Random Access

Friday – 22 October 2010
Bonus points to those of you who get the subject line without having to look it up.

It’s my 9/80 “on” Friday.
It started off somewhat quietly… but it picked up a little, around 9:45. No big deal. Nothing insurmountable.

Last night, after a couple of rounds of “Let’s Clean the House,” I managed to sneak off to Nova Praetoria for a while. I hadn’t played City for a week or two, so it was a nice change of pace. I ran a few missions. I leveled up once. I remembered how slow running through a city can be… although it’s still faster than Hover.

I also got in a bit more reading in Starship Troopers.

Stray Toasters

• Tweaking Tradition, Even in Its Temple
• Moon Crater Contains Usable Water, NASA Says
  • Shawn Colvin & Ernie: I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon
    
• Recently Rediscovered Letter Shows Wonder Woman’s Earliest Costume
• Middle Classes in Africa
• Haunted Mansion ghost hearse made from LEGO
• A Son Grows Thankful for His Father’s Tough Love
• Gays, Mormons and Boy Scouts’ discrimination
• 
• Credit Cards Soon to Get a Makeover
• T-shirt turns into a zombie
  • Sears reaches out to the neglected Zombie-American demographic
• No Net for the Man in Charge

Namaste.

Saturday – 16 October 2010
Yesterday, and I headed up to Clearfield to check out a new (to us) train shop: Almosta Junction.  They have the largest O-scale selection that I’ve encountered in Utah. And, they had an amazing layout, including one train that had at least 40 cars on it. pointed out that it “…isn’t just a toy train set, that is definitely a model.” We didn’t get to see the trains in action, but just seeing the layout was great. The shop was pretty cool and I am Ivory Soap sure that I’ll be heading back there again in the not-too-distant future.

After the model railroad outing, I came home and hung out until it was time for Clitorati. Last night’s gathering was small, but nevertheless good. And, I had recovered enough of my appetite to have a little something to eat when dinnertime rolled around.

This morning, we got up and took SaraRules!’ car to the shop to have tire and brake work done. After that, we made a quick stop at the store to pick up breakfast-typed food stuffs. While there, we ran into my former coworker, Brooke, whom we haven’t seen in a few months. Then it was back home for breakfast (French Toast and eggs).

Stray Toasters

• Prince announces tour to start in December
• The Swiss Have the World’s Longest Tunnel and They’re Proud of It
• 
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: Passenger: Airline said I’m ‘too disabled’ to fly alone
• Fox channels go dark amid financial dispute
• 
• HOW TO: Make a Zombie Barbie Garden
• 12 Awesome Airplane Paint Jobs

Now: Yard and garden work (ostensibly the last of the season)
Next: Red
Later: La Boheme

Namaste.

Friday – 01 October 2010
A new month begins and it falls on my 9/80 “off” day.
Convergence?
Coincidence?
Serendipity?

Who knows…?

Today also marks the beginning of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. And, as such, this blog will once again “Go Pink for October.”

Last night, SaraRules and I met up with Marcie and her niece and… dun dun DUNNNNN…. went to the gym.  According to the blog-a-tron, it looks as though it’s been a two (2) months since my last confession trip to the gym. And, as an added bonus: just joined our gym and may work out with us, from time to time.

Last night’s workout (courtesy of SaraRules) included:

• Elliptical: 5 minutes
• Leg Press: 3 sets/10 reps, 100 lbs
• Leg Extensions: 3 sets/10 reps, 70 lbs
• Leg Curls: 3 sets/10 reps, 65 lbs
• Calf Raises: 3 sets/10 reps, 100 lbs
• Incline Chest Press (dumbbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 35 lbs
• Sit-ups (incline): 3 sets/10 reps
• Upright Row (barbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 40 lbs
• Curls (barbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 40 lbs
• Tricep Extensions (rope): 3 sets/15 reps, 60 lbs

It was a good workout and a bit of a challenge, as I haven’t been in such a long time… but I’m looking forward to getting back into the swing of things.

The Legend of Chimpy
I was half-kidding yesterday, when I said that I should start a new section of the blog…

…but a few minutes ago, Minion #2 messaged me with this bit of monkeydom from Chimpy:

Is it wrong to laugh out loud if Chimpy 2.0 locked himself out of his own testing machine and then asked me if I knew the password?

Yeah.  This is the kind of thing we deal with.

I should also clarify something: The person we currently refer to as “Chimpy” is actually the second person to carry his own special monkey designation. The original Chimpy left the company a year or so ago. However, “Chimpy 2” has done a banner job of maintaining the high levels of monkey-rifficness that we came to expect from his predecessor.

