Archives November 2014

The headlines have been filled with the protests and rioting going on as a result of the grand jury decision to not indict the white police officer involved in shooting and killing a black suspect.  To be quite honest I have only skimmed over the details of the shooting and is often the case, there are loud voices on both sides of the situation.

A very simplistic view of this, which is all too many people require, is white officer shot black man, it must be racially motivated.  However if you read the officers account, Brown attacked the officer when the officer recognized Brown as a potential store robbery subject which was just called in.  According to Wilson’s account Brown actually grabbed the officers hand that was holding his gun, said “You are too much of a pussy to shot me” and turned it back towards Wilson.  Brown was a huge man at 6’4″ and almost 300 pounds and obviously could physically overpower a normal sized man.

During the wrestling for the gun it went off, shooting Brown in the hand which sent him running. Wilson got out, told Brown to stop which he supposedly did however according to Wilson, Brown then charged the officer and was shot repeatedly as he advanced.

One of Browns friends that was there disputes this claim, saying Brown never charged and in fact was saying he didn’t have a gun, yet he was still shot.  There were also stories of how Brown was known as a “big teddy bear” to help build additional outrage among the lightly informed.  I saw the security video of Brown robbing and assaulting the store owner.  That was no teddy bear, it was pure thug, regardless of his skin color, age, nationality or religious beliefs.

I think it is really sad that misinformation is allowed to spread, fester and infest the masses, creating a lemming mentality.  Brown’s stepfather uttering the words “Burn this bitch down..” in reaction to the announcement of the grand jury decision just further outlined the mindset involved in these riots.

I watched video of people running into and out of a broken window of a store front grabbing whatever they could, and felt utter disgust.  Do you think these people really gave a shit that a black man that acted aggressively towards police after indisputably committing robbery was shot and killed?  As they grabbed electronics, food or other merchandise was it supposed to be a tribute to Brown? I destroy and steal in honor of your name! It’s fcking insanity.

Now of course I wasn’t there and neither were you so all I can do is draw conclusions from the information presented.  To me the likelihood that Wilson, who states he NEVER has had to fire his weapon before, decided to go trigger happy without good reason is highly unlikely.  You don’t fire that many rounds at someone unless you are fearful for your life.  Unfortunately logic is something that is a vastly underused resource when much of the public is forming opinions.

I wish the the human race could all develop color blindness.

I am in the midst of the Thanksgiving race grind which I will not emerge from until around 9:30 tomorrow morning.  After that I can take a deep breath followed by a sigh of relief before enjoying the remainder of my 4 day weekend.

Last night Cindy and I watched this weeks Homeland.  After last season we were surprised they announced they were continuing the series since one of the central characters was killed off.  I expected this season, the last for the show, to jump the shark.  Well it has been anything but.  The story has been compelling, exciting, and complex.  Kudos to the shows writers for doing an OUTSTANDING job.

Last night I had a dose of something that thus far my fantasy football season has been lacking, good luck.  I was behind in my game by over 20 points and only had the Bills defense left to play. I had already written the game off as a loss.  I awoke this morning to see the Bills D went crazy, scoring me a virtual 38 points, securing the win and raising my record to 5-7.

All season I have had pretty rotten luck.  Time and again I would get a strong performance from my line up only to come up against a team that over performs greatly.  The Sportsline website sends out a robo weekly recap each week where it summarizes each game.  It has designated me as the “worst gameday coach” more than once this season because I don’t always go with who simply is projected as the higher scorer.  Somehow, despite this moniker my team has scored more points in total than any other team in the league.  So you can go suck it, robo-heckler.

Tonight after work I head straight to packet pick up for the race to get a head start on the data entry mountain that awaits me.

On Saturday we kept busy.  Event though the cold weather stints we have had has stunted the growth of the grass I still wanted to make sure the yard was whacked and mowed since next weekend the Xmas lights will go up.  Mowing once the extension cords are littering the yard is a pain in the ass.   I got the weed whacking part done pretty early Saturday morning.  We then headed out to run some errands.

I dropped off my pressure washer at Ali’s place so she could use it to blast the scuzz off her lanai.  While I was there I also used a couple of my big masonry bits to pop three drainage holes in the corner of her deck where water accumulates.  When I got home I did the same maneuver on my deck as I have a low corner that collects water as well.

