Big Ed says...

Running again

2009-02-20T15:13:00.002-06:00

Haven't posted in a while because my running has been lackidaisical (is that still a word?)

2009 is going to be The Year of Ed. All that means is that I've committed to get in top shape this year, all in preparation for the Austin Marathon in Feb 2010.

How am I gonna do it.

First off, I'm back on Atkins to try and trim off about 20 lbs. I've put on a lot of useless fat in the last few months, that has to go.

Second, I'm running 5 days a week and hitting the gym the other days. My first running goal is the Governor's Challenge 10K at the end of April, I expect to do that in under an hour.

That's it for now, I doubt anyone reads this but if you do, I expect to do at least a weekly post on my progress and anything else that happens to need posting.

I'm back

2006-09-18T20:51:00.000-05:00

Well, it's been a while since I updated the blog. It was important to me to keep track of my marathon training and blogging it was a great way to do it. I looked back several times to see where I had been. It was fun to see stuff about how hard 12 miles was after running 22.

Guess what, I'm ramping up for my next marathon. It is in Feb some time, I have my training schedule all laid out and you would think I would be ready to go.

Not so fast. A few months ago, I started having some dizziness, periods where I really felt like crap. After working out I would be really unsteady and it got worse and worse so I finally went to the doctor. To make a long story short, after seeing several people and finding out I don't have any heart problems or a brain tumor, I finally found someone who was interested in actually curing my problem instead of just kicking the tires and calling it a day. Turns out I have a type of shingles, a nerve disorder of some kind, in my right ear causing my balance to be hinky and consequently causing my dizziness. I'm taking some meds for it and need to do some blood work and stuff but I think I'm well on my way to getting better.

So, I cranked up my running last week in an attempt to get to start this at the beginning of October.

I've got a ways to go to get ready to start training. I tried to do 5 miles on Sunday and fell a bit short. I completed the entire 5 but only made it about 3 before having to walk on and off the rest of the way. I'm supposed to be doing 6 on Sundays so we'll see how I do next week.

Wish me luck. My body is still in pretty good form, the advances and changes I made last year are still with me but I have put on some flab. My wind usually seems really good but I haven't pushed very hard yet.

More next week.

The Freescale Austin Marathon and Me

2006-02-19T18:43:00.000-06:00

I tell ya, with the various problems I've had, especially crashing at 18 miles on my 22 mile runs, I was a bit worried in the week coming up to the marathon. However, Friday evening I went to this site to read up on everything I needed to know about the race:

Freescale Austin Marathon

I had been reading the site for a while when I noticed a timer at the top right, counting down the seconds until the race. This wave of excitment went thru my entire body, only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to see the results of the months of grueling training. Only 1 day, 12 hours till I was going to run my first marathon. I felt like a kid the day before Christmas, all the worry went right out the window.

Saturday was a long day, nothing seemed to hold my interest for long. I finally just hit the hay about 8 PM, planning on getting up at 4 to eat and get ready. It was a rough night, I didn't sleep good at all but finally the alarm was going off.

I got out of bed and checked the temperature. 27 degress, oh my God I'm gonna freeze my ass off. Oh well, what you gonna do. I made some coffee, had a breakfast bar and a banana and sat at the computer for a while. Around 5:30 I woke everyone up (my wife was driving me to the race) and we left about 6. It's not too far from my house to the race site but about 2 miles before the start, traffic was completely stopped. We sat in the line for about 30 minutes and finally got there 10 minutes before the start at 7. I jumped out of the car, ran to the start but no one was really lining up yet. I asked a lady who was walking by if they were starting on time and she said they had delayed till 7:30. Great, now I get to stand around freezing for 30 minutes. I was wearing a long sleeve shirt, a fleece pullover, shorts, sweats and my hat. My wife had loaned me an old set of ear muffs so that helped keep my ears warm but it was still freezing.

Finally, we start getting lined up. I was pretty far back, I never start at the front because I'm too slow. We couldn't really even hear the loudspeaker but eventually, I could see the line moving was up front. The movement finally gets to us but I decided to jump out of line for a last minute pee break. I was back pretty quick and crossed the start line about 8 minutes after the gun. For those of you who don't know, they give you an RFID chip you tie on your shoe and that records your actual start and finish times vs clock times. Starting to run after standing around is always nice, I always get an andreline rush but I just kept my pace slow and easy. We were running down a residential street and it was pretty packed, not that hard to run but impossible to pass. That was fine for me but some guys were jumping up on the sidewalk. There is this lady standing on the sidewalk yelling, "Ice, Ice, Ice." and pointing at the icy spot. Sure enough, here comes this knucklehead, totally ignores her and busts his ass big time. I didn't see if he got up or not, just kept running. I have to say something about the clothing during the first few miles. As folks started getting warmed up, they start stripping and most people just throw them on the side of the road. There was enough discarded clothing along the road way to start a second hand store. You had to see it to believe it. They have people that come along, pick it up and donate it to charity so nothing is really wasted but I was amazed at the sheer volume.

The first 5 miles or so were pretty uneventful. I felt pretty good even though my knee was talking to me a bit. I just kept plugging along. I would usually stop at the water stops and walk the short time it took to chug a drink, drinking mostly powerade but some water. There were a lot of spectators at certain spots so I kept looking for people I knew. I hadn't seen anyone so my focus had gone inside when I hear someone yelling. I looked up and it registers he is yelling, "Jim Edwards!!" It was a friend from work, Kenneth Mitchell. He is a big time runner (he wussed on this one) and has been a big suporter of mine so it was nice to see him out there. The course was mostly downhill so that was nice.

Miles 5 thru 10 were a little rough, my legs were bothering me a bit and I was letting my head play with me but I just kept going, keeping my pace easy and relatively slow. Right at about the 10 mile mark, once again my focus has gone inside and I hear someone yelling. There weren't as many spectators in this area so I look up and guess what, my wife, Janie, and my son, Jason (Bubba), are across the street yelling and cheering me on. I tell ya, seeing them was a real morale boost. My wife yells, "Where are your gloves?" Well, I had taken them off and stuck them in my wasteband so, thinking I wouldn't need them, I dropped them on the street and my son comes and picks them up. Big mistake. The temp hasn't gone up much but we have the wind at our backs. It might be 30 by now and when you hit an area where the wind gets you, it's freaking cold. More on that later. I ate 3 Clif Shot Bloks at around mile 10.

Miles 11 thru 15 went by pretty slow. Hitting mile 14 was a good milestone because I have been running 12 miles on Sundays so just tell myself that all we have left is a nice Sunday run. It was somewhere during this time when my left hand, the side the wind was blowing on I guess, starts getting really, really cold. The race packets had these cheap cotton gloves in them and a lot of people had dropped them but the pickings were getting slim. I finally found one, it was a bit damp but I didn't care. My left hand was so cold I couldn't even pick the thing up but I finally got it. I spent the next 10 miles switching it from hand to hand, warming one at a time.

Miles 16 thru 20 were pretty good actually. We started coming into downtown, my hood, and I started seeing familiar landscape. I also knew the end was in sight. I kicked up my pace a bit since it was mostly down hill and I was feeling good. I knew I probably should keep going slow but just decided to go for it. My hips and legs were hurting but I had lots of juice left. I would kick a couple of miles then walk a minute thru a water stop, then kick some more. It was working out pretty good for me and 16 thru 20 seemed to go by pretty quickly as we wound down thru UT. At mile 19 I passed a timer and it said, "3:30" That really encouraged me. I had wanted to do the marathon in 4 hours but realized early on that it was probably going to be closer to 5 hours. I really wanted to split the difference so when I saw I had an hour to make 7 miles, I was pretty jazzed.

20 - 26 were a bit rough. I was still running pretty good but walking more. Mile marker 21 took us around the capitol. There is a fountain on the south entrance and it had a lot of icicles haning on it so I guess the temp was still below freezing. Leaving the capitol grounds and heading down Congress is a pretty nice downhill run so I did that in good time. Just as we passed mile 22, Clif folks were handing out gel packets of this Mocha Mocha. I grabbed one because I was getting pretty spent and needed all the help I could get. I've never taken a gel before, they just flat don't appeal to me but with the end this close and me starting to lose the juice I needed some help. I held it till I saw a water stop, ripped it open and squeezed it in my mouth. Well, it was everything I expected, like taking a mouthful of mocha flavored Vaseline. I only took half and grabbed two cups of water to wash it down with. At 22 miles, the course headed west then doubled back. So, you can see the runners coming down the other side and there was nothing to prevent you from just crossing over (that I knew about anyway). It was sure tempting but as always, I just kept plugging on. The wind was in our faces. Luckily it wasn't very strong but it was still cold as hell. I had expected to shed some clothing along the way but was still wearing everything I had started with (except my gloves of course). However, my inner layer was soaked with sweat so that wind cut right thru. A lot of 22 - 24 was uphill so I ended up walking way more than I wanted to but when I ran, I was running strong with a good pace. I found a second discarded glove at about mile 23.5 and almost got run over when I bent down to pick it up. I would make myself run at least a mile before walking a short way. We finally get to the turnaround and 24 mile point. What I found at the turnaround was a chip mat, I guess to catch any cheaters who cut across. Let me tell ya, if you've never done a marathon, you have no idea how good it is to only have two miles to go. By this point, when I stop I'm having trouble breathing so have to stop and let my throat open up. Anyway, when I hit 24, I decided to kick it in and started running strong. I was tired, out of juice and my legs hurt like hell but two miles is like rolling over in bed. I ran a pretty good pace till about 25.2 miles or so when I had to stop and breathe again. I walked a ways till I saw a big crowd, no way was I going to walk past a crowd so took off.

Before I knew it, we were crossing the river bridge with only about a 1/4 mile to go. I hear someone coming up on my left and when I look over, it's a lady who looks to be older than me. Well, there simply ain't no way some old lady is going to beat me in the home stretch so I start kicking it up a bit. Guess what, so does she. Everytime I speed up, she matches me. We get about 3/4 of the way across the bridge and I learn a lesson in humility (not my first for sure) when I peter out and the old lady shows me her heels. I putter on for a while and enter the corral to the finish line. I decide to finish strong and kick it up a bit when there they are, Janie and Jason, screaming at the top of their lungs and cheering me on. I get a little choked up which affects my breathing but I'm still able to kick past one last person and cross the finish line with a chip time of 4:34:39.

I'm now a marathoner. I've done something a lot of people have done but a hell of a lot more never will. All the training paid off and while I certainly didn't break any records, I'm extremely pleased at my performance. I'm even more pleased that I stuck with it thru the whole training, not wimping out or getting lazy once. I'm pretty amazed I stayed healthy thru the whole thing as well. I gotta thank the most important person in my life, my wife Janie, for her support thru the whole thing. She not only rode along on my long runs but there were lots of evening when I'm sure she wanted to do something else but came home or went to the gym so I could run. She's not only the love of my life but my best friend, I'm a lucky man.

What's next? Well, there are two rather big deal 10ks in April, the Capitol 10k and the Governor's 10K. I plan on smoking those bad boys so need to start doing some speed work. I think I'm going to take a few days off though, my pegs need a little rest.

Week 20

2006-02-19T18:37:00.000-06:00

Week 20 ended with the marathon. I'll make a seperate post about that.

Monday was an off day, just hit the gym, lifted some weights and did some situps.

Tuesday was Valentines day and the wife and I took the afternoon off. We went to the gym first and I ran a fairly easy 5 miles. I almost got hit by a bus. I was running along not really paying attention and looked up just in time to see this city bus pulling in to the bus stop I was passing. This fat bitch either didn't see me or cut it too close but I had to jump up on the curb to keep from getting run over. I just kept running, she was gone by the time I got good and pissed off.

Wednesday was 4 miles, another fairly easy run. I'm feeling pretty good and ready for the marathon.

Thursday and Friday are rest days.

Saturday was 2 easy miles. It was pretty cold so I was able to test out my marathon attire. Man that wind cuts right thru you.

Week 19

2006-02-12T19:24:00.000-06:00

I was in New York City most of the week. Some who read this will have seen most of it already.

Monday was an off night. When I got out of class I just wandered around, scouting out my running areas. I found the running path along the Hudson with no problem and then found the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge. There is a big wide path going right up the center of it but after mapping it out, I just couldn't get the mileage I needed without running in some areas I wasn't too sure of. Besides, it's cold enough on the ground, I can't imagine what it would be like 300 feet in the air over a river (yes, I'm a wuss). I'll probably do the bridge when the wife and I come back on vacation, for now I'll confine my running to ground level.

Tuesday night was 5 miles. They have built a running/biking path all around Manhattan so you can run without having to cross many streets. It goes along the water so that is nice but that wind will cut right thru you. I spotted the Statue of Liberty on my return path. It was getting dark so I could just make her out but the torch was shining brightly. That was pretty cool for an old country boy like me.

Wednesday night I went running south from my hotel (went north on Tuesday). This took me around the south end of Manhattan, thru Battery Park, past the Staten Island ferry and under the Brooklyn Bridge. It was still light so I got a good view of the Statue of Liberty from Battery Park. The trail is not near as nice on this end, lots of running on sidewalks, across streets and as you come up the east side, you run thru what is basically a big parking lot. However, it improves a bit as you get close to the bridge. It's still freezing cold so I was glad to get my 4 miles done and get back to my nice cozy hotel room.

Thursday night I was going running Central Park at 7:30 with some of the folks from the Coolrunnings board. Here is their web site: http://thereservoirdogs.com/ I had to take the subway and there was a station right in the same block as my hotel so I head down there only to find that some asshole has jammed a candy wrapper in the credit card machine. So I head back up to the next station, get in just in time to see the train coming. Since there was only one choice when you go in, I asked a cop if that was the right train to Central Park. He gives me a dirty look but says it is. So, just to make sure, when it stops, I ask a guy hanging out the window on the front and he says it's will get me close. The only problem is that now I can't get in the damm train, it is so packed full of people. I mean these people are lined up at the door literally like sardines in a can. So, I move down to the end of the platform and wait for the next one. I finally get on but don't get to my stop till 7:25. I come out of the station not sure which way to go but just take off running in what I hope is the right direction. I'm at 86th street and soon come to 87th street (I'm going to 90th) so I know I'm going north and that Central Park is on my left. On the map, Central Park looks to be one block west of the street I'm on but when I look that direction, all I can see are more buildings. I get to 90th street and head west, hoping for the best. After a block, I see a lady and ask if I'm going in the right direction which she confirms so I keep going. It turns out to be 4 blocks so just as I'm crossing the street in to the park, I see a group of 6 - 7 people take off running. I pick up my pace a bit and soon catch up to them. I run up along side one of the them and greet him, expecting one of them to ackowledge me but he just returns the greeting and runs on. So, I'm just running along with them with no one saying anything so I say, "Are you guys the group I'm supposed to meet." They all turn around and look at me and one says, "Are you Big Ed?" Since I was probably the only Big Ed in Central Park that night, I acknowledge the fact that yes, I'm Big Ed. He says, "This is the guy from Texas." to the rest of the group and they all welcome me into their little running party. From that point, we all just chat and run and have a grand old time. 5 miles went by like 5 minutes. Central Park is beautiful, even at night and it is relatively quiet compared to the rest of the city. I got lost coming back to my hotel and damm near freeze my butt off but eventually get going the right direction, grab some supper and hit the room for the night.

Friday is an off day and it's a good thing because I fly back to Austin later in the afternoon.

Saturday is an easy 3 miles. My legs hurt a bit but level out once I get warmed up.

Sunday is my last 12 miles before the marathon. I get up about 7:30 and the temp is 30 so I make breakfast, putz around a bit and about 10 the temp is 47 so I get ready and take off. The wind is blowing but it's pretty comfortable with just shorts and a long sleeve shirt. The wind really hits me at places but I cover the 12 miles with little trouble. My hips are pretty tight by the time I stop but I pushed the last few miles pretty hard.

One more week to the big day, my first marathon. I'm a little worried but I'm just going to go and see what happens. My goal is 4 hours, I expect to do it in 4 1/2 hours but anything less than 5 hours is OK with me.

Wish me luck, hopefully I won't need it.

Week 18

2006-02-04T22:06:00.000-06:00

Week 18 is ending a day early because I'm going to New York City tomorrow (nanny nanny boo boo).

Monday was an off day and it was a damm good thing because I felt like hammered horse shit. Sunday's 22 miles took a lot our of me. I usually go to the gym but I bagged that too and just went home after work and vegged out.

Tuesday I felt a lot better. As soon as we got home, I went out and ran 6 miles. It was rough, my legs were pretty stiff and tired and my knees were hurting but I persevered and made it.

Wednesday was supposed to be 5 miles. I decided to bag it, my knees were not feeling well at all and I'll be dammed if I'm gonna blow a knee two weeks before the marathon.

Thursday I ran 8 miles. I felt pretty darm good most of the way but had to push it a bit at the end. Once again, I made it.

Friday was a rest day but I went to the gym and did some upper body and situps. My back was hurting a bit and I think it was because I hadn't been to the gym all week.

Saturday was supposed to be 4 miles but I decided to do my normal Sunday run on Saturday instead. My plane goes at noon which means I have to leave the house no later than 10. The run is 12 miles which is a good 2 hours. Add breakfast, a shower, pre being gone a week quality time with the missus and I would have had to get up at 4 AM.

So I got up Saturday morning, ate breakfast and took off about 9:30. Honestly, I almost bagged it. My legs had been hurting at night and my knees didn't feel 100% but I sucked it up and went anyway. Can't be half stepping this close to the marathon. The weather was beautiful, perfect running weather. It was about 47 degress but not cold with a light breeze and a completely cloudless sky. My legs felt really good, not stiff at all. My knees talked to me a bit at first but everything settled down and the first 8 miles went by like nothing. It's really funny when you get to the first mile on a long run it seems like you have a long way to go but when it's over, I can't remember most of it and it seems like a snap. At about the 9 mile point, I hit some pretty hilly area and started feeling it a bit. My mind was telling me to stop and walk, a habit I picked up on my long runs but 12 miles is cake, no way I need to walk on a 12 mile run so I kept plugging. By 10 miles my legs were hurting but I just kept going. I made the 12 miles in some pain, I was even limping a bit when I stopped but I made it so it was all worth it.

The next two weeks are pretty light as I taper down to the marathon. I'll be running in NYC next week, won't that be fun. Oh yeah, before you get too jealous, the high temp the whole week I will be there is 38.

Two weeks to the big day. Man I'm looking forward to putting that thing behind me.

Week 17

2006-01-29T17:54:00.000-06:00

Not a bad week overall. Hell it was a damm good week simply because I got my last long run done before the marathon.

Monday was an off day so just went to the gym. I stopped lifting weights on my legs altogether, just concentrate on my upper body and do a lot of situps and leg lifts. I'll go back to legs after the marathon but it was causing me too much trouble.

Tuesday was 5 miles. Legs were very stiff for the first half but loosened up afterward.

Wednesday went to the gym, lifted and did some setups and ran three miles. Still pretty stiff but got it done.

Thursday another 5 miler. My legs have loosened up a lot and I'm feeling a lot more confident.

I took Friday off from work for a complete rest day. Didn't do anything all day but sit on my ass. It was a little boring to be honest.

Saturday was 3 miles. A little stiff but that's what the runs before a long run are for, to work out the kinks.

Sunday I got up at 5:30 to take my daughter-in-law to work. I was going to just stay up and hit my run early but the bed was looking too good so climbed back in and slept till after 7. Got up and ate a banana and breakfast bar with a cup of coffee. I started getting ready to go around 8:30 and it looked like the wife was going to stay in bed but jumped up at the last minute and decided to go.