Stray Toasters

• StoryCorps: The Human Voice, featuring the late Studs Terkel
• ‘Black Dynamite’ Ass-Kicking His Way to Adult Swim
• For SaraRules: Great Comics That Never Happened: The Justice Luchadores of America
• A History of Rap: Jimmy Fallon, Justin Timberlake and The Roots

• The Sea Monkeys and the White Supremacist
• LEGO wedding Ring
• While this is cool, I’m still quite happy with the rings SaraRules and I have — with lots of thanks to for an amazing design job! (After all, how many guys get to have one of their favorite comic book symbols worked into their wedding band?!)
• Speaking of rings, as of Sunday morning, SaraRules and I will have been married one year.  Wow.
• Speaking of LEGO: My copy of LEGO Universe arrived yesterday.
• SF Says: “It Gets Better.”
  • In a related note, Ellen Degeneres taped this PSA:
    
• The Photographer’s Right: A Downloadable Flyer Explaining Your Rights When Stopped or Confronted for Photography
• The Inside Scoop on Making Gelato
• From the “I, Zombie” file: 17-yo Girl Must Digest Brain Fluid to Survive

And now it’s time to find some trouble to get into…

Namaste.

Friday – 17 September 2010
It’s my 9/80 day off and I’ve been ready for it since Monday afternoon.
(Fortunately, Tuesday through yesterday weren’t bad.)

I think that I’ve found what I hope is only a temporary measure in getting around the problem that my web host is having with subdomains: I just changed the format of how I access and post links for this blog.  I’ll need to try and do the same for Four-Color Coverage and Game Center. Monkeys.

Last night, SaraRules and I were both having a case of the “I don’t want to cook dinner” lazies. We wound up going to MacCool’s Public House for dinner. They were having another food/beer pairing (with Wasatch Brewery, I believe).  We hadn’t RSVPed for it, but Micheal (the manager) asked us if we wanted to get in on it.  We declined. We sat at a table near the back of the restaurant. Scott, one of the owners, saw us as we walked to our table and said “Hi.”  For dinner, we started with the Finn Skins; for entrees, SaraRules had the Smoked Salmon Chowder and I had the Salmon of Knowledge. Mick, the other owner, from stopped by the table a couple of times and brought samples of the night’s pairing menu. Michael also brought over a couple of the beer samples, including a very tasty “Black and Pumpkin” variation on the traditional Black and Tan. All-in-all, it was one of the best dinner ideas that either of us could have come up with.

Stray Toasters

• Autism’s First Child
• Gather Ye Olde Suburban Knights
• Dr. Volt’s Comic Connection is having their 20th Anniversary Sale tomorrow.
• 
• Rain Level rainboots with depth gauges
• Zombie poster
• By way of Prelate Derek:



• Official BBC DIY Dalek blueprints
• Lady Liberty’s nose and other icons for sale

Time to find some trouble to get into…

Namaste.

Saturday – 04 September 2010
Day 2 of the 4-day weekend is upon us.
It started out rather lazily – sleeping in and then stretching out on the sitting room sofa and reading comics. I’d pretty much call that a “win-win” start to the day.

Yesterday was a fairly lazy day. The morning was uneventful. A little before lunchtime, I headed down to visit Kate and Perry and the kids (or at least the kids who weren’t in school…). From there, I headed downtown to shoot a spot for an upcoming USUO video for new Thierry Fischer, the symphony’s new Music Director. It was fun. We’ll see if I make it into the final video or wind up on the cutting room floor. Then, I headed over to the USUO offices to say “Hi” to SaraRules.

Then, I did something that I haven’t done in over 25 years: I bought a new train set. (Yes, I do have a LEGO train set, but that was purchased for me.) My new acquisition was the Lionel Chessie System Merger Special Freight Set. Growing up in Maryland, Chessie System was the ‘road that I grew up around. (That and Norfolk and Western, to some degree.) Pictures of the unboxed set can be seen here.

To say that it’s “a little difficult” to find Chessie locomotives and rolling stock around here (Union Pacific territory) would be a minor understatement. Something that I didn’t realize before getting the itch to get back into model railroading – but makes perfect sense – is that hobby shops carry ‘roads that are appropriate to their geographic location. Therefore, I can find UP and BNSF stock with no problem, but finding things that are more common east of the Mississippi is a little more scarce… unless you special order them, in most cases.

Leaving The Train Shoppe, I gave a call to see if he wanted to come over and watch a few episodes of I Love Toy Trains that I’d recorded. He did. And, thus, we did. One of the episodes featured a layout owned by Tony Lash, that takes up over 2,800 square feet.  (Transcript of the show can be read here. You should read the first few paragraphs, at least.)

Two-thousand eight-hundred square feet.

I’ll give you a moment to let that sink in.

Just to put it into a little better perspective: His layout is larger than our house. Yeah, it’s that big. And it was AMAZING. Seriously.

