening.

There are a few pictures of my completed poker table online too. I was really suprised at how relatively easy ti was to put together. I would say, all in all, the production too about five hours and cost me a little over $200. I took some crap last night from my poker buddies about how I made a Barney table. I think that the purple felt looks good. "Tight" I think the kids are saying these days.

There are also pictures from Gabe's birthday. It seems like all of the pictures of Gabe show him making weird faces or closing his eyes. He had a good time though. Oh and cute pictures of Ally. No, not cute....adorable! And here's Ally and Noah with Brutus. I think Gabe finds people in suits, like Brutus and Mickey Mouse, a bit creepy. Ge was a little leary of Brutus and steared clear of Goofy when we were at Disney.

Anyway, enjoy!

Can you believe he's 7?

It seems like just yesterday that I was crapping my pants at the thought of fatherhood. I'm sure I felt like every first time parent: full of doubt, fear, and a general sense of holy-crap-what-do-I-do-now? Fun times. I finally got used to the idea, then excited, and then elated to see my little boy. That was seven years ago. Am I really that old? Jessica had to work on Gabe's actual birthday, but I made him a cake and he asked for cheese burgers for dinner. We got him a few presents, some Transformers and Bakugons (some weird ball creature things that turn into robots) and he seemed happy. Yesterday, we continued the celebration by taking the kids to Dave and Busters. It is an arcade typle place that has a lot of games you can win tickets for prizes. Gabe had a blast, so it was well worth the trip. It was a good few days.

A Pleasant Suprise

In an attempt to find new and exciting things to get via NetFlix, I tried out Stargate Atlantis. I had seen the movie Stargate and thought it was OK, but I had never seen any of the shows. I am glad to say that Atlantis has been hugely satisfying to me. I thought about getting Stargate SG1, but something about seeing McGayver every episode turned me off to the show. Maybe I will have to try it later. Anyway, Atlantis is a great Sci-fi drama with a good story and good effects. It has become a show that I am excited to watch.

I am also excited that seasons 2 and 3 of Doctor Who are available to watch online via NetFlix.com. I added them to my online queue, so that means that I can watch the episodes online through my Xbox on my flatscreen TV. I forgot how truely great these seasons of Doctor Who have been to watch. I am delighted to revisit them. Wheeping angels, Daleks, The Master......enough said.