Pilate

Like Pilate, I have a dog...

Isn't she cute? She doesn't look like that any more though...

Anyway, that's your song for the day.

Yesterday was Alice In Chains, which everyone seemed to know.

Did everyone catch Deal or No Deal last night? I love that show, don't know what it is, maybe the gambling aspect, sharing the excitement with the contestants, etc. It's a blast. Dude last night scored $349,000, the highest total so far. A good thing he took it too. He had 3 briefcases left. 1 had $25, 1 had $500,000 and 1 had $750,000. I was thinking "go for it, 67% chance you have at least a half million." Fortunately for him he got advice from Donald Trump who told him to take the money. His case had the $25 in it. I would have been one upset moron...

24 was pretty good last night. SPOILER ALERT. Finally had a little action but they still are focusing more on internal personel issues than Jack killing baddies. Unfortunately, the first lady was not blown up by terrorists, which is how it looked early on would happen. They introduced a new character played by Peter Weller (RoboCop). He used to be Jack's boss till Jack got him fired for selling secrets. Jack gets suckered in by the guy into believing that he didn't do it and Weller locks him in a vault with a bomb and tries to blow him up. Jack, of course, figures it out just in time and manages to avoid being blown into little pieces. Turns out Weller is a very bad man... and also, since the attack on the Russian president's motorcade failed the terrorist informed the President that they will be releasing the nerve gas on the US and that he won't hear from him again. Oh dear...

There will be 2 new episodes on back to back next Monday. Don't miss them!

And the debate rages on... what's worse, Vince Young's Wonderlic score or JJ Redick's poetry? Don't forget to vote!

REMINDER: Amazing Race starts tonight on CBS!

God Am

I saw the lead singer of this band in the cold medicine isle of an Albertsons grocery store in Seattle back in the mid 90's. He's dead now...

Rumor has it that Vince Young scored a 6 out of 50 on the Wonderlic test given to potential draft picks. If it's true (and it has been refuted by Vince's camp) that would make him one of the dumbest people on the planet. The Wonderlic is about as easy to pass as nap time in kindergarten. Here's an example test of 15 questions. If you don't get at least 14 right please go read some other blog.

Spent 2 1/2 hours on my taxes Friday. I'm not sure I did everything right but Turbo Tax asked all the right questions and I had my expense report from Quicken so I think I got it right. Not sure doing this independent thing is worth it though. I made more but paid almost all of the extra in taxes...

Saturday was bowling. Being in dead last place with just a few weeks left makes it hard to get motivated and it showed. I shot 540 something, don't even remember what. I cracked my first Guinness at 3:30.

Prior to that I spent $870 at Menards on ceiling tiles and the grid to put them up along with some beadboard for the basement. Sunday I grab the paper and see that they're all on sale... guess I'll be going back today for a refund.

Sunday we went to my nephew's baptism up in Merrimac where my grandparents went to church when they were still with us. Somehow it ended up being an entire service with communion. A little uncomfortable for most of us since we rarely go to church...

Last night was hockey. We won again to improve to 9-4-1. Of course, 6 of those 9 wins have come against 2 teams. It was a close one last night. They had the top goalie in the league and we were struggling to get anything past him. We were down 3-2 entering the 3rd. We got one to tie it up and it stayed that way till they took a tripping penalty with about 2 minutes left. With the face off in their end the center drew it back to the left point. He passed across to me and I passed it to the winger on the back door who rifled home the winning goal. That helped me forget the 3 mistakes I had made earlier that helped the other team get 3 goals. I did make a save at one point by batting the puck out of the air with the shaft of my stick as it was headed over our fallen goalie.

I need some more coffee, later.

Hey Tonight

Back to an oldie for today's song, sorry kids. I even gave you a picture of these guys from long, long ago as a clue. Grinder wins for yesterday's song by Velvet Revolver. Again, these are just coming randomly off my iPod.

The next song that popped up was Fat Bottomed Girls which reminded me to post something about the women's figure skating from last night. Why do they have to put it on so late? I saw some of them, but missed Sasha Cohen fall. I guess no one did very well, except the Japanese girl and I saw most of her routine before falling back asleep again. Cohen, even with falling down, won the Silver. The Japanese girl won the Gold for Japan's first medal of any kind in these Olympics and their first gold for figure skating.

Taxes....
How's that for an abrupt 180 (or complete 360?). I've been putting off doing it for a month now. It's going to be complicated since I became independent on July 1st and have to handle all that stuff myself. Estimated tax payments, IRA's, business deductions, etc, it all makes my head hurt. I use Turbo Tax online and have for years. I just upgraded to the premiere version, hopefully it will ask me all the right questions. If it doesn't look good after a few tries I'll end up hiring an accountant to take care of it but I'm pretty much a cheap bastard so I'm hoping it doesn't come to that. That's how I'll spend my afternoon since today is half-day Friday!