We got out of the house right at 9. The temp said 46 but it seemed a lot warmer than that. The sun was out and there wasn't a cloud in the sky and only a light breeze blowing, it was a totally beautiful morning. That is not always a good thing in Texas because it can get hot quick. I started out slow, legs feeling a little stiff and my knee was twinging a bit. The first few miles were a little rough but everything eased up by 3 miles. I decided to not try and run straight thru but stop and take short rest stops occasionally. I stopped at 6 miles, walked a bit and ate some Shot Bloks. The run into Hutto is a gradual uphill and was a little rough but as I turned the corner I stopped for a pee break and felt great. In fact, I was feeling a little too good and let my pace increase a bit which turned out to be a mistake. From the 8 mile to 11 mile point, I was running very strong and easy. The wife was riding right along side me and we were chatting a bit, it sure is nice having her along. I do worry about her a bit, she doesn't watch traffic like she should but luckily it's pretty sparse. She has been so totally supportive of my insanity, she either rides along on her bicycle or meets me in the car and keeps my fluids refilled and it's just nice having here out there with me.

Back to the run. At 11 miles I turn south and dag nabbit, start running right into the same headwind again. I swear there are places on this earth where the wind always blows and always blows against you and I chose to run on one of them. The wind was pretty strong and it took it's toll on me. I managed to run the 3 miles to the end of that road but I was pretty tired with 8 miles still to go. I stopped for another rest break, ate some more shot bloks and trudged on. The rest of the way was tough and somewhere between 20 and 21 miles, I was completely exhausted. I walked most of the rest of the way with short bouts of running, pushing thru on sheer will power alone but somehow still managed to finish something around 22.75 miles in under 4 hours. I ended up laying on the floor for about 10 minutes when I got home trying to get some energy back.

That was my last long run before the marathon. The next two Sundays are only 12 mile runs and the marathon is only three weeks away. I'm hoping that by pushing myself so hard in the training, it will show results as my body rebuilds itself into a lean, mean marathon running machine. We shall see...

Isabella

2006-01-25T20:35:00.000-06:00

Isabella
Originally uploaded by Big Ed the Bad.

You are now viewing the most perfect baby picture ever taken.

Week 16

2006-01-22T20:13:00.000-06:00

A pretty good week with a few rough spots.

Monday was an day off from running and from work. I normally go to gym on Mondays but I decided to just rest after my big bad 22 miles on Sunday.

Tuesday was 4 miles. I ran nice and hard today, really burned it up. It really feels good to run fast, really makes you feel like all that training is paying off.

Wednesday I went to the gym, lifted weights and went for a 7 mile run. My plan was to do 3 miles on the treadmill and then go outside for the other 4. It's really hard to do 7 miles in the neighborhood by the gym but all the treadmills were taken and I had figured out a 6 mile course so I just hit the road. It really is a nice course thru an older neighborhood although I have to cross a few very busy streets. I made up the other two miles just running up and down the side streets. My legs were pretty tired, this weight lifting is tough since I've never really done much with my legs before, thinking that running did everything I needed. Anyway, I got the 7 done with only one very short walk to rest.

Thursday the wife went off to Dripping Springs to help her friend get ready for her daughter's Quinceaneras. That left me with a lot of freedom as to where to go run. We usually carpool so I have to be considerate of making her sit around and wait somewhere while I run for 2 hours but today, my options were open. I decided to do the Austin Hike and Bike trail which is a 10 mile loop, perfect for my 10 mile requirement. I got down there about 4:30, checked out the map and was soon off and running. The trail is pretty nice in most places but there are areas where it needs some help. As you head west, pass under Mopac and head back toward town, it's all wide and well maintained but when you head further east, it leaves a lot to be desired. It just ends in a street and there are no markings as to which way to go. You just have to wander around and figure it out. I got lucky and didn't take too many detours. I had one moment where I felt a bit uncomfortable. There were 4 young vatos, about 14 or 15 years old, talking to two older guys. As I got near a rather narrow wood bridge, these 4 took off across it blocking most of the bridge. As I got to them, they split and let me thru but one gave me a look that said he really wanted to start something with me. I think the fact that I'm the size of a large grizzly bear persuaded him that it wasn't a good idea or maybe it was just my imagination (not likely). Anyway, shortly after that, I crossed over Longhorn dam just and the sun was touching the horizon. The view from up there is beautiful, you can see downtown Austin stretched out along the river and the sun on the water was really spectacular. That was the good part, my legs were really tired and my butt hurt a lot. My knees were also giving me fits, all I think from the weight lifting. I had to stop and walk a lot, the 10 miles took me a full two hours and it was getting full dark by the time I finished. I stopped at Wendy's for a burger on the way home.

Friday was an off day and I felt really tired. My right knee acted up throughout the day but I stopped by the gym and did some light weights anyway. It actually made it feel a lot better and kind of worked the kinks out of my muscles.

Saturday was supposed to be 4 miles but my knee was still bothering me. Add that to the fact the we were going to the Quinceaneras that night and would probably be doing some dancing and I decided to bag the Saturday run.

We didn't get home from the Quinceaneras until after 1 AM. I had to get up at 5:30 to take my daughter-in-law to work and felt like a total zombie. I crawled right back in bed when I got back and slept till almost 10 AM. Sleeping that late is just unheard of for me but it felt pretty good, I woke up alert and ready to go. I decided to wait till later to run, it was rainy and cold and I was starving so cooked breakfast instead. I didn't go running till around 12:30. It was still rainy and cold but I wore a fleece thing I picked up at Old Navy so was warm and toasty although a little wet. My knees gave me a little greif but I ran at a pretty good pace and did a very respectable 10 miles in about 1 1/2 hours. I am going to modify my lifting and concentrate only on my hips, I think I'm overworking my lower legs and I certainly don't want to make too many changes this close to the marathon. My mantra thru this whole process has been "Stay Healthy and you'll make it" and while there are things I can't control, overworking my legs is certainly one I can.

Next week is very exciting for me. Next Sunday is my last long run before the marathon. When I finish next week, it will only be three weeks till the big day. I can't wait.

Week 15

2006-01-15T16:48:00.000-06:00

A pretty good week overall.

I decided to go back to the gym and do some weight lifting. My hips have been hurting and I read that running only strengthes certain leg muscles and you need to work out the others seperately. So, I went on Monday and did what used to be my normal upper body and added in 4 leg machines, did some leg lifts and some sit ups. I wasn't too worried about being sore, my running should have at least kept everything somewhat toned and that turned out to be the case, I didn't get sore at all.

Tuesday was an easy day. I was supposed to do some intervals but just ran 3 miles instead with a few fartlek sessions. My legs felt a little weak from the weights lifting but not too bad.

Wednesday I hit the gym again, same routine as on Monday but I also ran 6 miles on the treadmill. In the past, I always just set it on 6 MPH (10 minute mile) and so figured that was good this time too. It was a little harder than I expected since I haven't been running quite that fast out on the road. However, I did the 6 miles without any problem although my legs once again felt a little weak about half way thru.

Thurday was 8 miles. Not much problem here but still my legs were a bit weak. I had originally planned on going to the gym and lift again on Friday but decided to skip it and give my legs an extra day to rest for the big 22 on Sunday.

Saturday was an easy 3 mile warmup. No problems there. 3 miles felt prety good and only really served to get me good and sweaty.

So, I felt pretty good and ready for Sunday. I decided to do the same course that defeated me two weeks ago. My wife decided to go with me at the last minute and ride her bicycle. I have really been on her to get back in shape, there was a time she could run 5 miles with no problem but hurt her knees several years ago and has been having problems getting going again. We loaded up with water and Gatorade and took off about 8:45. The weather was pretty nice, around 52 but a little windy. The only bad thing was I got about a mile out and relized I had forgotten my Shot Bloks. I decided to just forge on and hope the Gatorade would keep me fueled. The wind was at my back and was no sweat for the first 7.5 miles and when I hit the turn to go east, I was feeling pretty good and running easy. This was the point two weeks ago when I knew I was in trouble but today, I felt like a million bucks. The road I turned on here is about the most podunk back country road you can imagine, it's dirt for the first 1/2 miles but that's a good thing, no cars. The bad part is that it goes down between two cotton fields and the cotton is gone, nothing out there but plowed dirt to look at and nothing to stop the wind. Luckily, the wind was from the south so it was hitting me from the side and not having much effect. I put this section of the run behind me without too much effort and was still feeling good when I hit the half way point and turned into the wind. The wind was strong, probably about 10 - 15 MPH but I still wasn't having any trouble. I could feel it to be sure but was still running strong. This stretch of road is about three miles long and also pretty boring but not quite as bad as the last one. My legs were starting to get pretty stiff but I just kept plugging away. I finally got to Mortons Crossing, a little bump in the road that is about the 14 mile point. Although the wind was still pretty strong, there are some trees here to cut it a bit. I tried to walk a bit here to rest my legs but when I stopped, it just didn't feel right so I immediately went back to running. It wasn't long after that, maybe a mile where I hit a really steep hill. I normally kick it's ass but today was the hill's day, I got about half way up and started walking. I was feeling pretty tired by this point and my legs were hurting so the walk did me some good. I was able to start running at the top and continued on. I made somewhat of a tactical error shortly after this, I deicded to take a new route down Melber Lane. My normal route and this road form a square so the distance is the same so I opted for some new scenery, The bad part is that Melber Lane is EVIL!! It's all hills. Not pretty little hills, big leg chewing, lung busting hills. Melber Lane drained the rest of my energy reserves, I would walk up each hill and run down the other side. Finally, the ordeal of Melber Lane was over but I was pretty tired and running out of energy quick. I had about 2 1/2 miles left so did about a mile, walking some running mostly then chugged a large quantity of Gatorade, hopeing for an energy boost. The course I laid out was actually about 22.75 miles and I actually seemed to get a boost about the 22 mile mark and was able to run the last 3/4 miles at a pretty good pace. Maybe it was seeing the end that gave me some energy, I do always seem to have a pretty good kick at the end.

Anyway, it was finally over. It took me a little less than 4 hours to complete which I am certainly pleased with given the wind and evil I endured. My goal for the marathon is somewhere around 4 hours. Given that I have 5 weeks of training left, I think I might actually be able to hit 4 hours or pretty darn close. I was using this run as a test to see if I could actually do the marathon and I passed. I haven't signed up yet but I'll be doing that in the next few days.

Marathon here I come.

Week 14

2006-01-11T12:25:00.000-06:00

Week 14 started about 2 AM Monday morning with me heaving my guts out. I had been sick as a dog all day, my stomach feeling like I ate rocks covered in barbed wire. Finally turning loose of it Monday night, I felt a little better but woke up Monday morning so weak I could barely move. My son happened to have an interview at my office so I drove him there, intending to go to work but dropped him off, went back home and slept till 9:30. Anyway, since I can't point to any particular thing I might have eaten, I assume I got some kind of bug. I went to work Tuesday feeling a lot better but bagged the running for the week, not wanting to push it and get all better.

I went out for a short 3 miler on Saturday. I felt pretty good but was a little weak at the end.

Sunday was 10 miles. I was feeling great till about 6 or 7 miles and started feeling a little weak, not sick or out of breath but just a little weak. I think it was just a hold over from the bug. I just bucked up and made it thru the 10 without too much trouble and felt fine the rest of the day.

I'm going to get back on schedule next week and take another stab at 22 next Sunday. I'm also going back to the gym and doing some weight lifting, upper and lower body, to help my hip pain problems.

Wish me luck.

Week 13

2006-01-03T11:46:00.000-06:00

Good old lucky 13 turned out to not be so lucky for me.

The week started out well enough. I was off work on Monday so pretty much just chilled out, not doing much of anything.

Tuesday was supposed to be 6 880 intervals but I hate doing that stuff and don't have a good place to do it so just ran 3 miles with some Fartlek instead. No real problems there. I was supposed to pick up my new shoes today but time got away from me and it just didn't happen. I really wanted to get them broke in before Sunday when I'm supposed to do 22 miles.

Wednesday was a fairly easy 6 miles. Still didn't get my shoes picked up.

Thursday I finally got around to going to get my new shoes. This is the third pair of New Balance 766's I've used and I really like them. While I was at the store, I also picked up this little gadget: 4 Bottle Fuel Belt This thing has 4 7 OZ water bottles and a little pounch on the back for other stuff. I've been wanting to carry my cell phone with me but just couldn't stand the thought of it bouncing around in my pocket so this is a perfect solution. I've been carrying my water or Gatorade in my hand but am really getting tired of that. I set it down when I'm doing a loop and I just run so much easier without carrying it. Anyway, I used my new Belt and my new shoes on my run today. I had a little trouble getting used to the Belt. I cinched it around my waste at my belt line but it was bumping my hips. A small irritation can do one of two things on a long run, either go away or become a BIG NASTY irritation. I decided to move it lower down on my hips and that solved the bumping problem for a few miles but my hips started hurting from the pressure of the belt so I moved it back up to my belt line. Luckily, the bumping kind of went away and didn't cause me any more problems and I forgot about it pretty quick. It sure was nice to just run and let my arms swing naturally without something in my hand. My new shoes worked out really nice, new running shoes always feel so good but my orthodic in my left shoes started really hurting at about 7 miles. I finished the 8 miles without much trouble and was actually feeling pretty good about my new equipment.

Friday was an off day. Saturday I got up early and did 3 miles. I left my orthodics out just to see what would happen but didn't like it so decided to put them in for Sunday's 22 and figured I could just stop and take them out if they caused a problem. Saturday was also my wife's birthday so I spent the day catering to her every whim.

Saturday night I stayed up till after midnight since it was New Year's Eve and some nights of the year I don't get to be an old fart and go to bed at sundown. I had to wake up early Sunday to take my daughter-in-law to work and felt rather tired. I got back and ate 2 bananas and a breakfast bar with a cup of coffee and hung around for a while, just waiting for breakfast to settle. My stomach felt a little heavy for some reason, I had forgotten about that till just now (the importance of this will become apparent shortly). Anyway, about 9 or so I started getting everything ready for my 22 mile run and got out the door about 9:20. It was already conparitively warm, probably in the 60s. I started out slow and felt pretty good although I was sweating pretty heavy within the first few miles. I was running a different route and it was a very nice change, new scenery and part of the run on a very nice road with a wide shoulder. I'm used to running this back country roads and sharing it with cars so a shoulder was very nice. The road was wet and my shoes were slipping a bit in places but there was a strong wind blowing which dried things off before I got to any bad spots. The first 5 miles were very nice. My problems didn't start till I got to about the 7 or 8 mile point. This is usually a good spot in a long run, everything is warmed up and feeling good but not today. I knew something wasn't right, I just didn't feel good. I was getting very sluggish and my energy levels were dropping. There are always times during training when you feel like quitting and I just thought this was one of them so I pushed on. By the time I got to 10 miles, I was walking on and off with running. I was on a very long boring stretch of back country road that seemed to go on forever, nothing but plowed dirt on both sides of me but I kept pushing, walking when I had to and running most of the time. At about 11 miles, I called my wife to bring me out some fresh water and Gatorade and turned south on another long stretch. The difference here is I also turned into about a 15 MPH head wind. With my energy levels already down, this was the capper. I started walking as much as I was running, still trying to keep moving but not making very good progress. I managed to make a few more miles before my wife showed up so I handed her the belt and kept running. She refilled the bottles and parked a little way ahead of me. I was really dragging ass and walking by this time so she asked me how I was doing and I told her that I was not doing good at all. She asked if I wanted to quit and go home but I was determined not to quit. I felt a bit of the asthma I experienced a while back which I thought had gone away so thought maybe I just wasn't getting enough air and asked her to go get my inhaler. She took off and I kept plugging along, still walking way too much. I made a few more miles before she got back and a few puffs on the inhaler didn't help so I told her to wait a few hunderd yards ahead and let me see how I was feeling. As she drove off, I waved and she must have took this as a sign that I was telling her to stop so she did. I just decided to call it quits, knowing the next 8 miles would be damm near impossible. I ended up doing about 16 miles in about 3 hours.

When I got home, I didn't feel good at all. My stomach hurt a lot and I just generally felt like crap. I took a 10 minute cold water bath and then a shower and laid down in bed for a few minutes. I was getting sleepy but she had left to go pick up the kids and had told me not to go to sleep so I got up and watched TV. About an hour later, she came home and brought me a burger and even though my stomach wasn't feeling very good, I thought I needed to eat. I only got about 3/4 of the burger down and couldn't eat any more. My stomach hurt bad the rest of the day and I went to bed about 8 PM. I tossed and turned till about 2 AM when a big cramp hit me and everything came back up. I felt a bit better afterwards and was able to sleep the rest of the night but I felt so bad the next day, I didn't go to work. I'm still feeling like crap today, very washed out and weak. I still can't hardly eat but I came to work anyway, too much stuff to do. At first I thought I had gotten food poisoning but this didn't feel like that. I've had it in the past and within a few hours, my body always violently rejects the infidel but it was a good 12 hours between my last meal and the bad part in the middle of the night. I heard there is a bug of some kind going around and that must be what happened, I was probably already sick Sunday morning (hence the heaviness in my stomach) and that is what sapped all my juice. There is simply no other explanation for tanking like that when 18 miles and 20 miles have been fairly easy.

Well, I've got two more long ones before the marathon, plenty of time to see if I've got what it takes for the long haul. Believe me, I had lots of bad thoughts out on the trail on Sunday, why am I doing this, why am I putting myself thru this, etc but I'm not going to quit. It's just that simple, I'm not going to quit, nuff' said. I am going to take a few days off to get better though so we'll see how it goes.

Wish me luck.

Week 12

2005-12-25T20:14:00.000-06:00

Not much to tell this week. I did some research about the pain in my hips and found that it could be the result of various things. It could be shoes, my stride, or just plain overuse. I decided that I would attempt to fix the easy stuff, namely shoes and overuse. I decided to take the week off and since I am only down for two 5s and an 8, I figured it wouldn't make too big of an impact. Also, since my shoes have hit right at 300 miles, I've got a new pain on order and will picking them up on Tuesday. As for my stride, I don't even know how to begin to change that. How do you change some thing you've been doing the same way for 35 years?

I tell you, I didn't miss running during the week. It was sure nice to come home and just chill but it felt kind of weird. With the pain and the hectic training schedule, running has turned into work rather than pleasure. Anyway, taking the week off was a very good thing as it turned out.

So, Saturday, I was scheduled for a 3 miler. I thought about not doing it, giving myself an extra rest day but was anxious to see how I felt. Three miles were easy but my right leg was hurting a bit.

Sunday was a 10 miler. The wife was going with me, riding her bike and I had to put the turkey in for Christmas dinner so even though I usually go early, I decided to wait till after putting the turkey in to bake and let the wife sleep in. We left the house about 9:30. The temperature was perfect, somewhere around 50 and only a light breeze. The first two or three miles were extrememly rough, my right leg hurt like hell. all the way from my hip to my foot. It felt like when I had the ruptured disk, just painful and weak. I was actully thinking about quitting between the first and second mile but since it quite often takes me 2 to 3 miles to warm up and feel comfortable, I decided to gut it out. I tell ya, 6 months ago I would have just quit and gone home but I've learned that most of the time, something that hurts in the first three miles is going to go away if you keep plugging. So, that's what I did and by the time I hit the end of the first road, about 2.2 miles, the pain was mostly gone. By the time I hit 3 miles and the first major uphill, I was feeling great, running easy and strong. 10 miles slid by with no major problems and although my hips started feeling a little tight by the end, it was nothing like the pain I went thru last week. I think with the rest and a new pair of shoes, I should be good to go for the rest of my training. I've got three more really long runs so we'll see how that goes.

22 miles next week. Should be fun...