On Saturday night we made plans to go see the new Hunger Games movie at the fancy Silverspot Theater.  Afterwards we were going to meet up with several people from the group that were celebrating one of the girls 30th birthday.  We hadn’t been to Silverspot in quite awhile.  Since we see so many of our movies in the relaxed, sparsely occupied Coconut Point theater it was a bit annoying to be injected into a human bee hive of movie goers.  Thank goodness Silverspot uses assigned seating since the theater was pretty much sold out.

I enjoyed the first two Hunger Games movies and I enjoyed this one as well however my attention was not totally on the movie. Instead I found myself distracted by the environmental conditions.  It was like an ice box in the theater and to make matters worse our seats were positioned directly in the path of one of the vents, pushing 60 degree on air on top of us for most of the movie.  Perhaps my perception of the movie suffered a bit from this cold distraction but I would rate the flick a B+, a good but not great film.

The movie didn’t start until 7:30.  We figured by the time we got out the birthday group would have been done with their dinner that they had elsewhere and would have been well into imbibing at one of Mercato’s various establishments.  I was surprised when Cindy got a text saying they were still at dinner when we got out of the theater around 9:30.

We decided to go find a bar to sit at and chill for awhile, figuring they would show up any minute.  After 90 minutes and a few beers they still had not arrived.  By that point both of us had drooping eyelids so we headed home.  Drinking until the wee hours of the next morning just isn’t something that aligns with my likes or needs.  It was interesting to be immersed in the Mercato environment for a period of time.  There is lots of people watching to be done on those streets.

On Sunday morning we awoke to temperatures more appropriate to August than November.  It was 72 degrees at 7AM.  The humidity on my weather center was showing a dripping 90% as well.  We had decided to do the 20 mile Dunkin Donuts bike ride, something we had not done in quite a long time.  We did pretty well considering the long break since either of us did any pedaling, averaging 18mph for the ride.  The negative was the road was wet for most of the first half of the ride, coating our bikes in road grime that Cindy washed off when we got home.

Cindy handled the tractor mowing portion of the lawn maintenance on Sunday afternoon.  Before she did I went out and did a rig job on my tractor canopy.  The canopy has seen some abuse.  Both Cindy and I have inadvertently gotten the roof stuck on something as we passed by.  When this happens the canopy flips backwards as there is a joint that allows it do so.  However it has happened so often that the frame is now deformed.  The deformation is to the point where the canopy would flip backwards just from the forces of a strong headwind.

I think the eventual outcome will be my having buy some replacement canopy frame parts but in the meantime I used my rigging talents.  I drilled an additional hole by each joint and inserted a bolt through it which should prevent the top from from flipping backwards.  This is a good and a bad thing.  It means strong winds should no longer cause problems but the next time either of us hits something solid with the canopy it will destroy my rig job and the frame along with it.

The Eagles game was a pretty dominating win, even with two pretty bad interceptions by Mark Sanchez.  It was another case of Jekyll and Hyde.  Last week the defense looked utterly clueless against the Packers.  Yesterday they were all over the Titans rookie QB, creating constant pressure.  Really the game wasn’t as close as the 43-24 final score.  I am excited for the Eagles to be playing on Thanksgiving against the Cowboys.  I don’t remember them ever playing on Turkey Day in my lifetime.

Late in the day yesterday we went outside to put the chickens back in their coop.  As is the case with most weekends when we are home, the chickens were out the majority of the day free ranging.  As I went outside I spotted a gray hawk sitting stoically on my neighbors fence, facing my yard and the chickens that are in it.  I pointed the hawk out to Cindy who of course was concerned as it would appear the bird was scouting out the situation.  I pointed out to Cindy that the hawk  was smaller than any of the chickens which I would think would dissuade it from attacking.  Cindy still did not feel better about a flying predator being so near by.

When Cindy looked up the hawk online, it seemed to be a variety that is an actual “chicken hawk”.  When Cindy read a description of how it attacks she was horrified that the hawks don’t need to be able to lift the chickens, they will simply try to kill it on the ground, even if the chicken is bigger than the hawk. There was some good moderately good news as Cindy also read that having feeders in your yard to attract smaller birds is one way to give the hawk smaller, easier targets but of course that still does not ensure the chickens safety.

I told Cindy that of course I don’t want to endanger the chickens but I told her I was sure that if the chickens were given a choice of being able to roam freely about the yard periodically versus being restricted to a life exclusively behind chicken wire they would choose freedom.  The chickens mostly hang together when out in the yard which should be a further negative for the hawk and they always have access to the coop if they need to retreat.

For my part I will surely be scanning the property perimeter more for flying predators when the chickens are out and about.  Of course the last thing I want is to put any of the chickens in harms way, I just feel like I need to balance that desire with allowing the chickens a better quality of life.

