Tuesday Morning Wrap

Sully cheers me on to the finish!

The more things change, the more things stay the same. This grey MondayTuesday morning I find myself at my old desk in the bowels of a big cement box. And I now find myself trying to gather up the threads of projects I started months ago and had to put down when my contract ran out.

Lots of upsides to starting a new contract, like benefits including retirement stuff, vacations, sick days and the ability to go to the doctor to see if we can figure out what's up with my knee and how to cure this annoying Adderall acne-like crap (which is ridiculous since I haven't in taken Adderall in three months!). But hey, I'm all about the good side today.

Disengaged

I've been feeling less and less engaged this last week. More and more distant and out of sorts. I'm not quite sure why but I could point a finger or two at a few of the larger boogeymen in my reality.

My looming layoff. Its sort of like the school bully telling me during first period that he's going to kick my ass after school. You know its coming and yet you are, more or less, powerless to stop it. Hard not to feel a sense of powerlessness there.

The subsequently ever-tightening money crunch. Hard to feel footloose and fancy free when you know the meter is ticking down towards zero with each passing second.

My lack of regular exercise. Due to other circumstances, my bike rides have been fewer and further between than normal lately. I tend to get grouchy and uncomfortable in my own skin without my saddle time.

My Kyani organization. It isn't much of a secret that we've signed on to become distributors for Kyani, a company that's created and sells a fantastic liquid multi-vitamin based on Alaskan blueberries. The products are awesome, the company is awesome and yet I'm still struggling to get the organization underway. It is getting better but still, it can be tough to maintain the forward momentum.

I think I'll start a post specifically about Kyani and why we chose to get involved since I'm not normally the type to join up with a network marketing program. If anyone is interested in finding out more about this company and the potential with it then please leave a comment or email me.

Ending Spring Break Right

Most of Spring Break was pretty low key, playing with my kids, trying to give my wife some time to get on top of her paperwork, the monster of a desk she's been trying to cope with, working on her shop, yardwork and emergency fence repairs.

Not a bad break by any stretch.

But not too much to write home about and rave either. Until the last few days of the week and the weekend in which much goodness, fun and too much sun was all packed in.

First off, I got two good mountain bike rides in, one less than I'd targeted but I can call the demo ride of the Delta 7 Arantix at the Sea Otter Classic a half a ride so I'm even that much closer to my goal. But I did get two good rides in, one with Nande which makes for a more fun outing, usually.

My second ride was on Thursday and wasn't quite as far as normal but I didn't want to over-tax Nande on her first run/ride in a while so we took it easy. She did alright overall but was definitely riding the lag wagon towards the end.

On Friday, I headed south to Laguna Seca and the Sea Otter Classic bicycle festival. Aside from the long slow slog in, it was a great time. The weather was magnificent, there were some great races to enjoy, the dual slalom was particularly cool as well as the BMX trick riders. I did do a full write up of the event on NorCal Bikers, I think the link is in the post right below this one.

On Saturday, we hit the beach so that the boys could play with their cousins. The four kids had a ball running into and out of the surf, throwing sand at the water, making designs in the sand and generally running around like wild little boys. We also got to see a rather large fish wash up on the sand, still alive, flap around for a bit and then get carried back out into the bay. I'm still trying to figure out what kind of fish it was. It was about four feet long, had pretty big teeth and a bunch of spines on its dorsal fin. It also was extremely iridescent in the sun and flashed bright blues, greens and maybe some purple.

Sadly though, no pictures as I'd just put my camera back in my bag when it rolled up on the shore. And, because the four kids were getting really close, I couldn't just run over and grab it. Especially not after seeing how nasty big those teeth were!

On Saturday night, a buddy of mine and I went out to Salinas to watch UFC 97. Overall there were some pretty good fights but Anderson Silva's title defense fight was about as thrilling as watching paint dry. Which sucks because he was trying to draw Thales Leites into a fight but Leites seemed content to flop on his back about fifty times. The fights also pretty well ended Chuck Liddell's career with another TKO stoppage. That was a bit of a bummer. Overall, I went 5 for 8 on my predictions and should not have gone with the sentimental prediction on Liddell or I'd have gone 6 for 8. Not a bad night of fights but it could have and should have been way better. Silva may be winning but he's losing his marketing draw with each successive boring crappy fight. They need to put someone in the ring who will bang with him.

