Another halloween, another “best group” costume win. Our carpool went as the blue man group, and jeff (and jay) also built a “Drum-bone” that we played a little routine on. Somehow through all the pictures/etc at work, i don’t think anyone got a video of us!

Unlike the real blue men who use a blue paint that comes off, we used liquid latex. What a mess, and what a pain. It took us 3+ hours to do all of the prep with baldcaps, liquid latex, costumes, ick. Plus the time it took jeff to find parts and actually construct the drumbone. It turned out awesome, and we actually won 2 prizes at at work, “best group” and the “golden frankie” which is a little hard to explain :)

Watching Packers on NFL Network on DirectTV. After the cowboys kick a fieldgoal, all of a sudden, 0 reception. “Searching for satellite signal…(771)”. thats it. game came back on for about 10 seconds, then gone again. Fox+Comcast has fcked us 2x this year, with DirecTV coming to the rescue. NFL Sunday ticket is the ONLY reason we even have directv… Today, its 950AM KJR Radio to the rescue. that is just sad. Yay directv.

Again!? Fox just switched away from Vikings @ Packers in the 3rd quarter to go to the Redskins/Eagles game. The packers are 7-1, working on going to 8-1. Do you think they’ll switch away from the Colts this week? Hell no! Do they switch away from the Pats when they are up by 20? Hell no!

Sitting on the couch with my wife, fidgeting with a football as GB takes the field after the OT kickoff:

During tonight’s republican debate, McCain actually just said that he had voted against a 1 million dollar package to fund a “Woodstock museum”. He claimed that, woodstock might have been an important cultural moment, but:

…I wasn’t there…I was tied up at the time.

That’s good stuff. If you don’t get it, i can’t really explain it to you. I wonder how long he’s been saving up that quote? :)

Just finished playing through portal. It was the most enjoyable ending and credit sequence i’ve ever seen in a game, and I’ve played a lot of games!

The antagonist computer chick was also one of the best characters in a game so far. Leave it to Valve to come up with a great story, and involving exactly zero human characters (although that might be “Blade Runner” style debatable!) Without giving any spoilers, i liked the style of the puzzles/challenges in the last half of the game a lot more than those at the beginning half, probably because of the things the computer was saying.

From Rick Reilly’s column yesterday:

For instance, if you put your name on the [season ticket] waiting list today, you would be number 74,659. An average of 70 people give up their tickets every year, which means you’ll have your tickets by the 3074 season. Luckily you’ll still catch Brett Favre’s last year.

My dad and uncle inherited my grandpa’s 2 seats and each have the pair every other year. So someday, my brother and I will each have a half a seat! My wife’s sisters both married into season tickets too :). How Wisconsin is that?

I found this article at TechReport via a post at Daring Fireball, and i agree completely. I’m not sure who all these people are who are using vista that say it sucks. I recently upgraded my computer to a new HP, and i had the choice between a Dell with most of what i wanted and a choice of XP or Vista, or the HP, with everthing i wanted and Vista Ultimate. I got the HP.

So earlier i stated that the goal for this trip was to get back to WA with one win in the two games we went to this weekend in ‘sconsin. Well, we went 2 for 2 on that goal! The brewer game (aside from the frigging parking fiasco) was awesome too. We got to see (future NL MVP!) Prince Fielder hit home run #48 on the year (he hit #49 and #50 tonight!), we got to see (future NL Rookie of the year!) Ryan Braun hit a home run, got to see lots of run production, lots of offense, some great defense, and a sausage race! We also saw some of the funniest signs i’ve seen at a sporting event, with the clear winner being a couple rows behind us, with the “I (HEART) E-5” ryan braun sign! It was very handy when he had an error later, and a home run to avenge himself after that..

Traveling to the midwest can be a pain sometimes. Being from the midwest, we know that, so we planned for it. We’d been checking the weather reports, and were worried because the minneapolis area was due for thunderstorms right around the time we were supposed to arrive, so we split our stuff across our bags and carried one on. That way, even if we got stuck in MSP we’d be able to drive to green bay in time to make the wedding we had to be at on saturday and have our dress clothes. Then while boarding, a flight attendant started coming back up the jetway telling us that there’s no room for bags unless they fit under the seat. And this isn’t planeside check she’s doing, this is full on checking of our bags, we’re not getting them back until our final destination. After all our planning, we were about to be undone at the last minute. But our flight is boarding on time, so we’re not too worried. once we all get seated, the captain comes on and says “Well, folks..”, and at this point i know it isn’t good news, “..it looks like they are having high winds in minneapolis, so we’re looking at right now an hour and a half delay. So we’re going to let everyone back off the plane.” Then the flight attendant starts announcing flights that people are going to miss their connections, “If you’re on flights to amsterdam, blah blah blah, bring all of your baggage, as we’ll be rerouting you. Everyone else, leave your stuff so you can board faster later”. So we all get off the plane.

As soon as we’re all out, they come back on: “Sorry everyone, we have a new departure time, so we need to reboard right now. Nobody will miss their connections, everyone back on!”… so we all reboard. And we push back from the gate, taxi to the runway, then move off to the side. I turn to laura and say “Uh oh, this isn’t good”, as i see other planes passing us and taking off. The captain comes back on “Well, looks like we’ve got a new delay, we’re gonna be here until 4:15.”. We were supposed to leave at 3:21, it was about 10 to 4 at this point already. At 4:15 he told us it would be another 15 minutes, and it was. We made up some time in the air, but still ended up landing about an hour late.