After watching ILTT, it was time to head out for evening entertainment — SaraRules and her dad went off for a “daddy-daughter date” to see Machete (which she said was pretty awesome), while and I headed off to Clitorati. We had a good turnout; by the time we went to get dinner, there were 15 of us.

When we got back home, I unpacked the track, transformer and locomotive from the Chessie set and assembled it in the family room. And I was immediately transformed into an eight-year-old kid again. Yep, just watching the locomotive going around the oval elicited that much nostalgia… and was that much fun.

Stray Toasters

• Death in Space
• Invoice cake sent to People.com
• TRENDING: How Christians spoil sex
• Seven Famous Movie Flaws That Were Explained in Deleted Scenes
• 
• The physics of breaking stuff with your fists
• What are the perils of being a lefty?
• No, Facebook Places Is Not Tracking You
• Best Exploitation Flicks: Machete‘s Over-the-Top Ancestors
• Zombies get “red light camera” tickets, too
• “East Meets West”: flying carpet sofa

And with that, time to find some trouble to get into!

Namaste.

Monday – 30 August 2010
Today is both a Monday and a rainy day.
I think that the only “win” to be found here is that it’s a short work week. Despite that, here’s Today’s View:

This past weekend was good. It was equal parts fun/productive and lazy. Saturday, I ran a ‘Clix tournament at Dr. Volt’s. (Pictures here) The theme was “Family Reunion,” wherein each team had to have at least two (2) figures that were related to each other. It made for some interesting teams. I went with a Wonder Woman-themed team:

Wonder Woman (Diana Prince)
(gallery bb-figure-018)

Wonder Girl (Donna Troy, Diana’s sister)
(gallery cr-figure-038)

Wonder Woman (Artemis)
(gallery jl-figure-037)

They held up rather well, going 2-1.  (It didn’t really matter too much as I was just playing bye rounds, but it was still fun.) And, I got to use my new WW figure, to boot… which I need to get a good picture of.

Saturday evening, I fired up the grill and cooked burgers. We ate under the gazebo. It was good. Later, we ran a quick errand to Hobby Lobby – we were looking for frames for the artwork we bought at the Park City Arts Festival. We also ran into Sinister and his wife, while at the ‘Lobby. He told me of a possible monkey wrench in our Sunday plans, so we made a contingency plan.

That night, we watched The Dirty Dozen. I’ve seen bits and pieces of it and SaraRules had never seen it, so I added it to my Netflix queue a few weeks ago. Halfway through the movie, we stopped for a snack intermission. While scooping ice cream, I had a niggling suspicion about the movie…

… I went back downstairs to confirm or deny it.

Myth: Confirmed
Yep, I had bought the movie a few months ago.
*facepalm*

We laughed about it, as we started watching the second half of the movie, which was quite awesome.

Sunday, I got a call from Sinister correcting part of the mix-up from Saturday evening’s conversation. The original plans were for he, Jeremiah, and I to meet at Chris’ for a big JLA-Avengers ‘Clix match. Jeremiah wasn’t able to make it, so we had to call for a stunt double…

…and our stunt double had a conflict.

…so we called in a second stunt double, Johnny. He was able to fill in and save the day.

…and, thus, we gamed.  Sinister and Johnny played the JLA – and a well-fielded JLA, at that – while Chris and I played The Avengers. 2,400 point game. There were good (and bad) dice rolls from both sides of the table. When we finished – we had a time limit – Chris and I had managed to beat down most of the JLA’s big guns and were working clean-up duty on the rest; I lost four of my nine figures, while Chris lost no one. Good game.

Back at home, SaraRules had prepared a nice stew-like dish, served over polenta. It was very good and also marked the first time that I’d had polenta, to my knowledge. After dinner, we watched George Romero’s Survival of the Dead. It was… disappointing. Even SaraRules commented,”That sucked.”

We cleansed our entertainment palates by watching a couple of episodes of Mad Men, Season 2. That helped immensely.

Instant Replay: Football
The Ravens took on the Giants on Saturday. I didn’t get to see the game, but I did keep track of it via NFL.com’s Game Center. And the Ravens pulled out a big win over the Giants, 24 -10.

Stray Toasters

• Revisiting Black History on Martha’s Vineyard
• Three months until Burn Notice returns…
• Too Few Women in Tech? Stop Blaming Men
• This kid, at the 2010 Baltimore Comic Con, could be in my Corps any day:



• Original Kermit the Frog puppet donated to Smithsonian
• Hip-Hop History, Recreated by Those Who Invented It
• Parts of the valley are starting to look like locations from Stephen King’s The Mist.
• 
• Protest at military funeral ignites a test of free speech
• Clean People Feel Morally Superior
• 7 Inconsistencies in ‘The Fresh Prince’

Namaste.