Last night Cindy and I watched Earth to Echo.  I thought this movie was going to be really good, a modernized version of ET.  Instead I found it be average at best with a story that was not great that didn’t really lead anywhere surprising or interesting.  As a result it sadly only gathers a B rating from me.

This week is going to be incredibly overrun with items related to the Thanksgiving race the running club is hosting.  Even with me doing a fraction of the advertising I did last year the race has swelled in numbers, right to the limit of what we can accommodate.   We are already past the total amount of people we had at last years race with three full days of registration to go.  Last year we got CRUSHED with registrations the last few days before the race so I won’t be surprised if we easily surpass 3000 total participants which would be the largest race that we have ever conducted.  I am doing my part to try to streamline, inform and plan how to manage numbers of people this large.  It’s going to be HUGE.

So this morning the alarm went off at it’s normal 5:30 AM time and thanks to Cindy’s assumption of most of my former weekday morning duties, I was out the door well before 7AM, arriving at work by 7:30, even with stopping for a DD coffee en route.  My boss got in the office closer to 8AM.  As she walked by my office she gave me a strange look and said “You’re here??”  I said yep, been here since 7:30.

The confused look remained on her face as she said “Aren’t you supposed to be having AC work done this morning?”  All of a sudden it is my face that gets the confused expression as I blurt out “Oh shit, you are right, I have to leave!”, which I immediately did.  You see, earlier in the week I made arrangements to have routine maintenance done on my AC system at 8:30 AM.  I could not believe it totally slipped my mind.

So I grabbed my keys, wallet, phone and coffee and reversed the 23 mile trip I just made a half hour earlier, chastising myself internally for forgetting.  To combat elderly forgetfulness I usually use Outlook calendar reminders which are synched to my phone which I did for this appointment as well.  Unfortunately I didn’t do the one extra click to remind me further in advance than the 15 minute default setting.

I hauled ass, hoping the service guy would be late, as almost all service people are in SW Florida.  He actually was early, the company that does my AC work is one of the few I have dealt with in Florida that actually gets it and places an importance on prompt and professional service.  So in a short while I get to make my second commute of the day back to Naples, lovely.

Speaking of service guys, you may recall me talking about my pool deck that was painted by Rhinoshield in March of 2013.  The deck, which had a supposed two year warranty started having spots of paint come off only a few months after the work was done and has been continuing to “freckle” more and more as time has gone on.

Somewhere in the neighborhood of four or five months ago I began the process of trying to get Rhinoshield to honor their warranty and fix the paint work.  At first I contacted the guy who lives in Miami that did the work originally and got no response. After repeated, unanswered text messages and voice mails I contacted the regional Rhinoshield main office in Jacksonville.  I was told that the Miami guy would be the one to handle it and they would reach out to him.  Well that kick in the ass appeared to work as he finally got back to me.

Eventually I got him to come out and look at the deck.  His original intent was to just touch up the spots but I stressed that there are far too many to be touched up, the deck really needs to be repainted.  Eventually he agreed and said we would set something up once rainy season ends.

Since that time I have been trying to nail down a time for this to occur.  The last time I heard from the guy was October 28th when he texted that he would get back to me in a “couple days” to set up a date to do the work.  Since then I have sent 6 texts and one voicemail asking for this to actually happen and have received no acknowledgement or response.  The last text I sent let the guy know that my next contact would be with the Jacksonville office and even that information did not illicit a response.

So of course I will follow through and give somebody at the main office an earful about how poorly the communication has been with their south Florida guy and if they are not willing to do something to get my warranty on the paint work honored I will need to elevate my complaint to higher levels.  It is SO annoying.  Just do what the fck you say you are going to do, how hard is it?

I have started working on a face for the side race timing venture I have started with my purchase of the Ipico box.  If you want to see the beginning framework head on over here although it is still in the very formative stages. Pretty much everything is still subject to change. www.greenmachinetiming.com

This weekend I take one last deep breath before I am submerged with the mountain of work associated with what is looking to be a 3000 person Thanksgiving Day race.

I forgot to relay a pretty funny story from last night.  There are a lot of things I like about the Xfinity X1 platform.  One of those things is the ability to use my phone as a remote control for the system.  Last night Cindy was in the bedroom folding laundry while watching a show recorded on the DVR.   I walked over to my phone as I was putting away dishes and fired up the Xfinity app which works through your local wifi network.  I selected the bedroom unit and started the search function.