For our “paper” anniversary this year, the wife and i bought each other tickets to sporting events. We had to be in WI this weekend for a wedding in Green Bay, so i bought the Packer tickets for today, Laura bought Brewer tickets for tomorrow. I told people at work that I’d be happy getting one win over the weekend. Well, check that off the list! It was a beautiful day in green bay, 80+ and sunny at noon for the game. Sunny all game, so I got a little sunburned on my arms and my neck. Was an awesome game, back and forth with a great finish. Nick Barnett FTW! Favre got career TDs 418, 419, and 420, tying Marino’s all time record. After Barnett returned the INT to inside the 1 and the win seemed imminent, half of the crowd was chanting “Pass! Pass!” so favre could get #421. The Lambeau crowd can have a short memory, apparently, as no more than 5 minutes earlier the packers were right there trailing by 4 points on 4th and goal at the 1 and and incomplete pass ended a promising drive with 0 points.

Just got emailed this today from my uncle perry:

Go to flickr for the full size image, and see if you notice something…. strange! Stranger than your initial reaction!!

You have to be kidding me! Fox just switched from the packer game, tied with 59 seconds left, to play 2 minutes of ADS and go to the beginning of the seahawks game! THIS IS COMPLETE BS. There’s no way they tell direct tv in time to have the dish pick it up!

When i reviewed Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter back in March of last year, i said this:

The AI enemies seem to be a bit smarter than the AI friendlies though. it seems that the enemies will hide behind cover and fire, but if the friendlies are told to attack a target, they’ll move from behind their cover into the open instead of shooting over/around their cover. Some sections i need to just have them hold somewhere while i pick people off one by one. My biggest peeve is that if a teammate is incapacitated right next to them, they just stand there like a dufus and watch him die. Sure, you can tell him to give first aid and he’ll do it, but come on, you saw your buddy get shot! Hide and fix him already!

What do i have to say about GRAW2? Follow the jump!

A follow-up on the previous post, where Dad, Jimbo and I built a new deck. After a couple days of rain and some crap falling out of the trees, we realized that the spacing of the deck boards was a little too close. In some places the gap had basicly closed and the boards were touching. But the bigger problem is the crap that falls out of our cedar trees and firs. it was already getting stuck in the cracks, and basicly becomes impossible to get out. So this weeend, Laura and i redid all the decking. well, not all, because the first board stayed where it was, and one board about 2/3 way we didn’t move at all.

Recently, Laura took a couple weeks of the summer to travel to Australia with her mom, because her dad had to be there for work. While she was in Australia, my dad and brother came out to WA to help me build a deck. Or, more precisely, my brother came out, and we helped my dad build a deck for me. :D

Before

After!

For more pics and stories, follow the link!

This week i had the opportunity to go to Edward Tufte’s PRESENTING DATA AND INFORMATION seminar here in Seattle. It was fricking awesome (i believe that “fricking” is the correct technical term!) I’ve been getting the advertisement in the mail at work for years, but never had the time to go. I’m always on the lookout for things to go to for work to cover my employee development plan, and this was a great one. Not only do you get a day of class, you end up with all 4 of Tufte’s books, which i’ll add to my “Now Reading” list as soon as i find some time. I have 2 other books I’m actively reading as well (and coincidentally, they both have “Danger” in their titles!)

A little bit more after the jump…

Currently in Long Beach, WA. It’s windy and raining. But isn’t that a given here? :) anyway, we came over to the LB-WA to see the sandcastle building competition and have a weekend to ourselves before Laura jets off to Australia. We’re in “The Loft” room of the Inn at Discovery Coast, and its pretty sweet. Its more like a one bedroom apartment with a huge bathroom and euro style kitchen than a loft! And having a restaurant 43 steps (literally!) away is awesome! The Inn is 2 buildings, one with 9 rooms closer to the beach, and another building with the office and restaurant downstairs and our loft upstairs. We ate at the “Beach House” both nights, getting different things each time. Laura wants to stay for like 4 more days so she can try everything. When we went in tonight, the waitress asked us if we wanted “our usual” table, and we said “sure!”. that was pretty cool. Laura recommends the salmon, i recommend the rib-eye. I barely ate much of it, though, as i ate too much bread and salad beforehand… We’ll put some pictures up on flickr later, when i find a chance! The whole trip has been good, aside from the 2 hours it took us to get from Seattle through Tacoma. ick. we didn’t get up to the posted speed limits until we actually got to the 101. Now its time to lay down and enjoy the movie that we snagged from the office, “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”. We also got Stratego at the office, and i beat laura 3 times, and now we’re never, ever, ever going to play Stratego ever again. I need SOMETHING that i’ve beaten Laura at to stay that way!

So yeah, after driving through some pretty crazy rain squalls, getting to the airport at ~11:30 pm when the main road to the airport is shut down for construction, we get a flat tire. right at the airport. At least it wasn’t raining in the hourly parking garage!

There’s yer problem right there!

Man, i love some of the milblog sites that are around today. particularly the Military Motivator site.

That’s a keeper! Its about time we used the “but its for the children!” line to support the war.