And that brings us to yesterday. The early part of the day was spent at the house, doing yardwork, fixing a slowly disintegrating fence and trying to steal a little rest while avoiding the sun because it was hot, hot, hot here, must have been in the mid-90s. But the afternoon was spent at a birthday party. Lots of kids, a little wading pool, a sprinkler and some damned fine Hoegaarden White Beer on tap. It was alot of fun but very tiring.

After we got home, got the kids bathed and into bed where they put up only the most minimal resistance to going to sleep, we watched Thursday's episode of Survivor. And saw the most annoying character since Johnny Fairplay keep stroking his scraggly beard and massive ego. This season is turning out to be a pretty meager and bordering on annoying enough to stop watching one. The Coach guy is a complete tool, liar and jackass. If he'd been voted out then I'd have been happy but nope, we'll be subjected to more weeks of his incredibly grating personality. You're losing me, Survivor, you are losing me.

And that brings us up to current. This week will be a busy one, with meetings on Wednesday and Thursday, after school work on Tuesday and lots of little computer fires cropping up from the break.

My legs are worked, I might have pink-eye and a spot or two of poison oak but I look pretty darned tan and healthy even if my allergies are starting to lose the battle against the post nasal drip.

It was a very, very good end to the week off. Now we'll see what kind of looniness develops as California just got another $3.1 or $4 billion for education. I hope that money goes to its intended use and not to another of Schwarzenegger's projects because that money could mean I have a job in the fall.

Hacking on Me

What's on my mind this morning? Let's see...

I'm a bit annoyed that my wife used the last of my creamer so I got one measly and insufficient cup of coffee before bolting to work, late.

I'm more than tired of my eyes being so damned itchy all the time because of the high allergy alert going on right now.

There's an epidemic of kids at the daycare saying "Fuck you" to their parents. Well, epidemic in this case means one child spending the entire weekend saying it to her mom.

I'm back in my meat locker computer lab today. Its cold and the pile of surplus computers is still all over the floor. Oh, and the district energy nazi unplugged every single one of my computers.

I was under the impression that my new camera lens was supposed to be delivered today but that was wrong and it is now supposed to be here on Thursday.

The McDonald's Steak, Egg and Cheese Bagel may be a horrible greasy gut bomb but it tastes pretty frickin' awesome.

Today is an SBC training day for the school which means no students and all the teachers are in meetings most of the day. Which is cool by me. Maybe I'll start a movie from Netflix and project it on the big screen.

Crucial.com has asked for me to review my recent purchase from them before I've even gotten the RAM. That seems rather stupid.

And the computers are all really dusty and nasty. Plus, my workstation won't boot up properly if it has the aluminum keyboard and mouse plugged in. Odd and kind of irritating.

Mostly though I'm just cheesed about not having my usual cup of delicious hot coffee to get the day rolling properly. But perhaps it'll be warm enough for me to trade my car for the bicycle at lunch today and get some more saddle time as per my resolution.

UFC 92 Wrap

Wow, what an excellent and exciting night of fights. No submissions and lots of knockouts!

The Mir win over Nogueira was the house favorite of the night. Frank Mir looked poised, confident and very, very dangerous.

Rashad Evans had to work for his knockout win over Forrest Griffin but when it came, he hammered Forrest and it ended quickly. A new light-heavyweight champ has been crowned and Rashad looked excellent in the fight.

The other fights on the card were also pretty good. Rampage's wicked knockout of Wanderlei Silva was impressive and it looks like Rampage may be back on the path of utterly destroying his opponents again. Scary and fun to watch.

Cheick Kongo pretty well dominated Al-Turk with his sharp striking and then finished him with heavy elbows on the ground to cut him open and get the knockout. Another impressive win.

Overall, I split on my predictions going 3 for 6 calling Rampage, Dolloway and Hamill and missing on Mir, Evans and Kongo. I wasn't too bummed about my weak record because the fights were highly entertaining and it was a good night for the UFC.

And 2009 will bring many more excellent events starting with Franklin vs. Henderson in Ireland on January 17 and Penn vs. St. Pierre on January 31.

The Weekend

This ended up being a pretty good weekend despite the absolutely insane mid-November heat wave that peaked yesterday with temps on my deck reaching and breaching 100 degrees. No lie! I've got photographic proof if need be.

