Randomness

- So today's the day I picked for Tucker to finally get here. So far, there's nothing to report. It would seem like a good pick since the odds are in my favor. There's going to be a full moon tonight, and the barometric pressure has dropped over the past few days - both things that usually seem to cause women to go into labor, according to the people at our doctor's office. I guess there's still time...

- How come whenever there is a gathering of people and ice cream is being served, the gathering is called a "ice cream social"? Why is it that the only types of socials, are ice cream ones? Why aren't pizza parties called "pizza socials", or bagel parties (a common occurance around here) called "bagel socials"? I was going to ask this question last week, as we had an ice cream social at work.

- We've been getting quite a bit of rain around here, which is nice. Now we have a flood warning in effect for the day because rather than just rain here, its been pretty much pouring all day. It seems like the rain this year has either been feast of famine.

- Guitar Hero for the Wii comes out next week, and I want it. Seeing as its $150, I think it'll be awhile before I get it however.

- I can't believe that its now less than 2 months until Christmas. Where did the time go?

Randomness

- Its raining here today. It’s the first time in an extremely long time that we’ve had rain here. As a result of the rain, someone in our building had decided we needed to celebrate with a pizza party. Sounded like a ridiculous reason to me, but I’m always down for free food for lunch.

- We’re exactly 1 week away from the date that I picked way back when, that Tucker would be born on, and 2 weeks until the official due date. With that being said, he probably won’t come for 3 weeks.

- Yes, the Yankees lost in the first round of the playoffs, and Joe Torre won’t be back next year. Do we really need to have these 2 facts continue to be the “big story” on all sports related programs everyday? The morning after the Indians beat the Yankees in the playoffs, I turned on SportsCenter to see who won, and to check out the highlights (I can't seem to stay awake to watch the ends of games anymore), and 9 of the first 10 stories were all related to the Yankees loss, and no mention of the Indians winning the series. How is that right? Today, I check the news a little bit earlier, and in the “Breaking News” section on MSNBC.com, there’s a link saying “Joe Torre is addressing the media.” Really, MSNBC feels this is 1) a real news story, and 2) a important and breaking one at that?!? As I’m writing this, I find that there is someone else who feels the same way.

- Speaking of news, and prioritizing things - do we really need to know about all the BS that all these idiotic attention needing whores do every day/every night? It seems like at least 3 days a week I'll be trying to read the news in the morning, catching up on what's going on in the world, and there's always some "breaking news" about something stupid that Britney/Paris/Lindsay/the rest of stupid Hollywood did the night before. Its one thing if this is the big story on some Entertainment "news" outlet, and I can easily avoid it, but really, breaking news in the National/Global news portion? We have certifiable criminals running the country doing things like throwing around words like "World War III", "Invading Iran", "spying on US citizens", and "Vetoing healthcare for children", but all the news can tell us is that some over-paid, no talent hack is going to rehab in order to avoid going to jail. (Don't even get me started on the how lenient the law enforcement system is out there). I've always heard that one of these days a earthquake will hit California, and that the whole state is going to slide off into the ocean. Is it too much to ask that this just happens to Hollywood?

- I’ve been listening to the “Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds – Live at Radio City” album quite a bit lately. I think its one of the best albums I’ve gotten this year. The recording is crystal clear, and Dave and Tim’s playing is superb. Listening to the songs stripped down with just acoustic guitars (mainly), have given me an appreciation for Dave’s music once again. I’d really like to see another Dave and Tim show.

- Online grocery shopping might be the coolest thing ever. We have a grocery store near us that lets you order your groceries online. Someone in the store gets your order, goes through the store, and fills it for you, and then all you have to do is drive up to a special spot in the parking lot at a designated time, and the person comes out and loads up your car for you. Since the store is on my way home from work, Sara will place the order, and then I pick it up on the way home. We’ve been using this option for about a month now and are quite pleased with it. We may never have to set foot in a grocery store again. Ok, maybe that was a stretch.

