Biased Announcers

I really don't understand why baseball would allow crazy biased announcers on the World Series. I was watching last night's game, which was a great game, and the announcers were so blatantly rooting for the Yankees it was ridiculous. I felt like I was watching my brother announce a game.. The Phillies came to back in the 7th down by 1 run and the announcers were pretty much like "well, the Yankees only have to worry about the next 3 outs because we talked to Joe before the game and asked him what he thought about using Mariano for 2 innings today, he didn't even blink an eye and said yes. That means only 3 more outs before Mariano time!"

I'm not even a Philly fan and I am so irritated by this I want to call FOX and complain.

Anyway, I just saw this silly video on ESPN.com and figured I wanted to share...

---Diversion of the Day

Tattoo..

So, when last we left out intrepid traveler he was in the San Jose airport about to a "new york style bagel".. I ate it on the plane from San Jose, it was ok but certainly not a "NY Style bagel".. I guess I didn't really expect it to be. The flights home were uneventful but good. Got home, hung out with Dianne, Jessie and Joe on Saturday night.

Yesterday I finally got my tattoo, after years of design and waiting I finally have it. It only took about 2 hours and was not nearly as painful as I thought it would be. Pictures on Flickr. The only part that was real painful was the top of the shoulder by the neck. After the tattoo me and Lynz went and got some dinner at the Courthouse. They were slow and I convinced the waitress to give me potato skins instead of fries! So good!

Tomorrow I have to go to the Brazilian Consulate to finally get my Brazil Visa.. I just found out I may be going to London now as well as Georgia and Brazil.. If that's the case it will be, fly out Sunday to Georgia, leave Georgia on Friday, go to Mythical Journeys Future Imperfect, fly out on Sunday to London, fly home Friday morning and go to WPA Friday night, fly to Brazil on Saturday!

---Diversions of the day

http://www.dorktower.com/images/comics/DorkTower766.gif

BAT FIGHT with Will Ferrell from Will Ferrell

A Day in SF

Class got out before lunch, I changed into my MChat shirt and headed up to SF (that becomes important later). I got to the pier area and to the Alcatraz ticket line right before 1, but by the time I went through the ticket booth I missed the 1:10 boat so I got a ticket on the 2:20. I walked the pier for a bit while I waited and ended up eating a nasty hot dog for lunch because it was the only thing quick in the area.

The boat ride was actually quite enjoyable, I stood up on the 3rd deck in the front. At one point a group of kids were trying to get their picture taken and asked the couple standing next to me who ended up being from London. I ended up chatting with them on the boat and hanging with them a bit on Alcatraz during the Cell Block Audio Tour.

Got off the boat and walked the long way up to the Cell Block, and by long way I mean I walked all over the island before finally making my way to the Cell Block. The island is actually quite beautiful, it had a small town outside the prison that housed the guards, warden and their families. I walked by the old school, post office, shops, etc. Most of them were either ruins, rubble piles or at the very least very run down. The only thing that is in what I would think is usable condition is the actual prison.

When you enter the prison you go in as the inmates did, past the entry point and the showers before getting the audio unit and starting the tour. The audio tour was done by four former inmates and four former guards. Having them do the tour really added to the "realism" of the place, without the audio I can see some people not feeling this place could really be that bad. The cells themselves were so small I don't know if a tall person could actually lay down, there is a small cot, two metal "shelves" (one was a table, the other the chair), a toilet, a sink and two actual shelves above the sink/toilet. I took bunches of pictures and will sort through them before posting to Flickr, I hope I got some good ones but it was pretty dark in there. The audio did a good job of explaining how it felt to be there. It talked about a few escape attempts, one of them involved a prisoner making a "bar spreader" and scaling the bars to open a hole in the area where the guards had guns. It was crazy to hear about that and to have the inmates pointing to the exact bars the guy climbed, etc. The only escape that every actually worked was the one where three prisoners dug out a passage using spoons, the guards on the audio were saying how they think the guys drowned at sea, the inmates were saying they think they made it to Mexico. Nobody will ever know for sure I guess. The tour then brings you into the area where bad prisoners go, they have two stages of bad. The first is an open cell but away from everyone else, those cells were actually bigger than the ones in the normal cell blocks but they were facing the setting sun and the city.. According to the inmates on the tape you could hear the sounds of people laughing and partying from the yacht club which made being in there worse even though you had a bigger cell. The other level of bad was the "hole" which was a room with four steel walls. Apparently it's now a federal law that any solitary confinement had to have at least a light on, it was not back when Alcatraz ran so they would lock people into a four steel walled cell with no light or anything. After the tour I ended up jogging down the island to get to the 4:20 boat.

