All posts by Duf

Big Butt Cell Phone Girl or as she will be known from here on out, BBCPG had made some strides at the gym recently.  In late July I documented how she sleepwalked through her gym time and spent most of it doing nothing more than speaking on her cell phone while doing a cardio machine at kindergarten difficulty level. She was on her cell phone less and there were 1 or 2 days where I didn’t see her on her phone once (although she always keeps it by her side)  I even had seen her do some weighted exercise machines to mix up her routine.  Well today she fell off the wagon.  She had the phone glued to her ear as she walked in the door, as she walked out of the lockerroom, the entire time she was casually sauntering on the treadmill and still when she walked back into the lockerroom.  Unreal.  Before I hear the “don’t you have anything better to do than watch other people at the gym” comments, let me interject that most gyms, including this one have their walls completely covered in mirrors.  When you are in between sets there is precious little else to do than look around.  I wonder if BBCPG says on her phone calls “Yea, I go to the gym everyday but just am not seeing any results…”  Hmm I wonder why.  I was singing “BBCPG…” to myself, it is kind of catchy…

Last Friday I saw two examples of one of the things that is on the top 10 of all time annoying things for me.  People parking in the handicap spot that have no apparent phycial handicap except being lazy son of a bitches.  Two times I saw people pop out of their cars after hanging their tag on the mirror and head for our office front door.  One of these people saw I was looking at them in disbelief and immediately slowed thier pace and made a blatant attempt to seem more impaired than they were 2 seconds ago.  It is freakin pathetic.  I love the ones that have a tag for no other reason than they are f’in fat asses that are so heavy they can’t walk.  It’s ironic that they probably got that way largely in part for avoiding lengthy walks in the first place. Let’s reward their laziness and further encourage it!  Disgusting. 

911 snuck up on me.  Yesterday I looked at a calendar and saw it was the 10th and realized today was 911.  Wow I can’t believe it’s been 5 years already.  If you asked me then what I thought the end result of 911 was going to be my answers would have been quite different than today.  I would have told you that Osama Bin Laden would have been dead or captured within the first 6 months. I would have never imagined that we would have set foot in Iraq and certainly not involved in a conflict that has what seems to be an infinite timeline at this point.  To be honest I would have told you that there would have been another major attack by this time so the fact that there hasn’t has to lend itself to at least one thing the Bush administration can take credit for.  I certainly would have never predicted 3 dollar a gallon gas.

The biggest thing I remember about 911 was the sense of one that everyone felt.  For the first time in my life it felt like I actually shared something with everyone that lives here.  It was like we all took a collective punch to the gut and we all helped each other get through it.  It was a a very sad but inspiring period of time.  Unfortunately that feeling lasted at most a few months.  The actions our government took in the name of 911 turned us into the bully of the planet in the opinion of our neighbors, mired us in the 21st century version of Vietnam and wound up turning all that emotion we felt against the enemy back upon our own leaders as it became apparent that they used the situation to carry out political and special interest agendas.  

Putting all the post 911 bullshit aside, I’ll never forget that moment when I was watching tv, seeing the one building burning with a hole in it, thinking what a horrible accident for a plane to hit a building then seeing another plane, live, smash into the other building.  The realization that it was no accident was like a hammer.  That split second is one I will carry forever. They are replaying the Stern Show broadcast from 911 today, it is haunting.

This was opening weekend of the NFL and I had it set in my mind to enjoy it.  On Saturday Ali and I did most of the housework by early afternoon Saturday.  Then we went to a 4 o’clock showing of Invincible, the movie about the Philly guy that made the team out of an open tryout.  The movie was great, probably enhanced by me being an Eagles fan.  The idea of a down and out guy actually making a pro-sports team is every weekend warriors dream, including mine.  My intense childhood desire to be a pro athlete really made this movie emotional for me.  It’s just a feel good type of movie.  My only criticism was they used a little too much slow mo footage in the flick, it was everywhere.  It gets an A-.

After the movie we went out to dinner at a new place, the Roman Oven.  It was a pleasant surprise.  Even though we hit it at at 6pm on a Saturday night it wasn’t terrribly full and we sat right down.  We were greeted by a personable old man that was the host and we sat down and immediately took notice of the nice surroundings, filled with earthy colors and intricate tile everywhere.  They made all their own pasta which is pretty unheard of nowadays.  I ordered the basic test for an italian restaurant, spaghetti and meatballs.  It was quite good as was Ali’s meal.  Our waitress was very nice as well, we really had no complaints.  35 bucks covered the bill and we were out of there.