All of a sudden I hear Cindy going “What the heck??!!” as she grabbed the remote to get back to the normal screen.  I then continue the search, entering in various profane words as I hear Cindy’s confused ranting intensify.  I yelled back and asked her what was wrong.  She said the tv was acting strange.  “That’s weird.” I said in as innocent and disinterested of a tone as I could muster.

When I initiated yet another profane search she finally came out.  I heard her coming and immediately resumed putting away dishes as she asked me if I was doing it.  I asked her what she was talking about with my back turned to her but as soon as she saw my face she realized that I was the ghost in the machine.

I am friends with a guy that also does event timing in the greater SWFL area.  Unlike me, he does it as a real business and is timing something more weekends than not during a calendar year.  Well for a long time he was using the exact same timing equipment (Ipico) that I used for timing club races.  Having this duplication was convenient, more than once we have been able to help the other out by exchanging equipment for certain events.

Well recently he has moved to a different timing hardware platform and had begun the sell off of all of his Ipico gear.  I did not know this was going on until it came up during a chat I had with John the other day.  All of a sudden the gears in my head started to turn quickly.  Without giving it more than a few moments consideration I told him I would buy his last box.

In reality, I have considered buying my own timing equipment for several years and never pulled the trigger.  However with my receiving some funds from the still in process estate liquidation of my mom’s assets, I have a little money to spend.  I look at this as almost an investment in myself as opposed to blowing money on some nice but not really needed material object.

Having my own timing hardware allows me to rent it to the running club if they want additional timing points (splits) for some of their bigger events.  It also allows me to take on my own timing ventures if they make themselves available to me.   My timer buddy and the club are constantly turning down timing opportunities due to overload.  If I only picked up a handful of those events I will easily move my investment needle from red to black. Last night I was messing around with the box.  It’s actually several years newer then the box the running club bought and has additional features which will come in handy. The box even supports WiFi connections which is something I definitely would like to experiment with.

It feels good to take a bit of a risk and step outside the box, betting on my abilities to turn the expense into an asset.

The weather yesterday was pretty miserable, with the temperatures dropping 20 degrees during the daytime hours while being accompanied by a steady, cold rain.  The forecast lows for last night were in the upper 40’s.  Cindy and I closed up the coop for the first time, locking the ramp in the up position to cut down on the cold air coming in.  When we got up this morning to lower the ramp the chickens were waiting eagerly to escape.

Last night Cindy was playing WoW with me with her new virtual character, a night elf druid named Cincas.  Stepping into WoW is a daunting task for someone that doesn’t have a gaming background.  Hell when I started playing in 2005 I was overwhelmed.  The control scheme, which is second nature for me takes some time to get accustomed to.  Most of Cindy’s time in the game is submerged in confusion as she tries to get oriented.  Plus her new lasik altered, mono-vision eyes have a very hard time focusing on the screen.  The monitor appears to be at a distance which is in the dead zone between her one eye that is trimmed for close vision and the other which is used for distance.  In addition, the heavy mouse work that is utilized by WoW is tough on her hand.

I got on one of my other characters and traveled across the virtual world to be Cindy’s in game escort.  She hopped in the sidecar of my motorcycle so I could drive her around to save time.  I also was her guide and bodyguard, able to kill off any threats in milliseconds since they are much lower levels than I am.  I am not sure if Cindy enjoys playing enough to stick with it but regardless I appreciate her effort in trying.

Last night was the first running club board meeting that went down since my role changed to non-board member, part of which meant my attendance at board meetings was not expected.  Of course I still got a pretty comprehensive recap of what went down.  It will be a bit odd to hear about some of the points discussed, having opinions about them yet not expressing them to the board.  Like anything else, with time, it will become less weird.

So I got the party van back after work last night.  The repair price went up another $100 because they wound up replacing the front driver side metal brake line as well.  When they did a pressure test after replacing the passenger side brake line the driver side let loose.  So now all of the metal brake lines in the van except a small section that goes from the ABS unit to the master cylinder has been replaced.  In total I have spent $1300 replacing rusty brake line on the party van, how nice.

We have some strong weather blowing in.  Last night we had an abnormal, strong November thunderstorm.  Today the temperatures will be dropping from the mid 70’s we started at, dropping down into the mid-60’s with a low that could hit the 40’s tonight.