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Back on the mainland I saw the double decker tour bus getting ready to leave. It was the last tour of the night and I jumped on at the pier which was the first stop. The tour was about two hours long, all in all it was pretty boring. Most of the city is very bland looking and I couldn't get off since it was the last bus of the night which meant the few places that did look really cool (like Haight) I couldn't really go check out. Next time I'm in the area I must go spend some time on Haight street, it was the heart of the hippie movement in the 1960s and still very much looks that way. Looks like it would be an awesome place to kill some time. Speaking of Haight St, I saw Amoeba Music which is sorta like Powell's Bookstore but for music. Unfortunately I couldn't stop.. We went over the Golden Gate bridge and back, it was a nice bridge I guess, we went through some really nice parks I would like to visit and we went by the adult street. The bus didn't go down that street, just by it. Speaking of didn't do, the bus didn't go down to Lombard St which I thought was odd, I figured it would have to drive by at least the bottom of that block. As the bus got more and more empty it ended up just being me and this one girl, we were both on the top as it was getting ready to go over the bridge so we moved downstairs and ended up chatting for the rest of the ride.

Interesting fact: SF has the lowest mean summer temperature of any US city, but it hardly ever gets frost in the winter. It's just a steady 60-70 degrees for most of the year, too cold for me..

Oh, and we passed the building that Godfather was written in. They say that the first ever espresso was served in that building too. I want a fact check on that one.

---

After the tour I decided to get something to eat on the pier, I had seen signs for a place advertising seating area over looking sea lions. Apparently the restaurant is only open for lunch but I did get to see the sea lions. This may be the oddest thing of my trip, I was walking along the pier and a girl stopped me and commented on my shirt. Now, I've had comments in the past like 'cute shirt' or 'hey that's funny', but I've never heard anyone actually say they heard of the comic or let alone something like (I remembered the actual quote last night but now I don't because it's 5am and I'm sitting in the airport) 'Nice shirt, I love monsieur chat'! That's right, a lady in SF is a loyal reader of MChat, I guess Joe's little comic isn't so little anymore.. :)

After my failed attempt to eat near the sea lions I ended up eating at the Crab House. The place was pretty crowded so they put me at the "fireplace" which is a bar seating area with a firepit in the middle. The lady on the left of me was a food critic working for Zagat the lady on the right was Kim from Arkansas who is in SF on business. I was debating the menu and was going to order the Crab Enchilada when the food critic told me that the only thing worth getting was the crab, just the plane old crab, by plane old I mean cooked like New Englanders cook lobster. The butter was not plane however, it was a garlic butter and was so good. Ended up hanging out with Kim for a while and finally headed back to the hotel.

When I got back to the hotel I went to hang out with Ashley, I was pretty exhausted so I only hung out for a few minutes.

Now I'm at the airport and about to get a bagel and get on my flight.

Bella's Website is LIVE!

So, I finally contacted Mike about moving the Bella's URL over to me. I had him change the IP address to point to Steve's new server which is where I will be hosting. A lot of credit goes to Steve who is in the process of upgrading his systems to Windows 7 and took time out of setting things up to setup my website.. :)

I worked with Steve to get everything up and running last night and the URL started pointing there just an hour ago or so. I of course have a bunch of updates I want to make to it, right now I don't have FTP access to that site (it's not setup yet) so I have to send the changes to Steve and he will update when he gets home. Basically I changed the main logo to include "gelateria" and cleaned up some of the images to make them crisper.

Once I have own the URL I will see about setting up a .mobile version of the site. And onto other web news, Allen told the guy who owns the new BBQ place in Putnam that I did his website so I may have another customer. More free food?

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For dinner last night I went to Yo Yo Sushi which is by work, I got a 10% coupon from the hotel and had been wanting sushi so it works.. The place was pretty good, they had a boat moat that you could grab off but I went with a set sashimi meal which was actually quite a bit of food. After dinner and website playing I hung out and chatted with Ashley (the girl who works at the counter at the Residence Inn) and the two guys from Denmark again for a long time before finally heading off to bed.

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Today/Tonight.. Going back to SF to check out Alcatraz and possibly eat at Cafe Gratitude again.

---Diversion of the Day

http://www.bellasbistromarket.com/

1+1=Next Iron Chef

Last night I went to play Mini-Golf in Milpitas at Golf Land USA. They have 3 courses which are rated easy, medium and hard. I left to head up there (about 10 miles) right around 5pm so I was a so glad to have the Prius and all-access to the carpool lane! The traffic was stopped on the highway and I was doing 65 next to them! Anyway, as I got closer I saw a wonderful mountain range.. The way the sun was playing off it was so pretty, I took a crap ton of pics of it to capture the beauty. I posted 2 pics from the drive to Flickr. The Mini-Golf place was right at the base of the mountain range so I took another good pic from the parking lot.

Anyway, so.. Mini-Golf.. I decided I would play both the medium and hard courses. I played the medium one first as a warm-up and shot a 52 on 18 holes, I think I had one hole at 5 but everything else was in the 2-4 range. One thing I thought was really cool, well ok, maybe more than one.. First, the putting area changed colors at points which made a really neat trick of the eye when trying to read the hills. Second, the entire course was covered in "mini-golf carpet". When I say the entire course I mean the whole place, the hills, the walkways, everything. It was like immersing yourself into a mini-golf world.