Friday – 13 August 2010
Yes, it is Friday the 13th… (dun dun DUNNNN!)
But, it’s still Friday, which means that the weekend is nigh. With that in mind, here’s a little Janet (“Ms. Jackson,” if you’re nasty…) to help get your end-of-the-week dance on:

And we can’t just leave it like that, so here’s a little Will Smith, too:

After working a little later than usual on Wednesday and having to go back to work Wednesday night (to deal with a potential water leak), I had an extra hour of work on the timecard… of which I availed myself yesterday afternoon: I left a little after 4:00.  It was nice. I stopped at Pin-up Girl, ordered a Peach White Tea and then sat and chatted with Jim and his brother, Paul.

Then I headed home to get ready for some football. SaraRules had a Justice Junior League meeting, so that meant that I was on my own for dinner. (Hello, Papa Johns…?) Pizza went wonderfully with beer and football. and it wasn’t just any old football game… it was the Ravens hosting the Panthers. But I’ll go into the game later.

As if the early part of the day wasn’t enough, SaraRules, Bonne, Melissa S. and I went to see The Expendables. SaraRules called it, and I quote:

Quite possibly the best action movie I’ve ever seen… I’d give it nine-and-a-half bricks!

And, just in case that wasn’t enough, here’s what Bonne had to say about it:

If you prefer action over chick flicks, I have one word for you: Expendables!!!

That’s right: My mother-in-law thought it rocked.  Beat that.

And, yeah, it was pretty damned good. You’re not five minutes into the movie when the bullets – and bodies – start flying. The movie is “a little” thin on plot, but doesn’t suffer from lack of action. You get to see (almost) all of the stars chewing bubble gum, kicking ass and taking names. Something that I wasn’t expecting: The dialogue was actually witty at times. Sure, there were a couple of in-jokes here and there, but the banter was fairly fresh. And, the movie was just plain fun.

SaraRules’ Rating:

Rob’s Rating: 

That was my Thursday, how was yours?

Instant Replay: Football

Carolina Panthers at Baltimore Ravens
12 – 17
The Ravens played host to the Carolina Panthers for both teams’ first preseason game. The weather went from overcast and threatening to “Hey, Noah, where’s your ark?” during the course of the game. The Ravens have a lot of new talent on both sides of the ball. They also have a good number of returning team members. Among the new talent is former St. Louis QB Mark Bulger. Bulger looked a little rusty, but viewers saw that the talent is still there. QB Troy Smith got the short end of the stick, coming into the game as the rain started pouring down, but that didn’t stop him from engineering a drive that culminated in a rushing TD… by Smith, himself, on a QB draw. The Panthers apparently have twenty-nine (29) new players, including six rookie defensive players. They also have two rookie QBs – Jimmy Clausen and Hunter Cantwell – duking it out for the #2 slot. And I have to say: Clausen looked amazing. Seriously. First NFL game – against the Ravens’ D, no less – and he stood in the pocket, looking cool and in control. His passes were solid. His timing was unexpectedly and impressively precise, threading the needle more than once to complete long yardage passes to receivers in coverage. Yes, this was “just” a pre-season game, but it was still football and it was a good game. It’s good to know that both of my teams will be worth watching this season… especially when both teams meet again in November.

Workout
Thursday’s step count: 4,860

Stray Toasters

• Late night + early morning = Rob stopping at Pin-up Girl Espresso for some go-juice.
  Erin and Paul helped me kickstart my morning.



• Hidden World of Girls — Girls and the Women They Become
• Oh, North Carolina Public Schools… I didn’t know just how badly you needed help.
• ‘Tea Party’ members offer a ground-level view
• From Brad Guigar’s Courting Disaster:

  

  (click image to read the question and comments)

• White House against ending birthright citizenship
• 10 great haunted places across the USA
• I haven’t read the book or seen the movie, but I would probably be more inclined to read or see this take on Eat Pray Love:



• Organize your ideas to make more money
• Stock Your Garden with Foods Cheaper to Grow Than to Buy

Quote of the Day
Today’s quote comes from last night, by way of someone sitting in front of us to his friend who had just returned from the concession stand:

“You’re bitching about salt and sugar?! That much food will grow you two spare asses!”

Have a great Friday!

Namaste.

Wednesday – 11 August 2010
Mid-week and all’s well.
It’s Comics and possibly-Sushi Wednesday.

Last night, Chris, Jeremiah and Sinister came over to play ‘Clix. (Yeah, I know… what a concept!) Our theme for the game was “War of Light,” based on the “Blackest Night” storyline from DC Comics’ Green Lantern titles.  Chris and I played the Sinestro and Green Lantern Corps, respectively, while Jeremiah and Sinister played the Black Lanterns. For some reason, we thought that 1200 points per player was a good idea. And we also thought that starting (theoretically) at 7:00 was a good idea. We didn’t really get under way until 9-ish… and wrapped up somewhere around 12:30 this morning. We just called the game, but I think that if we tallied up points, Chris and I were ahead… but the other guys played one Hell of a game. And, it was a lot of fun. Pictures of the game can be seen here.