Week 11

2005-12-18T14:19:00.000-06:00

Not a bad week overall.

Monday was an off day so I went to the gym, pumped some iron and did some setups. I used to do this three days a week but my running has taken all my time so I try to lift at least once a week now.

When we got home Tuesday, the wife started talking to our daughter-in-law (she and my son live with us). They were talking about putting something together. I was in kitchen and looked thru into the living room and there was one of those huge wire deer things, the kind that bob their heads. Before I go any further, let me say that our attic is already full to bursting with stuff. We probably have 8 boxes of Christmas decorations and tons of other junk up there as well as in the garage and all over the house. I'm constantly tripping over something or knocking something down. Anyway, the sight of that deer and the thought of trying to find a place it just caused me to blow a gasket. I lost it. The wife and I had a short fight (we never fight very long anymore) while I was getting ready to go run and made up before I left but I was still plenty pissed. Consequently, I ran like a madman and overdid it a bit.

Wednesday was also 5 miles but I had this pain in my butt after a few miles. It wasn't too bad but it hurt like hell. I think it was from overdoing it on Tuesday. I finished the 5 without too much difficulty.

Thursday was 8 miles. It was kind of rough, I think I was still feeling the effects of overdoing it on Tuesday and it was pretty cold. I managed to finish so called it a good night.

Saturday was only 3 miles, once again feeling a little out of it but not too bad.

I had a bit of a motivation problem on Saturday. I actually said to my wife, "Tell me why I'm doing this marathon again." Yeah, whatever. There is no chance I'll quit, I've told too many people about it, sometimes it just gets a bit boring and time consuming. I don't think the marathon will be a problem, the training is tough though.

Today, Sunday, I was scheduled for 20 big ones. I was feeling pretty confident after my excellent performance on the 18. The wife hurt her back a few days ago so didn't go along. I got up around 7:20, at a breakfast bar, a banana and drank a cup of coffee. On long run days, I always wait till I do my morning business before I set out and things just weren't happening this morning. It was after 9:30 till I felt confident that I wouldn't have any unfortunate urges out on the road. The temp was about 48 with only a light breeze, perfect running weather. I took off feeling pretty good although somewhat under motivated. 20 miles sure seemed like a long hike. Anyway, I was feeling pretty good for the first half, ran out past Cele and down the road. The wife met me at the 10 mile point with a fresh bottle of Gatorade. I was eating a Clif Shot Blok about every 3 miles. My wind was good and I had lots of energy but around the 7 - 9 mile point, my legs starting hurting. It's not so much my legs as my hips, they really felt stiff and hurt a lot most of the rest of the way. I could relieve it a bit by varying my pace, speeding up or slowing down but it never went away and give me lots of grief. Anyway, I made it with lots of juice left but in lots of pain. Jumped straight in a cold tub of water when I got home, hopefully I won't be too sore tomorrow.

Only two months to the marathon.

Week 10

2005-12-11T18:49:00.000-06:00

Kind of an easy week for the most part.

Tuesday was 7 miles, the top of my foot hurt a bit but I think I'm just tying my shoes too tight.

Wednesday, about noon, a serious cold front hit. By the time we got home, the temp was about 28. Even worse, the wind was blowing about 15 - 20 MPH. I bundled up as best I could but couldn't find my beenie. That's not surprising since I haven't worn it in about 10 years. I think it's with my ski clothes which are in a box buring in the garage somewhere. Anyway, all I had on my head was my running cap. The first two miles I always run around the football statium at the high school by my house. The back side of the stadium is a practice field. Not only is it surrounded by nothing but farmland, it's kind of up higher than the surrounding countryside. That wind felt like it was cutting into me, I was freezing from the tip of my toes to the top of my head. I ran the two miles around the stadium and bagged it, deciding not to take a chance on getting sick.

Thursday it was still cold as hell so I decided to skip Thursday and just do my Thursday miles on Friday. Friday the temp was up in the 40s and the wind had died down. I also found a beenie at Bealls for $10 which really helped. I did an easy 7 miles.

Saturday I had to work in the morning. We put in some new power equipment and I had to migrate all my servers to it. I spent from 8 AM till around 1 PM crawling around on the floor, moving equipment and basically working my ass off. I had to do 6 miles so, since I was downtown already, I decided to go do them on the Austin Hike and Bike trail. A guy I work with had been bugging me to go try it out but I just hate dealing with the logistics of running any place but from home or the gym. The weather was perfect, in the high 60s and clear but I was dog tired from all the morning's labor. I thought a nice run would perk me up but it was pretty tough. The trail is nice, pretty well maintained with only a few pot holes and gullies and it runs right along Town Lake. There were tons of people out and it was nice to see humans instead of cows as is my usual scenery. Anyway, I made somewhere around 6 miles but I was sure ready to stop. I left there and drove straight up to Round Rock for my daughter-in-law's daughters birthday. She is 6 and it was at Gatti Land. A good time was had by all but when the party stopped and they hit the games, I hit the road.

Sunday was 9 miles. I slept till almost 8, very unusual for me. I finally dragged myself out of bed but I felt like hammered horse shit. I was going to postpone running for a bit but it sure is nice to get it out of the way so I just sucked it up, put on my stuff, grabbed a bottle of Gatorade and hit the road. It was rough getting started, I sometimes feel like someone cut off my feet and I'm trying to run on stumps (I call myself Stumpy the Clown at these times) and Stumpy was in full force this morning. However, after a mile or so, Stumpy started to recede a bit and I felt better and started running easier. It was a beautiful morning, somewhere in the 40s with only a slight wind and partly cloudy. The sun was up and everything just felt fresh and alive. These are the kind of days we runners live for, when everything just feels good. Anyway, toward the end Stumpy was re-emerging but I still managed to finish the 9 miles.

The wife and I went to see Harry Potter later in the afternoon. I thought it was far and away the best of the 4.

Week 9

2005-12-04T13:41:00.000-06:00

Good week this week. Last week was an easy week but was bit rough, everything seemed a little harder.

I noticed something on Tuesday. I took off and felt like I was flying, just like I did on Tuesday two weeks ago. Here is the pattern I noticed. Long run on Sunday followed by a light but rough week with a relatively short run on Sunday. Tuesday starts a longer run week but I feel great and the runs are extremely easy although they are longer. I'm constantly amazed at how great this training plan is. For anyone who wants to see it again, here is a link:

Cool Running Beginner Marathon plan

So, Tuesday I did 6 miles with hills. No big hills, just the ones in my neighborhood and I felt great. 4 miles on Wednesday, not as easy as Tuesday but still pretty good. 7 miles on Thursday which I did without even breathing hard. I'm telling you, it's amazing how my breathing has improved. I can easily do 10 miles without ever breathing hard. Saturday was an easy 3.

OK, if you looked at the plan, you know what I had to do today. 18 miles. Say it with me, 18 miles. That's a 20 minute drive in a car. I know there are people who would say "only 18..." but 18 miles is huge for me. I drove my course a few days ago just to make sure the roads were all still there and it seemed like a really long way.

Anyway, I got up about 7, had a cup of coffee, a breakfast bar and a banana. Just kind of putzed around till about 8:30 then started to get the wife moving. She was going to be riding along on her bicycle to carry the extra water and Gatorade. She was almost ready but with gathering all our stuff and getting it on her bike and yadda, yadda, yadda we didn't leave the house till 9:10. It was pretty chilly, somewhere around 50 and a stiff breeze. I debated whether to wear my parka or not but opted to just go with my long sleeve shirt. I started off really slow, not wanting to wear myself out. I started out carrying a bottle of Gatorade and had some Clif Shot Bloks in my pocket.

All in all, it was an excellent run. It's a pretty hilly course and I handled it beautifully. The first 5 miles or so, the wind was blowing across my path. I could feel the cold but I was never really cold. At Cele, which is about the 5 mile point, I turned into the wind and reached the hilliest part of the course. The wind really didn't bother me much, I was running strong, had lots of energy and was still feeling real good when I hit the turn around point at 9 miles. Let me tell ya, it was really nice to turn around and put that wind at my back becasue even though I was dealing with it well, it was still making it's presence known. My hips started getting stiff at about 10 miles and my knee was a little sore here and there but I just kept plugging. When I hit Cele again, my hips were still pretty stiff but I was feeling so good I picked up my pace a bit. The next 5 miles back to the house were mostly uneventful and I was cooking at a pretty good pace at the end. I was extremely pleased with how everything turned out, I've got my eating figured out, I keep a good pace, the hills and headwind were a non-issue, everything is coming together really nicely.

When I got home, I tried something I had been hearing about. I got in the tub and ran it full of cold water to soak my legs. It's supposed to reduce the inflammation quickly and provide for quicker healing. I even talked the wife into doing it. It's tough getting in but once you're in, it's not that bad and even though I was very stiff when I got home, I can tell the difference already. Not that I won't be still hobbling a bit tomorrow but hopefully not as bad as usual.

Week 8

2005-11-27T15:30:00.000-06:00

Light week this week so this will be a relatively short post.

Tuesday I ran a nice easy 6 miles. I laid out a course in my neighborhood and ran in a area I'd never been thru before. The only bad part was that it was after dark and there weren't many streetlights. Luckily the streets were well maintained, no potholes to break a leg in. I did have one moment when a dog I couldn't see started barking and getting close to me but I just kept going and he eventually decided I wasn't worth the trouble.

Wednesday was an easy 5. I was off so went about noon since I had run Tuesday evening.

Thursday was another easy 6, Friday was an off day.

Saturday I did 5 miles and my calves started getting really stiff at about 1 1/2 miles. A short time after that, my right heel started hurting. I just kept going but as I got close to finishing, my right foot started getting really numb and tingly. That has happened to me once before but it stopped as soon as I quit running.

Sunday was 7 miles and I ran my old loop around my neighborhood course. This course is pretty hilly and used to give me fits before I started my training plan. I was out so long one Sunday my wife was about to come looking for me just as I got home. I had been anxious to do it since I have gotten in good shape. My heel was hurting a bit, so much so that I switched sides of the road. I've been told that if you always run on the same side of the road, one leg will get shorter due to the curve of the road and since I always run against traffic (can't have stuff sneaking up on me), my right leg is the one that has always given me grief. Anyway, I finished with no problem. The weather was nice but the wind was blowing pretty hard. Running uphill into the wind is sooooo much fun but I finished in good shape and recovered pretty quick.

I got home expecting to make breakfast but the wife wanted to go to the mall and pick up something. We ended up eating breakfast at a little place here in Pflugerville called El Rincon. El Rincon is a little family place, their tortillas are homemade and they have the best migas on the face of the planet. If you're a local, you probably already know about El Rincon but if you don't, you're missing out on the best place in the hill country to eat breakfast.

Next week should be fun, I have to do 18 miles next Sunday. I just drove my route and whooo doggies, it's far. I can't wait...

Week 7

2005-11-20T17:02:00.000-06:00

Fabulous week this week.

Monday was an off day. Tuesday the wife wasn't feeling good so we went home instead of going to the gym. I was supposed to do 4 miles and that is easy to do from home. I changed as soon as we got home and went outside to stretch. As I finished stretching, I realized I had forgotten to take off my glasses so went back inside. As I came out, I took off running and grabbed my water bottle from on top of the truck as I went by. This small action seemed to catapult me forward somehow and I was off running a lot faster than I usually do. I decided to just go for it and see how I did and man alive, I was flying. 4 miles went by like nothing and it felt so good I didn't want to stop but I'm a stickler for my training plan so after running about a block extra, I broke the compulsion and shut it down. Man it felt good, I haven't run that far that fast ever.

Wednesday I took off at a pretty good pace but not like on Tuesday. About 1/2 way thru 3 miles, I started feeling a pain in my right buttock. I figured it would go away but it never did, just kept getting worse and worse. I made it thru the three miles and limped home but I could barely walk the rest of the night. Well, it wasn't all bad, I did get to walk around all night yelling, "AL, rub my tushie" at my wife. Thursday was supposed to be 5 miles but I could still feel the pain in my ass so bagged it although I really, really didn't want to. I just doesed up on the Advil and tt turned out to be a good thing I skipped Thursday.

Friday was an off day. Saturday was an easy three miles and the pain in my ass was gone.

Sunday was a momenteous day. I was signed up for this event:

http://stampede.motive.com/

Saturday night I was pretty restless. I was plenty worried about running 13 miles after hitting the wall and crashing doing 12. I have to get up early on Sundays to take my daughter in law to work so I decided to go to bed early Saturday night. I got in bed around 9 and just could not get to sleep. I finally dozed off and woke up at 3:30, once again, unable to get back to sleep. The alarm went off at 4:20 so I got up to take the in-law to work. I got back and ate a breakfast bar, a banana and drank a cup of coffee. I got to the race about 6:50 and the place was a zoo. It was also really cold. Without too much useless detail, it was finally 7:30, the horn blew and we were off. It was nice to get moving after freezing for so long. Other than a quick trip to the woods close to the start, I was feeling great, running steady and strong. The course gets really hilly at around 4 miles and continues uphill sporadically for a few miles. The first hill pulled me a bit but the rest felt good, I maintained a steady pace and when we finally topped out at around the 7 miles mark, I knew it was going to be a good run. A few weeks ago on my 12 miler, I was pretty much done when I hit 10 but today, I hit 10 feeling like I could do another 10. I even increased my pace a bit and finshed strong in 2:14:14. It was a little off my 10 minute mile pace and I could have knocked a few minutes off except for one thing. My training plan said I was supposed to do 15 miles today, not 13 so as soon as they got the chip off my shoe, I headed back out to do 2 more miles. Because of a miscalculation on my part, I actually only did another 1 2/3 mile but I could have easily done the extra 1/3 so I'm not too upset about it.

I am so jazzed about this, it's once again the farthest I have ever run in my entire life and I did it easily. That 12 miles was the longest for me too but I didn't feel good about it, it was so hard I somehow felt like it didn't count but today was a good strong effort in an acceptable time on a tough course. All I got to say to that marathon is "Bring it On."

Week 6

2005-11-13T19:15:00.000-06:00

I took it pretty easy this week. I was supposed to run Tu, Wed, Th, Sat, Sun but Tuesday was Election night. I go to work at my normal time on Election night but usually don't get home till the wee hours of the morning. I was going to go to work late so I could get in some running but because of having such a hard time on Sunday and discovering I probably had exercise induced asthma, I decided to just skip Tuesday's run. I didn't get home till 3 AM Wednesday morning and had a Dr appt at 9:30. He gave me an inhaler which seems to work well. Long story short, I skipped Wednesday's run as well. Thursday got away from me but being off on Friday, I decided to do my normal Thursday run on Friday morning since I was off.

Friday I had an easy 6 mile run. Hitting the wall on Sunday made me rethink a few things so I decided to try taking a bottle of Gatorade with me on Friday instead of just water. That worked out really well, I had lots of energy at the end. I ran 5 miles on Saturday and another 5 this morning (Sunday). I tried just water on Saturday but I started out really stiff but it was still a pretty easy run. The 5 miles this morning was pretty smooth too.

Next week is another big test, the Motive half marathon. I'll let you know how I do.

It's election day

2005-11-08T13:21:00.000-06:00

Constituional amendment elections are usually real snoozers but Prop 2 looks like it might get a little attention. Here is the amendment text:

"The constitutional amendment providing that marriage in this state consists only of the union of one man and one woman and prohibiting this state or a political subdivision of this state from creating or recognizing any legal status identical or similar to marriage."

Before I get started with my usual rant, take a look at this little gem. This is not from some wacko like that letter I got the other day, this is from the web site of the Republican Party of Texas and is authored by no other than the Chairman. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that means that it is endorsed by the entire Republican Party. Here it is:

SAY “I DO” TO PROPOSITION 2

How do you respond to logic like this:

But does this really matter to you? Absolutely. Consider the following:

Do you want schools to teach your children and grandchildren that homosexual marriage is normal? Do you want to undergo “sensitivity training” at the workplace to ensure that you don’t favor heterosexuality over homosexuality? Will your employer be able to continue offering health insurance once rates skyrocket as some analysts predict if homosexual marriage is sanctioned? Do you want to continue collecting or be able to collect benefits from Social Security, a system already on the verge of bankruptcy? Do you want to jeopardize your right to religious freedom? Do you want your church or synagogue to be forced to hire people even if they are openly homosexual? These are not rhetorical questions - these are issues that we will face if we fail to defend and protect marriage.

The Social Security thing is a new one. I didn't realize that gay people getting married was going to wreck social security as well as destroy traditional marriage and take away our religious freedom. Man, gay marriage is some really dangerous shit!!

You know for me it all comes back to two simple principles. The first being that any person of legal age should be able to marry any other person of legal age and the second being that any two people getting married has no effect whatsoever on any other two people. If you take away all the stuff that is the real issue with gay marriage (which is going to happen, married or not), two men or two women or one man and one woman getting married comes out exactly the same from a fiscal standpoint.

I'm really pretty tired of this issue to be honest. We all know how it's going to turn out in the end because we've already been here so many times it's not even funny anymore.

It should be interesting to see how Texans vote. I just hope most of them are as sick of the whole thing as I am.

Just so you know, I'm not stupid enough to think we've come that far yet.

I forgot to mention something I found incredibly humorous. The Ku Klux Klan had a rally here a few days ago in SUPPORT of Proposition 2. I just have to say it right out plain and simple, ANYTHING that the KKK endorses is WWW (Wrong, Wrong, Wrong). I just haven't found the right person to ask how they feel about this yet.

Week 5

2005-11-06T14:04:00.000-06:00

Not a particularly bad week, not a particularly good week.

Tuesday had a good 4 miles with Fartlek. I was supposed to run 4 - 5 miles with hills but my long runs are all hills and there just aren't any to speak of where I run during the week so I just did Fartlek instead.

Wednesday and Thursday were 3 and 4 miles, nothing to speak of although they were both tougher than I would have expected. I've been eating a lot of left over Halloween candy and I've felt for a long time that an over abundance of sugar weighs me down somehow. Maybe I'm just in a slump.

Short 3 miles on Saturday, once again feeling rather pooped. We went out to my sister's house on Saturday afternoon and had a very nice time. My other sister and her husband were down from Washington so that was nice.

Today, Sunday, was supposed to be 12 miles. I found an excellent course, out to Cele, make a right and go in a big loop. I got up around 7 and ate, sat around for a while then took off around 9:45. My wife went along on her bicycle to carry some extra water.

November in Texas is like box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get. The past few weekends the weather had been perfect, nice and cool. It has been warming up for the past few days and when I stepped outside this morning, it was probably already in the high 70s and humid as hell. It wasn't too bad when I started because the sun was behind the clouds but about half way thru, the clouds cleared off and the sun started doing it's thing. I started really feeling it about 7 - 8 miles along, I was really struggling. I have to say that this is a pretty rough course with lots of hills. I had carried along three Clif Shot Bloks and ate those. I had to really slow my pace down to rest for a while but the Bloks kicked in and I was feeling pretty good for a bit. That didn't last long and by mile 10, I was going on sheer willpower alone. I felt like I was barely moving and the road stretched out forever. It doesn't help that the last two miles is mostly up hill either.

Somehow I persevered. I just plodded along and finally, it was over. I had actually run 12 miles, the longest of my life. When I stopped running, I had to lean against a tree for a few minues just to get some energy back, I was completely done in. I always stop about a half mile from the house and walk back to cool down. By the time I got home, I was feeling a little better so the wife brought me some fresh water and I walked on a bit. The muscles between my shoulder blades were really tight and I bent over to try and stretch them out. When I did a wave of dizziness crashed over me. I was on the sidewalk so just fell over into the neighbors grass and rolled over on my back instead of eating sidewalk. My wife was with me and almost freaked out when I collapsed. I ended up making it back to the house but then laid on the floor for about 15 minutes till I had enough energy to get up and walk around.