On Saturday, I took the boys to "Blue Ball" park in Soquel. It is so named because the predominant feature there are a series of huge blue balls set into the hill side. The park itself is large and sprawls a bit but the main attraction is a couple of slides with a bump at the top and a good runoff landing in the sand below. One of the slides had been removed for repairs so the remaining slide was pretty impacted and the kids had to wait their turn.

It was hot enough that I had to take my shirt off to keep from overheating. Sully had to be convinced to keep his pants on. We played at the park for nearly 3 hours before we all got hungry and headed off for some lunch. Sully took a short nap on the way home but that was it, I was pretty sure they would both crash. But nope, they charged ahead without naps which means we could look forward to sniping at each other as the evening goes on. Sully still needs a little break to recharge his batteries or he turns into, well, a little fucker. It isn't really his fault but boy does he get annoying. From stealing Graydon's toys to trying to hit Nande with whatever he can lay his hands on to shutting off the tv repeatedly to laying the open hand slap on whatever bare skin he can to dumping his juice on the floor.

On Saturday night I took up a teacher friend's invitation to join him for some mixed martial arts mayhem in UFC 91 Couture vs. Lesnar. I've already written it up along with my scorecard from my predictions. One re-reflection I'd like to note is that Lesnar showed some real class in his victory over Couture. Unlike his last facing of Heath Herring when he beat him, this time around he handled it well. Oh yeah, one more thing, I was kind of shocked at how quickly Demian Maia walked through Nate Quarry.

It was a fun evening and I enjoyed spending time with Manuel, his wife and his very sweet little boy (who's got a little of the stinker in him too). Plus, the Marzen tasted awesome, I forget how good that beer is.

On Sunday, the wife and kids were headed to a birthday party that I was invited to as well but Sunday's are pretty much my only day to be at the house, get projects pushed along and enjoy some pigskin fun (that's football). And I did get a whole bunch of stuff done around the house including most of my laundry, I finished hand sanding the bunk beds and they are ready for pre-staining, staining and sealing. I also gave Nande a bath which was desperately needed if the amount of fur coming off her was any indication. I had to stop and clear the drain at least ten times. And then, later on in the evening when she was dry, I took another massive pile of fur off of her. She really has an amazingly thick coat. And she was rather happy to get cleaned up, rubbed down and brushed.

The Forty-Niners put a whooping on the Lambs which was a refreshing change from their six game losing streak. But then the Redskins had to go and lose to the Cowboys which will make winning my football pool a little more difficult. Basically, I need the Browns to win tonight and the total score to be more than 52 or 53 points.

I also had a good chat with my mom.

All in all, it was a good and productive weekend. I would have liked to get a bike ride in too but it was just too freaking hot on Sunday to go out even though I'm sure it was at least ten degrees cooler in the shade at Nisene. The problem with going riding in Nisene Marks on the weekends is that there's about ten times as much foot traffic as during the week. And its no fun to scare the living crap out of walkers who happen to be on the bike trails. Okay, its a little bit fun.

Time for me to get cranking on my massive tasklist. Hope you had a great weekend too.

UFC 91 Wrap

Well, the good news is that it was a good night of fights. Gonzaga was fun to watch, Florian was fun to watch and, yes, Couture/Lesnar was fun to watch even if the outcome wasn't quite what I'd hoped for.

Thanks to Manuel, his wife and his sweet and funny little boy for having me over.

The Quarry/Maia was over very quickly and Maia pretty well dominated because the fight went to the ground, he got a very solid body lock figure four and could take his time alternating between punches and working the rear naked choke in.

Gonzaga/Hendricks fight wasn't really much of a question. Gonzaga overpowered him from the start and ended it with his fists though he could have chosen to submit him too.

The Florian/Stevenson fight was quite a bit faster than I expected and Stevenson was much more aggressive than I expected. But he underestimated Florian's ground game (perhaps the result of his recent promotion to a black belt in Brazilian Jui Jitsu). I wonder whether Kenny finishing him via rear naked choke (they had an outstanding close up in the replay!) was by opportunity or choice since the rear naked is usually Stevenson's go to move.

The Hazelett/McCrory fight had one of the most painful to watch submissions I've seen in a while. And they replayed it many times. How Tamdan McCrory's arm didn't snap or tear some tendons is beyond me. Plus, Dustin Hazelett's beard thing looked really stupid. But he's a good fighter.