Workout
Tuesday’s step count: 4,633

Stray Toasters

• Tonight is the Epic Brewery Dinner at MacCool’s. SaraRules and I are going with the in-laws. If it’s anywhere on the level of the Guinness dinner from a few weeks ago, it should be fantastic.
• Letter from a freed man to his former slave owner
• I’m not a Twitter user, but found this article interesting: How black people use Twitter
• City of Heroes: Going Rogue comes out on Tuesday.



• Last week, Comic Book Resources’ “Comics Should Be Good” column asked for submissions of Disney-Marvel crossovers. This week, they posted some of the submissions — and they are good. Check them out here.
• This had me literally laughing out loud… and then sharing it with the rest of my team, when they came over to see what was up: Soul-Toons
• Another cooling unit’s pump appears to have gone out in our server room.  This would be (more)  understandable… if the units were more than a year old!
• Anti-terrorist hotline ad banned for being ‘insensitive’
• By way of Brad Guigar (Evil, Inc.): 



• My Day of “Dreckoning”
• Literary Destinations: Five Books to Help You Escape

Quote of the Day
Today’s quote comes from last night’s game.  Attacked by two Black Lanterns, my Ganthet evaded an attack from BL Superman and shrugged off part of an attack from BL Martian Manhunter.  Jeremiah looked at Ganthet’s dial and saw that he was still ready to rumble. Rolling his eyes, he muttered:

“Stupid Ganthet…”

…and considered options for trying to remove him from the game. (Didn’t happen, just for the record.)

Namaste.

Thursday – 05 August 2010
Today…
…aside from being NBN Thursday…
…and aside from the Rush concert being tonight…
…is also the birthday of two of my friends – Christine and Land:

Last night, I played D&D (4E) with Jack at Hastur Hobbies. It was fun. No one died during the encounter… although a couple of characters came close. We even had a couple of new players in the group — one of whom, with his near-encyclopedic knowledge of some rules minutiae, reminded me of Brad or Chris.

Workout
Wednesday’s step count: 5,068

Stray Toasters

• Froyo 2.2… I am learning to both love and hate you.
  • Google CEO: 200,000 Android devices sold each day
• Meetings.  YAY!
• Ethics training. Double YAY!
• 
• Zombie Survival Scanner (iPhone app)
• WizKids/NECA posted a new “Web of Spider-Man” figure preview last night: Wolverine
• MarknTyme sent me a link to this video last night:
• Today is apparently National Underwear Day.  Who knew…?!
  • How to Choose Comfortable Underwear
• Video Game Hall of Fame inducting Pac-Man and pals
  • Five Disturbing Truths about Mario Games
• Critical flaws discovered in widely used embedded OS

No, his mind is not for rent…

Namaste.

Wednesday – 21 July 2010
It’s Comics (and maybe Sushi) Wednesday.  ‘Nuff said.

Despite having most of the things I needed for this morning prepped and ready-to-go last night, I managed to walk out the door without my ID badge. I didn’t discover this fact until I was in the elevator.

::: facepalm :::

I was able to get into the office, thanks to a coworker. And, I acquired my badge thanks to the world’s most awesome wife ever dropping it off on her way to work.

Last night, SaraRules and I went to The Days of ’47 Rodeo. (It’s a Utah thing.) Let me break it down for you:

• Days of ’47
• Rodeo

Put the two together and you get: The Days of ’47 Rodeo.
SaraRules is a rodeo fan and has been for some years.
Until last night, I had only seen bits and pieces of rodeos on television.
We went. And I have pictures to prove it.

Tonight, we are going to MacCool’s Public House for Guinness Dinner, featuring dishes made with Guinness.

Workout
Tuesday’s step count: 3,900

Stray Toasters

• Sometimes, I have odd dreams. Not in the “fantastic flights of fancy” sense; they are often more rooted in the “Where in the Nine Hells did that come from?!” sense. Last night’s sleep included at least one of those dreams.
• Afflicted: 11 Abandoned American Hospitals and Asylums “Open” for Exploration
• Orioles outlast Rays 11-10 to win wild 13-inning marathon
• By way of Meliko:



• 14 Things You Didn’t Know About Star Trek
  (I actually knew 6 of the 14 things.  I blame my stepmother.)
• I’m not a Guitar Hero player. I think that I’ve covered this fact before. That being said, I discovered something yesterday that has the greatest potential to change that for me: Rush on Bringing “2112” to ‘Guitar Hero’
  • And in a nominally related note: Rush’s Return to the Limelight
• Blacks Face Bone Marrow Donor Shortage
• 
• Many States Adopt National Standards for Their Schools
• From Comic Book Resources: “Take On Me” – The Greatest Music Video Ever

Namaste.