I should be excited about the 12 mile run but I'm still too washed out and exhausted. I did it so that's something, hopefully it will be a little cooler next week.

Pictures

2005-11-02T16:36:00.000-06:00

Here is a link to my pictures from the Pervasive Power 10 miler.

http://www.kreutzphotography.com/default.asp?LOC=%2FKPhoto%2FPhoto%5FViewPic%2Easp%3FDID%3D16%26FID%3D2266%26GID%3D708%26IMG%3D1%26SRCH%3D48%26TYP%3DPUB

You know, I don't know why I post these things, I was feeling great but I still look like death warmed over. Couple that with the fact that since I've slimmed down a bit, I look like Lurch in a tshirt. BTW, that last two aren't me.

This is where you all say how great I look for being older than dirt...

Week 4

2005-10-30T12:19:00.000-06:00

Not a bad week but had a few problems with my knee.

Monday was an off day. Tuesday the wife and I went to the gym and when I stepped on the scales I got a hell of a shock. You see, my "fighting weight" and my target for a lot of years has been 220 lbs. I've gotten close a few times but can never quite seem to get there. Before I started the training program, I was hovering somewhere between 222 and 224. In the last few weeks, I've lost about a pound or two a week but I didn't weight myself while I was in Denver. Tuesday the scale said 216!! I almost dropped my teeth. I've definately been slimming down, my rather prominent belly has shunken considerably but I never imagined I'd lost that much weight. I did a 4 miler with Fartlek that day and had a most excellent time of it.

Wednesday my knee started hurting a little. It's something I have had for a very long time and it comes and goes. I ran 3 miles on Wednesday and it was fine when I was running but hurt and felt swollen when I walked. I decided to take Thursday off. Man that was hard to do, when I get a plan I stick with it but it turned out to be the best idea. I just ice it a couple of times in the evening and take a lot of Advil.

Saturday I ran a short 3 miles. I had to go help my daughter move later in the day which meant a lot of trips up and down the stairs. My knee was fine till later in the day when it started hurting a little but we were over by then so I went home and relaxed. I had to go pick up my son so stopped at Oshmans and bought some new running gear. I got a long sleeve shirt for the cold days, a hat to keep my head warm and some really thin gloves.

Sunday was a really good day. I was scheduled for 10 miles today so ran out to just beyond Cele. I tried out my new gear. The shirt is made out of this really light material that is supposed to wick moisture off your body. It was really comfortable. I also tried out the new hat. I usually spend a lot of time wiping sweat off my face and out of my eyes but didn't have to a single time which was realy nice. I also tried out these Clif Shot Bloks. Normally, the only thing I take with me is a bottle of water. When I'm running a race, I'll occasionally grab some Gatorade but I've never needed anything else. However, I read that when you run a marathon, you're supposed to eat along the way so I thought it was a good idea to try this stuff out while I'm training and find the right thing for me. Anyway, the little fuckers are expensive as hell, $2,49 for a package of 6 and you're supposed to eat 3 - 6 at a time. So I put all 6 of them in a ziploc and carried them with me.

Anyway, I got up about 6:45 and had a breakfast of potatoes and eggs. I took off about 9:15 and felt great. The weather was cool and overcast with a light breeze. I was running easy and strong within the first mile and my knee was twinging a bit but nothing significant. I cruised the first 5 miles and turned around to come back. I had decided to eat three of the Shot Bloks when I turned back. They are like little blocks of Jello and don't taste bad. Eating and running is kind of tough. It's hard not to suck food down your windpipe but I got them chewed up and swallowed without choking to death and had a few swallows of water. I was feeling great at this point but my stomach started acting up a bit after I ate. I started getting repeats and some mild heartburn. I was trying to conserve my water but drinking some helped a bit. Eventually the heartburn faded and I was able to do the last two miles at a pretty decent pace. I'm not sure if those Shot Bloks helped or not, it's really hard to say.

It was a good run. I hope my knee heals up and doesn't start giving me more greif.

Imagine explaining this to your wife

2005-10-27T07:53:00.000-05:00

You paid $241,000 for WHAT??

I guess if you're really rich, 1/4 of a million dollars is pocket change but isn't there some kind of limit? I mean really, how does a person run up that kind of bill in a strip club? I couldn't afford to pay that much for a house much less to have someone rub my dingus for a few minutes.

I'm still cracking up thinking about how this guy with too much money and not enough brains explained it to his wife...

What is wrong with these people?

2005-10-25T07:37:00.000-05:00

OK for the CIA?

Are we that terrified that we just throw everything we stand for out the window. What do these people think they're going to gain by allowing only certain people to break arms and burn people with cigarettes? A better question is where does it stop? How hard is it these days to classify someone a "terrorist?"

I can handle a lot of the bullshit that Bush and his buddies do but we have to draw the line somewhere.

Week 3

2005-10-24T12:35:00.000-05:00

Week 3 was a bit rough. After the race on Sunday, I got on a plane to Denver. After driving around in circles for a while, I finally found my hotel. Pretty nice place.

Monday was an off day so after class, I drove around laying out my running courses. I had to do 4 miles with Fartlek thrown in for good measure. I found a good course thru a neighborhood and another one straight up the side of a rather large hill. Just a note for anyone who doesn't know, Denver isn't known as the Mile High City because everyone smokes dope, it's base elevation is over 1 mile. High altitude is known for a few things, dry air and thin air. A real recipe for trouble to a low lander like me. However, our class instructor gave us a few tips on surviving the altitude so that helped a lot.

Tuesday was a beautiful day, the temp was about 65 when I got out of class and the sky was clear. As soon as i got out of class, I was off and running with 4 miles being my goal. The first mile wasn't bad although I was a lot more winded than I am used to but the second mile was mostly up hill. I struggled a bit but persevered and made the entire run without stopping, even managing to throw in a few high speed intervals. I grabbed a Subway sandwich and spent the rest of the evening watching Law and Order.

Wednesday saw a serious change in the weather but it was kind of drizzly so it was a wet cold instead of the bone breaking dry cold. I had noticed some joggers at lunch so managed to lay out a very nice 5 mile course with some spectacular views of the mountains. Only problem was having to wear a parka the whole time with the hood up. I gotta get me something better to wear on my head, that hood is a total PITA. I did the 5 with not much trouble although once again much more winded than usual.

Thursday was an uneventful 3 miles. I got back to Austin late Friday night.

Saturday was an easy 3 miles but Sunday was rough. I was scheduled for 8 miles but decided to run the 9 or so out to Cele again. I'm not sure what was wrong but it hurt a lot more than it has the last few weeks. Well, it might have been the dozen or so free donuts I ate while in Denver or it might have been that I just didn't feel like doing it. Add that to the fact that Saturday's jalapeno cheesburger decided it wanted to exit with at least three miles to go and you get the picture, just not a good time on this particular Sunday.

You know what, the measure of a man is not how he handles the good times, it how he handles the bad times. Even hurting and with an inpending intestinal emergency, I still chugged along and did my run.

Let's see how I do next week. Gotta remember to stay away from the jalap's a few days before a long run.

Week 2

2005-10-22T12:46:00.000-05:00

Week 2 started out slow and painful but ended in a most excellent way.

This week was another week of 3 miles on Tues, 5 miles on Wednesday and 3 miles on Thursday. Thursday my butt was cramping after I did some curls and felt a little pull in my back. I had a herniated disk back in 1991 and this felt a lot like that. Anyway, my 3 miles on Thursday were a little painful till I got warmed up.

Saturday was supposed to be a 3 miler with an 8 mile run on Sunday. However, part II of the Austin Distance Challenge, The Pervasive Power Charge, was scheduled for Sunday so I only did a short 2 miles on Saturday.

I gotta tell ya, I was worried. The Pervasive gets a lot of hype as a very tough race due to the really steep hills. It's a 10 miler and 10 miles is the longest distance I've ever run in my entire life. The last time I did it was like 1982. Add that to the sore ass muscle and I was plenty worried.

So, I got up really early (4:20 AM) to take my daughter in law to work. I ate a banana, drank some water and left the house at about 6:10 for the 7:30 race. I ate another banana on the way to the race and got there a little before 7. The weather was absolutely perfect, clear and cool. Hanging around before a race is tough, time seems to drag but not today. Before I knew it, the airhorn blew and we were off.

I started out slow and easy. I burned out too fast in the 10K a few weeks ago so I just cruised. The front part of the course is pretty easy, a bit of up and down but my entire training course is on hills so no sweat. At about the 4 mile mark, there is a very long steep downhill slope. Running downhill is rough, very hard on the knees but I took it with no problem. At the bottom is what everyone calls The Wall and for goodreason. It's about 1/4 mile damm near straight up. As soon as you turn the corner, you can feel the drag but I just dug in. About half way up, I had to stop and walk but I kept my stride long and as soon as I topped it, I picked back up running again.

Let me tell you, one of the most amazing things about all the running I've been doing is how fast I recover and I recovered really quick after The Wall. I was pretty winded but within a 1/2 mile, I was running strong again and my breathing had settled down. I took another long steep hill without walking.

The last 4 miles is pretty flat. I passed the 6 mile mark and felt strong and had lots of energy and wind left. I started letting my pace increase a bit, still knowing I had another 4 miles to do but feeling too good to run slow. I missed the 7 and 8 mile markers but knew we had to be getting close. Suddenly, there was the 9 mile mark and I was still feeling great. I started pouring on the steam while counting my steps (it takes 726 of my strides to make a mile) so I could have some left. At a 1/2 mile to go, I was still cooking so poured on a little more, passing several people who I had been back and forth with for several miles, crossing the line with a better overall pace than I did for the 10K. Here are my results.

1:39:45

This was a real milestone for me. 10 miles, tying my own personal distance and crossing the finish line feeling like a million bucks.

This new training plan has been a godsend. It's amazing how just doing things a little different can make such a huge difference.

A few hours after the race, I had to hop a plane to Denver for this class:

Sun StorEdge 6920 System Installation and Administration

I'm gonna have to do my week day runs in Denver at a much higher altitude. Should be fun.

Week 1

2005-10-09T19:52:00.000-05:00

Week 1 of my marathon training is in the books and I'm feeling really good. I ran the treadmill on Tuesday thru Thursday with a 3, 5 and 4 mile run. I finished them all really easy with plenty of wind left. I went on our Saturday for a 3 mile run but the culmination of the week was this morning.

I ran this course:

My house to Cele.

My goal was 8 miles. I thought it was around 4.2 miles to Cele but it is actually 4.77 so I ran around 9 miles instead of 8. My usual course is a big loop which totals 7 miles so I had to add a few jigs to it to get up to 8. As I passed the road to Cele, there was a nice big hill out there just calling my name. I found it too much to resist so decided to break out of my routine route and do something new. It turned out to be an excellent decision. I didn't take off till about 9:30 and the temperature was perfect. The sky was crystal clear, the countryside was beautiful, it was an excellent run all around. I adjusted my pace to be a bit slower than normal according to the instuctions in the training pages so I finished 9 miles with plenty of wind left. My legs and hips were pretty tight when I finished but that's part of it, getting my body used to running long distances.

I had my doubts when I started this whole thing about being able to make a very long run but this mornings performance really pumped my up. Of course, 9 miles isn't even close to 26 but I'll get there if I can stay healthy.

Going for it

2005-10-04T16:29:00.000-05:00

One of my life goals is to run a marathon. That's running for 26.2 miles, all at once, without stopping. In order to get ready for that, I'm doing this as well:

Austin Distance Challenge

I figure if I can do each of those, the marathon should be cake. I ran the first leg of the Distance Challenge this last weekend. Here are my results:

1:00:09

My goal was to knock 5 minutes off my time from the April 10K but I actually added about 30 seconds. I didn't even manage to break 1 hour. I'm gonna blame that damm heart problem I had (which has cleared up) on setting me back. I finished the April race with some energy to spare but I was about to pass out when I crossed the finish line this time. Even after eating some fruit and drinking some water, I had to sit down (or fall down). Oh well, my ultimate goal is to finish the marathon, this can just be a training run.

Speaking of training, I decided I might not be training correctly. I just go run, usually 5 miles Mon, Wed and Friday with a long run on Sunday. However, after my poor performance on Sunday, I started searching the web for a training program and found this one that fits for me.

Beginner Marathon Program

My macho pride was hurt by the term Beginner. "Hell", says I, "I've been running since before they invented shoes, how can I be a beginner?" Then I realized I am a beginner marathon runner since I've never actually done it and the longest run I've ever done was 10 miles. Anyway, it gave me what I need, a formula to build to a marathon on.

Anyway, I'm pumped. There's nothing like a firm plan and a goal to get you psyched.

If I can keep healthy, It's gonna be a good year.

New gadget

2005-09-30T08:11:00.000-05:00

Even though I'm a computer professional and a serious geek, I'm not a gadget freak. I believe in function, not technology. My cell phone just makes phone calls, I've never owned a Palm, I listen to the radio, etc.

Anyway, I'm a runner and I listen to music while I'm running. For a very long time, that has just been a small portable FM radio. I've heard a lot about MP3 players but didn't get it for one simple reason, I thought you had to either buy the music (per song) or steal it, neither of which appealed to me.

Last week I was on Yahoo and happened across their music site. I was astounded to learn that you could download music for $5 a month AND transfer it to your MP3 player. Not on a per song basis but as much as you want for $5 a month. I know I'm probably the last person on the planet to realize this so be gentle, I've always admitted to being something of a dinosaur.

That started me on the hunt for an MP3 player. I only want this to use while I'm running so it has to be small and have a good way to clip it on the wasteband of my shorts. I have had to carry my radio for a while because the belt clip is weak and that is a serious PITA. After buying one that didn't work right and taking it back, I found this one.

MP3 player

The first thing that attracted me to it was the large metal clip integrated into the body. No spring to wear out, just a big curved piece of metal kind of like an old ink pen. The second nice thing was the size, it's really only about as big as my thumb. Of course the screen is tiny but I don't want to watch TV on it, I just want it to play my music. The thing would have to be 5' x 5' for me to be able to read it without my glasses anyway (which I don't wear while I'm running). It also has a battery that charges while it's plugged into the USB port, another cool feature preemtping the need for AAA batteries or yet another device (an external charger) to keep up with.

I discovered something else which, once again, I know I'm the last person on the planet to discover and that is that I can "rip" my CDs and transfer them to my player using Windows Media Player. I have drug my entire CD collection into my computer room and am ripping them one by one. I just grab any good running songs as they go by and sync them to my player.

There are only a few gripes I have about this thing. The randomizer seems rather poorly done. Sometimes I get the same song twice in a row, some songs I never seem to hear but others play every 10th song or so. I need to dig into the menus a little and see if I can fix that I guess. The buttons are really, really tiny as you would expect but I'm getting used to them.

I've used it for about a week now and really like it. I went for a 7 miles run last Friday before I bought it, using my radio and probably got 2 decent songs the whole time, now I get nothing but good music. The only problem is that people look at me weird when I start singing as I run by...

It's about damm time

2005-09-29T07:17:00.000-05:00

DeLay Indicted

Tom DeLay represents everything that is wrong with our political system today. There are two questions here:

Q: Is his indictment politically motivated?

A: Probably.

Q: Is he quilty?

A: Abso-freaking-lutely.

OK, there is one more question.

Q: Is he going to be convicted and held accountable?

A: There is not a ice cube's chance in Hell that will happen. What will happen is that the people who just followed orders will get all the blame and all the punishment.

More to come on this one.

Starbucks in church

2005-09-28T07:21:00.000-05:00

Sorry for not posting in a while. I'm busy as a one armed paper hanger at work which is where I usually do my blogging (you're tax dollars at work, eh).

Anyway, back to the topic. One of the guys who works for me just came in talking about how his church is opening up a Starbucks IN THE CHURCH. His church is a pretty hard line conserviative Christian bunch so this was a little surprising to me, very money lenders in the temple type thing to my simple mind.

On the other hand, I'm seriously impressed with Starbucks' business sense. The whole idea makes perfect sense, having a cup of joe while sitting in church seems as natural as putting cheese on macaroni and should be a whopping success. The church gets the profits, Starbucks sells them the supplies and equipment and gets the Starbucks name in yet another place.

I sure wish I could come up with ideas like that.

California does it first

2005-09-07T08:23:00.000-05:00

Gay marriage again

Lots of good stuff here.

First off, this bill does nothing but take religion out of the picture when it comes to marriage. That is the right thing to do. It simply makes marriage between two people instead of making it based on what they carry or don't carry between their legs.

Second, I still wish someone would explain to me how this affects straight people? It simply says that any two people of legal age can get married. It simply says that any two consenting adults can enjoy the same priviledges as any two other consenting adults. You hear a lot about how gay marriage destroys the institution of marriage but I also once heard that the earth was flat, the problem is that there are no facts to back up either assertion.

Third, WWAD (What Will Arnold Do?). It's gonna be a lot of fun watching what everyone's favorite action hero/governor does with this little nuclear potato.

Lastly, you gotta love these folks who create organizations with names like
The Campaign for Children and Families. There has to be a special place in hell reserved for these self righteous assholes who want to tell everyone else how to live.

This one is gonna be a lot of fun to watch.

BTW, Texas has a constitutional amendment on the ballot for November to define marriage as between a man and a woman. More on that one later.

A Great Day

2005-09-03T22:14:00.000-05:00

As you all know, my oldest son Jimmy and his girlfriend Stephanie made me a grandpa a few months ago. They were planning on getting married sometime in the future at some unspecified date.

Two weeks ago, they announced that "sometime in the future at some unspecified date" was actually Sept 2, 2005. They were planning on just going to the local JP and having a quickie.

Last Monday my wife decided they were going to have a ceremony at our house on Saturday, Sept 3. Nothing fancy, just something simple with a few family and friends. BBQ from Rudy's and our normal party fare were the menu.

Believe it or not, we pulled it off. My wife made the cake and our daughter Jessica and I pitched in and helped with the rest. The wife used to work with a bunch of judges and one of them routinely does weddings, he performed the ceremony for my father and his wife, so he came and did this one for us. The ceremony was truly special, lots of laughter and then lots of tears when they each read what they had written for each other. They really do love each other and Stephanie has been an unofficial part of the family for so long, it was just good and right that they made it official.

The house was full of people with lots of kids, everyone ate and drank too much but no one broke anything or got out of hand. One guy showed up completely wasted but his friends just immediately carted his ass home. I bought 25 lbs of BBQ and about 20 lbs was gone along with a lot of other stuff. We bought way too much beer and liquor but it's not like that is hard to get rid of. Everyone made their way out the door by 9:30 or so, my wife is in bed sleeping it off and I'm just enjoying the quiet again.

So, the Edwards clan just grew a bit and that is always a good thing. Like I said, a great day.

Them crazy Kentuckians

2005-08-30T16:35:00.000-05:00

Out of control

So, the Gov and his cronies are charged with all kinds of political shenanigans. Instead of standing up and facing the music, the Gov just issues a blanket pardon for everyone, even those who haven't even been charged yet. He supposedly did this to "move the state forward" whatever the hell that means.

Talk about some crazy shit, I didn't even know you could do that.

Some people

2005-08-30T11:55:00.000-05:00

Pedophile or not?

Is a 20 year old man, who has sex with a 12 year old girl, a pedophile? Is a 22 year old man who has sex with a 14 year old girl a pedophile? The answer is obvious. There is no circumstance where a 20 year old man can claim innocence because a 12 year old girl simply can't legally give consent.