Randomness

- I'm sick of hearing about Michael Vick. It seems like that's all that I hear about. Sports news, regular news, etc. I can't wait for Monday to get here, so he can get his sentencing, and hopefully this will start to go away.

- One question I have about Vick, even though I said I am sick of hearing about him, is why he will get off with such little time in prison? The other big story this summer is about the NBA ref who has plead guilty to gambling. He could get 25 years, while Vick might get 2 years maximum. Sara and I were watching TV one night, when the NBA ref gambling case was being discussed, and Sara asked why he would get so much time in prison for something like gambling? I never really had thought about it before then, but the more I think about it, the less sense it makes, especially in the context of the Vick case. The ref conspired to help some people make a few extra bucks, and yes, as a result some people lost money because of his actions as well. Those people were going to bet anyways, so there was going to be some losers and winners on those games...big deal. Vick bankrolled an operation where dogs killed each others, and if some dogs weren't to his liking after he trained them he would kill them in a pretty gruesome way. I'm not a judge, but to me Vick's actions seem a lot more criminal, and should deserve the more severe punishment.

- Today is the first day of the school year for Blake. Its crazy to think how fast the summer went. I remember when I was a kid, the summers seemed to last forever.

- Following the Tigers the past few weeks has been like riding a rollercoaster. They've been up, down, and generally just all over the place. My jinxing is still in effect. I didn't watch the game against the Yankees last Thursday, and they won. I watched them the rest of the weekend (thanks to Polio for the mlb.tv account), and they lost. I didn't watch them last night, and they won. A coincidence? I think not. Sara did wear one of my Tigers shirts last night when they won, so she's been instructed to wear that shirt some more to see if maybe she's a good luck charm. Time will tell....

- Sara had her bi-weekly appointment with the doctor the other day. The doctor gave us instructions on what kind of signs we should look for to know that Tucker is on his way, and when to call her and where to go. It made me realize that we're starting to get real close to the due date now. I'm sure it'll really start to set in once we start taking our classes at the hospital.

- I am having a huge craving for Chipotle.

- A few friends went up to DC recently to see the Dave Matthews Band show. I realized that this is the first year since 1996 (when I started following them) that I probably won't be seeing them. I'm still stuck on 49 shows and counting.

- Sara and I are going to see Ryan Adams here in Charlottesville in a few weeks. I'm pretty excited, as I've been wanting to see him for a few years now, and I've been wanting to see some live music.

- We took an afternoon trip out to the Blue Ridge Parkway a couple of weekends ago. Even though we only live a half-hour away, we rarely think of going there whenever we're trying to think of something to do. Blake really liked it. He said that once Sara has the baby, she can stay home and do baby stuff with Tucker, and he and I can go back there and go hiking. Here's some pictures:

Randomness

- Sara had her ultrasound this morning. Looks like Tucker is going to turn out a-ok, and it also looks like he's going to be a bit on the chubby side. Its amazing to see what a difference 4 weeks makes. In the new 4-D pictures we got today, you can see that he's starting to accumulate some baby fat. The pictures from 4 weeks ago, he looked to be on the skinny side. Maybe I'll do a side by side comparison on here, if I get a chance to scan the pictures that we got today.

- Some of my friends are starting to take bets as to when Tucker will be born. A co-worker of mine says he'll be born on Halloween. Sean wants him born on the 9th (which is Sean's birthday), Dock wants him born on the 7th (which is Dock's birthday). I for a completely random guess have October 26th as my guess.

- I think I'm starting to jinx the Tigers. It seems whenever I watch them play, they end up losing, and in a big way. I went to the game a weekend ago and they lost 10-2. I tried to watch the game last night, and they lost 13 to something. I stopped watching full-time after the 1st inning. I couldn't handle it, and when I flipped over to check the score, it seemed to just continue to get worse. Maybe I should give my lucky t-shirt another try. Something needs to happen. I was starting to think maybe it was time to start panicing about the recent plight of the Tigers, but my favorite blogger of all things Detroit, Big Al, says not yet, so I'll take his advice. I mean, they are still in first place (for now).