Monday – 19 July 2010
Another work week begins.
It’s sunny and warm… on its way to being “hot” later today.

This past weekend was quite good. Saturday, I wound up going back to GEEX and hanging out to run a few more demos. One of the guys who played a demo game on Friday – and dropped a sizable chunk o’ change on ‘Clix right after – came back Saturday and bought even more! And, after running into a Zatanna cosplayer on Friday, I ran into a Harley Quinn (from the Batman: Arkham Asylum game) cosplayer and a friend on Saturday:

A little before I was ready to leave the expo, I got a few notifications of a possible problem at work.

*grblsnrkx*

It turned out not to be a problem, just a situation that needed (a lot of) monitoring. I wound up getting alerts about it from roughly 3 PM until just after 11 PM, which meant that I was getting alerts during…

…the Ben Folds concert at Deer Valley.

(hanging out with 5,000 of my closest friends, waiting for Ben Folds and the Utah Symphony)

The concert was fun; it was roughly two hours long, with one encore. (Only one encore, which was unfortunate, because I was waiting to hear a song that was later in his encore set.)  I also ran into Derek, thanks to the joys of Foursquare. (Turns out that another coworker was there, as well, but we didn’t see her or her husband.)

Sunday, we slept in. Selah. After breakfast – I made blueberry muffins – we went to the gym. Back home for a shower and change of clothes. Then we were off to run some errands before our impromptu ice cream social! I found out earlier in the day that it was National Ice Cream Day and figured that was a good – or at least “good enough” – reason to invite people over for a little get together. And it was. To wind up the evening, SaraRules and I watched The Crazies, the recent remake of the George Romero film of the same name. It was entertaining. There were some plot holes. There were some gaffes. But, all-in-all, it was decent.

Workout
Sunday, SaraRules and I hit the gym:

• Elliptical: 22 minutes/ 5.5 MPH (avg.)
• Bench Press: 3 sets/10 reps
  • 2 sets @ 135 lbs
  • 1 set @ 155 lbs
• Shoulder Press (seated, dumbbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 40 lbs
• Flys: 3 sets/10 reps, 100 lbs
• Curls (dumbbell): 3 sets/10 reps, 25 lbs

Saturday’s step count: 5,490
Sunday’s step count: 1,0707

Stray Toasters

• The razor’s edge of having a new phone:
  • I love the new phone and finding ways to customize it and just… play around with it.
  • Having an 8 megapixel camera – with integration into Facebook – makes it FAR too easy to take random pictures and upload them to the Interwebs.
• I’ve become quite a fan of Foursquare, which I discovered by way of SaraRules. I like its social media gaming aspect, as well as the fact that it can be used as a way to form impromptu gatherings. It’s available for Android, iPhone and Blackberry phones. Another neat feature is that some businesses offer specials to Foursquare users. Check it out.  What have you got to lose?
• Smithsonian’s Spacesuits: Number One on the Runway
• I often post strips from Evil, Inc. in here.  Another light-hearted and fun superhero comic that I enjoy is Love and Capes, by Thom Zahler.  It follows the adventures of Mark (an accountant… who is secretly The Crusader) and his now-wife, Abby (a bookstore owner).

  

  The series rarely shows superheroics, instead choosing to show character interactions, with the action happening off-panel. Love and Capes has recently been picked up by IDW Publishing for print, with the first issue hitting stands in December.  If you’re looking for a fun read, this is a great way to go.

• Take a Walk with “The Walking Dead”
• Jersey Numbers Assigned
• By way of Nyx: Dear Girls Above Me

Namaste.

Monday – 12 July 2010
Holy cow… where’d the weekend go?!

Saturday, SaraRules and I did the Lavender Harvest 5K in Mona with our friend, Melissa. The race was held at the Young Living Lavender Farm, where SaraRules’ bridal pictures were taken.

The race started a little late, but there was a good turn out — according to Doug, Young Living’s CEO, the race has grown from about 300 people to over 1,000 in four years. As this was my first-ever 5K (and as I am not a runner), there was a little jogging (briefly) and a lot of walking in this event. SaraRules figures that we finished in about 45 minutes or so.  It was a good first experience with a 5K.

On the way back to SLC, Melissa started feeling decidedly “not well.” We stopped a couple of times… and finally wound up heading to the InstaCare in Springville. Shortly after arriving – and before the doctor really did anything – she started feeling better.