Onto my second course.. Oh, wait.. I forgot to mention the most supertabular thing about this place! When I grabbed my pencil out of the pencil bin it had LETS GO METS carved into it in orange writing! OK, now on to the second course. Remember this is the "hard" course. I was actually talking to Lynz for most of this course so she can vouch (in a way) for my awesomeness. What, what, can't hear you over the sound of my awesomeness.. :D Right, so.. I actually hit two consecutive Hole-In-Ones! The first one was one of those holes that you just have to hit it up the ramp in the middle and you automatically get a hole in one but the second one was a brutal looking hole. It had a MASSIVE hill in the middle of the green and then at the end had a V right after the hole so if it came down the hill too quick or at the wrong angle it would pass the hole, hit the V and head out into the outskirts of the green! So, continuing on with my amazingness (couldn't use awesomeness, it would have been repetitive), there was one hole that had two choices, picture of it on Flickr, one choice was to go up a real steep hill into the mouth of a tree which presumably would bring the ball near the hole, the other choice was to hit it straight through a really thin passage. I shot the hole twice, once up the tree and once down the passage. Both times I got a 2 on the hole, both times I was right near the hole after the first shot! I can't believe I made it through that thin passage.. Oh, wait, yes I can, because I am that awesome.. ;)

After Mini-Golf I went to the Great Mall to check on yet another Verizon store. I told the stupid guy I had a Z6c World Edition and needed a charger that would work with my international adapters (they slide onto the old charger and won't fit the new one) or I needed new international adapters. He said that they don't make international adapters for my phone and the only one they have them for is the blackberry and that the blackberry charger won't work for my phone because the blackberry is micro-usb and my phone is mini-usb! I really wanted to punch him, why in the hell can't a Verizon rep know that my phone, first of all, does exist and second of all does NOT use the same accessories as the Z6TV! So, after explaining that my phone was indeed micro-usb (which by the way he argued with me about) he pulled out the blackberry charger and it worked! No "unsupported charger" or anything, just straight up charging! So, I want to buy.. Nope.. They don't stock that charger, but he can order me one which will take approx a week to get in. No thanks.. Ordered one on-line and it will be at the house maybe as early as Friday, but no later than Monday.

That guy get's a "random people - douches" tag! Anyway, speaking of the "random people - cool" tag.. I went back to the hotel and spent some time chatting with Ashley, the girl who works the night shift behind the counter, and two of her friends. They are all in college and the one guy is doing a project where he has to come up with original game ideas, Ashley was doing Spanish homework, put those two together and you get... "Language Brawl" Language Brawl is a game idea the three of us came up with.. So, here's the idea.. You're driving down the street and you hit a car, you get out and so does the other driver. The other driver does not speak your language, instead he speaks the language you're trying to learn. As he speaks it shows up on the screen and you have to translate it and answer him, if you don't answer in time he kicks your ass. Figure the beginning levels will have the sentence in your language except maybe one word you have to translate but in the end you could have to translate the whole sentence. We even figure you can do a multi-lingual one (for our European friends who speak many languages) where you hit a car which hits a car and both drivers speak different languages and you have to translate them both in the alloted time.

---

Food TV is doing another "Next Iron Chef", the last time they did one it was to replace Mario Batali who had a contract difficulty with Food TV. So, I was trying to figure out who was leaving this time.. Well, I too can add 1+1 and get 2.. For years now Cat Cora said she would not open a restaurant because she could not juggle her personal life, the show and a restaurant. Apparently she opened a restaurant in Disney World called Kouzzina. So the only question now is, do I go there this year or do I wait till next year and go with Jessie. I have to figure that out soon because if I'm going this year I need to make reservations.

---Diversion of the Day (watch with sound to truly enjoy)

Where I put my attention creates my experience

I went to Cafe Gratitude last night and they have inspirational paintings around the restaurant. They actually sell posters of them, but apparently not all of them.. The one I loved was in the bathroom, it was a big mural and in the middle was a kid drowning in negative words, around him were positive places and the word choose repeated. Around the kid in the center and before the other places were the words "Where I put my attention creates my experience." I thought it was an amazing piece, but it's one of the few they don't sell posters for. I have emailed the artist asking him if there was a poster or print of it available.

So... I got out of class around 4ish and went straight up to SF. I love the fact that in California they let hybrids drive in the carpool lane. Actually the law has been changed, it used to be *any* hyrbid, now it's only select hybrids. I guess they are not allowing those crazy SUV hybrids which still only get 14-15 MPG in the carpool lane, you have to be above a certain MPG to get access as a solo rider. Well, using the carpool lane it took me about 40 mins to get up to SF. When I left work it was something like 82 degrees, as I was driving with the windows down, it started getting real cold. After a bit I rolled the windows up and looked at the temp gauge in the car, it read in the 50s, I looked up and saw signs for "Candlestick Park - this exit". I was pretty shocked actually, I had heard the stadium was built on the side of a mountain but what I didn't realize is that it *was* built into the side of a mountain. It was a beautiful view of the mountain, bay and stadium (didn't get pics because I wasn't ready for it). By the time I got into SF proper it was back up into the 70s.