- So its football time again. It seems like every year I'm becoming less and less of a football fan, thanks to the recent plight of the Detroit Lions. I'll never be as big of a fan as I was when I was in high school when we had Barry Sanders to watch, and when Lloyd, Mike and I would drive from Lapeer to Pontiac 3 to 4 times a week to watch training camp. At least back then the Lions were entertaining, and you could expect at least a 8-8 season from them. Even if you didn't have a great feeling about the team, you always knew you had Barry and he would probably do something amazing, to at least keep you watching, or Wayne Fontes would do/say something entertaining as well. Lately is been painful to be a Lions fan. When I say painful I mean, its really painful to watch, but yet you watch, because you want to see what's going to happen. At least while the Tigers had their down years, there was some hope that in the distance things had a chance of changing, since the guy that owned the team had a history of winning in hockey. There's no such feeling for me about the Lions anymore. The owner has a long, extensive history of sucking (what is it, like 50 years now? You could also insert any "Ford cars suck" joke here as well). He has Matt Millen running the team, who has proven over and over that he's in over his head, and the owner (when he actually does talk) continues to praise Millen, saying that his job has not been in jeopardy at anytime during the most recent period of ineptness. Ford-Millen is like the Bush-Cheney of the sports world, both duo's need to be impeached. Living in central Virginia, doesn't help matters any either though. Sundays consist of having to watch either the Redskins, Ravens, and Eagles/Giants (if they are playing at a time when the Redskins aren't). I usually end up watching whatever is on Fox, so I can keep up with the players on my fantasy team, and hope that at some point they'll break into the game I'm watching with highlights (or should I say, lowlights) from the Lions game. I guess since I live so far away, I no longer am able to talk myself into wasting money on buying tickets anymore.

- I can't think of anything else to say right now.

Infrequent Friday Randomness

So I was looking at my blog today, and saw that its been a month since I've last posted anything. Whoops. I guess its time for another round of Friday Randomness..

- When we found out that Sara was pregnant, one of our top priorities was to find some place new to live, since we were out of room in our apartment. After a lot of searching, we're finally moving next Friday. I can't wait to get out of the crappy neighborhood we live in. We're renting a nice townhouse in a newer development, just north of town. It'll be so nice to move out the ghetto where we've been living, and move into something nicer and hopefully quieter.

- May/June/July are going to be 3 of the busiest months that I can ever remember. The rest of May has us moving, going to see Gwen Stefani (with front-row center tickets that Sara just "happened" to get), unpacking, Memorial Day, and a trip up to Michigan to Dock's wedding. For June, I'm home a week, then we go to Myrtle Beach for a week for our vacation/anniversary. For July there's 2 more weddings to go to - Sean's up in D.C. and Mike's up in Michigan. My Jeep will be adding a ton of miles. Good thing I like roadtrips.

- It's funny, it seems like weddings and pregnancies happen in spurts. Like I just said - Dock, Sean, and Mike are getting married this summer, along with Mike's brother Steve who is getting married this month as well. Soon after we found out that Sara was pregnant, we also found out that Joe and Lori (well technically Lori) are expecting too. Even cooler, Sara and Lori are due right around the same time. Coincidentally, Joe and I's birthday's are pretty close together (2 months exactly to the day), so it'll be cool that our kids are so close together as well. Sometimes its strange how thing play out. It'll be interesting to see just when both babies arrive.

- Last Saturday we went with my mother-in-law to see Rod Stewart here in town. Thanks to Sara's cool job, we got free tickets to the show. While the show was entertaining, I really think its time for Rod to retire. He was huffing and puffing after the 2nd song, and he looked like he was struggling most of the show. He regularly relied on the band to jam out so he could catch his breath, and when the song hit a high spot, he would stop singing and let the crowd take over for him. Now I don't think its wrong for the singer or a band to stop, and let the crowd take over momentarily, once or twice in a show, but he did it virtually for every song in the 2nd half of the show...It became a bit of an overkill. I'm glad our tickets were free and we didn't have to pay the $55 price that the seats in our section cost.