Back home, I took a shower, grabbed gear and headed up to Dr. Volt’s for the weekend’s ‘Clix tourney. Almost as soon as I got in the care, I realized that needed caffeination. Badly.  (Which sounds really funny, if you hear the voice from Gauntlet saying “Green Elf needs food badly!”) I swung into the parking lot at Pin-up Girl… but there were five cars in line and I was already running late. Not an option. So, I headed on to Dr. Volt’s. Fortunately, Dave has “Mexican Coke” (the one that has real sugar, not artificial sweeteners) at the store, so I had a bottle of that to get me through. The tournament went well; I wound up playing bye rounds — my team was the Justice League of Arkham.

After the tourney, I went back home to take care of a few last-minute items before our open house. We had a good afternoon with family and friends who were able to make it.

By 11:00, “awake” was becoming less and less of an option. I don’t think that I made it to (or much past) 11:15.

Sunday, I was up at 8:30. That was fine; I was quite happy with a good seven hours’ sleep. I was a little restless, but couldn’t figure out what to do. I solved that by plopping down on the sitting room sofa and wasting time with my Evo. Then I headed downstairs and wasted time online. After she got up, SaraRules made omelettes! We watched the Spain – Netherlands game. (The regulation time seemed… dull and a little lifeless.)

After the match, we headed up to the in-laws’ for a few before going to see Predators. Both SaraRules and I agreed that it didn’t suffer from “sequel suck” and that it was definitely a good choice for an afternoon popcorn flick.

Workout

• Saturday’s step count: 13,228 (Thank you, 5k!)
• Sunday’s step count: 2,308 (It was a lazy day.)

Stray Toasters

• Deer Valley Music Festival: Power to the People
• Hyperbole and a Half
• Gospel Singer Walter Hawkins Dies at 61
• Iran woman escapes stoning death for adultery
• ‘Avatar’ Finally Reaches Feature-Film Length
  (Because, you know James Cameron just *needs* more money…)
• Columbia, Gaithersburg make Best Places to Live List
• 
• Do other countries have their own Uncle Sams?
• Enter the LEGO Design Challenge
• From the “Gully Dwarves” file:



• Roman Polanski freed after Swiss reject U.S. extradition request
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: Zombies in Car Crash Confuse Onlookers
• ‘Voice Blind’ Man Befuddled by Mysterious Callers

Namaste.

Tuesday – 06 July 2010
The new (and short!) work week begins. I hope that everyone had a safe and enjoyable long holiday weekend.

I was informed, this morning, that I completely missed two coworkers’ birthdays… despite wishing a third coworker a “Happy Birthday” on the same day. So, with that in mind:

Friday was very quiet around the office… although, there were more people in the office than I had expected. One of the day’s highlights was getting to watch the Uruguay vs. Ghana World Cup soccer match. I had hoped that Ghana would be able to pull off a win, but it wasn’t meant to be. After work, I hung out with Jim at Pin-up Girl Espresso, while waiting for SaraRules to get home from work. Then, it was off to Clitorati.

Saturday, Chris and I got together for breakfast (Millcreek Cafe and Eggworks) before heading to Dr. Volt’s for the weekend’s tournament, “Patriotic Fight for Freedom:”

We had nine players, so it was a good turn out for a holiday weekend. As there were an odd number of players, I got to play – I put together a team comprised of:

• Uncle Sam
• Wonder Woman
• Captain America
• Winter Soldier
• Harvey Dent LE and
• The Question

After the tourney, SaraRules and I visited her folks… and her aunt and uncle, who are in town for the week.

Sunday was a nice sleep-in day. Then we headed to The Garden of Sweden, for brunch and to pick up a few things… unfortunately, they had changed their hours (again), so we wound up visiting the Ashley Furniture,  across the street, while we waited. Into and out of the IKEA. On to more errand-running and then back to the in-laws’ for dinner and birthday cake for SaraRules’ mom.

Monday was a “work around the house” day. We walked up to Pin-up Girl for caffeinated goodness and then came home, where SaraRules fixed breakfast. After that, we got to the business of housekeeping. This also included hanging pictures and making the space look generally “lived in.” Later in the evening, SaraRules suggested that we go for a walk. We went up Big Cottonwood Canyon and walked around Silver Lake. While out, we saw two deer (just hanging out along the road), a moose (!) and SaraRules saw/I heard a beaver jump into the lake, just ahead of us.

Workout
Walking step counts for (most of) the past few days:

• Friday: 7,403
• Saturday: 5,794
• Sunday: —
• Monday: 6,480

Stray Toasters

• There’s a free Utah Symphony concert at Abravanel Hall tomorrow, just call the ticket office and reserve your tickets: 801-533-NOTE (6683). For more information, click here.
• Caramel Mocha Frappe from Pin-up Girl == Win.
• 
• Puttin the Punk Back in Steampunk
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: Alligator takes late-night stroll through town
• loonybin88 just put in an appearance in the office. He was here to follow up on a project on which we’ve been working; apparently, I haven’t bolloxed things up. Win!
• I was feeling a bit nostalgic, so I checked out some old posts:
  • http://blog.echopulse.net/?p=401
  • http://blog.echopulse.net/?p=402
  • http://blog.echopulse.net/?p=403
  • http://blog.echopulse.net/?p=404

  They made me smile.