Why is there controversy in this case? Who in their right mind thinks this guy should be left alone? They should put this child molesting mother fucker under the jail and throw away the key. He literally ruined this girl's life and made her a mother at 14. No child should have parenthood forced on them at 14, it's just that simple. Shit, most people can't handle it at 30, I can't imagine the burden it would be at 14. The fact that he married her is immaterial. The fact that the girls parents are happy about it just means they're terrible parents.

I don't get it, what is wrong with this country?

Some new readers

2005-08-29T13:58:00.000-05:00

My kids were over this weekend for my birthday. I walked into my computer room and found my son Jimmy, he's 28, on my computer. My daughter Jessica was on the other side of the room on my wife's computer. Jimmy said, "I was being nosy Dad and clicked on what you had minimized." It just so happened I had my blog minimized and he and my daughter had been perusing it. My daughter was laughing about my tipping post. So, I sent them off a link this morning.

Maybe it's just me but it will be weird to have my kids reading some of the off the wall stuff I write about. I wonder if my wife will want to read it, she's certainly seen me posting plenty of times and read bits and pieces over my shoulder.

Hopefully they'll register and post comments.

51

2005-08-27T22:06:00.000-05:00

That's right, today is my birthday. I'm the same age as rock and roll. Stevie Ray Vaughn died on my birthday in 1991. I remember when a candy bar cost a nickle and gas was $0.17 a gallon (and keyboards had a cent sign). I was married with children before I ever touched a real computer. I remember the day Kennedy died and I remember when TV was three channels and it went off at midnight.

You know what, even though I'm 51, I ran 5 miles Friday morning. I take care of myself and plan, God willing, to live to 151. I watch what I eat but that doesn't mean I starve myself and eat nuts and grass. Life is to be enjoyed, not just endured. I'm not afraid of dying but I'm in no hurry. I'm a grandpa and I want to watch my grandkids graduate from college and I want to dance at their weddings.

Life is good. 51 is just a number.

Six Feet Under

2005-08-26T21:45:00.000-05:00

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say it was probably the best show ever on TV. It was hard to watch at times but I think that is what made it so damm good, you just couldn't not watch if for no other reason than to see what they were going to do next.

They carried on their unpredictability right to the end. I just watched the ending for the second time and it was just as cool as it was the first time. I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it, just be prepared for something completely different.

I miss it already. I hope Rome is good.

A few gaming articles

2005-08-23T07:48:00.000-05:00

PK Arrested

Several of us, for many years, have predicted various gloom and doom scenarios related to the buying and seeling of virtual goods for real money. I don't think any of us forsaw this outcome.

There are a lot of issues here. First off, this guy was supposedly "cheating". According to the story, he wrote an unbeatable bot and used it to kill people. Tough to prove to start off with but is there such a thing as an unbeatable bot or was he using it just against newbs? OK but if the game allows killing other players and taking their shit, the only thing he did illegally was use a bot. Selling stuff on eBay might be against the EULA but it is a criminal offense? It is certainly a wide spread practice but I don't know enought about the laws governing such things to comment. Let's really fly off into left field, who else is liable? Isn't the company at fault for allowing such activity to happen unchecked? I mean really, if you allow someone to kill people and take their shit, aren't you an accomplice?

I know one thing, this is what we've all been worried about. Granted, this happened in Japan but how long before it bleeds across the big water?

On to happier topics:

Video Games Make Youths Violent, Says Study

Sorry, not so happy after all. Yet another group coming out and saying that video games are bad for us.

A pertinent quote

Kieffer says the research points to numerous gaps that can be filled with further studies on the topic. Among the areas of study he suggests is attempting to determine whether those who play violent games are predisposed to violent behavior to begin with. "I think we really have to get to describing the individuals who are playing the games and see if they're any different from the population," he says. Kieffer also says that a truly complete study would involve research from institutions in multiple geographies to achieve demographic balance.

However:

Based on Kieffer's and Nicoll's findings, the APA drafted a resolution recommending a number of steps to reduce violence in video games.

So, even though they acknowledge that they might be all wet and that other factors might actually be the cause, they go ahead and issue their recommendations anyway.

People get violent WATCHING a soccer game. People tear a town apart because their team WINS a world championship. People get violent just driving down the street. Can we somehow tie that to Doom III?

I'm not going to beat this one to death, it's already been done. I just wish these so called intelligent, educated people would get their heads out of their asses every once in a while.

Yet another rant about the war

2005-08-15T12:38:00.000-05:00

An opinion piece from the NY Times:

Frank Rich

First off, figures don't lie but liars figure. That means that anyone can find any numbers they want to justify any position they like.

That being said, I believe that most of the people in this coutry are sick of the war in Iraq. Now, unless I misunderstand, don't we elect the President to represent us? Doesn't that mean if most of the people think we should do something, shouldn't he do it? If most people believe we should pull out of Iraq, shouldn't we pull out of Iraq?

Let me tell you, as a retired soldier, killing more people doesn't do shit for the people who have already been killed.

A visit in the night

2005-08-15T12:13:00.000-05:00

Saturday morning, I woke up and heard some banging. Our back patio is just outside our bedroom window and it seemed to be coming from there. I got out of bed, went into the kitchen
and could see something moving around in the corner. I turned on the light and the culprit soon stepped out into the center of the patio. It was a medium sized raccoon. I had a large plastic container of birdseed that he was pillaging for the sunflower seeds. He didn't seem to be much bothered by the light and we watched as he pulled up the lid and reached inside. After a few minutes, he toddled off down the center of the yard. I promised my wife I would move the birdseed into the garage.

Saturday night I had just gone to bed. My wife and daughter were watching TV when our little friend returned. They got me up and we watched as our little furry visitor once again made himself at home with the birdseed I had forgotten to relocate. He entertained us for a while then once again, waddled off to wherever he was going.

Well, about 6 AM the next morning, I found out where he went. Seems he went to get his neighbors and relatives. My wife woke me up saying that there were more of them. We couldn't see them very well but as it turned out, there was 6 of the little buggers. They had managed to get the lid completely off the birdseed container and were having a party on the patio. They all eventually trotted off two by two. It was pretty funny how they paired up to leave.

I moved the birdseed first thing next morning. I like little critters but don't want them waking me up at 0'dark o'clock.

Raccoon facts for anyone who is interested.

The Matrix Online

2005-08-14T21:03:00.000-05:00

I was bored with CoH and Guild Wars was a total bore so I stopped by Game Spot (or whatever the store on way home is called) and decided to look around for a new game. After persuing everything, I came across TMO. I know it's gotten less than stellar reviews but I still wanted to try it out and when I saw that it was only $20, I decided to give it a shot.

I've been playing it on and off all weekend and have made it to level 10. I gotta say, so far I like it.

The world is huge but there is a lot to do. There are baddies all over and plenty of missions. The skill system seems very fluid. It's tree based and while I believe there is some kind of cap, it seems like you could just level everything up. You can only load so much into memory at once and you do that at a "hardline" but the skills are still there so I guess you just load and unload them as you like. I've never even come close to running out of money but I'm only a level 10 so who knows.

The crafting system is pretty different. Since everything is technically a program, you assemble things from bits of code. Everything from skills to equipment to consumables are basically built from the same basic structures which makes things a bit easier. I haven't done too much coding, I'm just kicking ass right now and exploring.

It is laggy as hell at times. I'm running at minimum level so that might be part of the problem.

I have also only solo'd, no teams yet. I did get a few invites to a crew but turned them down. I wanted to get a feel for it before hooking up with more people.

Anyway, I'm having fun. I've already gotten my $20 worth.

in a dream...

2005-08-10T09:30:00.000-05:00

the doorbell rings. Half awake, I wonder, "Did I just hear the doorbell?" and doze back off. I hear it again, this time I realize it's not a dream. Who can it be, it's pitch dark outside?

Stumbling to the door, fumbling with my pants, I see a police officer with a flashlight. I feel the special panic only a parent can know once their kids have left home. What Happened!! Who died?? Who had a wreck and lies in some emergency room somewhere??

Now fully awake, I turn on the light, open the door, ask what is wrong. The alarm goes off and my wife says, "What's going on?" from behind me.

"Sorry to bother you Sir but I noticed your garage door was open and the dome light is on in your car. Can you check to see if everything is OK?"

"Sure thing." Great relief, just the garage door.

I go outside and see that the back door of the car is ajar. I open it, see the stupid plastic flowers on the floorboard and realize what has happened.

"Is everything all right?" as he shines his flashlight in.

"Yeah, I was taking groceries out of the car and didn't close the door all the way. I forgot to come back for the last item, everything is fine. Thanks for stopping, have a good evening."

He goes back to his car as I close the garage door and stumble back to bed.

"What time is it?"

"3:33"

It's hard to go back to sleep once your heart has stopped...

Tipping

2005-08-10T07:19:00.000-05:00

To tip or not to tip

Tipping, as a practice, has always bugged me. Not just in restaurants, but in all of the places where people have their hands out these days. Just for the record, I generally tip 20% for even mediocre service at a restaurant.

Let's start with restaurants. Why is a tip based on the bill. Is it harder to fill my glass of water in a high class restaurant than it is at IHOP? Don't greasy spoon wait people work just as hard (or probably harder) than people at a steak place? It just doesn't make sense that the price of my food figures into the amount of the tip.

Now, who decided who gets tipped? If I go into Best Buy and spend an hour with a guy deciding on a washer, I don't tip him (whether he makes commision or not) but if some guy at the airport knocks me down to grab my bag and move it 3 feet, I owe him a dollar. What's up with that?

I know that these people don't make much money but really, whose problem is that? Is it mine or the guy who runs the restaurant. Should I pay $20 for a steak and then $4 for someone to bring it to me but nothing to the guy who cooked it?

Oh yeah, I don't like it when the waiter squats down at my table, who thought that was a good idea? I'm not sure why that bugs me so much but it does. I also don't like a lot of chatter. Smile, take my order, keep my drink full and leave me alone. I'm not anti-social but I'm usually socializing with the people I came with and you're interrupting me. Showing some personality is one thing, being intrusive and annoying is quite another.

I told you so

2005-08-05T11:52:00.000-05:00

Here come the thought police

I said it's gonna get worse before it gets better.

Am I the only one who gets sick to my stomach at statements like this:

Blair said the government also would compile a list of Web sites, bookshops and centers that incite hatred and violence. British nationals involved with such organizations could face strict penalties. Foreign nationals could be deported, he said.

Here's another good one.

The government also was considering a request from police and security services to hold terror suspects for three months without charge. The current time limit is 14 days.

What exactly is a "terror suspect" anyway? This is some really scary shit. They can just pick you up, throw you in the slammer and not even charge you with a crime for 3 whole months. Let's take this to the next step. What happenes to a person's life if they are picked up as a terror suspect and held for three months? Anyone who thinks any of this stuff is a good idea needs to think about your life if YOU got thrown in the slammer for three months because you happened on to click on the wrong web site or wander into the wrong book store.

I think a lot of people support this crap because they can't imagine it happening to them.

Al Queda wants to blow us up

2005-08-05T07:22:00.000-05:00

No shit Sherlock

Let's just start at the top.

Confidential government assessments say that Al Qaeda remains intent on attacking targets in the United States and that suicide bombings are clearly "a preferred method of attack among extremists" in the wake of last month's terror attacks in London.

First off, is this a news flash? Of course they still want to attack us, we're still killing people in Iraq. We're still running around the world telling everyone else what to do. We're still building our nuclear arsenal while telling everyone else they can't.

Now, if this assessment is confidental, where did some reporter get the information? Isn't it strange that this thing is confidental but still leaking certain parts of it? Am I just going all Alex Jones or does this smell an awful lot like the same crap they pulled during the campaign?

A second security bulletin also prepared after the London bombings warned that in addition to setting off bombs on trains and subways, Al Qaeda might seek to derail trains or crash a truck carrying flammable material into trains.

Like I said, if we put cops in the subways, they'll go blow up the mall. No matter what we do, they can still get us. I can't say it enough, no matter what we do, they can still get us. The only answer is to stop making them want to kill us.

And the International Association of Chiefs of Police, with 20,000 members worldwide, has issued new training guidelines to its members advising them to have officers shoot a suicide bomber in the head to avoid a life-threatening detonation.

The new guidelines, which were developed before the London bombings and first reported Thursday by The Washington Post, represent a more deadly posture in dealing with the threat of possible suicide bombers, said Joseph Estey, who is president of the chiefs' association and the police chief in Hartford, Vt.

"These are new circumstances for us to deal with, and this is an aggressive policy to respond to a narrow set of circumstances," Chief Estey said in an interview Thursday. If an officer believes he is confronting a suicide bomber who may be about to explode a bomb, he said, the new guidelines "call for a head shot, which unfortunately is the securest way of disabling someone who may have a suicide device and may try to detonate it."

Chief Estey acknowledged that the shooting death last month in a London subway of a Brazilian man, whom the police mistakenly thought was a suicide bomber, underscored the tragic possibilities if the police make the wrong decision.

For an officer to make a spot decision on whether someone is a would-be suicide bomber "is a real tough question, and there are situations where you're not sure," he said. "But when you're making those decisions on the fly, you have to have the greater public good in mind and try to save other people's lives."

That last statement causes me a lot of problems. Is our way of life now simply a numbers game? If 1 guy can harm two other people, do we just head shoot him in case he's a suicide bomber? Does a running man in a long coat = suicide bomber? This bothers me a lot but I don't have a good answer other than the one I already gave, to stop making them want to blow us up.

It's a scary world we live in. The problem is that there aren't really any good guys anymore.

Creationism vs Evolution

2005-08-03T07:47:00.000-05:00

Intelligent design

First off, the President gets to have an opinion. It shouldn't be a monstrous controversy every time he states it. Of course, since we live in such a contentious time and this particular President has created such an us against them administration, I don't have much sympathy for him. Just for the recod, he's still an idiot.

Intelligent design sounds like a good description of my own personal belief of how the world was created. I believe that God created the universe over a course of billions of years, that he started the process and nudged it along the way. The whole 6 earth days theory is just flat silly in more ways than one. That being said, our current knowledge of exactly how the universe was created is, in my humble opinion, still in it's infancy. We think we know a lot but we don't. I'm sure a lot of people will argue with me but you're wasting your time.

Now, intelligent design is creationism, plain and simple. It says that we were designed by some intelligence. We all know that George wasn't talking about aliens from Zardoz.

So, now that we've got my own personal prejudices laid out on the table, should the concept of intelligent design be taught in school? Should evolution be taught in school and the concept of creationism/intelligent design be left to Sunday school? I guess that depends on what class you're teaching. Creationism has no "science" behind it so it doesn't make sense to teach it in science class. Evolution does have a good bit of science behind it, as limited as it might be in the overall scheme of things. The things we know are science, the things we believe about God are not. The two really have nothing to do with each other, teach one in science class and the other in a theology class. Yes, students need to be exposed to different ideas but not in the same room at the same time.

I don't know why this is so freaking hard. Well, that's not true, it's hard because we have people involved and we all know how fucked up people are.

Atkins goes belly up

2005-08-01T16:38:00.000-05:00

Bankrupt!!

I think they just pushed too hard. It seems like they got a little popular and started shoving everything under the sun branded with the Atkins name. They really went nuts when the old man died. I wouldn't have had a problem with their products except for the fact that they cost 3 times (or more) as much as the comparable normal stuff. You can get a box of store brand bread machine mix for a $1. The Atkins bread machine mix was like $5. To top it off, it probably tasted like baked dog shit but I can't say because it was just too damm expensive.

My wife and I have been on Atkins for a while. We both lost the normal 25 lbs then started putting it back on. Atkins has always made sense to me and it works but it is really hard to maintain. The biggest problem with the Atkins diet is that it's plain fucking BORING!! I love meat as much as the next carnivore but I just gotta have a stack of pancakes or a bowl of spagetti at least every once in a while.

Man does not live by ribeye alone.

This pisses me off

2005-07-29T14:32:00.000-05:00

NOT BigFoot

You know, there is nothing that pisses me off worse than bisons running around pretending to be BigFoots (or is that Big Feet?) Damm bisons have always had a weird sense of humor, running around on two legs and making drunk Canadians think they are Big Foots (or is that BigFeet?) You would think bisons had something better to do...

The Aristocrats

2005-07-29T11:27:00.000-05:00

I want to see this movie: The Aristocrats so bad I can taste it. I don't think I've been this excited about a movie since the first LotR. The only word I can think of to describe my sense of humor is twisted but that doesn't really capture the essence somehow. Not only do I love a good dirty joke, I'm a real student of human nature and love listening to people talk about how they do what they do.

Anyway, this movie might actually be the death of me. I laughed myself stupid at Jackass: The Movie. I might laugh myself into an early grave with this one.

Heading for the Big A

2005-07-28T21:02:00.000-05:00

Saturday morning, someone rang the doorbell. It was the postman and he had a big envelope that was short .23 postage. It was addressed to my wife so I gave him a quarter.

It was an invitation from one of her cousins. It's for a Quinceaneras which is a Mexican/Catholic thing they do for a girl when she turns 15, kind of a coming out party. It's damm near like a wedding, these people spend 1000s of dollars on them. It's a church ceremony then a big party.

As soon as I saw what it was, I knew I was doomed. She didn't say anything till yesterday but I knew she was going to want to go. So I guess you might be asking yourself why this is such a big deal.

Well, you see, her cousin lives in Amarillo. I would rather get a barb wire enema than waste a weekend driving to Amarillo. However, sometimes you just gotta grin and bear it so being the great guy and terrific husband I am, I just nodded and said no problem. So we're leaving tomorrow afternoon and coming back on Sunday.

Pray for me. It's gonna be a long weekend.

Immunity from civil suits

2005-07-28T07:11:00.000-05:00

Guns for everyone

First off, I don't have a problem with guns. I grew up in North Texas where everyone has a gun. I had a .22 growing up and my grandpa gave me a 16 gague shotgun for my 16th birthday. I wish I knew what happened to that .22 but I still have the shotgun. I was also in the Army for 20 years so lets just say that I have more than a passing familiarity with firearms. I must admit I do have a problem with letting someone build a personal arsenal but that is a topic for another time.

That being said, this is not really about guns. I have never understood this kind of legislation. Why do we need a law that says a certain group of people who make a certain type of product, whether that be the pre-gurgitated goop we call fast food or an assault weapon? What is it about these people or these products that give them special status not enjoyed by say the ladder or blender manufacturers, have immunity from being sued? Does the fact that they are a popular target mean they need protection or that they need to clean up their act?

I know our judicial system is a mess but giving people license to do whatever they want and not be subject to the same consequences the rest of us are is just flat wrong.

An interesting saga

2005-07-27T08:33:00.000-05:00

Don't go here unless you've got a few hours

Fat Man Walking

His journal is probably one of the most interesting stories I've read in a while. Good luck and safe travels to Steve and his family.

They've won

2005-07-26T12:54:00.000-05:00

Closing the barn door after the horse is dead

OK, so some nut job sets off a few bombs in London and we spend more and more resources on the off chance someone will walk past a police officer, that police officer will happen to search their bag and it will be the one bag in 20,000 that has the bomb. Here is a quote that really ticks me off:

In Hoboken, Valerie Roedel, a 30-year-old accountant, had her bag searched as she began her trip home to Bayonne on the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail system. "It wouldn't be my target of choice, but it's as vulnerable as any other transit system," she said. "Every little bit helps. Searches are just a new part of the commute."

Fuck that shit. Every little bit doesn't help. Every time we knee jerk over some random event, it makes things 10 times worse. They are called terrorists because their aim is to invoke terror and we are all completely mad with terror. We are so filled with terror that we just blindly accept this bullshit. Isn't it bad enough that our wives get felt up at the airport and we have to walk around in our socks, now we get our personal belongings searched whenever anyone feels like it.