- While reading on my lunch break today, I found there's a new sport involving Wiffle. It's called Wiffle Hurling. It looks like it might be a cross between Lacrosse and field hockey? (That's a question because I know nothing about either lacrosse or field hockey..that's just my guess) I think I'd be willing to give it a shot, especially if the sombraros are mandatory. I don't think we'd do any worse than we do every summer at the Wiffleball Tournament in Ohio. Anyways, here's a video of it:

- So American Idol is down to the "Final 3" - Blake, Jordin, and Melinda. While Blake is my favorite, I don't want to see him win. I think if he wins, he'll be locked in by the contract the winner gets, along with all the obligations they have to fulfill, and as a result he wouldn't be as free to do what he'd be best at. I think by not winning last year actually helped Chris Daughtry quite a bit, and look how big he is now. Ideally I'd like to see Melinda get kicked off next week, have a Jordin/Blake final, with Jordin winning. I'd like to see Blake have one more awesome performance before the end of the show. Something along the lines of what he did with Bon Jovi's "You Give Love a Bad Name" which might be the coolest performance I've ever seen on AI. Should be an interesting last couple of weeks.

Randomness..Its Been Awhile

- So its been awhile since I've posted on here. What can I say, I've been busy.

- Tomorrow is Sara's first appointment with the doctor. We should find out the due date and all that fun stuff. I'm pretty excited. I really can't wait to find out what it is we'll be having (I mean, a boy or a girl...I know we're having a baby)

- How is it mid-April already? February and March don't even seem like they happened.

- My parents are due into town tomorrow for the weekend. I haven't seen them since October. It'll be good to see them. Hopefully the weather is better than predicted for the weekend, so we won't be stuck inside all the time.

- I'm glad its baseball season again. After the success the Tigers had last year, I really missed following it the past few months. I just wish we could get the baseball package through our cable company, so I could watch the Tigers every night, or at least flip over to the game throughout the night.

- Sanjaya is still around on Idol. I really don't care anymore. I'd like to see him go far now, and totally screw with the format of the show. I'm no longer liking Melinda (aka as Shrek) or LaKisha. They do the same stuff over and over, and I'm bored with it. I really hope Blake wins it all.

- Speaking of Idol, last nights show has to be one of the most boring of all time. Latin night? Why? I understand having different themes every week, to see what the contestants are capable of, but why latin night? Latin hasn't been mainstream since the late 90's/early 00's, when Ricky Martin, J Ho Lo, Marc Anthony, and Enrique Inglasis had hit records (records, plural as in when you combine their records together there were multiple hits, but individually, they each had like 1). And why was J Ho Lo the celebrity guru? She's not particularly good at anything that she does, let alone someone who should be giving out "expert" advice.

- If you're looking for something new to listen to, I highly recommend Amy Winehouse. She had a free single of the week on iTunes awhile ago, so I downloaded it and listened to it at work a couple times, and really dug it. She's got a jazz/soul sound, reminescent to old school jazz, but only sounding current. My description isn't doing it justice. Suggested songs to try out are: "Back to Black", "Rehab", and "You Know I'm No Good". You really can't go wrong with the whole album in my opinion.

That's Gotta Hurt a Little

Who says basketball players don't risk the same type of injuries as other more physical sports? Here are 2 fine examples:

Example #1


Example #2

The Soundtrack of My Life - My 100 Favorite Songs of All Time

So I've compiled a list of my 100 favorite songs of all time. These are what I guess you could call my "deserted island" songs - all of the songs I would want on my iPod, if I were standed on some deserted island, (well if island had a power source so I could constantly recharge my iPod.)