Survivor...
Couple interesting developments last night. First La Mina keeps losing as they lost both closely contested challenges last night. They really need some food, that's becomming evident quickly. Not sure why they can't catch a single fish, they seem to be flying out of the water all the time, just put your damn hand out!
After the reward challenge (an outdoor bathroom was the reward) , Casaya decided to send Terry to Exile Island. This guy is looking like the most dominating player in the game (isn't it always the 40 year old guy that dominates? I'm pretty sure I would too. :). And sure enough, he uses the few clues that are available and finds the individual immunity idol! He's gold now, as he can whip that sucker out the first time someone turns on him and he gets the most votes. That could be his ticket to the final four.
In the immunity challenge, Sally and Austin were clearly the fastest in the balance beam water filling up challenge. And at the end they had a good lead but Austin, fearful of spilling any water, slowly poured 2 buckets of water into the big bucket while Casaya just threw theirs in and got enough to raise Danielle up to pull the ring to win the contest. That loss was clearly on Austin and he admitted as much but no one called him on it.
In the end it came down to a minor alliance busting with Ruth Marie being sent home instead of Sally. This is going to cause some additional friction between Austin and Terry with Dan, since Dan had told Ruth Marie she was with them and gave her his word. Oh well, she wasn't much help in the challenges and Sally was, so she's the 4th person (all women) voted out.

Sucker Train Blues

It's way too hard to pick a song each day that means something so from now on the songs will be a random selection off my iPod (using the Music Quiz feature).

Yes, yesterday was Bon Jovi. I hate to admit it, but Slippery When Wet and New Jersey were two awesome albums. Today's song is only a year or so old so maybe some of you younger people (you know who you are) will have a chance. They are made up of guys that were all with other rock bands previously.

Bowling last night was interesting. First game I stunk and as a team we weren't much better, losing by about 100 pins. I had a whopping 160, only bettering one person (CB) by 2 pins. Our high game was only a 193 and we had 5 doubles. Then something odd happened. Starting the 2nd game we cut lose, doubling 18 times and crushing the other team (I had a 258). 3rd game continued to be more of the same as we had 16 doubles, hung the house twice and CB 3 times. Of course, he won the damn card game and got all his money back. We ended up going 5-2 and set 2nd high team series (just think if we had done anything the first game). Both 2nd and 3rd games we just missed getting on the board for high game. I finished with a 198 for 616.
The amazing part is that we had 4 of our 5 over 600, led by the Grinder's 632, then n1ce's 620, then me and Jimmy with a 601. CB had a 503 or something like that.

And I believe I have added another Guinness convert. Grinder decided to try it out last night and he bowled great, I believe he's sold. I'm sure he'll blog about the wonders of Guinness on his blog as well.

He also gave me a copy of a Lacuna Coil cd. I only got through the first 4 songs but have some impressions already.
1) Very powerful guitars
2) Not really the types of songs you sing along with
3) Sound is similar to Queensryche, not sure why I feel that way, just what came to mind.
4) Every song sounds the same... (but I've only listened to the first 4). I just couldn't tell where one ended and the next one started.

Later...

Bad Medicine

Here's a gimme for you, n1ce. It's late 80's but I know you know it.

The reason I picked that song is that Cdubya is sick. Been sick all week. Just miserable. She won't go see a doctor either. Says they won't be able to give her anything because it's viral. Personally, I think she's afraid of the bad medicine... ok, I know that was bad, I admit it, but I'm not backspacing over it, you'll just have to live with it. Move along, nothing to see here.

Last night was a lazy one. With her being sick it was quiet time in the dubya house. We watched er and Boston Legal that we had on Tivo. er sucks, not even sure why we keep watching except that we've watched every episode for the last 23 years so I guess we gotta play it out. Boston Legal is consistently funny and thought provoking every week. James Spader is playing the character of his life and has it down cold. Personally, I think he should win an award for it. Shatner, of course, is a total knucklehead with his hate of democrats and irrational fears of dying from his "mad cow disease" (actually alzheimers). He asked Spader to kill him when his brain turns to mush. Spader says sure, he'll pull the plug. Shatner is outraged. He doesn't want to be "turned off", he wants Spader to shoot him. Spader won't do it and Shatner angrily calls him a democrat... If you haven't watched this show before I don't think you would have a problem starting it up now. The shows are self contained and while you won't get the interaction between the characters immediately, it won't take long.

Then came the Olympics. Bobsled? Uh, pretty boring with them staying on the track and not having any other sleds to run into but the US women did win a silver medal. Is Scott Hamilton doing the bobsled announcing as well as figure skating? I swear it's the same thing with that rising crescendo of a voice every time he gets all excited... you gotta wonder how many times he has to change his pants in a night...

The actual girl figure skaters (as opposed to the ones wearing pants last week) started last night. I slept through most of it. *Digging through the sports page* Oh, American Sasha Cohen is in first, followed by the greatest name in figure skating history, Irina Slutskaya. The 2 other Americans are 5th and 7th. I did see both of them skate and both were impressive.

US hockey team lost again. They finished the prelims 1-3-1 but managed to make it to the next round anyway. Don't look for anything from them. They play Finland this morning.