You want the really bad news? It ain't over by a long shot. We've only seen the tip of the iceberg. 1984 is gonna look like a fairy tale before it's all over.

Guild Wars

2005-07-25T19:59:00.000-05:00

I had been seeing the press on this one and decided to give it a try after Janey met one of the devs. The fact that there is no subscription fee made it even more appealing.

I played most of the weekend and made it to level 13 so here is a quick review.

First off, as should ALWAYS be the case, they fixed a few of the constant nags we all have about most MMORPGS.

Logging in takes about 20 seconds from the time you double click the desktop icon till you are ready to play. Logging out is immediate, either select logout and pop back to the login window or click the little X and Boom, back to desktop.

Character creation is not even worth mentioning, one race (Human- YAWN!!), 6 professions, are you a dude or a chick, pick you hairdo and move along. PvP opens it's up a little but more about that later. You start out in happy bunny land and do a few missions then go 2 years into the future after a large devestation has happened.

Death penalty is gone for the most part. Everything outside of town is instanced and you only take a hit while you're in an instance. You lose a percentage of your stats every time you take a death so it doesn't take long to make an instance undoable. Pop back to town and you're back to normal but the instance resets (which means you have to kill everything yet again). The good news is you never lose xp or items or money.

Travel is easy, just open the map, click a town and Boom, you're there. The bad news is that you have to get to the town thru the wilderness or a mission first but to me, that's called playing the game but it can be tough. Chat in town is full of people offereing to "run" people to this town or that one.

There are no servers to pick, you just get 4 characters per account, that's it. 4 characters is not a problem because there is nothing new to do with a different character. Everyone starts in the same place with pretty much the same mission progression. If you love your alts, you're gonna hate this game. However, you get to pick a primary skill at character creation and get to choose a secondary skill set thru a series of missions that lets you try out all the other professions.

Crafting is not crafting, crafting is gathering random crap, salvaging it into materials and and trading the materials for a shiny new axe or piece of armor. Weapons drop but armor, except for shields, does not.

Probably the coolest thing about this game, which I experienced for the first time last night, is that you can make what they call an RP character (described above) and do the treadmill or a create a maxed out, PvP only character. That's right, install the game, create an account, make a fully equipped, maxed out PvP character and start kicking ass. Take note you other game makers, THIS IS THE WAY TO DO IT. No bullshit, no 6 months slogging to level 90, just go kick some ass. There are three different types of PvP, guild, friends or 4 on 4. I don't have any friends so I made a big honking warrior and went into the 4 on 4. I literally just clicked thru the defaults on the character and Boom, there he is. I teamed up with 3 complete strangers, the gates opened and it's balls to the wall. You get to keep fighting till you get defeated and we won 7 straight matches. It's arena type matches, either get the most kills (you res automatically if you die) or annihilate the other team (last team standing wins). So, no more level 50 one shotting a level 30 then spitting on him, everyone is max level and while balance is a myth, it really does seem to be a pretty level playing field. I know our team had a healer, some kind of mage and I believe our advantage was two warriors. Warriors don't seem to be really tanky but they can deal some damage. It was amazingly fun and the best part, it requires no investement of any kind to play.

Back to the normal game play. More of the same ol' thing. Kill monsters, get xp, kill more monsters, level, get a new skill, kill more monsters, get some xp, die, do a mission and kill some more monsters, die, carry this thing to that guy while killing more monsters. One thing they did right here was henchmen. You can put together a group of real people or, if you hate people like I do, just talk some henchmen into going with you. It doesn't cost anything but your henchmen take their share of xp and gold. You get all the drops though. You have absolutely no control over the henchmen, they follow you and attack what you attack. I have to say that their AI is pretty good as is the monster AI. The more intelligent mobs seem to go right for the healer and their healers will run from you. You can also just go into the wilderness alone but you won't last long.

They actually have a bit of a story and it's not too bad. They have small regular type mission and they big complex cooperative missions. The big missions advance the story line and even have little cut scenes which you get to play a part in. I've never, ever played any game, MMORPG or otherwise where I gave two shits about the story and while this is pretty much the same, it's really not too awfully bad.

The other players in this game are pretty much what they are in every other game. Lots of people crowded around in various spots dancing and emoting various random garbage. People fighting, spamming, cussing in global chat. I got an invite to a guild for some reason, must be my winning smile, so joined for lack of anything better to do. They seem like decent enough people. They had an auction last night for some runes (I have no idea what they do) and I heard the guild master talking about kicking some guy for scamming a newbie. Global chat is silent in instances Thank God but you can still hear guild chatter if you chose.

I would give the RP game a 6.5 because of all the things they got right but not higher because, while they did a lot of things right, it's still pretty much the same ol thing.

On the other hand, while I don't know if there is a point to the PvP game (I got some points of some kind), I give it a 9 just on implementation alone. If you're into PvP, give this one a try.

That's about it. I'm sure I'll think of more later on.

Why is this so funny?

2005-07-25T13:10:00.000-05:00

Professional Putt-Putt

In light of Lance's 7th consequetive Tour de France win, I thought I would post about some oft forgetten althletes.

Sorry, I cracked up just writing that. There are a lot of good jokes there I'm sure but just the thought os a professional putt-putt player is enough for me.

I don't know how they do it

2005-07-19T10:07:00.000-05:00

A smack in the face

I was at the gym yesterday. I usually lift weights then go outside to run but the temp was around 98 and the humidity was somewhere in the neighborhood of 3000% so I decided to run on the treadmill instead.

Anyway, the Tour de France was on the TV. They were showing two guys running neck and neck. The amazing part to me was the crowd. There were 1000s of people in the road. Not on the side, behind a nice fence but in the middle of the road. They were't just standing quietly, they were jumping around and waving flags in the riders faces. They would part as the riders got close but they were so close to these guys, it's absolutely amazing to me that this kind of stuff doesn't happen more often. The pace cars and media vehicles were also very close, right on their asses. I would hate to think what would happen if one of them went down, as close as those cars were, there is no way they could stop in time without killing someone.

Even more amazing, it didn't seem to bother the riders. They were focused and just doing their thing.

Ultima Online

2005-07-12T12:37:00.000-05:00

Man, haven't been here for a while:

http://www.uo.com

UO was a big part of my life for a long time, about 4 years if I reckon correctly. I've never had a game last 1/8 that long before or since. Before the Sunsword boards went down for the count, there used to be some UO folks still around but I didn't pay them much attention. UO, in it's pre-Felucia/Trammel days was probably the best game ever invented and still holds a special place in my heart. You actually had to interact with people as people, not just with their powers or abilities like you do in the current batch.

Want a good laugh. Go down to the lower section and read about the EVIL items. I don't have a clue what evil items are but it just tickled my funny bone that evil items are a problem. DUH!! they are evil after all. ROFL...

No real point, just remembering the good old days.

Space elevator

2005-07-12T11:08:00.000-05:00

Interesting

OK, so we make this big long (62,000 miles) wire, attach it to something out in the ocean and a satellite in space and then send an "elevator" up it.

Excuse me... *COUGH*Bullshit*COUGH* Sorry...

I know, I know. I'm open minded enough to know that anything is possible but please, a 62,000 mile long piece of wire? Seems like the elevator would still face all the same problems as a conventional rocket, just having a wire to guide it wouldn't help it escape gravity. I'm not near smart enough to comment on this, I know that but I'm gonna take an "I'll believe it when I see it" stance on this one. Let's see, I'm almost 51 so I'll revisit this issue on my 66th birthday.

I know one other thing too, I sure wouldn't want to be around if that sucker broke...

Poetic Justice

2005-07-12T10:47:00.000-05:00

Guess who??

Man, does this go in the "Be careful what you ask for" category or what? This one definately has me walking around smirking like the cat who ate the canary.

Of course, the chances that anything what-so-ever will happen to him are practically zero. There is no way The Turnip will let his his #1 right hand man go down, even if he is guilty of committing a felony.

Still, it affords me a great deal of amusement that they got caught in their own trap.

More eminent domain

2005-07-12T07:18:00.000-05:00

Not enough

So what if you have to be a slum when the local government can change the rules and declare you a slum anytime they feel like it.

I know I'm harping on this a lot but I have to ask, who besides the obvious benefactors thinks this is a good idea? Everyone from arch Christian far right wing conservatives to tree hugging liberals are in an outrage over this.

I know the Supreme Court just interprets the law but they just got it all wrong on this one.

Wireless hitchhiking

2005-07-08T10:18:00.000-05:00

Wireless hitchhiker arrested

Hitchhiking was the only way I could think to describe this. It's generally called war driving by the people who do it regularly. You drive around a neighborhood with a wireless network equipped laptop and use any unsecured networks you come across.

As a network admin and security guy, I used to think this was totally bad juju, akin to using your neighbors faucet to water your lawn. Well, real life has a way of intruding on our lofty ideals. When I in Washington, the hotel wanted $1 a minute or something like that for Internet access. However, when I turned on the wireless equipped laptop I brought from work, I found some wireless access points within range. I must admit I found the temptation too much to resist given the outrageous rate the hotel was charging. I hitched a ride on the free wireless train every morning to check my email and while I felt a little guilty, it certainly didn't stop me.

Personally, I don't see much difference in what I did and what this guy did. Maybe he was using it to send spam or something, who knows but the end result was the same, we "stole" someone else's bandwidth.

Hopefully, we'll get some clear laws on this soon. I'm not holding my breath though.

I'm confused

2005-07-08T07:27:00.000-05:00

Attack on London

Quite often, the titles I give on my posts are sarcastic to the extreme but this one is sincere, I really am confused. I know I'm going to take some heat but I just don't feel anything about this. Maybe the events in my personal life have overshadowed anything I can feel about someone 5000 miles away but I don't think that's it. I think it's that I hear the exact same thing every day out of Iraq, that someone blew up 20 people in a crowded market or 8 soldiers died in a car side bomb. Is it different because it happened in downtown London instead of downtown Baghdad? Should we care about someone who speaks English more than we should care about someone who speaks Arabic?

I really am confused.

Pictures

2005-07-08T07:24:00.000-05:00

Isabella

Ain't she cute!!

It's a girl

2005-07-06T14:33:00.000-05:00

My oldest son, Jimmy, and his wife made my wife and I grandparents this morning.

Isabella Geneva Edwards was born at 9:58 AM and weighed 8 lb 4 oz. My wife got to be in on the delivery so she was very happy about that.

Everyone is doing great. Pictures in the next day or two.

Eminent domain in action

2005-07-05T11:11:00.000-05:00

An piece about what happened in Pittsburg.

Take a look at Pittsburg

I'll let you form you're own opinions on what this means.

BTW, I think Sandra Day O'Connor resigned because of this issue.

Too funny not to share

2005-07-05T09:17:00.000-05:00

You go girl

I agree. I think it's high time we stopped fucking with the universe.

A tough one

2005-07-05T07:25:00.000-05:00

Time caves

This is a tough call in a rather theoretical sense. It's obvious that Time caved because the corporation was going to get hit with fines so, as is the way of the day, they hang the people out to dry.

To the issue, the press is not above the law, no one is. Well, unless you happen to be someone like George Bush or Tom DeLay or have enough money.

Man, this could get ugly fast. I wish I had more time but I think I'm just gonna say that I'm torn on this issue.

Is the sacrifice worth it?

2005-06-29T07:22:00.000-05:00

Is it worth it?

Our illustrious President asked this question last night. The guy who lied us into this war, who has squandered billions of dollars on it, who is personally responsible for the deaths of 1000s of American military personnel and uncountable innocent Iraqis as well as having no personal stake in this boondoggle answered, "Yes"

You know, every time I hear this jackass say this kind of crap, I remember the scene from Shrek. Lord Farquaad is giving a speech to the knights he is about to send off to fight the dragon. He says, "Some of you may die but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make."

Now, I'm not so blind that I can't see what a quagmire the war in Iraq is. Should we stay or pull out, I don't think there is a good answer to that question. It kind of boils down to whether we stay and kill more people or leave and let more people die. Does killing more soldiers somehow validate the death of the ones who died before them or does pulling out before more die make it more meaningful?

It just chaps my ass that the PTB are so fucking smug and cavalier about all my fellow soldiers coming home in body bags or without their legs and arms.

Various stuff

2005-06-27T07:19:00.000-05:00

Various stuff I didn't feel like making individual topics for:

First off, I need to talk about this guy:

Lance

I'll probably get run out of town on a rail for saying this but God Damm I'm sick of Lance Armstrong. I don't have anything against Lance per se, I'm just sick of hearing his name and hearing him whore for everything from used cars to health spas. The guy rides a bike for a living, he's not working on a cure for cancer. I got nothing against a guy making a living and I would sure take the money he gets but the concept of over exposure seems to be lost on the marketing types these days. Enough of that...

I saw this movie on Sunday:

Be Cool

It's predecessor, Get Shorty, was less than spectacular so I wasn't expecting much. I even took some grief from the family for getting it but hey, that's what Netflix is all about, get a movie you don't want to pay for and if you don't like it, stick it back in the sleeve and move on. Even though the original movie left a lot to be desired, John Travolta's character was an interesting guy and I've got a real thing for Uma Thurman so decided to take a chance.

That being said, we all loved this movie. The story is a bit disjointed but the characters are hilarious. Vince Vaughn is great as usual but The Rock steals the show. Chili Palmer is really the only character from the previous movie, Rene Russo is no where to be seen and Danny Devito has about 10 seconds of screen time so don't expect a real sequel. Anyway, highly recommended for a lot of good laughs.

Truly a dark day

2005-06-24T07:37:00.000-05:00

Misuse of Eminent Domain upheld by the Supremes

In a nutshell, the local government can come in, take anything they want and give it to whoever they want. Oh yeah, first they declare it "blighted" so they can pay bottom dollar for it.

Eminent Domain has always been a rather strange concept to me. Actually, the concept makes sense to a point, the execution has always been flawed. The main flaw is that the government can come take your property and pay you whatever they feel like paying for it. Lots of people take the cash and are generally happy about it but you have the people like the lady who was born in her house 80+ years ago and just doesn't want the money. She has a house and a very compelling reason to stay there. On the other hand, you have a private developer who has convinced some local official to give them the land for a business venture which has no guarantee of succeeding.

It's really disappointing that the Supreme Court has now officially said that money is more important than people.

My Life, part IV

2005-06-17T15:24:00.000-05:00

All right, back to the show.

There is a lot about this time and place a lot of you will never understand. The cost of things for example. A candy bar cost a nickle, a 10 oz soda in a glass bottle cost a dime. No one knew what low fat or low carb meant. Only old ladies drank skim milk, everyone else drank whole milk. The kids price at the movies was $0.35 and I think the adult price was like $0.75. No movie house had more than one screen. Gas was under $0.20 a gallon and cars were the size of a battleship.

It was safe to let your kids run around unsupervised all day and all night. We quite often "camped" out in the backyard but spent the whole night roaming the neighborhood. We never did anything harmful, just wandered around enjoying the night. It's hard to explain what that is like, wandering the streets at 2 AM, unless you've done it.

Anyway, it's around 1965 - 1967. The Beatles and The Monkeys are a big deal. I never liked The Beatles that much but I loved The Monkees. They had a TV show every afternoon and I never missed it. Another funny thing around this time was the 5 o'clock hour. Dad was a big country and western fan and every day at 5 o'clock, some country act had a 30 minute TV show which we never missed. Porter Waggonner had one and that is where Dolly Parton started out.

I don't remember a lot about 5th and 6th grades. Our english teacher used to fall asleep in her chair a lot and she had a nervous breakdown at one point. There was one incident which caused me a lot of grief though.

From 1st thru 5th grades, not much changed, it was pretty much the same bunch of kids all along. Some names I remember, Butch, Kay Cole, Debbie, Mitchell Bias, Phillip Lewis, MC, Peter Bradbury, Kieth, Cody... Anyway, this new girl showed up during the summer between 5th and 6th grades. Connie had blond hair, she was beautiful and I was instantly in love. Add that to the fact that she played the guitar and would occasionally get up and play and sing for the class and it was hopeless. She hung out with a few girls who lived near me and didn't like me much which didn't help the situation. It really didn't matter, I was too shy to even talk to her anyway. So, we're all around 12 and 13 and the hormones are raging. It seems that someone felt the same way about Connie that I did and actually even wrote her a love note which the teacher found and read in front of the class. The fun part was that he signed it "Mr X". Obviously, this was the juiciest thing we had ever heard of in our innocent little lives and it was the talk of the school, who was Mr X. Well, one day in the lunch room or the library, while talking to someone I had my foot up across my knee as usual. I always wore Hush Puppies which have a flat runber sole. Just screwing around, I wrote a big X on the bottom of my shoe. It must have taken all of 10 seconds for the entire school to get the news that I was Mr X. As was usually the case in those days, I handled it badly and vehemently denied it which just gave everyone more ammunition. I caught more hell about that than I probably have about anything I ever did in my entire life. Kids can be really tough on other kids and they worked me over to no end. Toward the end of the year, I made friends with this fat kid named Gerald who, one day over lunch, confessed to me that he was the real Mr X. This is the first time I have ever told anyone, it had blown over by then and no one would have believed me anyway. Besides, I knew how he felt and he was a good guy, I didn't want to put him thru the same hell I had been thru.

I had my tonsels out when I was 12 as well. I remember being in the hospital the day The Munsters debuted. I cried like a little baby.

That's all for today kids, on to Middle School next installment.

Trip to DC

2005-06-16T14:09:00.000-05:00

Because of my job, I got selected to take a trip to Washington DC to attend a technical workshop.

It was, overall, a very nice trip. I took my wife along and since the workshop was on Monday and Tuesday, we left Friday afternoon and got to spend the weekend seeing the sights.

The flight to Washington was mostly uneventful. We flew on Northwest Airlines who decided to stop giving out peanuts and sell a "snack pack" for a $1. We got a drink and my wife had packed some snacks so no big deal, just yet another thing you used to get that you no longer get.

The excitement started soon after we got to the hotel. The workshop folks put us up in The Watergate Hotel (yes, THAT Watergate). It isn't a bad place, just rather expensive. So we get to the hotel about 9 PM Friday night and I'm hungry. I'm hoping to find a little cafe to get a coffee and a piece of pie or something but my wife doesn't want to go out. I remember seeing a convenience store close by so go down, get a few sodas and some cheesy poofs. As I am walking in the front door of the hotel, Condolezza Rice comes out the other door with a group of people. Personally, I don't care for the woman but I have to admit to getting a little thrill out of it. As I come in, I hear a group of people going, "ooohhh, she did this and she did that..." and they sound so much like 10 year old girls who just saw N'Sync. It makes me feel a little sheepish about getting excited but I still went up and told my wife about it.

We got up fairly early Saturday morning and found some breakfast. DC is a very weird place when it comes to finding something to eat or souveneirs or the normal tourist stuff. The breakfast buffet at the hotel was $22 per person so I asked the desk cleark if there was a Denny's or something close by. He looked at me like I had just dropped trou and pointed me to a little shopping center around the corner. We had a pretty good breakfast of croissant sandwiches and headed off down to the Mall.

For those of you who don't know, the Mall is the big strip of federal office buildings and monuments in downtown DC. We started at the Lincoln Memorial. It's a pretty cool place and you can look out on the whole area from there. We next went down to The Wall (Vietnam memorial). That place is hard to describe. I'm sure everyone has seen pictures but nothing conveys the impression of standing in the middle of 57,000 names of the people killed in Vietnam. There were lots of vets around and people taking rubbings.