First stop - AT&T Park. I don't count this as me being at the stadium for my stadium list, but I had to drive by. I actually parked on the side walk by the stadium, I asked the attendant and he said I could park there since I was only going to take some pics. I walked around the stadium and took some pics (uploaded to Flickr). The stadium is right on the bay and the outfield wall is open to the bay so people walking by can look into the stadium, there are signs asking people to please only stand in "viewing areas" for an inning at a time. You can actually see a good portion of the field from these "viewing areas", they were inside setting up for some concert. Anyway, around the front of the stadium there is a nice steak house built into the stadium. There are no doors into the stadium from the restaurant but I imagine it would be packed on game days, I went in to use the bathroom and there were a few people but not a mob.

Second stop - Lombard St.. There a few theories behind why this street is the way it is. Some of the locals say that the people who lived there didn't want the traffic so they convinced the city to screw with the road. Lombard is a short cut from the Eastern section of the city to the Golden Gate Bridge and they were getting tons of cars driving that way. If that's true it backfired because now people come from all over just to drive down the street. Other stories say that they made the road that way because the incline of the road was too steep and was causing problems with cars going up and not being able to and with cars not stopping as they go down. I don't believe that theory because there are steeper roads in SF and even in the surrounding area and they didn't do it to those. Either way this is one crazy fuck road, you really have to see it and drive it to really get the grasp of it. I stopped at the bottom of the road and took some pics, then I drove around and down it, back around and parked at that top. I walked down and back up and took some cool pics and videos. The best pic I found is one that was taken from a nearby building top, I posted it on my Flickr along with my pics. I also posted videos of people driving on it on my YouTube.

Third stop - Golden Gate Bridge.. Nope.. It was getting very foggy and the traffic was out of control going there so I decided I would go after dinner..

Third stop - Cafe Gratitude.. The restaurant was very pretty, as I stated above I loved the paintings they had. The staff was really nice too, the place was mobbed so I ended up sitting at the bar which worked out well because I got to chat with the guys working while I waited for food. All of the menu items are things like "you are wonderful", "you are insightful", etc. I got a White Bean and Kale Soup which was cooked, a raw Bratwurst which was made of nuts, fennel and had kimchi and a mustard seed sauce wrapped in romaine lettuce. For dessert I had a raw chocolate moose which was so good. I really never understand why people insist milk should go with chocolate to dilute the flavor. Nothing like a good strong raw cacao.

Fourth stop - Golden Gate Bridge.. Nope.. The fog was even worse and I didn't feel like going if I wouldn't really appreciate it. Maybe I'll go back on of the other nights I'm here, if not I'll get there eventually because after all it's just another bridge right..

Fourth stop - Candlestick Park.. On the way home I drove up to Candlestick Park. If you think it was cold at 4:45 you don't know cold. The car said it was in the high 30s! I got out and walked around and took some pics but it was too dark and none of them came out. It is a very pretty area, the stadium is generic but the area around it is very pretty.

Drove back to the hotel and relaxed in the hot tub a bit before bed.

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Oh, going back to yesterday's blog.. Rice-A-Roni.. I was going to post a big long thing about how I doubt Rice-A-Roni is the SF treat. I mean seriously, lets think about who lives in SF.. Gays and Asians. Can you possibly imagine an Asian whipping up some Rice-A-Roni? And as for the gays, I certainly can't see it. SF is probably one of the most "hippie" areas of the country (aside from maybe Portland) and I can't see people who care about food eating tons of Rice-A-Roni.. Anyway, so I was going to post this long blog about that and I decided I would post a little video clip of the old commercials. Well, I did a search for "Rice-A-Roni: The San Fransisco Treat" and the first hit was a blog ranting about the exact thing.. A guy answered that blog with a history lesson about why Rice-A-Roni was indeed the San Fransisco Treat..

The DeDomenico family all enjoyed an old Armenian dish consisting of rice, vermicelli pasta and chicken broth. The rice and pasta were sauteed in butter before the liquid was added, giving the dish its distinctive taste.

In 1958, Vince DeDomenico decided to take this recipe and produce it for sale in grocery stores. He placed the rice and pasta in a box, and added a dry seasoning mix in place of the liquid chicken broth. Because this product was made up of half rice and half pasta, he decided to call it RICE-A-RONI®.

Chicken RICE-A-RONI was first introduced in the Northwestern states in 1958. With it came the first RICE-A-RONI commercial, featuring San Francisco's Cable Cars and the now famous jingle. Created in San Francisco, RICE-A-RONI would soon be known to all as "The San Francisco Treat®!"

The RICE-A-RONI jingle, The San Francisco Treat® slogan, "Saute and Simmer" and scenic San Francisco became familiar to every household in America in the 60's as the product was introduced through television advertising.

Well, I guess I've been told..

All in all.. I think SF is a very nice city, it is easy to drive around, easy to park and pretty to look at.

BTW - I'm reading this blog realizing how much of a "gay hater" I sound like.. For those of you who know me you know I'm the furthest thing from that.. For those of you who accidentally stumbled on my blog, first off "welcome, hope you enjoy my tangents" and secondly I can assure you I'm not a gay or Asian or really an anything hater.. :D Well, ok, maybe I'm an Atlanta Braves hater.. :P

Gut be Gone - At Jack in the Box?