Saturday night Ali and I did some work on the web site for the 6k run she is organizing.  It’s nothing fancy but I like it. Check it out. 

Sunday morning we did our 3rd week of Nicki walks.  She really seems to look forward to them already.  The walk got off on a bad start.  Shortly after we started, we noticed behind us an actual live armadillo walking on the road.  We never have seen a live one, just dead ones on the road.  They are basically nocturnal animals.  Well anyway he was just sort of wandering around on the road with no apparent destination.  As we looked back, a fire engine with sirens blaring turned onto our road.  As it came screaming up the road the armadillo kept farting around, oblivious to the oncoming danger.  Ali was freaking, saying the truck was going to run over the poor thing.  As she looked away, I watched as the engine approached, never slowing or diverting it’s path.  The armadillo froze and the truck straddled the animal (without slowing), I watched in horror as the frozen animal decided to come to life and move just as the truck was going over it.  Ali gasped “Did he kill it?” as we stared at the firetruck as it flew by with disgust on our faces.  I said yep, as all I saw was the motionless figure on the road behind.  I figured out why I see so many dead armadillos, they don’t get out of the way very well.

Well the whole incident put a very dark cloud on the walk.  Ali was outraged the firemen made no effort to avoid the animal.  She talked of letters to the editor about it.  She was in a bad mood for pretty much the entire trip.  Nicki on the other hand was having a great time, prancing along she was sniffing from side to side repeatedly.  Ali’s mood was made worse by Nicki’s refusal to drink during the walk.  She was panting heavily with her tongue hanging out wildly but absolutely had no interest in drinking.  So since she wouldn’t drink the water we dumped some of it on her.  I took a pic of her during the walk.

It seems each time we do the walk I see new things.  One of the things that made me laugh was this mailbox.  If you look quickly you may not notice what is so funny.  It is installed backwards.  Hey mailboxes don’t come with installation directions, maybe they should. 🙂

On the way back Ali was dreading walking by the dead armadillo.  So you can imagine our amazement when we turned back onto our street and saw nothing on the road.  As we got to the spot there was no blood, no signs of massacre.  The armadillo lived!  It must have balled up and just missed the tire of the truck.  You could feel the weight lifted off of Ali’s mood. 

Sunday afternoon was all about watching football.  The Eagles had a strong start to the season after a bit of a shaky start.  When they allowed the Texans to march down the field and score a TD on their first possession I was like “Oh shit”  However in the 2nd quarter they started to roll and cruised to a 24-10 win.  I was impressed that at the end of the game they totally controlled things, holding the ball for a long time to run out the clock as opposed to the normal 3 and out and then play sloppy prevent defense and give up cheap points. Granted it was the Texans, the worst team in the league last year but regardless the Birds looked good.

Next I watched a good chunk of the Cowboy/Jaguars game.  I was hoping to see TO hurt himself.  Instead he had a strong game and scored a TD.  The good news is the Cowboys lost.  My fantasy team started strong and then faded.  I am down 81-80 with no players left to play and my opponents kicker plays tonight so I am toast, disappointing.  Carson Palmer and Rueben Droughns let me down, scoring a shitty 5 points between them.

DirecTV has a great new feature this year.  You are able to program in your starting fantasy team roster and then when any of them do anything that generates fantasy points a little alert pops up at the bottom of the screen, no matter what game you are watching.  What an awesome little piece of tech! I love the Sunday Ticket.

I played no WoW this weekend at all, instead devoting my time to Half Life 2, probably too much time.  In WoW the only time your adrenalin gets going normally is during an impromptu PvP encounter when you are up against a horde player one on one.  In HL2 it is like that all the time and then some.  You are constantly on guard as you round each corner, never knowing what is going to pop out and try to take you down.  I can feel my blood pressure elevate as I play.  By Sunday, my eyes were both bloodshot and hurt.  Not from staying up late but from the constant darting eye movements that the game requires.  They still hurt today.  It’s a great game though, really, really good.

On the way home I spotted this hot car, a Reliant K car with mag wheels!  There is something very ironic about a K car, one of the most basic, plain vanilla, boring vehicles ever produced with a set of mags on it.  It was the deep type that made the tires sit outside the wheel well, almost go-kart style.  It just looked ridiculous.  I wish I could have gotten a better pic of it.  Ali asked me what the hell I was doing when I snapped the pic.  When I explained it to her she realized it was going to be blog material and just shook her head.  I think she realizes me with a camera phone is going to be dangerous.