We then walked down to the WW II memorial and on to the White House. We found out you had to get a tciket for the White House to get in so just took some pictures from the fence and headed for the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. We were originally planning on doing that on Sunday but when we walked in and found out it was free, we decided to go thru. That was an amazing thing to me, most of the stuff was free. I'm just so used to people being in my pocket, I was amazed at how much there is to do for free in that town. We spent the rest of the day at the Smithsonian and then grabbed the Metro back to the hotel. After we found a place to eat, we decided to just head out and ended up following some people to an area on the river and ended up in Georgetown, a pretty nice shopping area and place to just hang out. We wandered around a bit and called it a night.

Got up Sunday and headed for the Capitol, hoping to get in early but found out it was closed. There is no doubt that you are dealing with the government in DC because they roll up the sidewalks at 5:30. EVERYTHING closes around 5:30 during the week and most are closed on the weekend. One of the events we came to next turned out to be some of the most fun we had the whole trip. We were leaving the Capitol and heard music, someone singing Dancing Queen by Abba. We found a big stage at the end of one of the main streets and the street for several blocks lined with booths. When we got to the front of the stage, the music we heard was from some people doing a sound check and on top of the stage was a big banner that said, "CAPITOL PRIDE FESTIVAL." Well, it didn't take long for us to figure out what they were so proud of. As I turned from the stage and looked down the line of booths, the second one on the left was sponsored by "Your Gay Realtor" and the second or third one on the right was covered with the little rainbow stickers. Two guys walked by holding hands about that time and we kind of figured out what was going on. Not to mention that all the little carboard trash receptables lining the street were advertising LD Lubricants. Anyway, talk about a laugh a minute, just looking at some of the booths and most of the poeple was a lot of fun. It's always amazing to me how much people scream and rail against stereotypes but then embrace the stereotype with a passion. My favorite, other than the guy with the "I heart Dick" t-shirt was the tell slender person dressed to the 9s, mini skirt, sequined blouse, poofed up hair and the face of a lumberjack. I know I'm an insensitive lout and I try hard not to be but this one just cracked me up and it was all I could do to stifle the laugh till she/he/it was out of ear shot.

So, we grabbed some food from one of the booths then ended up at the Art Museum. This is a big place and has some very interesting pieces, so many that they kind of blend together. I really like a lot of the stuff but find it hard to understand why some of these guys are considered such great artists. They have the only Da Vinci in the country and it is really beautiful. That was a very interesting afternoon to say the least. We then did a sculpture museum with lots more art till I was completely arted out. Since everything else was closed and she wouldn't make a decision as to what she wanted to do, I took us down to Arlington Cemetary. It was right at 5:30 when we walked up the road to the cemetary and the guard atopped us and told us it was closed but that Iwo Jima was still open. He gave us directions which took us around the outside of the cemetary. It was warm but a nice walk. The number of graves as you walk along is staggering so it was a rather quiet, reflextive walk. After a few misadventures trying to find a bathroom, we found the Iwo Jima monument. This place is special to me because my Dad was there when they raised the flag. The monument is a lot bigger than I expected and the detail is strking, it is a very moving monument. We were pretty tired by this point so found a place to eat and headed back to the hotel.

Monday I had to go to the workshop and my wife was on her own. She ended up back down in Georgetown and I met her there for supper. We wandered around a little but made an early night of it.

Tuesday I had to work again and she went to some of the old house in the Georgetown area. We headed back down to the Capitol as soon as I got finished but you have to get a ticket early in the morning to get in. We opted instead for the Library of Congress which ended up being a good choice. It is a beautiful place, lots of statues and art work.

We flew out on Wednesday and other than a stewardess who felt compelled to use the intercom every 5 freaking minutes, it was an uneventful trip back.

All in all, a fun time.

Greedy bastards

2005-06-08T14:20:00.000-05:00

and liars too

I wish one of these guys would just come up to me and say, "We are trying to suck every penny out of you we can. Consequently, if we could charge you extra for the air in the threatre, we would do that too."

I think I could handle that. We might be able to negotiate some arrangement if they were just honest about their greed but lying about it just pisses us normal people off.

That is why it costs you $5.50 to get in a movie and you can't bring in your own snacks or drinks. Charge me a $1 to bring in my own stuff but at least give me some options.

I've said it before, things are going to get a lot worse before they get any better.

My life, part III

2005-06-06T16:11:00.000-05:00

I've only got about 30 minutes so this installment is gonna be short.

I think I need to talk a little about about the best friend I ever had in my whole life. It seems like he showed up about the 3rd or 4th grade. His name was Keno. He was half Doberman Pincher and half Boxer. Dad told me not too long before he died that Keno was actually half Pit Bull, not half Boxer but I once found a picture of a Boxer that was the EXACT same color as Keno, in fact looked exactly like him except for the face. Keno had the face of a Doberman and the body of a Boxer and was this reddish brown color. He was without a doubt one of the most beautiful creatures I ever laid eyes on. We got him when he was just a little tiny puppy and he was supposedly my sister's dog but in my heart, he always belonged to me.

Keno and I spent a lot of time together. He went everywhere with me except to school. When there was no one else to play with, I played with Keno. He could be scary looking but all the kids I hung around with knew and loved him. He was extremely intelligent and always gentle with me but he didn't play well with other animals. For some reason, he hated poodles with a white hot passion and it was a real challenge to hold him back when one came into sight. I once took him to a dog show at the park and he got in a fight with every other dog there. They actually gave him a ribbon for being the meanest dog, a fact I wasn't too awful upset about. I was a pretty timid kid so having the meanest dog wasn't a bad thing. He loved riding in Dad's pickup and could jump in the back without putting down the tailgate. Dad always called him out when we got close to home and he would race us. Watching him run was an incredible experience.

Keno lived to be about 15. He'll show back up occasionally as we go thru the years.

Back to 4th grade. I think it was 4th grade when I fell in love for the first time. I guess I was about 10. I'm an incurable romantic, I was always in love with some girl. I believe that so much of how we are is built in from birth, I was destined to be in love a lot but unfortunately, seldom have my affection returned. The problem was a crippling shyness, something I still haven't completely overcome. No one who knows me believes this little fact but it's true. Even when a girl showed interest, I was too timid to pursue her so spent a lot of time pining after this girl or that one. I never had a real girlfriend till I went to college.

Anyway, my first that I remember was named Julie. She was blond, always wore her hair in long braids and had freckles. She was always nice to me, not something I was used to, and there was just something about her. I can still see her face like she is standing front of me.

I'm out of time so on to 5th and 6th grades in the next installment.

My life, part II

2005-06-03T19:55:00.000-05:00

I have a few vague memories of the farm. I remember pigs circling the house on a rainy day and us all watching them out the kitchen window. I think that might have been a dream. I remember turkeys...

My first real memory, one that I am sure of and know actually happened was on the day we moved into our new house in town. That was also the day I met Charles Russell, the kid who was to be, for at least the next several years, my best friend.

Our new house was here: 1307 Sunnyside Lane. Let me talk a minute about this place. If you could draw the perfect neighborhood, it would be the neighborhood surrounding 1307 Sunnyside Lane. The highway wasn't there at the time, neither was the houses to the south of it. That whole area was just mesquite thickets populated with rattlesnakes, rabbits, owls and all sorts of other strange and wonderful creatures. The large open area to the north is Lamar Elementary school and the surrounding play ground. I walked to school every day from 1st thru 6th grade because that's what people did back in those days and because it was like 3 freaking blocks. There were kids everywhere, most my age, some older, some younger but kids everywhere. Not all of my childhood was wonderful as you will see but the times I spent roaming that neighborhood hold some very fond memories for me.

Back to our first day. I don't remember going out but I remember I was in the back yard. There was another kid in the next yard and he was doing something at the fence. I remember something about a frog in a hole. I was a few days shy of 6 years old. Charles was a few months older than me. We were best friends for most of my childhood. I'll talk about why our friendship ended later. The Russells were a good bunch, they had an older daughter and a younger son as well as Charles. Mr. Russell was a postman and Mrs. Russell worked at a downtown department store. Charles and I spent a lot of time together, we spent the night at each other's house most weekends. Charles wasn't a big kid, just a normal guy. He had kind of sandy blond hair and I can't really see his face any more. I kind of see Robert Redford when I think of Charles. Anyway, he was a brain, I wasn't. Neither of us were very good at sports, he taught me how to play chess and always beat me. I still never haven't gotten very good at that game. We spent a lot of time roaming the neighborhood, just being kids. We both got into Cub and Boy Scouts, I still remember the day he made Eagle Scout. I barely made First Class.

So, I started first grade soon after we moved even thought I wasn't supposed to. I think you had to be 6 by the 25 of August but I missed by a few days but my parents talked my way in somehow. My first grade teacher's name was Mrs Borden. She was one of those sweet old white haired ladies who probably should have retired before I was born. She didn't teach us shit, just kind of napped in her chair. Consequently, 2nd grade was rough for me. Ms Carr was a fairly young lady conparitively speaking and she expected you to perform. Back in those days, you made the grades or they flunked you and your parents expected it and supported it. Kids didn't act up in school because a teacher would take you out in the hall and smack your ass or even worse, send you to the principle and let him do it with a big wooden paddle. That sounds barbaric these days, I know, but kids knew their place and kept it. You didn't smart off to someone twice your size when you knew they could take you and beat the shit out of you. Somehow, I made it thru 2nd grade with my class. 3rd grade was not much problem except my teacher was a mean old bitch. Her name was Ms Phillips. She was one of those big square women with the tight white bun. I can still see her to this day. If you acting. up or were talking, she would sneak up on you, grab you by the shoulders and shake your teeth out.

4th grade things changed. 1st thru 3rd grade were all in the same room with the same teacher. When you got to 4th grade, you changed rooms for different subjects. You went as one class in a big long line but you had a bunch of different teachers. I don't remember most of the names but I can still se a few faces. Our music teacher was a young, pretty lady. I remember one day we had to get up and sing in front of the class solo. Everyone was freaking out and this red headed kid named Eddie took out his pocket knife and sliced his thumb open to keep from having to do it. He sat right by me, I watched him do it. He got to go home for the rest of the day. I do remember our art teacher, Mrs King. She reminded me of Endora on Bewitched and we all thought she was a real life witch. She loved little girls but hated little boys and she was a mean old bat. I was sick a lot that year to avoid her. There was one man teacher in the whole school, can't remember his name but he whupped my ass one day for carrying my books on my head "like a Zulu."

Two dramatic things happened that year. This was about 63/64 and some of you can guess what one of them was. I was coming back from lunch and as I walked into music class, someone said President Kennedy had been shot. They said he had been flying over Dallas and someone had shot him thru the bottom of the plane. The only real effect this had on me was his stupid funeral was the only thing on TV for THREE WHOLE DAYS.

TV, there's a whole subject by itself. Back in those days, TV was it as far as electronic entertainment was concerned. We had three channels, ABC, NBC, and CBS. They stopped broadcasting around midnight. The TV was ALWAYS on but most kids didn't spend much time in front of the TV if the weather was pretty. There was too much to do outside. We did spend every evening in front of the tube. I loved Saturday mornings, I would get up real early and watch the Bowery Boys, Rin Tin Tin, The Lone Ranger, Sky King, My Friend Flicka, all real life adventure type series, mostly westerns. Cartoons on Saturday didn't start till around 1965 or so but once they started, they went gang busters. All the old dramas just dried up and blew away. I'll have to come back and revisit the whole vintage TV thing some day, there is way too much for this particular thread.

I went to the moves a lot. Tarzan was a big deal back in those days. Johnny Weismuller, the real Trazan that is. It's really funny to think about now but you could go out in the back yard and do a Tarzan yell and kids all the way up and down the block would start picking it up. Monster movies were all the rage. King Kong, Godzilla, all the cool ones as well as The Mummy, The Creature, Dracula, etc. There was always a cartoon before the movie too. I'll never forget how pissed I was the first time a movie started with no cartoon.

Second thing that happened in 64 was a monster tornado that blew thru Wichita Falls. It tore the hell out of Sheppard Air Force Base. We could actually see it even though it was miles away.

Mom and Dad both worked. It wasn't unusual for both parents to work back in those days. Mom worked as a secretary at a place called Cox Drilling and Dad, bless his heart, owned a string of bars. Not fancy nightclubs, bars, dives, juke joints, places you could just as easily get your head busted as get a beer. His first place was called Bill's Elbow. It was right on the edge of the bad part of town. I never remember going there but he soon sold that place and moved a little closer to downtown. This place was called The Hideaway and I spent a lot of time there on the weekends. I got to know a lot of the regulars and saw some wild stuff. I followed my Dad and a guy out the door one day. Dad didn't see me till he grabbed this guy by front of his shirt, doubled up his fist, stuck it in the guys face and said, "Where's my money." The other guy was about to piss himself. Then Dad saw me and told me to go back inside. I went. My Dad learned how to fight in the Marines. He was a nice guy to his patrons but he didn't put up with no shit. I remember the day Dad ended up in the hospital with a broken jaw because some drank had smashed him in the face with a beer bottle. He told me stories about having a gun pulled on him three different times. That being said, the bar was a fun place. I could play pool or shuffleboard all I wanted, most of the drunks were pretty cool guys and they treated me really good. One place had a train track about 10 feet out the back door and I would go out and watch the trains go by. There were always bums in the open cars, I always wondered about what their story might be.

My Dad was a fisherman. That was what he liked to do for fun so pretty much every weekend we would go fishing. Most of the time, just off to a favorite small lake in Nocona or St Joe, sometimes out on the boat in Lake Wichita. He always had a boat and loved tinkering around with it. Various extended family members would come along as well. My grandmother was quite a fisherman and would quite often tag along. My grandfather didn't care much for fishing so seldom came but Granny was always there. She was a hefty gal and always wore those old farm dresses. Inevitably, you would be fishing and look up and there would be the south side of a north bound Granny bent over the minnow bucket or tackle box. Thank God she also always wore a slip and all those other undergarments ladies wore in those days or I might be more fucked up than I already am. Granny was a great old lady. My sister and I would quite often spend the night at her place. They had a small farm just outside of town with a small pond and a horse. They had feather beds and these big quilts, you climbed in and it felt like sleeping on a cloud. Granny made the most incredibly awesome pancakes in the world, they had a little crispy ring around the outside and you could use all the butter you wanted. Their garage was part sand and was full of ant lions. I would spend hours playing with these things, they are really fascinating creature. Grandpa had been a rancher all his life but just got old. He didn't say much but when he did you better listen. He was a cool guy but I never got very close to him. Him and his brothers all chewed tobacco. Not that shredded pouch stuff but the stuff that came in what was called a plug. It was a hard compressed little brick that you cut a chunk off of with your pocket knife. He always drove a pickup and there was always a 1 gallon coffee can on the hump. It had a papertowel in the bottom and was usually about 1/4 full of tobacco spit. Heaven help your ass if you kicked over the spit can.

Man, I've only made it to the 4th grade. The more I type, the more I remember and the more I want to say but I've been at this one part for two hours. We'll pick up where we left off in Part III.

My life

2005-06-03T15:47:00.000-05:00

I'm going to try to chronicle my life over the last 50 years. This is probably going to be boring but I want to try to capture some of the people and events in my life, this seems to be as good a place as any. Another important note, this is a real life, not some movie thing. There is no one who is completely evil or completely good so you might get something on you if you follow the story.

This will go in installments as I get time.

So, there was this lady named Helen Stubeda living in and around Philadelphia, PA. She was a working girl, something clerical as I remember, and liked to go out dancing on the weekend. Helen was around 27 when she met this dashing young car salesman named Bill Edwards at a dance one night. Bill was from Texas, fresh out of the Marines and could talk the bark off a tree. I don't know much about their courtship or even how long it was but somehow, they ended up married. Bill (henceforth known as Dad) once told me that Helen (henceforth known as Mom) was a virgin when they got married and that he married her because that was the only way he could "get in her pants." Dad liked to drink but more about that later.

So they got married in early September of 1953. It wasn't too long after they were married, maybe 5 or 6 months, that Mom found out she was preggers. Those first few months must have been tough because Mom once told me or my wife, can't remember which, that she was extrememly pissed when she found out she was pregnant because she was planning on leaving Dad. Dad liked to party but more on that later.

So, we have the stage set for the arrival of your truly. Isn't this a happy little situation we find ourselves in. I know what you must be thinking but none of this really ever bothered me. I was always pretty perceptive and able to realize when things weren't really my fault or, for that matter, my problem. Maybe my parents helped me learn that.

A little more on Mom and Dad. Mom was a pretty conservative gal. It doesn't surprise me that she was a virgin when she got married. My Mom had a great sense of humor and was a wonderful mother but she had a few blind spots as we all do. She saw the world in black and white and if you looked in the dictionary under tightass, she would have a full page ad. She was always there for us, always. My dad on the other hand was everyone's best friend. If there was a party, he was there. If he felt like partying, you best get out of his way cause a partying he was going. A doctor one time described him as a compulsive alcoholic. When the compulsion hit, you might not see him for several days. To be fair, as far as I know, he always provided for us. We lived a comfortable middle class life, we always owned our own home, always had two cars and plenty to eat. He took what he saw as his family obligations very seriously and he loved us a great deal. He was just what you might call a free spirit. He made a lot of mistakes, he set a lot of bad examples for me but I can still honestly say he was a good father.

August 27, 1954 saw me, a bouncing 9 lb, 9 oz baby boy enter the world. My Mom and Dad agreed not to name me after a relative (probably because they couldn't agree) but Dad pulled a fast one on her. Dad's stepdad's name was Elmer Bradford. Well, what Mom didn't know till later was that his real named was James Elmer Bradford but he went by Elmer. They named me James.

Naturally, I don't remember much about those years. I used to hear a lot about a "little house in Maple Shade". I'm guessing that is this Maple Shade. My sister, Debra, was born a few years after me. Somewhere along the line, my Dad convinced my mother to move back to Texas. He promised her that they would go there for 6 months and come back if she didn't like it. No one who knows my Dad belives he had the slightest intention of ever returning to PA under any circumstances. When we got back to Texas, my Dad tried his hand a farming for a while but that didn't work out so we moved into town. There begins my first actual personal memories and that is where we end the story for today.

Cell Phones on planes

2005-06-03T07:21:00.000-05:00

STFU

On one leg of our flight to Hawaii, there was a group of teenage girls, all dressed in the same tshirts. A middle aged lady I assume was their group leader was seated right behind us. For the entire flight, at least one of the girls, sometimes more, were hanging over our seats yacking with this lady. They were loud and didn't seem to care about anyone around them and their leader just joined right in. Add to the fact that she had a loud, obnoxious laugh that could curdle milk and you can imagine what that flight was like.

When my wife and kids came to Germany (I was already there) in 92, my son got up to go to the bathroom and the guy next to him took the opportunity to put up the arm rest and lay down in his and my son's seat. When asked to move, he refused. My wife had to get the stewardess who had to threaten the man to get him to give my son back his seat.

The point is that cell phones are not going to turn nice people into assholes or assholes into nice people. Assholes will find a place and time to asshole, cell phone or no cell phone. I view cell phone usage just like I view cigarette smoking, talk on your cell phone all your want, just don't include me (or run me down with your car). A quiet conversation on a cell phone is no different than a quiet conversation with your seat mate.

I do have a problem with the whole thing though. I don't think it's really worth all the trouble they are going to have to go thru to make it work. There are so many other things you could do to make air travel more comfortable, why are we so worried about someone who can't talk on their cell phone for 2 hours? What percentage of air travelers need this service, 10%?

We get so wrapped around the axle on this kind of stuff, it's really kind of silly.

Women drivers

2005-06-02T12:02:00.000-05:00

Here's the story. We'll all wait here while you go read it.

Not what you expected.

To be fair, I can certainly understand a total, all consuming fear of women drivers but come on, surely you can come up with something better than "they might meet men."