This list is a bit biased for some bands, that is to say, that some of my favorite bands (U2, The Beatles, DMB) had more songs listed than others, but hey they're my favorite, so that's the way it falls. Also, some of the songs are pretty cheesy, but they're on there because at one point or time in my life, the song always seemed to be around me, and now whenever I hear it, I always go back to that time. (Woah! I'm starting to sound like a Kenny Chesney song)

Songs #11-100 on the list are arranged in alphabetical order (no, I didn't alphabatize them myself, I let Excel do that for me), since I didn't want to take the excruciating task of weighing where each song should fall on the list. For the top 10 songs, I did rank them in order of favoritism. Anyways, here's the list..

Songs #11 to #100:

#41 - Dave Matthews Band
A Day in the Life - The Beatles
A Horse With No Name - America
A Whiter Shade of Pale - Procol Harum
Acrobat - U2
Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone - Bill Withers
America - Neil Diamond
Baba O'Riley - The Who
Back in Black - AC/DC
Belief - John Mayer
Black Hole Sun - Soundgarden
Bobcaygeon - Tragically Hip
Breakfast at Tiffany's - Deep Blue Something
Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp - Led Zeppelin
Cantaloop - Us3
Cap'n Kirk - Bob Schneider
Come Undone - Duran Duran
Crazy - Gnarls Barkley
Crush - Dave Matthews Band
The Distance - Cake
Don't Change - INXS
Don't Look Back in Anger - Oasis
Down Under - Men at Work
Drive - Incubus
Get Back - The Beatles
Glory Days - Bruce Springsteen
Grace, Too - Tragically Hip
Handle With Care - The Travelling Wilburys
Hey, Hey What Can I Do? - Led Zeppelin
Hey Ya - Outkast
House of the Rising Sun - The Animals
The Humpty Dance - Digital Underground
If I Had $1,000,000 - Barenaked Ladies
I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles) - The Proclaimers
In The Blood - Better Than Ezra
In the Ghetto - Elvis Presley
Interstate Love Song - Stone Temple Pilots
Into the Mystic - Van Morrison
It's A Hit - Rilo Kiley
I've Just Seen A Face - The Beatles
JTR - Dave Matthews Band
Kodachrome - Paul Simon
Laid - James
Losing My Religion - REM
Love Shack - B52's
Loves Me Like a Rock - Paul Simon
Me & Julio Down By The Schoolyard - Paul Simon
Merry Christmas (The War Is Over) - John Lennon
Never Tear Us Apart - INXS
Night Moves - Bob Seger
Nightswimming - REM
Norweigan Wood - The Beatles
One - U2
One Headlight - The Wallflowers
One Man Army - Our Lady Peace
Ordinary World - Duran Duran
Paint It Black - Rolling Stones
Plush - Stone Temple Pilots
Ramble On - Led Zeppelin
Rebel Rebel - David Bowie
Right Now - Van Halen
Rock the Cashbah - The Clash
Roll Me Away - Bob Seger
Roll the Bones - Rush
Shotdown - Agents of Good Roots
Solsbury Hill - Peter Gabriel
Soulshine - Gov't Mule
Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For - U2
Summer of '69 - Bryan Adams
Superman's Dead - Our Lady Peace
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond
Sweet Child O'Mine - Guns N' Roses
To Be With You - Mr. Big
Tom Sawyer - Rush
Turn the Page - Bob Seger
Typical Situation - Dave Matthews Band
Ultra Violet (Light My Way) - U2
Unchained - Van Halen
Wake Up - The Arcade Fire
Walk of Life - Dire Straits
The Weight - The Band
When I'm 64 - The Beatles
Where the Streets Have No Name - U2
Whipping Post - Allman Brothers Band
White Room - Cream
With or Without You - U2
Wonderwall - Oasis
Won't Get Fooled Again - The Who
Your Time Is Gonna Come - Led Zeppelin
You've Got to Hide Your Love Away - The Beatles

Songs #10 to #1:
10.) American Pie - Don McLean
9.) Suspicous Minds - Elvis Presley
8.) It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine) - REM
7.) Mr. Jones - Counting Crows
6.) What Would You Say - Dave Matthews Band
5.) Centerfield - John Fogerty
4.) Yesterday - The Beatles
3.) Bad - U2
2.) All You Need Is Love - The Beatles

And the #1 song on my Top 100 Song list is....