After work Ali put in 7 miles, she is making good progress in her goal to run the half marathon.  If she can do 9 to 10 miles she can run a half.

This morning I had my follow up meeting with the knee doctor.  He asked how things were and I said fine.  In reality my right knee is still noisy and is in pretty much the same shape it was before the 3 knee shots.  However I had zero interest in prolonging my treatment plan.  My knees are better, good enough that I can work my legs at the gym again.  My plan is to get them stronger and then try some limited impact and see the results.  If the pain immediately resumes then I will need to permanently alter the physical hobby/activities I do away from things that impact my knees.  We’ll see.

A chiropractor I talk to at the gym turned me onto a good unconventional lower body exercise that is a great all around activity to strengthen everything from the waist down.  I grab a 12 pound medicine ball and squat.  Then I take relatively large sidesteps, 10 to the left, 10 to the right and then back and forth one more time, all the time trying to stay crouched, holding the ball.  By the end your legs should be burning.  It is the type of movement that really helps the stabilizing muscles around the knee as well building strength in your quads and hamstrings.  Try it, the deeper you can crouch, the harder it becomes.

 Between my new computer and my new Treo phone I am in tech nirvana.  My computer is slick looking, fast and cool.  My Treo allows me to be plugged in 24/7 from almost anywhere, I really like it. 

 I watched maybe 20 minutes of the game last night.  We got home late and had to watch Big Brother and then I set up a domain name for the 5k run Ali is organizing and took 5 minutes to throw a page up there.  By the time that was all done it was after 10 and I was too tired to watch much of it.  I saw the Dolphins take the lead in the 3rd quarter.  I was glad to see the Steelers came back to win it in the 4th.

 This weekend the Eagles start their season.  Fittingly I want to go see Invincible this weekend, the flick about the walk on player Dick Vermeil signed up in the late 70’s.  It should get me pumped up for the season.  Otherwise there aren’t any huge plans for the weekend.  We will continue our new Sunday tradition of taking Nicki on an extended walk.  Once football season starts, Sunday afternoons are reserved exclusively for Eagles games.

I was talking to Charlie about my new system and he asked if I tried out any games on it.  I only had installed WoW but that is not a graphical powerhouse of a game.  I mentioned about Half Life 2 which I still had in the box from Christmas, Christmas 2004!  Yes I got that game the same time I got WoW. I opened WoW before I opened HL2 and as a result HL2 has sat on my computer desk, unopened for over 19 months 🙂

Well anyway, Charlie said that would give me a real peek into the power of my new rig so last night I loaded it up.  Wow, Valve has made it as much of a pain in the ass as possible to get the damn game up and running.  First you go through installing the 5 cd’s which includes installing Steam, an annoying front end that constantly runs in your system tray, that is required to play the game.  So after dumping 5 cd’s worth of data I figure I am ready to play, right? Wrong.  You launch the icon and it brings up a Steam login screen, even if you just want to play single player, you have to create this online account.  Once the account is created, great, now I am ready to play? No.  Once you login to steam you have to activate the key that is on the first cd jacket. Whew, ok, ok, now I am activated, can I play yet? Nope.  Now it has to unecrypt the files that are already installed on your hard drive (which takes a looong time)  JC, ok can I play the f’in game now? NO!  Steam also is nice enough to connect to the internet without asking you and downloading all the latest versions of the game files which even with a screaming broadband connection, takes a long ass time. So after more than an hour of prep, I finally get to play the damn game.  A big thumbs down to Valve for not using common sense with their install procedure.

Well it only took me a few minutes in the game to forgive them for the shitty install process.  I checked the graphic settings it selected for me and they were all set to high.  I was blown away with the game.  The realism is startling, the in-game physics are amazing, the detail of the characters is incredible, and the game is 2 years old!  Since I have been exclusively enveloped in the cartoonish graphics of World of Warcraft for the last couple years I had forgotten how realistic FPS graphics can be.   As I wandered through the game I was constantly aware of how incredibly realistic my surroundings were.  I had my headphones on so the immersion was pretty complete. I could feel my blood pressure rising as I turned a corner and stepped into a firefight with multiple bad guys.  The act of disposing of enemies in the game is taken to a new level as well.  If I am off with my aim and am pumping the guy with bullets in his legs or chest he will not die nearly as quick as a well placed head shot.  It rewards accuracy as opposed to older games where you could shoot a guy in the big toe or the face and have the same result. 