OK, let's be serious here. There is one group of people who need to pay particular attention to this story. That would be anyone who DOES NOT believe in the seperation of church and state. Women can't drive in Saudi Arabia because the government is run by a religion, not by the people.

Imagine the same thing happens here, that religion gets a greater and greater hold on the Government. Now imagine that it's NOT your religion that gets control.

If you don't get it now, you probably never will.

Getting old is a bitch

2005-06-01T15:06:00.000-05:00

About a month ago, while I was training for the race, I suddenly noticed a pain in my chest when I took a deep breath. I let it go for a while, it didn't hurt much at all, thinking I had just injured myself because I was training so hard but it not only didn't get better, I started to regress in my running abilities, having less and less energy so I went to the doctor. After blood work and a chest xray came back normal, they did a CT scan which also came back mostly normal except for a few enlarged lymph nodes. They also sent me to a heart doctor today. They did an ultrasound of my heart - pretty cool to watch your own beating heart - and found out I have this:

Pericarditis

The guy said to just take Advil for a few days and it should clear up. I have to go see him again in two weeks. It's really annoying not to be able to go running or work out, I hope this clears up soon.

Deep Throat, traitor or hero?

2005-06-01T12:57:00.000-05:00

So we all now know the identity of Deep Throat, the famous Watergate informant. Seems a few of the guys he and the Post guys took down are crying foul.

Pat says, "Traitor"

I guess those of you who know me can figure out how I'm going to respond to this.

Fuck Pat Buchanan, Fuck G. Gordon Liddy and fuck anyone else who was involved and got caught. You whiny little bitches need to shut up and crawl back under the rock you came from.

These people have simply forgotten what it's all about. Everyone at the upper levels of government have forgotten what it's all about. Mark Felt knew what it was all about. What it's all about is loyalty and doing what is right. Not loyalty to a man, not loyalty to a President or an administration, not loyatly to a bunch of corrupt assholes who can't see past the end of their own ambitions but loyalty to the country, loyalty to the truth.

Maybe if we had a few more people who had the courage to stand up and tell the truth, we wouldn't be in the sorry mess we're in today.

Amazing...

2005-05-31T16:43:00.000-05:00

Isn't it amazing how some people just never change...

Opie

It's over, someone turn out the lights

2005-05-29T15:26:00.000-05:00

Free speech is dead

I guess MTV sold out a long time ago but this one makes it official. I'm at a loss for words...

Lame Wars, Revenge of the Lamers

2005-05-29T15:18:00.000-05:00

Lame. That's the only way to describe the latest George Lucas debacle. Nothing could save this movie. Everything stunk starting with the two pieces of wood they used for stars, a script that had to be written by a 5 year old, and action sequences that just didn't cut it. Even Sam Jackson managed to be lame, how bad a director do you have to be to pull that off?

I should sue George for wasting my time.

Thank God it is finally over.

Thanks Janey, youre a peach

2005-05-27T12:59:00.000-05:00

My blog has needed a little help for a while now. For some reason, the stuff on the right kept sliding down to the bottom. Maybe it was tired, who knows.

Janey volunteered to fix the formatting and, as you can see, made a big difference.

It's sure is cool to have smart friends. Anyone want to help me with my yard work:)

My world view

2005-05-26T13:03:00.000-05:00

A pretty neat quiz but obviously flawed. Here are my results:

You scored as Modernist. Modernism represents the thought that science and reason are all we need to carry on. Religion is unnecessary and any sort of spirituality halts progress. You believe everything has a rational explanation. 50% of Americans share your world-view.

Modernist

69%

Postmodernist

69%

Materialist

63%

Idealist

56%

Cultural Creative

44%

Existentialist

44%

Fundamentalist

38%

Romanticist

25%

What is Your World View? (updated)
created with QuizFarm.com

I believe in God but I also believe that everything can eventually be explained by science. God and science don't have to be mutually exclusive concepts.

They just don't get it

2005-05-26T11:25:00.000-05:00

Poor ol' Rummy

Maybe if we weren't invading other countries, imprisoning their people and making them play naked pyramid, and doing all the other nasty things we Americans seem to have a dedication to, the press would find someone else to pick on. They can't seem to understand that people hate us because we not only carry the biggest stick, we use it whenever we feel like it, on whoever we feel like. They hate us because we just flat don't play fair. We expect Americans to be treated one way but we treat everyone else exactly the opposite. We whine about 9/11 while blowing up 50 times more of their people.

To the whole Koran down the toilet thing, does anyone really believe that someone who would attach eletrodes to a man's Johnson would have any qualms about desecrating a book?

As to whether Newsweek should have printed an unsubstantiated story, that's a subject for a whole other rant.

Too funny for words

2005-05-25T13:55:00.000-05:00

Two new Darwinites

I think it went something like this...

Knucklehead 1, "WOW, Star Wars was sooo cool, hey pass me another brew. How many we got left anyway?"

Knucklehead 2, "Here ya go, think I'll have one myself. Damm two cases gone already. Yeah, man I love those light sabers."

Knucklehead 1 looks up, "Hey, these light tube things look kind of like light sabers."

Knucklehead 2, "Yeah, I bet they make them glow by filling them with petrol."

and the rest is history.

I know that people getting horribly burned is not supposed to be funny but two people taking a piece of glass, filling it with gas and then smacking them together is just too much for this reporter.

There is probably a special place in Hell I'm gonna have to do some time in for not feeling sorry for these idiots.

Sold!!

2005-05-24T16:17:00.000-05:00

Scrub Robot, Scrub

We tiled our entire house a few years back. I like it but the floors, especially in the kitchen, are alway dirty. I'm no male chauvenist pig but scrubbing floors is just not high on my list of thing to do when you want to have a good time and my wife feels the same way.

One of these things would easily be worth a few hundred clams.

Eat Beef, the government says so.

2005-05-24T12:13:00.000-05:00

Eat Beef

Am I the only one who finds it rather bizarre that the government is behind the whole Beef, It's what for Dinner campaign? My simple mind has a hard time comprehending why the government is pushing beef. I can understand the whole "Don't do Drugs" and "Go Vote" kind of stuff but "Eat Beef" just doesn't seem very governmental to me.

OBVIOUS JOKE WARNING

I guess they have been pusing pork so long that beef got jealous or something.

What's really hilarious is that they not only created it, they are making the beef ranchers pay for it whether they want to or not.

The pot calling the kettle...

2005-05-24T12:00:00.000-05:00

Trial Begins in Washington Over Election for Governor

So, seems like the Republicans lost one so they are taking it to court claiming the Democrats "stole" the election.

Well, if nothing else you gotta admire their sheer audacity. The Republicans stole the whole country not once but twice and now they are complaining about Washinton state. The depth and breadth of the dirty tricks they pulled in this last election boggles the mind but because it didn't quite work in Washington, they are crying foul.

I feel sorry for my brethren in the Washington SOS office, they must be going thru pure hell right now.

Some stories require no comments

2005-05-23T15:55:00.000-05:00

No Space Billboards!!

Ahh what the hell, blogging is all about flinging about useless bullshit so here goes.

I guess I'm glad that the guv'ment is watching out for us poor old eathlings but this sounds a little too Spiderman vs Superman to me. You gotta wonder who decided this was a problem in the first place. I can just see it, a bunch of FAA guys sitting around drinking beer and looking at the sky when they start playing what if and BAMM, Monday morning we have a crisis about space billboards.

To be honest, a space billboard would probably piss me off a lot more than a space laser would...

Game grouping, part II

2005-05-23T12:40:00.000-05:00

Well, three good groups in a row, you know there had to be a bad one in the near future.

Friday afternoon I'm tooling along headed to a mission when I get a tell asking if I want to be in on a 38/39 level group. I say, "Sure" and join up. You gotta have high hopes for a group where the guy sends a tell first even though I had my "I'm looking for a group" light off. I hate blind invites and ALWAYS refuse them unless my "Looking for a group" light is on.

Anyway, we finally get the group together and jump in. The tank, a guy named Forbiden Knight... Hold on a minute and let me rant about names again.

I'm a name nazi, no two ways about it. Maybe it is a character flaw but I would never be able to run around with a misspelled name simply so I could have the name. Misspelling as a pun or with a purpose is one thing but simply misspelling your name because you're too stupid to come up with anything else is just wrong.

Back to the story. So, we get in the mission and, before we all even zone in, the tank says, "Can I go?" and without another word, starts gathering mobs. We all try to follow and support him and kill the first batch when he says, "I was gonna herd." So we all stand back and let him go off and do his thing and he gathers a batch, we all kill them, etc. This goes on for a while till he gets in a room with about 40 mobs and starts yelling for help. I manage to get in and start blasting but the doorway soon becomes clogged with monsters and no one else can get in. It doesn't help that we're fighting DE either, those things are monstrously hard anyway. So, we soon start dying and the tank, who cornered himself in a room where no one else can get to starts cussing out the healers for not healing and whining about how high his debt is.

Anyway, we finished the mission (I took two deaths myself) and I make an excuse to part ways. Nothing I hate worse than someone who screws up then blames others.

BTW, they have added a new Inspiration called Break Free. When some mob sleeps or holds you, you hit this sucker and you're free again. I got in against a Rikti Headman Mentalist without a Break Free and got held and whacked to death without being able to fire a shot or run. I never leave home without 3 or 4 now.

EQ II

2005-05-20T19:46:00.000-05:00

Sis said Little Sis was playing the EQ II free trial. "Free" thinks I, "I like Free".

Let me say up front that I hated EQ. I hated EQ before I ever played EQ and I hated it even more once I had played it.

However, free is free and I wanted to see if they might have learned anything. I heard it sucked but I wanted to go see for myself.

Well, I saw and what I heard was right on. It sucks like nothing has ever sucked in all of suckdom. To be fair, I've only played about an hour but that was enough. The characters are clunky, the interface is weird, the graphics ain't nothing to write home about, there is just nothing to like.

I simply don't understand why these people can't create something new.

Game grouping

2005-05-20T13:41:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to push to the next level with Little Janie (my CoH energy blaster) but she is out of missions. Hunting is kind of boring and the freaking xp bar moves about a millimeter for every hundred mobs you kill. So, I decided to go out for the dreaded pickup group.

Before I talk about the groups I ended up with, I noticed something about grouping. I'm sure someone, somewhere has drawn this comparison before but game grouping is very much like sex. The more I think about it, the more parallels I can draw. Stay with me here:

The amount of prep is totally random. It takes some groups ages to get to it and some jump right in and start blasting.

Once a battle gets going there are lots of explosions and fury then it is suddenly over.

Some people work a lot harder than others.

When the whole thing is over, there can be this awkward time when you want to go on and do something else but everyone just kind of hangs around then makes excuses to leave.

So, back to the action. The first night I get a tell from someone I never heard of asking if I want to get in on a higher level mission. I saw "Sure" and head off to the mission site. We have a group of about 6 people and the action was heavy duty. I think CoH has the most intense and exciting group combat. You haven't lived till you've been in the middle of 6 players and 20 Nazis going at it. It can be quite confusing, being a blaster I just click on the tank and blast whatever he targets. I can't even see my target half the time. The great thing was that the XP was flowing like water.

The next night I get in a group who, when I popped in the mission, was all just standing there. Once I found the tank and clicked on him, I see he is running around the area for some reason. Everyone else is just chatting and standing. Suddenly, after what seemed like 5 minutes, the tank shows up dragging about 40 mobs. Everyone else is still standing and chatting. Not being one to stand by and watch, I start blasting and immediately get the crap kicked out of me. Then the tank says, "Ready" and everyone jumps in. I find out later that this guy goes around and herds all the mobs on the floor, takes most of their power then lets everone jump in for the kill. It was a lot of fun but the standing around waiting for someone else to do most of the work was kind of annoying.

The next night was only one mission and pretty much a repeat of the first night. After the mission was over the group started breaking up with everyone making lame excuses to leave.

I went back to soloing but it just wasn't as much fun. I might have to go back to this group thing and just see how it goes.

Do we need more weapons?

2005-05-18T12:48:00.000-05:00

A NY Times article about space weapons.

Another bright idea

It always amazes me that we can't find the money to get health care to poor people but we can find $300,000,000 for Iraq and somehow, find money to built space weapons.

To the subject: Do we need more weapons? Back when I was a kid, there was this cold war thing going on. There was China and Russia and any minute, some crazy Chinese or Russian dude was going to push the "button" and we would all be obliterated in a big action movie explosion. Seriously, we had bomb drills where we went in the hallway, tucked out heads between our knees and kissed our asses goodbye. So we built this montrous machine so we could have our own button to push, absolutely assuring the end of the human race. Back in those days, you knew who to nuke and the guns were already pointed there.

Who we gonna nuke today? Russia is akin to an old lady in a rocking chair who can't find her dentures half the time, China is more worried about making CPS (Cheap Plastic Shit) and electronics than they are about nuking anyone. Sure, there are people like North Korea and Iran but they just want us to leave them the fuck alone and are just making nukes to have a big enough stick to whack us with if we get to close. Who we gonna point the space lasers at anyway? What are we defending against. Dubya is gonna ring the country with missle defense systems but who is gonna shoot us. We can already tell you the specific gravity of a mouse fart in outer Mongolia, how much more monitoring do we need? Everyone knows that the next nuke that goes off will be from some terrorist who smuggled it in the back of a tortilla truck coming in from Mexico, what good is a space laser gonna do there?

We have so much potential to do good in the world, why are we so intent on making them more afraid of us. Why aren't we feeding people instead of figuring and new and innovative ways to kill them?

It's a mystery to me....

Recent movies

2005-05-10T16:25:00.000-05:00

I'm a Netflix'er. At least three movies every weekend with the occasional visit to the theatre. Here are some recent ones.

The Interpreter Took the wife to McDonald's for a syrup sandwich (McGriddle - her idea, not mine) and an early movie. This movie is pretty dark, lots about death and dealing with death. Sean Penn is fabulous. Nicole Kidman was good but would have been a lot better if she had JUST GOTTEN HER FUCKING HAIR OUT OF HER FACE FOR ONE DAMM SECOND. Sorry but seeing someone with their hair stuck in their eye drives me bat shit. Overall, a pretty good flick. 4 stars

I Heart Huckabees I think I kind of liked this movie but it was too damm weird for words. Lots and lots of metaphysical bullshit in a story about a guy who just needs to figure things out for himself. I say 3 1/2 stars.

Elektra Silly and boring. Better than Daredevil but just barely. Even the fight sequences couldn't save this one, too much silly super powers that seem to turn on and off. 2 1/2 stars on this one.

Finding Neverland Mostly boring drama with some interesting stuff thrown in about the guy who wrote Peter Pan and some kids he hooks up with. He does pull a pretty interesting trick on his old up-tight audience on opening night. It was a good movie, just not my cup of tea. 3 1/2 stars.

Sideways An enjoyable movie about a strange little guy. My wife was bored to tears but I liked it. 3 1/2 - 4 stars.

Garden StateA very enjoyable movie about a really screwed up guy getting his stuff together. Great music, a must buy soundtrack. 4 stars.

Meet the Fockers About the same as Meet the Parents with some over the top non-funny nonsense. Not a bad movie for a rainy Sunday afternoon when you don't want to think too hard. 3 1/2 stars

I saw a preview for a new movie called A Sound of Thunder. This was from an old Ray bradbury short story I remembered from when I was a kid that always stuck with me. Time travel stuff with an interesting twist but it looks like they are taking the twist and turing it into your usual run away from the dinosaurs thing. I expect it to suck.

More later.

Legalize it, regulate it and tax the shit out of it.

2005-05-10T14:10:00.000-05:00

A story about one of my biggest pet peeves.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050510/ap_on_re_us/brothel_tax

We're talking about cutting benefits everywhere. We're talking about how over worked and under paid our law enforcement officers are. However, we spend an inordinate amount of law enforcement time arresting, processing and procescuting prostitutes. Same thing goes for marijuana users and sellers.

Why can't we get the stick out of our butts and legalize prostitution? We spend so much time pretending it doesn't exist and trying to stop it but it isn't called the oldest profession for nothing. There is an old saying in the software business, "If you can't fix a problem, feature it." Prostitution can't be "fixed" so why not legalize it, set up health regulations to ensure everyone stays disease free and then tax it like crazy. You hire a few inspectors (any volunteers for that job?)and free up a hell of a lot of law enforcement time. You also put a lot of illegal bitch slapping pimps out of business.

Same thing with marijuana. You can't fix it and if you allow booze and cigarettes, why not weed? That way you get all the illegal shit off the market, you can regulate it and once again, tax the crap out of it. Who would buy a bag from some guy on the street when you could walk into a liquor store and buy a pack?

I guess it's all too logical. Heaven forbid we stop trying to legislate morality and start treating people like adults.

Bored with WoW, back to CoH.

2005-05-10T13:47:00.000-05:00

It's a familiar feeling. It happend in UO, it happened in DaoC, SWG, AC2, CoH and now WoW. You log in, pull up the character screen and stare at it for 5 minutes trying to decide what you want to do. You finally pick one out of frustration and get loaded then stare at the screen for another 5 minutes trying to decide what to do. Then you log out and go see if there are any old Kung Fu movies on the tube.

I hit the wall on WoW this weekend and played some single player stuff for a while.

So, yesterday, I'm at work and check my home email and see that CoH has gone live with The Arena. Woulf had said something about it but I got that other old familiar feeling (where you just HAVE to go try it out) and knew that when I got home, I would be cranking back up my CoH account and giving it a go.

I just love how easy it is to get back in a game you've cancelled. It took a while to download the patches but about 2 minutes to reactivate my account. Very soon, I'm logging in and Little Janie, the all powerful energy blaster, is back in action.

The only problem is that I couldn't remember how anything worked. Wait a minute, I remember my trinity of ass kicking (the three powers I used the most) but which buttons were they? So I'm staring at the screen trying to remember which button Fly is bound to when I see a message from someone in the Super Group. I send out a "Hi All" and one of the resident smart-asses comes back with, "So, did you beat WOW?" and about two seconds later I get a group invite from Woulf. I remembered going back to UO and no one knew me, it was sure nice to pop in and get a warm welcome.

My first challenge was how to get from Galaxy City to Crey's Folly. I'm one of those guys who has the entire map in my head and I'm sure it's still in there somewhere but the synapses aren't quite firing yet. Finally, after they've watched me bounce around a while, someone offers a suggestion on how to get there. I run a mission with them, die pretty quick because I'm just hitting buttons and targeted the wrong purple thing. I slowly remember what powers do what and have a pretty successful time of it by the end.

The mission finishes and Voodoo Joe invites me over to the Arena for a little PvP practice. I run in and check the salespeople. There is a new thing call a Break Free so I buy a couple, knowing he is a holder type guy. He sets up a duel and we log in. You log in to what looks like a mission so i run around looking for him. I find him and we stand for a few seconds just looking. You can't talk so he eventually attacks and it's on. Like I said, he is a holder (controller or defender) so if he can hold me and bounce me off the ceiling, he will probably win. I'm an energy blaster so if I can blast, he's toast. Dueling is pretty simple, you kill each other as many times as possible in 10 minutes. Amazingly, I won. Being old and slow, my basic tactic is to target, blast, blast blast, blast until everything else is dead or I am. We played 9 rounds and I won 5 out of 4. Those two hold breaks figured heavily in my first few wins and it went back and forth after that. More importantly, it was great fun. I thought I would get totally pwned so was pleasantly surprised.

I'm still amazed at how awesome an energy blaster is at dealing out damage, especially one on one. Many of my blasts have knockback which help a lot (they can't attack from their back).

I'm not sure how long I'll be back in CoH but for now, I'm having a blast.