This will be the first winter that we have had with the chickens.  Even though the chickens are supposed to be cold tolerant we are probably going to start closing the ramp up to the coop on cold nights to keep it warmer for them.  Cindy said she thinks some nights the chickens huddle together in one of the three nesting boxes to stay warm based on the poop patterns the next morning.  If it gets really cold the landscape fabric we have to protect the garden and plants may instead be used to insulate the chicken living quarters.

I am going to be switching up my exercise routine.  I have mentioned directly and indirectly some of my issues below the belt that all started with my GI ailment in Early April.  Since then I have had off an on issues with irritation in “sensitive” areas.  Many times this irritation would crop up in the afternoon after my workout.  Yea I loosely thought about the connection but I never really thought about it seriously until yesterday.

I had been doing well in that area for several days and again yesterday morning I felt fine.  At the gym I did chest work which included some dumbbell chest press reps with relatively heavy weight.  As I was straining to complete some of the final reps at the heavier weight I could actually feel the strain extend down below, after which I stopped repping.  Yesterday afternoon I got treated to the return of irritation and soreness so it became crystal clear what was the catalyst.

My new workout routine will still contain some bodyweight staples like pull ups and push ups but heavy, low rep, high effort movements are off the menu for the foreseeable future.  I also think I will be doing a lot more cardio, including more rower time.  My routine may start to look a little more soccer mom-ish and less beast mode but if it allows me to return to normalcy in other areas of my overall health I am down with it.

This weekend was an unusual one as the race I was timing happened on Sunday instead of Saturday.  That meant Saturday was get stuff done day.  Cindy and I were up and working early in the day.  Later in the morning we took the SSR out in the beautiful weather to complete a few errands. It was very enjoyable to just cruise about.

On Saturday night we decided to just stay in because of the race the next  morning and the early alarm it demands.  We watched Draft Day, the NFL version of Money Ball.  I liked the movie but was surprised Cindy did as well since she isn’t a big football fan. I’d rate it a solid B+ flick which stood above most of my recent Netflix rentals.  I didn’t nod off once.

Cindy and I managed to get down to Marco Island by 5:15 despite driving the farthest distance of anyone to get there.  Cindy decided the night before she was going to not only volunteer but also run in the race as well.  It would be her first “racing” since Memorial Day which is hard to believe.  This is another one of those races that is laid out in a logistically poor manner. The registration/awards area is three blocks away from the start and finish line.  However the race participant levels were low so it wasn’t a huge deal to manage.

Cindy did quite well considering her lack of running over the past 6 months.  She finished in just over 26 minutes and actually won first place in her age group.  I was happy for and proud of her.  It’s a tough course that takes you over and back the Jolley Bridge which has quite the incline.

I had someone there that I am training on the timing system.  I am hoping to get him to a level where he would be ok timing some of the smaller events, relieving some of my workload.  Of course this is much easier said than done as there are many situations that come up during a race which require troubleshooting beyond the scope of what an instruction manual would cover.  Regardless I am making the effort to make it happen.

On the way home from the race we stopped and picked up the girls for a one night sleep over.  To make room in the already packed Tacoma we had to pile stuff up in the bed of the truck in a way that would not promote items blowing out while going 70mph on the highway.  The girls had a very nice time out at the homestead enjoying the great weather.

As I mentioned on Friday, my mom’s birthday was yesterday.  For the most part I kept my mind occupied throughout the day but the few times I allowed myself to think about it was rough.  Not having mom around to celebrate her birthday for the first time in my life just felt very strange and foreign.

The Eagles game against the Packers did nothing but deepen my already poor mood,  It was awful.  The Eagles literally looked like they did not belong on the same field as the Packers.  They were dominated in pretty much every possible way.  Let me offer my amateur analysis.

Obviously Mark Sanchez had a bad day although I don’t place a lot of blame on his plate.  He was constantly under pressure the entire game.  The pick 6 interception he threw was ugly of course.  We are 10 games into the season and I still am wondering what happened to LeSean McCoy.  I get much more excited nowadays when the ball is handed to Darren Sproles.  Sproles is explosive and fights for every single yard he can grind out.  McCoy seems to do tons of lateral movement/tap dancing and does very little to resist going to the ground once someone touches him.  I don’t understand why he is so much less effective than he was last year but it is dramatic. The Eagles defense was putrid.  They got no pressure on Aaron Rodgers and repeatedly gave up 1st downs when the Packers were facing 3rd and forevers.  It seemed incredible this was the same unit that stepped on the field against the Panthers six days prior.  They just had no answers to anything.