Shani Davis and Chad Hedrick finished silver and bronze respectively in the 1500 speed skating and then were cordial to each other. What?!?!??! How can that be??? NBC wasn't too happy about it apparently so they spent a half hour picking at the scab until finally Davis says something about not getting a hand shake and Hedrick comes back with Davis wasn't a team guy and we're back to square one. That's good TV! The NBC execs are very proud, I'm sure. Assholes.

And yesterday's song, guessed correctly again by KK, who apparently is the only one that
(a) has ever listened to music or
(b) is the only one playing this game.

It was Blood, Sweat and Tears. Released in 1969.

Spinning Wheel

Today's song is a stretch to say the least but I heard it just before I parked and now it's stuck in my head. I think it does relate to my feelings about 24 this morning. What goes up, must come down... 24 has been riding a high, every week an awesome show. Until recently. I've lost that feeling about it the last few weeks.

It used to be that every episode of 24 would, at some point, cause me to say something like "Oh, holy fuck!" Not since episode one this season have I said that and quite honestly, the last 3 weeks I have been bored. What happened to Jack having to kill a ton of people while he's narrowly escaping death himself? Where's the cliffhanger!?!?! Each week of the first 4 seasons would always end with something super bad or exciting happening. Now? I can't even remember how last night ended. Can someone fix this please? It's not too late...

I didn't get much of a chance to relax last night. As soon as I got home I had to finish up on the powder room transformation. Cdubya took it all apart this weekend and painted it (Oak Moss green instead of the purple that was there) and I got the light fixture after work yesterday. I did that first, then a new oval framed mirror, hand towel ring, toilet paper holder, painting and some sort of aztec symbol thingy... By the time I got done it was almost 7:30.

Oh, KK got yesterday's song correct. It was Huey Lewis and the News. Which reminds me of a funny story. Way back in the day I was riding with my old man in his '81 blue Ford F150 and the song "I want a new drug" came on. I hear him singing along "I want a new truck" and I'm like "uh, dad, that's not how the song goes" and he says "what? what's it supposed to be?" I answer with the actual title and he's like "Well. I don't like that song any more then." I busted out laughing.

Workin' for a livin'

Ever spend the entire weekend working your ass of then get back to work Monday morning completely exhausted and in need of a vacation? Yeah, me neither.

Anywho, there's an update on my basement finishing blog if you're interested. It's coming along pretty good and honestly, it looks like it's almost done but the stuff I have left is going to be very time consuming and expensive (wainscoting, ceiling, carpet and trim).

In hockey last night, we won 6-3. We were down 1-0 about 13 minutes into the 2nd period when one of their players got pissed off because he got the puck taken away and then tried to hook one of our guys and still couldn't stop him so he, uh, he KICKED him! WTF is that about? Kicking in hockey? That's just dumb and it is an automatic match penalty (5 minute major and game misconduct) and in our league that's an automatic 3 game suspension. Just stupid... We managed to finally score towards the end of the power play as I drove down low from the point and backhanded a pass to a waiting teammate who one timed it in. Less than a minute later we scored again off a deflection of a shot from the point and we finished the period up 2-1. We erupted in the 3rd for 4 more.

My weekend Olympics highlights.

Number 1 had to be that Jacobelis chick from the Visa commercials hotdogging it in the snowboard cross final and biting it, allowing the girl from 100 yards back to pass her for the gold. Lovely...

A close 2nd would be Switzerland's 2-0 victory over Canada. I only watched the beginning of the game and the Swiss were scrambling their asses off and got the first goal. I said "wouldn't it be awesome if they could beat Canada?" never thinking they actually had a chance. I am so sick of watching NHL players in the Olympics. I wish they would go back to using college players. I would rather the US was an underdog like in 1980. I heard Jagr got hurt for the Czech's, maybe that will put an end to the NHL allowing the players to go.

Speaking of 1980, the Swedish women's hockey team used the movie Miracle to get motivated for their game against the US women in the semi's and it worked as they won 3-2 in a shootout. Now, that's not hardly fair. You can't use our story against us! Anyway, this marks the first time in 9 years of international competition that the US and Canada won't meet in the final.

Oh, I forgot. Friday's song title was from Destiny's Child. Today we're back to an 80's band.

Survivor

Not only is the title today a song title (a little more recent for you younger folks), it's also the show I want to talk about.

But first... 10" of snow fell on Madison yesterday, what a zoo. Today, the clouds have cleared, making way for clear, sunny skies but also frigid temps with it being 10 right now with a -5 wind chill. Not supposed to warm up much. I took this picture at 6:45am as the sun was rising.

Looks very peaceful, doesn't it? Now check out what the snow plows dumped in front of my driveway that I'll have to deal with (luckily we have a Yukon that will go right up and over it this morning).

And on to the Olympics. 2 topics to discuss today. First one is Snowboard Cross. Ok, this is a sweet sport, am I right? It's like motocross but on snowboards and some pushing in shoving since their hands are free. Of course, it's got to be another American invented sport (like half pipe) put in to help pad our medal count. Seth Wescott brought home the gold for the US. The women go today and surprisingly only 1 American woman in the competition. What's up with that? They're all doing half pipe instead I guess.

