Happy belated 8th birthday, neglected blog…
So, on December 12, 2002, I started this blog, and it's been dormant for the last 16 months as I moved more and more of my "blogging" to Facebook status updates, which I'm gonna try and figure out how to integrate with mememiner.com. I never got all that many comments with mm, but do get lots of comments on my Facebook posts. Hopefully I'll be able to have a grand unification of some sort.
Oh, and I finally converted over to WordPress. I tried to stick it out as long as I could with MT, but ultimately, it got to be not very much fun hosting an MT blog, and this lack of fun contributed to a lack of usage, ultimately. Now that I'm on WordPress though, I've got all kinds of poorly-written half-ass plugins to try out! ;-)
Never buy a VAIO notebook
A couple years ago, I bought a Sony VAIO VGN-AR370 notebook. I thought I was getting a really full-featured machine, and perhaps I was, that is, if I was able to use all it's features. First it was the HDMI cable not carrying audio. Now, believe it or not, despite the fact that this notebook has an svideo input jack, and right next to it, and 1/8" stereo audio input jack, there's no way to access these components inside of Vista; and although it has a TV tuner card installed, I cannot use this tuner with anything besides Windows Media Center.
Not to mention the two dead batteries in 2 years (the most recent of which they're refusing to replace), the USB male port part that pulled out when the cable was disconnected, the spider that died on the TFT LCD screen, the screws that randomly go missing and the warped bezel, and UHH, **Vista**, well....
I will not be buying a Sony computer for the rest of my life. I wish I would have bought a Rain LiveBook.
Fire Todd Sauerbrun
Just fucking fire him already. 21 points off of punt/kickoff team fuckups? Exhibit A:
What's surprising is that Mike Shanahan, tactician Shanahan, let Sauerbrun kick not once, but twice to Devin Hester. Both kicks straight up the middle resulted in Hester running them back for TDs. The blocked punt in the third quarter which also resulted in a Chicago TD was the icing on the shit cake.
I realize Sauerbrun caused Ellis Hobb's fumble in the 2006 playoff victory against the Patriots, and Denver was in a big bidding war with the Patriots over him earlier this year, but his direct responsibility for 21 points to a chump team like the Bears is a fire-able offense. His punt average of 48.5 yards is really respectable and all, but he showed today that he's not capable of strategic thinking. The Broncos should have dumped him after his problems with ephedra came to light earlier this year.
The Broncos defense shares some of the blame too, giving up 14 points in a little less than 5 minutes to a shitty Chicago offense is pretty weak, and the Ponies' failure to capitalize on third-down conversions (I think they were 1-for-8 today) also hurt (and continues my extreme antipathy towards Jay Cutler), but really Sauerbrun and special teams should shoulder the blame for today's loss. Of course, as shitty as the AFC West is, the Broncos can lose today and still make it to the playoffs.
Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown
(image courtesy of pinballrebel.com, because i forgot my camera and my cell phone was dead)
Jalen and I headed down to the Jefferson County Fairgrounds today for the Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown 2007, and man, did we have a blast.
Imagine if you will over 100 of mostly-showroom quality pinball machines from the last 50 years with unlimited free play and no lines (well, there was a bit of waiting to get on the Addams Family machine, but that was somewhat expected as it's THE BEST PINBALL GAME OF ALL TIME). It was heavenly.
In addition to such classics as Fireball, Centaur (which has some really cool speech synthesis and artwork that totally freaked me out as a kid) and Xenon, they also had this amazing Joust cocktail machine where you could play head-to-head pinball! Apparently these were prototypes, less than 500 were made. I can see why -- there's long periods of the game when all the balls are on one side of the machine, leaving the other player to just umm, twiddle their thumbs as it were, but the concept is so cool it's a shame they didn't mass-produce these.
Also got an opportunity to play some vintage wood-rail pinball machines such as Yuma (released in 1950) and Scuba (released in 1970). Gameplay is a lot slower than on "modern" machines, but the sounds, feel and even "smell" of some of these electromechanical games is very charming. What was amazing about these games in particular was how little pinball machines had advanced in those 20 years.
We also saw the Alexander clan - Dave, Erin, Daphne and Hunter were there. I had a feeling I might see Dave, it was cool to see everyone again, haven't seen them since we went camping at the Sand Dunes last spring.
I have to say, once we're in a living situation where we can have a rec room, we're gonna have to get a pinball machine.
Dear Glenn “Instapundit” Reynolds
Today on your blog, you wrote:
> So far I'd say the Dems are off to a weak start.
It's a better start than your party's off to, Glenn. Losing 28+ seats in the House, 6 seats in the Senate, and 6 governorships without a single pickup? That's not what one would call the definition of "strength". Of course, maybe you and Karl "Genius" Rove are using THE math to come to these sorts of conclusions.
Meanwhile, you're sniping, not at the sidelines but in the nosebleed seats reserved for the newly irrelevant, about who's going to be the Democrat's choice for MAJORITY leader. You huff n puff all you want. Your side lost. Better get used to that feeling, cause there's a lot more where that came from, esp. once the oversight machine starts rolling along. Nobody's gonna remember shit about Hoyer vs Murtha or Abramoff's tossed off BS about Harry Reid once those subpoenas start flowing.
every site should have a theme.
i'll be the first to admit: for someone who's been as a big enthusiast of the web as i have, it's a damn shame i haven't put more work into my own little neck of the woods. let's hear it for fresh starts and fun, easy-to-install technology. now i only have to figure out how to customize it.
i hope this site can reflect the regular exchange of ideas, images and sounds i find myself running across on a day-to-day basis. i do a lot of exploring -- might as well as document it along the way.