Alrighty then, now to the main event. Couture vs Lesnar was everything it was hyped to be. Lesnar and his meathook hands came out throwing, Couture stayed composed and stuck to his plan. I would give Lesnar the first round by a little bit. In the second round, Couture cut Lesnar over his eye and it was obviously annoying him when he landed a glancing blow behind Couture's left ear that dropped him. He pounced and pounded and the fight got called. Maybe a little too soon but maybe not. Lesnar's the real deal. He showed a lot of class in victory which he hasn't shown to this point. It made the win easier to stomach and will make the heavyweight division a rather interesting one for sure.

It was a very good night of fights and I enjoyed the heck out of it. I went 3 for 5 on my fight predictions so I can't complain too much.

Rough Start

The week has gotten off to a slightly rough, slightly late start thus far. Between the boys getting their sleep patterns all mashed up last night with late naps and later bedtimes and the generalized stress of the start of the workweek and then toss my wife's birthday in on top of everything and you've got a recipe for meltdown mania.

I hope things start to smooth out sooner rather than later since I'm now at work and unable to provide assistance.

Some thoughts on the weekend:
Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live was lame and SNL should be ashamed for helping to promote her. I've heard she's already been offered a position with Fox News once the election is over and her ticket gets crushed.

The Red Sox just didn't quite have enough in the tank to get by the Devil Rays. They put up a good show, came from far, far behind to tie it up but just couldn't quite get over the top. A Phillies and Devil Rays World Series isn't the worst thing that could have happened though and it'll be interesting at the very least. Besides, the distinct lack of Yankees in the post season has already made winners of us all.

The latest UFC Fight Night had some good fights, I haven't gotten through the whole show yet but the Paul Kelly/Marcus Davis fight was good action and the Lytle/Taylor match was very good. I think Brandon Vera's just about done in the UFC, he can't keep putting up pretty mediocre fights and expect to stay in the big leagues.

The slowly dying freezer at home just adds to the general chaos of our life and not really in a good way. It complicates things tremendously and is forcing us to spend time on it when we don't really have time to spare.

We did have a good time at a lumberjack party up above Scotts Valley yesterday. It always amazes me at just how totally different someone else's home environment is like. Their house couldn't be any more different than mine if it were on the moon. While Sully and I were hanging out on the deck, two deer came up from the mostly dried up stream below, they circled the house and then made their way up the street to the next house. There haven't been deer near my house in probably twenty years. The house was Santa Cruz old-school hippy funky which meant that it had lots of interesting spaces, a sunken living room, a big deck, lots of sun, privacy and it was really quiet.

Plus they had a 26 ton log splitter available to help grind through the rather large pile of wood that had accumulated. And nothing says fun like a gas-powered log splitter!

The weekend, as most weekends seem to, went by too quickly and not enough stuff got done although I was able to knock off some minor list items on Saturday with the boys. But it isn't quite enough and we start the week just a little bit further behind than we left last week.

I wish I'd been able to give my wife exactly what she really wants for her birthday, a day off to catch up. But that'll have to wait until I've got a day to give her. Things aren't exactly easy these days but we're getting through it all together as best we can.

I did not get a chance to go riding this weekend but that's only partially because I'm a lazy guy, I torqued up my shoulder towards the end of last week and I'm not quite sure if its going to play nicely right now. Its been pretty sore all weekend but feels a little better this morning, maybe that's just wishful thinking though. We'll see.

Today is going to be a grind from start to finish, whenever that might end up being.

Chug Chug Chug

Some days I feel like the Little Engine That Could. Others I feel like the Little Engine That Could Not. And still other days I feel like the Little Engine That Just Wants A Nap.

I think part of this is due to my lack of exercise lately and the changing of the season from sweet summer to wet and windy fall.

Oh and the never-ending depression that is the state of politics in America. And its downstream effects on the economy, the mortgage nightmare, the endless war in Iraq, the disgusting Republican doublespeak and the generalized venality of partisan life these days. When I see a McCain sticker on a car, I have an immediate tendency to think that the person driving that car is an asshole. I know that's a bad kneejerk reaction but I just cannot help myself. If you support an asshole then it stands to reason that you are, at best, an asshole sympathizer.