So, yesterday was a fail on the Gut be Gone program. I got out of work and headed over to a local bar called Quarter Note to watch the end of the Yankees / Angels game. I love being in CA and watching baseball games during happy hour that would be night games back east.

I had a Fat Tire (had it on tap).. This is a good point to mention.. After talking with Jessie I decided that doing no alcohol was not necessary for my Gut Be Gone program, and that I should instead just cut back greatly on it. I ended up sitting at the bar with a guy who worked at Cisco and his hot friend. After a bit the girl's friend came in and the four of us got a booth together and chatted till the girls had to go to work.

After the game I went on a failed mission for a new mobile phone charger. Sometimes I love my phone, but it's always a struggle to find accessories, the Verizon store was out of Z6World Edition chargers so they sent me to Microcenter which had a generic Motorola charger. The guy was nice enough to let me try it and it came up as an unsupported charger. Grrr.. I guess I give up now and will just order one online.

After Microcenter I went and got my California treat.. No, not rice-a-roni.. Rice-A-Roni may indeed by the SF treat but I probably won't have any of that in SF either.. My California treat is a Jack in the Box Ultimate Cheeseburger. I was standing in line and came up with a brainstorm, what would make this burger better is if they put it on sourdough bread.. I was sooo right..

I almost died laughing when I saw a sign on the counter for "healthy food options" at Jack in the Box.. Seriously, who are they kidding?

Speaking of SF.. Tonight I'm going there, going to hit Cafe Gratitude which is a big raw restaurant. Have to balance out the Jack in the Box right.. :)

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I updated Flickr and YouTube.. :)

Prius and warmth..

Saturday after dinner, I'm picking up where the last blog left off, me and Jessie went to see A Murder is Announced at the Bradley. We had not been at the Bradly in a long time, we apparently missed all the plays this year.. Have to make sure to get to more of those next year, the only one left this year is the Broadway Live Christmas show which is always "eh".. This play was good, I was actually wrong at guessing who did the murdering.. Jessie was right.. Not going to say who because I don't want to ruin anything for anyone who might see this play in their lives..

Onto sunny California..

The flight from Hartford to Minnesota was great! It was a brand new plane and had next to no noise and no turbulence, I actually walked up and down the aisle without having to hold the seats.. I sat next to a lady and her baby who where on their way to Irvine, she grew up in WeHa and now lives in Irvine with her husband. The baby was amazingly quiet too which was good because when I saw them come onboard I was a bit scared it would be an annoying flight.

The flight from Minnesota to San Jose was NOT a new plane, it was actually so old it still had ash trays in the seats! It was NOT a quiet turbulence free flight, as a matter of fact we hit a big storm right outside San Jose and ended up getting thrown around quite a bit.

Landed and shuttled over to rent-a-car where I was given a Prius! It's a 2009 Prius, but it's a base model which means it has no iPod connection. The radio station it was on had Madonna playing when I finally turned up the volume so yay for me.. :)

Speaking of iPod, I finished the Element on the plane and started Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. I figure it's almost Halloween so it's a good time to listen to this finally. It's pretty short (7 hours), I listened to about 1/3 of it already. It's a fun book so far.

Oh, well back to class for me.. I have not done any real exploring but I found out that the hotel has free breakfast and dinner! I probably won't take advantage of the dinners because I want to hit some of the sites while I'm here but it's good to know.. Oh and since this is a customer class I get free lunch too!

Back on the road - - To Santa Clara CA

Today's rainy cold weather made me glad to be heading out of the North East. Weather in Santa Clara, 70s all week.. I'm glad to be going but glad it's only a week too, it's been a long time since I've been on the road so I'm torn with my sense for adventure and my sense of missing those back home..

Since last I wrote I did lots.. I was just getting ready to go to Laire when last I wrote, Laire was a great time. I even played on Friday night (have not done that since right before my surgery). Friday night was almost a mistake as I pushed myself a lot to far when Naryn went down and I felt the need to run her to get a life spell. After that little incident I had to lean on her to get back to the cabin. While relaxing in the cabin we got ambushed and we almost died, my crazy running speed (almost forgot how fast I can really run) saved my life and Naryn's, unfortunately it was not enough to save Ventrick. I stumbled my way back to the cabin once more and feared I had taken myself out of the weekend with my crazy running.

I woke up on Saturday and was surprisingly fine, so onto another day of hard core combat. Saturday night ended with a big mod in which I kept getting yelled at for breaking the line, I was a bit over zealous to kill things since I was finally able to again.

One of the coolest things about Laire was that Robyn came back.. I ended up hanging out with her most of Saturday going on mods and overseeing her warrior training. Friday night she hung out with me while I was doing the dishes and Saturday night she came with us to Veggie Heaven. I'm making her a shield now that she knows how to use one.. :)

Sunday night me and Jessie went and had dinner with dad so I could fix the speaker wires I put on backwards and to get my new blueray/dvd player.