2nd topic is men's figure skating. I am going to probably anger some people but not likely that any of them read this anyway. I'm just going to say it. A straight figure skater will always beat a gay one. Just take a look at what happened last night and it's oh, so obvious. The Russian (married man) goes out and is methodical, lacks any type of flair or flamboyance, but hits every stinkin' jump, throwing in a quad like it was nothing. Then there's Johnny Weir(d) of the US. He's about as straight as Just Jack McFarland on Will & Grace. I'm pretty sure he was wearing a woman's outfit yesterday. He's got style, panache... his choreography is awesome. Too bad he can't land a jump to save his life. Enjoy 5th place. Of course he storms off like a little bitch when the scores are announced. What did he expect? You fall, you completely miss jumps, you generally look retarded and you expect to be rewarded? Please, girlfriend...

Ok, on to Survivor talk.
After how many years of this I finally have figured out a key component to the game. Never tell anyone that you work in an occupation that is considered "smart". Misty learned the hard way that being an engineer is bad on Survivor because you will get voted out just because you're deemed to be smart by the others. I gotta tell ya, if I was going on that show, do you think I would tell them that I was a software engineer or a computer programmer or a consultant or a business owner? Hell no! I'm a frickin' janitor or garbage man. Or maybe the guy that follows the elephants picking up shit in the circus. But I am NOT smart!

Anyway, she didn't know that (shows how smart she really is) so she's gone. Bye Misty...

Let It Snow

Well, the weather outside is frightful...

I knew I shouldn't have laughed at those poor bastards on the east coast last week. We're getting our payback today. Could be about 10" or more by tonight.

Should be sunny for the weekend though, but it will also be COLD! 7 for a high Saturday with an overnight low Saturday night of -11. Yes, that's Fahrenheit, not Celsius.

Last night was bowling night. We managed to win 5-2. Gerks had a big first game and ended up about 70 over his average. I had a 682 but was very disappointed. It was one of those nights that had big score written all over it. After a rough start in which I missed a 10 pin in the first frame and got a 9 spare in the 2nd I strung together 7 strikes in a row but crushed a 10 pin in the 10th and shot 248. 2nd game I started with 5 in a row, then a 9 spare and 3 more in a row. In the 10th I crushed a 10 pin again but this time I missed it and shot 246. That one really pissed me off as I had a bet that I could beat Saturday's 503 in 2 games. All I had to do was pick up that spare. So, I had 494 going in and started with a double, 9 spare and double. Then, it's beer frame and what do I do? 7 split. Awesome. I always find a way to fucking do that. My first non-9 or strike all night. Then to make things worse I bury a 7 pin, 9 pin and 8 pin right in a row before I throw another split in the 10th, which I should have picked up but somehow a pin managed to miss another pin by some act of god... I end up with 188. Very, very disappointed.

Then, I walk outside and find my car is buried under 4" of snow! Cool...

Watched the short track speedskating relay last night with Ohno and the Americans winning their semifinal to make it to the finals. Should be an interesting final as Italy got in because of a penalty so there will be 5 teams in the final instead of 4. It's already super crowded and confusing with 4 teams of 4 out there, wait till there are 20 guys circling that little track, pushing and shoving the whole time. You can bet there will be some wipeouts, which is of course, why we all watch (just like Nascar).

Also caught the finals of the men's moguls. That was pretty interesting, though I don't really understand how the scoring works. Jeremy Bloom didn't fair too well and finished 6th but youngster Toby Dawson hung on for the bronze. It was cool seeing his adopted mom going nutso in the stands. He was adopted from a Korean orphanage and his next mission is to find his birth parents.

US Hockey... man, what can you say there? Tieing the Latvian no-names is pathetic. Only getting 3 goals on a 65 year old goalie... sheesh. Put a fork in them. No way can they compete with Canada, Sweden or Russia.

Alright, have a great Thursday.

Tequila Sunrise

(updated for song title)
We have this new radio station in Madison called Charlie. They took the place of a station that I actually kind of liked so I didn't give them much of a chance but then of course the big corporate jackasses took my favorite rock station and turned it country so I had to look elsewhere. Charlie claims to play ANYTHING and now I believe them. They played Shelly West's Jose Cuervo this morning. If you haven't heard this little number (and I don't think I'd heard it since some time in the early '80s), it's a catchy tune "Jose Cuervo, you are a friend of mine. I like to drink you with a little salt and lime".

Now, back in the '80s I could drink some tequila but in 1985 there was an incident with a group of shrimpers (back in another life for me) playing trivial pursuit for shots of frozen Cuervo gold... I don't remember much but I do remember I woke up on the front yard sleeping next to 2 german shepherds...

I don't drink tequila any more.

So, with that, I will leave you with beer.

Knockin' on Heaven's Door

There are 2 artists I'll accept for this one today. Yesterday's was, of course, the Rolling Stones.