Let's be clear, McCain and Palin are poison to the future of this nation. They are the continuation of the exact same policies that have gotten us to this sad state we're in now. Voting for them is a vote for more of the same, only worse since Palin is actually a nastier and more deeply frightening VP candidate than even Dick "Shoot 'Em in the Face and Fuck You All" Cheney. And that is saying an awful lot. But the McCain campaign is employing the politics of desperation, smear and lies now and its very easy to see how poorly their message is resonating with Americans (bye Michigan, bye Ohio, bye Nevada, bye Virginia).

As I'd noted before, I did watch the Elite XC fights on Saturday night already knowing that Kimbo got knocked the fuck out. There were still some decent fights on the card and, when there were not, I'd just jump to Spike and watch the Griffin/Rampage rerun. That was a 25 minutes war between Forrest and Rampage and it really could have gone either way. But Forrest won, Rampage's life went sideways for a little bit and now we're looking at Forrest fighting Rashad Evans (fresh off his knockout of Chuck Liddell).

And then there were the other sports, the baseball and the football. Bummer on the Cubs for meekly rolling over and letting the Dodgers have their way with them. That sucks because I like the Cubs and freakin' hate the Dodgers and loathe Manny "Duffbitch" Ramirez. They are the first to bow out of the post season after having an outstanding year. Which leaves the Phillies to face the Dodgers and the American league possibilities are still open with the Angels and Red Sox still fighting and the White Sox still alive against Tampa. I would be happy seeing anyone but the Dodgers in the World Series at this point but, if they do make it, I'd love for the Red Sox to pound them out in four.

As for football. I lost a mere 3 games in the football pool yesterday but they were three big point games and I was out of the running by the start of the afternoon games. But that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy the games. The Niners had a chance to win but not much of one against a bye week Patriots team coming off a loss. The Raiders didn't lose because they didn't play and the Redskins continue to shock, amaze and awe with a win last week over the Cowboys and a win this week over the Eagles. Right on! Oh, and I got crushed in my fantasy league this week.

That's about it for the Monday morning wrap up. I suppose I should get to working now. Oh wait, I have been, I'm waiting for a drive to empty its trash. What joy.

Just a Quickie Before Bed

My laptop broke last night and stayed broken most of the day, so bad that I had become resigned to dropping $500 to replace the motherboard so I could replace the video card that's soldered to it.

The signal to the display had gone all haywire and zapping PRAM, resetting the PMU, none of it helped (by the way, thanks Apple for trying to charge me $49 to do just those two basic ass key sequences, way to try and capitalize on a down computer). So I backed up my hard drive and started to get it prepped to get sent off for repairs.

And, just when I'd brought my spare laptop, the wisened old Pismo aka the kitchen computer aka Grady's Thomas the Tank Engine viewing machine, up to the office to stand in for the much faster Aluminum. But I thought I'd reboot the Aluminum another time or two to see if it fixed itself yet. And, lo and behold, it has fixed itself. For now.

I have no illusions that my laptop is going to need some major and expensive work sometime in the next couple of months. But it works for now and we're going with it.

I also took Nande out for a great, great ride/run this afternoon. We met up with John and Brady and hit the lower flanks of Nisene Marks but this time we rode all the way out to the far trailhead which was a damned ass long ways up some goodly hills. By the time we topped out, I was nearly tapped out. But there's not much better to recharge your batteries than turning around and descending the hill you've just grunted your way to the top of. And its made more fun by the addition of your hound and your hound's pal and your pal.

I'd also like to note, for the record, that the record now stands at John - 1, Erik - 0. That's a good thing because he's now beating me in biffage. On one part of the descent, he got his front wheel tangled in some roots and went arse over heels, as it were. I was right behind and got a great view, I wish I'd built the camera mount for my bike because it would have been good video.

Anyway, he was actually pretty well protected by his sweatshirt and pants and only suffered one good rashie on his elbow, the initial point of contact.

By the time we'd gotten back to the cars, I was pretty well fried. So tired but really happy with the fantastic ride we'd just racked up. The dogs had had a great time running and playing in the river, we'd gotten in some excellent, fast singletrack and good hill work too.

And Nande and I got a nice bath when we got home, for we were ten kinds of filthy from the trees, dirt, water and dust.

Next time I'll take the GPS to map and measure it. And, hopefully, I'll have put together the camera mount.