Monday was another long crazy day, me and Jessie went down to NYC to see Garfunkel and Oates. We parked by the venue (Upright Citizen's Brigade) and walked over to Pure Food and Wine which is a raw vegan restaurant on the other side of Manhattan. Dinner was great and the show was better! We ended sitting center stage right behind Riki's mom, it was very cute to see how flustered she got by having her mom in the audience. If they are ever in your area I recommend seeing them, they are funnier live than they are on their CD/YouTube clips.

Tuesday was my 14 year dating anniversary with Jessie. To celebrate we had Tuesday night dinner at our house.. OK, well to celebrate the anniversary we went to see Garfunkel and Oates but on Tuesday Jessie broke open a bottle of ice wine we have had for years, it was very good and just reminds us both that we miss Montreal. The Tuesday night crowd was very small this week and we ended up having it in the basement. We will continue to have them in the basement till it gets too cold to do so..

Wednesday I went up to see Nurit, she cooked dinner and we hung out and watched Cheers. Thursday I was supposed to go see Stacy but she cancelled at the last minute. In a way I'm glad she did because me and Jessie got a chance to relax and I ended up going to bed before 9! I guess my body finally had enough of the late nights and needed the after Laire rest I was not giving it.

Friday Lynz came over and we walked to Bella's for dinner. The idea was to go to 85 Main for sushi but as we walked we decided we didn't want that. After dinner hung out and watched some Star Trek TNG.

Saturday, yesterday, me and Jessie went to the CT Ren Faire again. It was cold but there was no rain in site which means we got the full show this time. We saw a bunch of shows and ate lunch before leaving. I ended up getting called on stage during the Wheel of Mis-Fortune and got to sit down without a dunking after guessing the word right. :)

After the Ren Faire we went home, napped and met Matt, Sile and her parents for dinner. We were supposed to go to the Courthouse but because of the size of our party the wait was too long so we went to 85 Main. I had a pumpkin bisque with scallops that was ok. The scallops were good but the bisque left a bit to be desired, it was better after adding soy sauce. As an appetizer I got some Tuna sushi and it was really good, pretty big pieces and nicely cut.

I'm boarding in Hartford now.. I will post more later..

new Kiss, old Kiss, bad Kiss

Kiss just released a new CD set this week. They released this as a Walmart exclusive which is the first thing that pisses me off but whatever. I went to Walmart on Tuesday morning to wait in line and get my copy like all the other Kiss fans, yes there were lines.. I cleverly avoided the line in electronics when i saw a few of the CDs sitting on a A-Frame and grabbed one along with the new Madonna DVD and walked to the front registers which had no lines. :)

This CD set has two CDs and one DVD. The first CD is a new CD called Sonic Boom, on first listen I loved the first song then it dropped off dramatically till the last few songs. On second listen I was more forgiving perhaps because I found myself liking most of the songs but my favorites are still the first and last. The CD booklet lists who wrote each song but not who sung them, obviously I can tell the Gene and Paul songs but there was one song sung by someone else, I assume it was Tommy Thayer because I've heard Eric Singer's voice before and it was not that bad.. :)

Speaking of bad voice, Eric did sing Black Diamond on the second CD but did it in his best (it was bad) Peter Criss impersonation.. If you hadn't guessed the second CD was a CD of recorded Kiss hits called Kiss Klassics. The did 15 tracks and for some reason felt the need to include Christine Sixteen in that set. For the most part these songs sounded almost identical to their original versions all the way down to the fade out and fade in at the end of I Love it Loud, they did sound better if only for modern day recording studios. A few of the songs were actually different and mostly in good ways, for example I Was Made for Loving You was done more in line with how they play it live and not in the original disco mold. Forever was a stinker, Paul's voice sounded strained and uninspired. All in all I think Do You Love Me was the best of the re-recordings.

But wait, there's more.. This set comes with a 6 song live DVD that was recorded on the last tour in Buenos Aires. Kiss fans are everywhere and one of my co-workers was talking about getting this CD so I let him borrow mine and then we decided to watch the DVD here on one of the projectors. Wow, was it bad.. I gotta think as a marketing decision this was a major screw up, nobody is going to watch that DVD and then think to themselves 'man I gotta go see these guys'. They were out of tune, out of sync and generally had no life on stage. I have to imagine that they could have found a better night to take the recordings from.

All in all, is the new CD set worth it? Yes.. There are enough good tracks on the first CD to make the $12 paid a value not to mention most of the songs on the 2nd CD were well done and sound fuller than the previous versions. The DVD, just throw it out..

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If you live anywhere near Hebron CT you need, need, need to get to the CT Ren Faire this year.. They did an amazing job on the fight sequences this year. The story this year is called 'For the Love of Lancelot' and there are four shows throughout the day, five if you include the show at the gates before the faire opens. By the way, if you can you really want to try and get there before the gates open because that show was really good and really sucks you in.

I mentioned the fight sequences were great this year and that's mostly in part to Taryn Bazinet and Colette Marie Crowley who play two French girls who fight as one, they were like watching intense synchronized swimming combat. The final fight had this holy crap amazing sequence that you really just have to see to believe. No, I'm not going to describe it because you need to go see it live!