Visited the Home Depot last night and picked up 2 doors for our basement as well as 2 12' 1x12's that go between the stairs and the wall. Not sure if those have a special name or not, we'll just call them the stairwell gap fillers. Cdubya asked if we could just forget about any type of home improvement for Valentine's day and I agreed. We've been going gangbusters on this stuff and need to remember to relax some too.

Hardest part about those doors and boards was getting them down into the basement without banking into my newly painted walls. I should probably be that careful all the time.

After all that I was able to watch 24 (recap below) and then some of the olympics.

Caught the women's snowboarding half pipe which the US went gold, silver in. That was cool. Only bummer was the defending gold medalist from the US had the run of a lifetime and hit her ass on landing the last jump or she would have had gold. She was so high! Way higher than the other women and about the same height the men usually go.

Caught the 2nd run of the men's 500 meter speedskating and American Joey Cheek put on a clinic in blowing away the competition to win gold. Unfortunatley, defending gold medalist and Verona, WI's own, Casey Fitzrandolph finished 12th, nearly a second and a half behind Cheek.

Caught the end of the pairs finger painting, I mean figure skating, and saw the Russians win, big surprise. The amazing thing is what they had been through. Back in '04 the guy dropped the woman on her head and she was in the hospital for quite awhile. They showed the video and it made me ill. I don't know how (a) she could trust him again and (b) how he could get over it. You could tell they were very emotional about it.

But, that wasn't the most impressive part. The last pair, from China, were attempting to do a throw quad early in their routine and she bit it really hard and injured her knee. I didn't think they'd go on but after a short visit with the doctor she decided she wanted to try to finish. They did and it was amazing. They received a standing ovation afterwards and despite the fall managed to win the silver medal! It was pretty cool.

Ok, and now your Tuesday morning 24 recap.
When we left our hero, Jack was trying to set up a way to find the nerve gas canisters and he impersonated Rossley who was killed by the Russian girl he was holding captive. He managed to get them to believe he was Rossley and reprogrammed the remote detonator (with some help from Chloe of course). Unfortunately, they insisted (at gunpoint) that he come along for a "field test" which happened to be at a crowded shopping mall.

After CTU and the President agreed that the best course of action was to let all those people die so they could get back to where the rest of the canisters were. Yeah, Jack doesn't play that way. Despite the order to help the terrorists, he refused and was beaten and handcuffed to a desk. When they figured out how to release the gas without him they were going to kill him but of course, he took a guy down and took his mask and managed to shut off the canister before too much got out. About a dozen people were killed instead of 800-900.

Because they had put a tracking device on the chip they installed in the detonator they were able to follow the other terrorist that had gotten away (he also played Judge Amy Gray's mom's boss on Judging Amy, only he wasn't Russian then). Anyway, knowing that guy would be followed the rest of the terrorists cleared out and the guy left behind killed himself as Jack and the others arrived to find no nerve gas.

Once again the terrorists are in the wind with the gas and CTU left without a clue.

That's it, Happy Valentine's day.

Paint It Black

Easy song for ya today (of course I thought Friday's song was easy too and you guys managed to prove me wrong).

I spent all weekend painting the basement. Lots of work but it's done and I can move on to the next few steps.

Unfortunately, with all the painting, etc. I didn't get to see much on TV. I did see Bode Miller lose and Apolo Anton Ohno gag in his semifinal race in the short track 1,500. Americans not off to a great start. I caught part of the Canadian women's hockey game against Russia. It's pretty obvious that Canada and US will meet in the final.

Spent 90 minutes in the hell that is a 7 year old's birthday party on Saturday. My sister in law's father is a total jackass, I'd really like to pop him one. This is the guy that basically cancelled Christmas for them because she wouldn't come to his house on the day that he ordered her too, then said he wouldn't come to his grandson's b-day party because of it. Then he just shows up out of the blue and what is his gift? $50 in $1 bills. Is he looking to take him to a strip club??? Like I said, he's a jackass. There will come a day when my brother lights him up. I guarantee it.

Valentines day is tomorrow. Another of those damn Hallmark holidays guaranteed to fuck me up. This is my 18th year of marriage. How am I supposed to come up with something new and original each year? It's a joke. I think this year I'll give her a "Valentines 5" (Scrubs reference for those not getting it).

Oh yes, bowling Saturday night. Another ugly exhibition of bowling, my worst of the year as I shot a whopping 503. But, there was a silver lining. We won a game after losing 8 in a row. Oh, and I did manage to get a higher score than the Grinder. But that's not really saying much... :)

Last night was hockey night.

I just realized that there is no flow to this posting at all, bouncing around like a boxer on Meth.

Anyway, where was I? Ah, hockey. 6:30 start time. At 6:05 I was in the basement cleaning up when I glanced at the clock. Oh sonofa... Grabbing my bag I raced out to the car and hauled ass. Just as I finished getting dressed the horn sounded to start the game... aw, who needs to warm up first. I did a half-assed stretching motion and we're off. We won 7-4, I had an ok game considering I didn't warm up and we only had 3 defensemen so I had to play a lot.