   I reluctantly drug myself away from the game after only maybe an hour and a half.  It is just OUTSTANDING. I was surprised that while I was in the game my CPU temp app popped up an alert.  Playing the game raised the temperature of my processor roughly 20 degrees, wow.  I turned the alert off.  I’m sure most of my cpu gaming time at home will be inside HL2 until I finish it.  I heard the ending is disappointing so I will just have to enjoy the ride up to that point.

We got another 2 inches of rain yesterday.  When I got home I was treated to a huge beautiful rainbow down our street that I snapped a few pics of with my Treo.

The rainbow was pretty, the sight of more standing water was not.  The pic above gives a good look at our new front yard pond.  There is a story in today’s paper about all the rain and how it has caused the worst flooding in our area since 1995. Since Ernesto, our area has seen as much as 20 inches of rain and at the minimum 10-14 inches.  If they hadn’t sprayed for mosquitos we would be eaten alive right about now.

It’s my new computer all lit up!  All my lighting/UV reactive stuff showed up yesterday and I stayed up until after 11 getting it all in place.  I had to mess with location of the lights several times.  The fan in the vent over the processor had to be reversed.  If I had it pulling air out, the cpu temp hit 147 degrees.  Reversing it and blowing air in the temp dropped to a much more suitable 115 to 120 degrees.  I took a pic of it with the lights off as well, it turned out shitty but you get the idea, it’s cool lookin IMO.

The pc is rather loud with the the two additional fans I added but they look sweet and help keep things cool.  I could get more UV reactive stuff but I think it looks good as is and I will let it be.  Hopefully the new computer serves my needs for the next few years.

Last night as I was getting done with the computer I heard the welcomed roar of a plane buzzing over the house low.  I knew it was mosquito control spraying, thank goodness.  With all the standing water we have right now, without spraying we would be eaten alive by the little bloodsuckers.  You can see from these 2 pics what the front yard looked like Labor Day afternoon after we got dumped on yet again.

For those of you that read my blog for my opinions on reality tv, all none of you, here is my latest take on Big Brother All Stars.  Last night Dr Will was finally kicked out.  Him and Boogie have been playing everyone the entire show.  They have been backstabbing person after person with little repercussion.  Normally if someone did that they would get kicked out in short order.  However Boogie and especially Will have some sort of charisma that makes people want to keep them around, it’s weird.  Will can talk himself out of almost any situation, it’s a gift.  Well anyway, the 2 girls left finally figured out they were being played off against each other in a nick of time.  Janelle, whom I was sick of, changed my opinion of her nearly 180 degrees when she “manned” up and finally kicked Will out.

Howie really has morphed into a sore loser asshole.  His rant and raves since being evicted have revealed a much darker, crueler side than the happy go lucky person we saw for most of the last two seasons.  I mean attacking Chicken George??? It’s a shame.  Of the 3 left, it is a toss up between Janelle and Erika as far as whom I would like to see win.  Before the game started I would have preferred to see Kaysar or James win.  Next week it all winds up.

I added about a dozen more images that will show up as the header image in the blog, I now have 30+ in rotation.  Visit the blog several times a day so you can see them all!! 🙂

As I was listening to the tendons in my shoulders creak and crack into place as I hoisted 90 pound dumbells into position for a short set of incline presses, I was thinking to myself why I do this.  Why do I choose to lift weights heavy enough that I can hear my joints moan in protest?  The answer I came up with in that splt second was, because I am not sure if I can do it. 

My life is filled with many certanities, many routines that offer many situations that return predictable, almost identical results.   There aren’t many things that come up that I don’t already know the outcome of.  Such is the life of a late 30 somethin old guy with no kids and most of life’s major challenges like a career and home well in hand.  However the gym gives me an opportunity to do things that I am not sure if I can do.  Will I be able to get one more rep at 225 on my bench, can I do that new exercise I read about in one of my fitness magazines, can I push, pull or lift a large amount of weight in various ways?  If I push myself consistently, these situations have uncertain results and that appeals to me.  The successes are a little notch in the belt, the failures are motivation to try harder. 

On the way back from the gym I had an Anole (little lizard) pop out from under the hood and hitch a ride all the way back to work.  He held his head out high looking around almost like Nicki does when she hangs her head out the window.  After I parked I shoo’d him off the roof only to have him hop up on top of the tire.  Hopefully he relocates before the drive home tonight.