I was a little disappointed by some of the cast changes and the fact that the sheriff was not around but all in all it was an amazing time.

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Sunday me and Jessie went to the final Mets game of the year with dad. He bought tickets in the Ceaser's Plaza Club which were right in front of the SNY broadcast booth. Believe it or not the seats were a bit thiner than the seats in the section we want to move to in the Promenade, they were actually thinner than some of the seats on the same level but further away from Home Plate.

When we got to the game they had closed off our normal parking area and let us park in the main lot (usually only for pre-paid parking). Because we were in the main lot we decided to walk over to the Shea Stadium base markers. It was neat standing on the pitchers mound marker and looking around at how small everything looks. Citi-Field was beyond the outfield wall at Shea but yet it looks so close when standing on the mound and even at Home Plate. I guess it looks smaller because now it's all just a parking lot.

It was a really good game. Nelson Figueroa pitched a complete game shutout, first in Citi-Field history. Jessie got a new sweater from Touch and we got a ball autographed by Alyssa Milano. Here is a quote from the label of her sweater.

"to rally for each other

to play fair

to run with abandon

to dance with life

is to Touch"

:)

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Speaking of Monday.. Lynz come over Monday night with Anja and we watched a great episode of Nova regarding the possibility of life on Mars. You can watch the entire episode here on PBS.

This was especially interesting right now because I just finished reading the Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson which is all about Terra-Forming Mars.

Speaking of Terra-Forming.. I'm going to be playing Mythical Journeys: Future Imperfect in November, it's a futuristic LARP that takes place on a newly colonized world. Just finished making my character the other day. Going to use a shot gun so it should be fun and at the very least different.. Come check it out with me..

Tuesday dinner was spent working with Kevin on his costume and on my gun. We had to modify the shells so the bullets go further by drilling holes in the bottom to let more air in. Sarah stole the food show with her soup. Hopefully she will post the recipe either here as a comment or on the Tuesday night dinner blog.

Holly came over last night and I re-made my Tomatillo Salsa tilapia dish, but this time with cod because Price Chopper didn't have any tilapia. It came out good but not as good as it does with tilapia. The salsa was just as good but the end product was a little less then I would have liked it to be.

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Yay, Laire is tomorrow... Speaking of yay! Garfunkel and Oates are coming to NYC next week, they will be at the Upright Citizen's Brigade on Monday and at the Gotham Comedy Club on Wednesday. Me and Jessie will be going to the Monday show, care to meet us there?

--Diversion of the Day

http://erim.net/misc/GeneSimmons_TerryGross.mp3

Push up - Sit up - Day 3

Just did my day 3.. Here are my day 3 numbers:

Set	Push ups	Sit ups
1	22	12
2	30	15
3	20	11
4
5

Remember that set 5 is supposed to be MAX, they give you minimum numbers for set 5. The minimum numbers were 28 and 15 respectively.

I failed this morning to complete this day.. I am planning on doing sets 4 & 5 later today, I will update this entry when I do them..

Push up - Sit up - Day 2

Just did my day 2.. Here are my day 2 numbers:

Set	Push ups	Sit ups
1	20	15
2	25	12
3	15	9
4	15	9
5	25	10

Remember that set 5 is supposed to be MAX, they give you minimum numbers for set 5. The minimum numbers were 25 and 10 respectively.

I apparently read the wrong column when I started the sit ups, I was only supposed to do 9 in set 1 and I did 15.

Yoga.. It's good for you?

I have lost so much flexibility over the last year, Achilles Tendon surgery will do that, so I decided I would start doing yoga with Jessie and Hoyle. Plus, I figure yoga is also good for my gut-be-gone plan so it's a win all around. Well, I am so not ready for yoga yet. It was nice to get stretched out but my left ankle was so not ready, I ended up sleeping with my soft cast on and even that wasn't enough so I took three Advil before I was able to fall asleep. All day my ankle was killing me too so I ask you... Yoga, it's good for you?

I've been a bit slack the last few months but I think October is going to be my return to blogging. The original idea of this blog was to keep everyone updated of my travels and I haven't been travelling so therefore haven't been blogging. Well, travel is back on. If you don't know I recently stepped down as global lead instructor and am now a regular instructor again, with that demotion I will be teaching more which after all is what I enjoy about my job. So, upcoming trips? Chicago the week of Oct 12th, Santa Clara the week of Oct 19th and Sao Paulo (if my visa gets approved) the week of Nov 16th.

Somewhere in there I want to finally get my tattoo, I'm thinking the week of Oct 26th. I need to talk to the tattoo guy, I will go over there next week and try and set that up. My tattoo design can be found on my flickr site.

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The semi-monthly update..

Last we left off was Sept 18th and I was just about to go to Jesse and Marie's house for a game night. Game night was fun, I was a bit concerned how the night would go because I had not seen John in a long time and I didn't know who else would be there to hang out with. I was glad to find out my concerns where unfounded because the night went well and me and John even played some games together plus I even got some time to hang out with Lynz upstairs.