Ok, I gotta get to work now.
Later

I Will Survive

Since it's obvious the songs I'm picking are way too hard, we'll go simple for today's pick. It may not rock, but you should know the singer. Just a side note, this popped into my head around 2:30 this morning and I was unable to get rid of it, though I tried for the next 2 hours.

Finished hanging the 2 light fixtures last night and managed to take some pictures of the basement and get them uploaded just before Survivor started. Go check out the pictures, I'll wait.

As for Survivor. It's official. Shane is a jackass and I hate him. Oh, poor me, I just want to go home, I hate it here, wait, no, I want to stay, no, leave, I miss my son, I quit smoking, did you know I smoked 3 packs a day before I came here...
bla bla bla, just shut the fuck up already. I miss Johnny Fairplay.

They merged the 4 tribes back into 2 using a school yard pick and in an interesting twist, they sent the last person to be picked (Bruce) off to exile island for 3 days and brought him back to sit in on tribal council, where he takes the place of the person voted off. As for the tribes, the tribe without Shane won both challenges (of course, Sally lost the spear they won immediately). For the vote, it basically came down to one of the two older women and Melinda was selected to go back to Tennessee.

Bad Luck

Another song title for you to figure out. This one is a little tougher than yesterday so I'll give you a hint. A friend in Seattle gave me this punk rock cd before I moved back to Wisconsin (so it's pre-'98). And no, it's not that song from Hee Haw (and yes, I realize my under 30 friends have no idea what the fuck I'm talking about).

On to the reason I chose that title today. Stupid bowling... I start out with 6 great shots and I manage 2 strikes, 3 10 pins and a 7 pin. Problem is that I let it get me down and I kind of give up instead of continuing to fight it. I ended up shooting a 560 series, well below my average and we lost all 7 points. I need to find a way to overcome these streaks of bad luck.

On the bright side we hung the house (for the 7th time) and got free beer. CB had to go to work afterwards so I had his beer too (that's how nice a guy I am, always willing to jump in and help).

Collected the first half of my super bowl pool winnings yesterday, probably take 2 months to get the other half. I'm getting closer to being able to pick up that DirecTV HD DVR I've had my eye on.

Does anyone understand Big 10 basketball? What a frickin' zoo. Badgers beat Indiana and Northwestern beat Iowa. Just when you think you know who the powers are they up and lose (like Illinois losing at home to Penn State this past weekend). My question is: Is the Big 10 loaded with top tiered talented teams (the 4 t's) or are they all sucky? I'm leaning towards the latter.

Bad news for the Badger hockey team as it appears stud goaltender Brian Elliot is still out for this weekend's game. To make matters worse, captain Adam Burish left practice with a knee injury too. The extent of his injury is unknown at this point. By the way, the game against Ohio State Saturday will be played outdoors at Lambeau field. Truly the frozen tundra this time.

In better news, the Brewers avoided salary arbitration and agreed to a 2 year deal with 32 year old centerfielder Brady Clark. The deal is worth a reported $7 million. Hard to believe just 2 seasons ago he was little more than a journeyman backup behind Scott Podsednik.

This whole Rick Tocchet gambling thing is like an episode of the Soprano's. Someone's gonna get whacked for sure. Question: Is Janet Jones (Wayne Gretzy's wife and allegedly connected to this thing) running the whole show? Is she the Godmother? Hmmm

I did watch Lost when I got home from bowling but I didn't really get into it. Here's what I learned (Grinder, turn away if you haven't watched it).

Looks like Charlie is still really pissed at John Loch for punching him out and taking his heroin. He works with Sawyer (who Loch now calls "James" since that's his real name) to steal all the guns and make Loch look like a fool. Not sure what that accomplished but now Sawyer has all the guns. Make anyone nervous?

Have a great Thursday. Don't forget to make your song artist guess.

Light Up The Sky

I'm thinking of starting all my posts with a song title that vaguely resembles my topic. See if you can guess the artist each day.

Ok, so speaking of lights, we bought new light fixtures for the kitchen, hallway and foyer. Got the main kitchen one done quickly. For those of you that don't have one yet, pick up one of those headset led lights. They're great for providing hands free light when you have the power off.

Anyway, the light we bought for over the sink is a pendant light. I had never hung one of those before so it was a little different. I kept screwing up the routing of the wires through everything and I was trying to rush so Cdubya could make dinner and that kept making it worse. 3 times I had to undo everything and re-route the wires again because I was being stupid.

Finally, I figured it out and got it all hooked up. I went downstairs and turned the breaker back on and I hear Cdubya go "Uh oh, it doesn't work." I'm like "sonofa! #$@#!$^1##!$!@#$@#" and as I'm walking up the stairs I see her standing by the WRONG light switch. I ask her if she bothered to try the RIGHT light switch. Of course, she realizes right away what she did wrong and tried the right one and it worked. I called it a night after that. The foyer light is the same pendant light so I should get that done quickly. The hallway light is a standard flush mount, again, really easy. Tonight I have a hair cut and then bowling so it'll have to wait till tomorrow.