1.) Imagine - John Lennon

Of course, some or all of these could change tomorrow (except the top 10 - those 10 have been favorites for awhile now), but as it stands right now, these are my favorite songs. Feel free to poke fun.

Funny Video Friday

Ok, so its been awhile since I've last posted. I haven't really been able to think of much to say on here, to be honest. I think its just a case of the winter doldrums finally setting in. And yes, its finally winter here. We got about 2 inches of snow on Wednesday, and its been insanely cold here (well insanely cold for Virginia...I hear its been even colder in the Midwest). The word is, that we're supposed to get some more snow early next week as well. As much as I hate snow, I feel that if we're gonna get some snow, I wish we would just get hammered with a snowstorm, and get something like 12-15 inches, and just shut everything down for a few days. Then it can melt away and Spring can then come.

I've decided that I'm going to try to start posting on a more regular basis. One way I'm going to do that is to start a weekly series called "Funny Video Friday" (creative title, eh?) , where I'll post a video (or two, or three), that I find mildly entertaining. Since I come across some pretty good ones, on the blogs I read, I figure it can't be too difficult to do, right?

So anyways, here's the first installment..

Video #1 - Slingshot

I wish I had thought of this when I had my 4-wheeler growing up. I'm sure our neighbor Paul would have volunteered to be the one in the slingshot.

Video #2 - Trampoline Basketball

I'm surprised this never happened to me or any of my friends actually. All we ever did was play Trampoline Dodgeball on my friends Wayne & Scott's neighbor's trampoline, before they started putting up the safety nets all around them.


Video #3 - Basement Basketball

No, this isn't actually a video of me as a teen. I'll just say I'm glad my parents never had a video camera while I was growing up.

Randomness

- We got our first snowfall on Sunday. Actually it more sleet/freezing rain than snow. Either way, winter is finally here, and it can go back to where it came from now.


- Speaking of winter/snow/freezing rain - On Sunday Sara and I went out at 11:30 to go pick up Blake from his dad. We couldn't get out of town. About 2 miles into the trip on Route 29 (the main road here in C'ville) there was a minor fender bender. Once we got past that, traffic soon came to a halt again. After waiting impatiently for about 15-20 minutes, I tried to take a back route to where we were going. I got about 2 miles down that road (a country road), we had to turn around because the road was blocked, due to probably an accident. We tried yet another backway (a dirt road..I felt like I was back in North Branch for a minute), and had to turn around because small cars tried to take the same route, and were going off the road. After about an hour of going absolutely nowhere, Blake's dad called and postponed the transfer until later, due to the roads being bad for him as well. We found out on the news that there were 12 separate accidents on Route 29 around the time we were on the roads. Pretty crazy, I don't think I've experienced anything like that before.


- Right now is my favorite time of year....for TV watching. There's basically something good on every night that we watch TV. Sunday's have "You're the One That I Want" (Sara made a point to watch this, and I'm hooked) and "The Apprentice". Monday's have "How I Met Your Mother" and "Two and a Half Men". Tuesday's have "American Idol"(finally!!!), and Boston Legal (my 2nd favorite TV show). Wednesday's have American Idol, and Thursday's have "The Office" (my #1 favorite TV, thanks to getting hooked on the original British version) and Scrubs. As far as Friday and Saturday goes, we're usually doing something else. And yes, I'm not afraid to admit I like American Idol. I'm can't wait for the actual competition to get started. Right now we already have a favorite. A guy named Blake from Seattle. And maybe we are biased because of his name!


- Thanks to iTunes and some random music blogs I've come across lately, I've found some interesting stuff to listen to. Some of my new finds are: Lily Allen (a UK artist..kinda pop like Jem, only more edgier) and David Vandervelde (from Chicago, has a cool 70's David Bowie-like sound going). If you're interested in finding something new to listen to, you should look them up on iTunes, or Myspace to get a taste of what they sound like.

-Spring Training is less than 1 month away. I can't wait for baseball to get started back up again!