• lj user=”chromeangel” posted this, it made me laugh:
  



• Underwater Baskey Weaving: The Real Story
• I still haven’t picked up a copy of Batman: Under the Red Hood.
• Zombies in Wonderland tee shirt
• These changes in temperatures 15F+ are not helping me to shake this congestion.
• This is possibly one of the best business cards I’ve ever seen.

Namaste.

Thursday – 17 June 2010
So… it seems as though today is actually my mother’s last day of work.  She had told us “the 16th” when we visited last month, so that’s what I went with. *shrug* Whether it was yesterday, today (or even tomorrow), she’s put in nearly 40 years in the public education system, which is a long time to work in any one job.

I’m also hoping that today actually is an NBN Thursday. I think that last week’s deviation from the norm has affected this week… at least, that’s what I’m attributing the week’s problems to. Last night, SaraRules and I came home from work to find water in the basement. On the floor.

*braincramp*

It wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been.  It appeared that the feed tube for the swamp cooler disconnected from the pipe that goes to the roof and sprayed over the floor in the unfinished portion of the basement. Fortunately, most of it stayed in the area where there’s a floor drain. Thank God.  The rest of the water flowed onto another part of the floor that goes under the stairs that lead to the main floor (concrete slab) and a little got onto the landing at the bottom of the stairs — about ten or so square feet of carpet.

*grblsnrkx*

I headed back to work to get the ShopVac that I had borrowed from my father-in-law, while SaraRules headed to Target to get a couple of fans. We vacuumed water out of the carpet and padding. Twice. Then, we set up the fans to dry things out. We’ll see how much – if any – vacuuming we need to do tonight.

All things being equal, I consider it no small blessing that the water was confined to a couple of areas and that the “damage” was not nearly as bad as it could have been.

Workout
Yesterday’s step count: 5,937

Human of the Day
My mother.

Stray Toasters

• This morning’s musical selection was co-selected by SaraRules:
• Oh, snap!
• By way of SaraRules: Redoing those ’80s ‘Dos
• ‘The Golden Ticket’ Is Finally Unwrapped
• The newest addition to my Green Lantern Corps arrived yesterday: Kilowog
  

  

• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: B.C. school yearbooks to be reprinted after teacher cut out student’s photo
• Poster for a notional ‘Left 4 Dead’ movie
• 
• CD on one side, vinyl record on the other
• The Bell Tolls: Injuries, money factor in expanded NFL season

Namaste.

Wednesday – 16 June 2010
Today is not only (Sushi and) Comics Wednesday.
Nor is it just my mother and stepfather’s anniversary.
Today also marks my mother’s last-day-EVER of teaching.

I hereby declare today “Triple-Win Wednesday”.
I also declare my mother today’s Human of the Day.  (Yes, I’m biased. But, it’s my blog; I’m allowed to be.)
And for today’s musical fare: Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine:

Last night, SaraRules and I had dinner with the in-laws, including the brothers-in-law and Swiz. Grilled Salmon. Salad. Asparagus. Homemade rice pilaf. Mojitos. It was a good dinner, all around. And, for dessert, Logan and Swiz made mini-pecan tarts, which were very tasty.

Back at home, SaraRules and I enjoyed a quiet (read: “uneventful”) evening. After the headaches of Monday evening, it was a very welcome change of pace. We wound down the night with last Thursday’s episode of Burn Notice.

Workout
Yesterday’s step count: 3,987

Stray Toasters

• There were numerous articles in the news yesterday about lightning striking the statue of Jesus near I-75 in Cincinnati yesterday. That reminded me of two things:
  1. Captain Marvel Jesus
  2. Big Butter Jesus
• I saw an ad on Facebook for Pretzel M&M’s which somehow led me to the thought “Pretzelcoatl.”
• ‘Godfather of the Dead’ George A. Romero Talks Zombies
• The new “Hope” trailer for the upcoming Star Wars: The Old Republic has been released/leaked.
• Miniature sit-com sets
• After talking with the service techs who came to the house to work on the swamp cooler, I feel quite justified in my opinion that our home’s previous owners were perfectly satisfied to half-ass their way through a home “improvement” projects.
• Sperm whale feces ‘helps oceans absorb CO₂‘
• 
  
• Shortest-possible Monopoly game
• New FDA website lets public find drug safety info

Namaste.