We watched King of Queens from Monday on Tivo then 2 Scrubs and Boston Legal. Scrubs was pretty funny with Zach Braff's real life girlfriend Mandy Moore playing his gf on the show, only she was a total clutz. Of course, he found one other thing wrong with her that he couldn't deal with (she never laughed, just said "that's SOOO funny") so they broke up.

Boston Legal was pretty good, not great. Not enough Denny Crane, though his short appearances were quite funny.

Have a great hump day.

24 Recap

So, yesterday I turned another year older so around 11:00 I decided I owed it to myself to not work so I went home and watched Star Wars Episode III. Sometimes you just have to have a me day.

On the basement front, my brother is just about done with his part. He is just cleaning up and fixing a few spots after spraying texture on yesterday. I will be painting this weekend.

Last night we went to my mom's for pizza, cake, etc so I didn't get home in time for the start of 24. Ended up watching about a half hour of it before CSI Miami came on then got up this morning and watched the 2nd half. Gotta love Tivo.

Here's the 24 recap:
The bad guys find that they can't detonate the nerve gas because they don't have the right codes so they call some old dude who happens to be in LA and is a specialist in this type of thing and of course, knows how to reprogram nerve gas canisters... yeah, uh huh, ok.

Anyway, CTU intercepts the call and finds the old guy. They capture him and Jack of course wants to beat the information out of him. He's informed that he is to accept the old guys terms of a deal to get the information which includes allowing him to keep his 15 year old Russian bride who has been keeping locked up with him. Jack's not too damn happy about this and promises her they will get her back after they capture the bad guys and asks her to get changed. She is not happy either but gets changed. But, when she comes back out she has a gun and blows the old guy away. Now Jack's in a pickle because the bad guy is supposed to call back to set up the meeting. It appears that Jack will fool him next week to set up the meeting anyway and will eventually go with the terrorists into a shopping mall. Next week looks like a don't miss episode!

Also, Walt Cummings hung himself with his belt. Big whup... he wasn't any help anymore. Jack is also trying to get Audrey to find his daughter, Kim, and bring her to CTU so he can tell her he's still alive (I think she'll figure it out when she sees him).

That's it for now...

Super Bowl

Well, I won $128 on the Steelers but none of my numbers came in so that's it. I feel bad for my friends back in Seattle. That game could have easily gone their way but for some iffy calls and boneheaded plays and penalties. But, that's how it goes some times. It's pretty easy to name a bunch of things that cost them:

1. The TD call on Big Ben's run. Sure didn't look like the ball crossed the line to me. But, this is one of those "must have conclusive video evidence to overturn the call on the field" deals.
2. Jerramy Stevens fear. Dude dropped how many passes? Ok, he cought one td but man, he was a dropping fool.
3. Hasselbeck's overthrow. Oops, that was not a good pass.
4. 2 big penalties. Jackson pushing off in the end zone negates a td (yes, looked to me like he pushed off). Also a holding penalty that negated a pass down to the 2 yard line.

Now, on to the important stuff. The commercials. But first, did anyone feel sick like I did watching the Stones? Man, high definition TV is not their friend. And Mick, no one really wants to see your scrawny stomach, please buy bigger t-shirts.

Ok, commercials, what were your faves?

Funniest: The doctor shocking the fly then saying "that killed him" just as the dude's wife and kid walk in. Note: I missed the Fed Ex caveman one but heard others laughing from the living room. The Michelob football game one with the girl getting drilled (you were open, now you're closed) wasn't bad either.

Most Disturbing: The Monster/Robot baby = H3 Hummer. I felt ill afterwards.

Lamest: The whole Diet Pepsi thing was stupid...

Heartwarming: The baby clydesdale one for Bud had the ladies all oohing.

Enjoyable: The Stunt City and McGuyver ones weren't too bad.

Ok, I just watched the Fed Ex one. That was funny.

You can watch the commercials and vote for your favorites on MSNBC.

Survivor 12 - Game On!

The 12th season of Survivor started last night. I will recap and provide my opinions at the bottom of this posting so those of you who haven't watched it yet... what were you thinking?!?!?!?

Badger running back Booker Stanley was kicked off the team yesterday. This guy is trouble, I'm glad he's gone and I hope after he gets out of jail he won't stick around. I feel bad for the people in Whitefish Bay if he decides to come home (and I know a couple people that live there). He's got a history of beating the crap out of people, mostly women. It shows good judgment by new coach Bielema that he's not going to mess around.

Ok, is it just me or is the media making this Joey Porter/Jerramy Stevens thing into way more than it is? It's almost like they were begging for someone to say something just so they could report something other than "Matt Hassselback is bald" or "Mike Holmgren looks a lot like Craig Stadler".

Badger hockey boys take a little drive up to Duluth this weekend to try to get back on the winning track. Since Brian Ellott went down with a new injury they have lost 4 straight and are now in a 3 way tie for first place in the WCHA with Minnesota and Denver. Replacement goalie, freshman Shane Connelly, has lost all 4 games and has a save percentage of 86% with a GAA of 3.25.

Ok, here starts the tv recap...