Wow talk about altered reality….

I received the components for my new super computer a day early on Thursday and as a result I asked to take Friday off to use as PC migration day.  I threw the components together Thursday afternoon.  My office was a f’n mess of boxes, static bags and packing peanuts.

I hadn’t built a system for myself for a loooong time.  My last 2 systems had been Sony Vaio’s and I have been quite content with them.  My last one has served me since 2002, an ETERNITY in my pc world.  For whatever reason I had the bug to put one together again.  A lot has changed since the late 90’s in system building with new style cases, power supplies, uv lighting, SATA hard drives and enough fans to cool a large room. 

I took my time but did not take the time to tie wrap and carefully route everything because once I get all my UV lighting I will be redoing the connections anyway.  The moment of truth came where you hope everything works and you push the power button.  It lived, I was relieved.  I got a sample of the speed of the beast when it installed Windows XP Pro in all of 10 minutes.

Thursday night and Friday I spent tons of time getting data, programs and application settings from my old PC to the new one.  I had close to 100 gig of data to move.  The procedure was made more tedious because the plan was to have Ali utilize my old pc so I had to duplicate the effort a second time once mine was migrated.  After many, many hours over the 4 days and much frustration, I am pretty much done.  Ali’s old pc/my file server is tucked under her desk on an A/B video switch humming away doing it’s server duties and Ali is happy running on my old pc which feels like greased lightning compared to what she was used to.  I took some pics of my new pc as it stands now.  The components had a total of 5 separate rebates associated with them, filling them all out was a pain in the ass. 

Saturday morning Ali participated in a 5k.  Even with it starting at 7:30 am the air was thick with humidity and as soon as the sun cleared the horizon the temps skyrocketed.  Once the race started I volunteered my services on the food prep table.  I quartered what seemed like a couple hundred oranges.  By the time the first few runners were crossing the finish line I was still cutting away.  Once that was done my job was to man the table trying to keep the water and gatorade jugs full and minimizing the mess created by the chaos of dozens of runners converging on the refreshment table simultaneously.   The water jugs were filled with a garden hose which seemed low class but with the amount of water that is consumed there is little choice.  The problem was there was no ice to dump into the coolers so the water didn’t stay cold very long.  People were constantly complaining the water was warm.  I am suggesting that a bunch of ice is purchased for the next race.

Anyway Ali finished the race in what was a slow time for her.  The steamy weather and the fact that she did a hardcore spin class the day before contriibuted to her time.  When I was running with her I would have been really on her back to pick up the pace.  Since I have been relegated to the sidelines I feel I have little basis to say much.  I feel like if I am not putting in the miles with her, it is out of line to say much.  I don’t think it is a coincidence that Ali’s 5k times bounced back up after I stopped running them, I acted as a pace setter.  I added the pics from the run to Ali’s running picture page.

The weekend was very, very wet.  At several times rain was just coming down in sheets, like someone with very large buckets was dumping them on our heads.  Our yard was completely underwater several times.  I took several pics where it had receded a bit.  I took some more yesterday where you can see full submersion but they aren’t online yet.

We scattered a good amount of activities into the weekend.  We went out to dinner and miniature golfing with the neighbors on Saturday.  Sunday evening we went to a party at a friends house for a few hours.  On Labor Day, Ali went shopping with my Mom in the middle of the day.  I played a lot of WoW.  Last week I hardly played at all, I think I played zero until Friday. I made up for lost time Monday.  The only effort I made towards a traditional Labor Day celebration was making burgers on the grill for Nicki and me, wahoo.

The NFL starts this week!  My fantasy football roster is set and I am excited about the Eagles this year.  If they stay healthy I am hopeful for a strong year.

Our cat Buttons is a load. I snapped this pic for some reason. She lookes like a 2 liter soda bottle.  Several times during the weekend I wanted to choke her after cat puke/ass wiping on the carpet episodes.  I really am ready for her to go to cat heaven.

Man I was sad to hear about Steve Irwin.  I really liked that guy.  What a way to go, although I would say it is fitting he went down doing something like that. RIP Steve.

 Full moon is coming and I can feel it.

Yep this is being sent from my Treo. I am passing the time while Ali works out.

I saw something funny today. There was an SUV that had a Yankees tow hitch cover. Not very funny. What was funny was the full size, straw bristled, broom tied below it. I could only assume it was to be symbolic of the Yankees sweep of the Red Sox in Fenway. Wow that is hardcore, in your face, smack.