Of course the Eagles are not alone with these wild swings in their level of play.  If you look around the NFL there are countless examples of teams going from red hot to ice cold on a weekly basis.  As a fan it’s very frustrating.  The game got so bad that Fox flipped over to the Cardinals/Lions game midway in the 3rd quarter.  I didn’t even care.  Instead I jumped on WoW and watched web score updates that ended with the team going down in flames 53-20.  If anyone had ideas that the Eagles were among the elite teams in the NFC those ideas should have been adjusted downward after yesterday’s performance.

My week got started this morning in a very dangerous way.  I left early in the van to drop the dogs back off at Ali’s place before work.  After doing so I was on one of the main arteries approaching an intersection where the light had just turned yellow.  I was getting close to the go/no go point so I had to hit the brakes pretty hard.  As I did all of a sudden my deceleration stopped as the brake pedal went straight to the floor.  Thank goodness there were no vehicles in front of me at the time.  I rolled straight through the intersection with my foot mashed to the floor.

I was able to get the party van stopped by downshifting and using the emergency brake.  This was not the first time this has happened.  Several years ago the brake lines to the rear ruptured due to the extreme rust the undercarriage has accumulated from it’s years on Michigan roads.  Back then I again hit the brakes hard and again got very lucky that nobody was in front of me when the brakes failed.

I got out of the van and looked for a puddle of brake fluid similar to what I saw last time.  I was surprised nothing was there.  I called Cindy and told her what happened.  She said she would come and meet me.  She didn’t want me to drive with at least her in front of me to be a buffer.  I was actually within a mile or so of Tires Plus, the place that replaced the rear brake lines.  I put the van in first gear, turned on the 4 ways and putt putted my way back to them.  I did not want to deal with the hassle of calling, waiting for, and paying for a tow truck.

Cindy pulled in after I dropped off the van.  Luckily her work is on the way to my office so I could drop her off without much hassle.  I got the call from the garage that now the right front metal brake line has ruptured and the bill to replace it is a stiff $500.  Almost all of that cost is labor as the mechanic has to custom size and bend the new brake line to make it fit.  The party van is nearing the end of it’s lifespan obviously at 19 years old.  Twice I have been lucky to avoid potential disaster, I don’t know that I am willing to roll the dice a third time.

The only real reason I have the van is for dog transport although there are other rare situations where having a vehicle of this category has proven useful.  Of course there are tons of memories and sentimental value wrapped up in the party van which is probably the primary reason it still has been residing in my driveway.  The last couple years have been all about how life changes and your only option is to roll with these changes and come out the other end.  The van may be next on the list of “Things that used to be”.

So yesterday was the release of the latest expansion for World of Warcraft, the MMORPG that I have been playing since 2005, yes 2005.  I played a little bit in the morning before work to check out the new content and had a good time.  When I got settled in last night after work I tried to log in again to play some more.

I was greeted by a server full message, something I have not seen in WoW since the height of it’s popularity 6 or 7 years ago.  I was placed in the back of a 400 person line which took nearly 20 minutes to get to the front of, which was annoying enough.  However when my reward for that wait turned out to be a game loading screen that went nowhere my mild frustration got bumped up several notches.  I wound up closing the load screen and didn’t bother trying again as it would have meant being put back at the end of the line.

I read online that the problems were supposedly related to a DDOS attack on Blizzard’s servers however who knows if that’s true. DDOS is a great catch all excuse for server problems that could be actually tied into poor planning for the expansion launch.  I have no doubt Blizzard will fix the issue, they always do and in a perverse way I was happy to see that there was enough interest in the decade old game to cause such problems.

My mom used to always tell me she could care less when I wrote in my blog about WoW and gaming in general.  She said she would always skip past those parts as she had no interest in them.  I never quite understood her aversion to talking about the game and how it’s virtual reality tied into very real feelings, emotions and human nature.  I view gaming as my version of mom’s romance novels that she would read endlessly.  That was her escape, her way to release her mind from everyday stress and problems.  WoW and gaming in general has always been my way to accomplish the same thing.

Speaking of mom, this Sunday marks another of what will be many sad and awkward moments that will be forthcoming.  It would have been mom’s 67th birthday.  Yesterday marked 3 months since she passed away.  It’s been a very weird thing trying to figure out how I feel.  In some ways it feels like more time has passed but at the same time her last few days are imprinted in my mind like it just happened yesterday.  The bitterness, remorse, irony, sorrow, and reality of my mom’s passing has left a permanent cloud in my field of vision, even on the brightest and bluest Florida days.

Having her birthday come and go without seeing her face or hearing her voice will be another cup of cold water thrown in my direction.