I left early because the next day we (me and Jessie) went to King Richard's Faire with Jesse, Marie and Lynz. Lynz's birthday had passed recently so me and Marie bought her an outfit, she got a dear skin shirt, some bracers and a fur cowl. It was pretty funny because when she got the shirt I was talking to the lady at Pterodactly Leather about how I envisioned some type of fur scarf/cowl and she told me that the fur guy sold his booth so I left her shop looking for other options, we were a few feet away and she came running out with some fur she had in her shop and put it over Lynz's shoulders and it was perfect. We went and got food while she sewed it together and put a bone button on it. I love the end result, she did a great job and in very short time. Pictures of Lynz in her outfit can be found on my flickr site. Oh, I love this picture of Jessie and Lynz.. :D

The 20th I went to the Mets game with dad, uncle Larry, Mike, Scott, JM and Katie. We ate at the Acella club which is the restaurant in left field, it was nice but a bit over priced. No matter what you got it was $51, they had a bbq beef brisket sandwich, bbq ribs, a really good salmon dish, a really good scallop dish and a burger on the menu. That's right, $51 for a burger or $51 for scallops! On top of the main dish you also got access to four appetizer stations which had bagels, cheeses, salads, pizza, etc.. It was nice to watch the game while eating but I really didn't feel like I was at the stadium till we left the restaurant. Speaking of Citi-Field, the Mets just announced that they will be lowering the prices of all their season plans next year. I really want to sit in section 424 next year, they have a few extra rows above the regular section which have a few seats per row. Perfect row would be row 8 which has 5 seats in, 3 of those seats are the wider ones which would make it much more comfortable for dad and Mike. I tried to call them and they told me I had to wait, I might try and call them again next week.

Thursday the 24th Holly came up to Putnam, we went to Bella's and watched Planes Trains and Automobiles. It was a good night and it was nice to hang out in my area instead of hers, no nosy neighbors.. :)

The 25th I brought Luna to a new vet to get her checked out, the new vet is holistic only which means that I needed to go to another vet to get her blood work. It was a long stress filled experience, she is overall healthy but has some digestive issues we are addressing with supplements. After the vet I went up to Nurit's house for dinner. The crazy odd thing of the day is that Jessie ended up chatting with a guy on OKC just to find out it was Nurit's room mate! Jessie ended up going to a concert with him that night.. The somewhat odd thing was me, Nurit, Shoshanna and Mike went out to an indian restaurant.. I know, crazy right? Non of the four of us are vegetarians but we all ended up getting vegetarian dishes.. I thought it was odd, screw you if you don't.. :P

Jessie bought a cuff set when we went to King Richard's Faire and we had to go get it so we went down on Sunday. Funny thing, when we got there they were closed! Apparently it poured in Carver so they closed early. Luckily Jessie called the guy and he had the guard bring us to his booth to get it. It was kinda cool to walk around the faire with nobody else there.

After that we went to Julian's in Providence for their Dieu du Ciel beer dinner, I don't know where the menu is right now so I can't put the food list in right now. The food was great and we met up with Ara and Ellis there which was awesome. Ara and Ellis are the couple we met at the Armsby Abby beer dinner. They are a very cool couple who teach at Holy Cross in MA. Julian's is now the 2nd place we had beer dinners with them and the 2nd place that O'hara's Celtic Stout on draft! This time I had one as a pre-game beer. The only way I would have beer this month is if we did another beer dinner with them because it would be silly to go to a beer dinner and not drink..

Monday Lynz and Anja came over and I made hot dogs with bok choi and quinoa for dinner and we watched Episodes 2 and 3 of Star Trek the Next Generation. Tuesday night we had dinner at our house again even though the weather is starting to get cold, Holly and Louie made their Tuesday night debut, Hoyle and Badger brought lots of meat for the grill.

Going to the CT Ren Faire tomorrow, hope to see you all there! If you can't make it tomorrow go another day! There, is that a good ad?

---Diversion of the Day

OMFG!

one hundred push ups - Take 2

You may remember last year before my tendon surgeries I had done the one hundred push up challenge. Well, I am feeling pretty darn fat lately so I am going to do it again. The site has gotten a bit cooler since last time, they now have a tracker and they also have a 200 sit-up program.

Alright well, I did the tests the other day and my push ups came in at 37 which means I skip to week 3 and start at the hardest level of week 3. My sit ups came in at 20 which means I start at the middle level of week 1.

Well, here are my day 1 numbers which I just did now:

Set	Push ups	Sit ups
1	14	9
2	18	9
3	14	6
4	14	6
5	30	20

Remember that set 5 is supposed to be MAX, they give you minimum numbers for set 5. The minimum numbers were 20 and 8 respectively.

What else am I going to do to get rid of my gut? Well, I am feeling inspired by Sara's 30 day challenges (I know, like half a year later) so I am going to go the month of Rock-Tober with no alcohol.

--Diversion of the Day
http://mchat.comicgenesis.com/d/20090925.html

ps - so apparently this site sucks when it comes to putting in tables.. I did an HTML table and it is not showing up correctly so I had to use underscores.. Will look into that more later.

pps - figured it out. :)