First, did anyone see Four Kings last night? Seth Green telling that "gay story" about camp had me rolling on the floor. "Blooop"... hahahaha... priceless. If you didn't see it... well, there's no way I can tell it like he did.

Now, on to Survivor. This season they added 2 more twists.

First, the teams. Instead of having 2 mixed teams they went with 4 teams of 4 players each:

1. Older Men
2. Older Women
3. Younger Men
4. Younger Women

Second, Exile Island. During the competition it appears that the losing team in the reward challenges has to pick someone to spend the next day or 2 on Exile Island alone with no shelter or food and only a machete and water bucket to help.

But, there's another twist. Somewhere on Exile Island there is an immunity idol hidden. Similar to last Survivor, except this time you can hold on to until after the votes are read, which means you can totally screw up the voting! You get voted out but noooo, you have the idol and show it. The person with the 2nd most votes is gone! Wow... that's cool.

Now, on to the show. They stared with a reward challenge for fire right off the bat and the last place team did not get any fire and had to leave one person behind on Exile Island. The Younger Women lost and left Misty behind to fend for herself until Immunity challenge time. She came back and kind of tried to bluff that she found the idol but no one bought it.

The immunity challenge consisted of swimming, rafting and solving a brain teaser. I found myself quickly cheering for the Older Men (yay, old guys) and the Younger Women. Ok, so I like the scenery, gimme a break! The funniest thing for me is seeing the Younger Men just totally befuddled by everything, acting retarded and struggling to beat the old ladies, which they just barely did to escape tribal council.

The Older Women proved to be dumber than I thought they could be as they decided that LumberJill Tina (out of Hayward, WI) would be too much of a threat to them. Uh, hello? Is anyone home? You're at least 3 weeks from being in position of doing individual challenges and none of you is going to be around now that you got rid of your one strong person. Talk about your bonehead plans. Personally, I get rid of Cirie. She's never been outside before and is afraid of leaves! Leaves! What would make a person like that sign up for Survivor? Have they never seen the show before?

In other TV news... They showed ads for Amazing Race last night, looks awesome! New season starts Feb 28th. Also, I heard that the 6th season of The Soprano's starts March 12th. I think this may be the final season. I don't even remember what was going on, it's been so long since season 5.

Have a great weekend.

Update: Andy Samberg from SNL was on Letterman and they talked about a short film he was making in LA that was interupted by Keifer Sutherland doing his Jack Bauer character. It's pretty funny. Click here to view the interview.

Decision Making Skills

I was going to write some long stupid thing about how alcohol impairs your judgement but fuck, everybody knows that already and I'll have to live with my 173 last game to blow a really good series... Stupid MC and his goldslagher... For the record... 219, 257 and 173 for 649. And we lost the last game, to the vacant team, by 3 pins.

I guess we finally, sort of, kinda have some bulletin board fodder for the super bowl now. Kind of... Jerramy Stevens of the seahawks says that it will be a sad day when Bettis leaves without the trophy. Some how that statement got Joey Porter all bent out of shape "I've been asleep all week but now I got woke up." Oh boy, that's some good words you spoke there Joey. Sheesh

It took a 17 year old high school girl in New York to one up Kobe... In a game last night, the 5'10" senior put up 60 shots, hitting 54 and scored 113 points in her teams 137-32 win. Too bad it was against St. Agnes School for the Blind.

Today's groundhog day. Here in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin we have Jimmy the Groundhog. It's pretty cloudy today so I doubt he'll see his shadow which means we'll get an early spring. Considering that we've had like 42 straight days of highs above freezing, I'd say we already got it.

On the other hand, the Grinder should fill us in on the results from his prognosticating stick. Head over to Grinder's Warehouse later to find out.

That's all I got for now, must get more coffee....

Circling the drain

You know how the water in your toilet spins faster the closer it gets to the drain? Life is like that too. Seems like we just got over Christmas and it's already Feb 1. I swear the days never went this fast when I was 15 and waiting to get my drivers license. Speaking of that, I need to go get mine renewed for another 8 years this week as another b-day approaches.

Met up with some old co-workers last night at Madison's downtown. Had a few beers and got caught up with them. It was a retirement party for one of the section chiefs I had worked for. Good to see everyone again. And as an added bonus, they had Guinness on tap... for only $3!

So, after 3 beers and dinner I spent about an hour and a half putting mud on 600 screw holes in the drywall for my basement project. We should be painting by early next week. I only had time to do that because Bush decided to ruin my night of tv watching. Why can't he do that in the middle of the day and interupt Oprah or Dr. Phil Medicine woman?

Anywho... it's bowling night!

PS, I submitted Mike Greenberg for "Just Shut Up" (part of the Mike and Mike show on espn radio, starring one Mike Greenberg) for his ludicrous comments on Brett Favre. I suggested he put down the crack pipe.

Oh, and how quickly I put that game out of my brain... The Badgers were crushed at home by Illinois in men's hoops last night. Badgers were up 24-13 early but fell apart under an unrelenting Illini defense and went scoreless as Illinois scored the next 19 points and it was over.