For any Aussies out there, a classic beer commercial:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDUtsaHlq_c
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Grumpy Old Man
Now that I am closing in on 35 (very quickly) I feel like I am moving out of the young, immature adult phase and so I suppose I would now be classified as an old, immature adult. After my performance last night the term "grumpy old man" might be more appropriate.
I was on the couch at about 9:00 watching a little TV, Mindy was upstairs and settling the kids to sleep when the doorbell rang. Strange to get a caller so late but when opening the door, there was no one there...however, I saw two local teenagers running out of my front yard. Knowing that the bell, plus our two Chihuahuas going crazy would have completely disrupted the kids gettting to sleep, I felt my blood boil.
I went out our back door and around the side of the house and waited a couple of minutes before I saw the kids re-appear from down the street. As they approached, I crossed our front yard to confront them - I must have been quite the sight in a black T-shirt and black shorts - and they froze upon seeing me. I threw out a berating tirade, calling them "knuckle heads" and explaining to them why it was not such a good idea to be ringing doorbells and waking kids up. While they said that it was not them (perhaps I really do look that stupid?), a humble apology was offered for them being in my yard (something they did admit to). I certainly I made my point quite clear and I think they will think twice before selecting our house as a target for their nonsense in the future.
After coming inside, I realised that this was the first time that I have had to be a cranky adult like that. Hopefully, at least with these kids, this will be the last.
I was on the couch at about 9:00 watching a little TV, Mindy was upstairs and settling the kids to sleep when the doorbell rang. Strange to get a caller so late but when opening the door, there was no one there...however, I saw two local teenagers running out of my front yard. Knowing that the bell, plus our two Chihuahuas going crazy would have completely disrupted the kids gettting to sleep, I felt my blood boil.
I went out our back door and around the side of the house and waited a couple of minutes before I saw the kids re-appear from down the street. As they approached, I crossed our front yard to confront them - I must have been quite the sight in a black T-shirt and black shorts - and they froze upon seeing me. I threw out a berating tirade, calling them "knuckle heads" and explaining to them why it was not such a good idea to be ringing doorbells and waking kids up. While they said that it was not them (perhaps I really do look that stupid?), a humble apology was offered for them being in my yard (something they did admit to). I certainly I made my point quite clear and I think they will think twice before selecting our house as a target for their nonsense in the future.
After coming inside, I realised that this was the first time that I have had to be a cranky adult like that. Hopefully, at least with these kids, this will be the last.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Concert and Cricket
Friday began with a 4 hour drive up to Boston. Mindy's friend had secured tickets to an Indigo Girls concert for her and Mindy as well as lining up accommodation at her in-laws house in the area, so how could we refuse? Apparently the concert was good, it was the 5th time Mindy managed to catch them on their current tour and from her reports, this was one of the best shows.
Saturday morning involved a relatively early start to drive back down to Connecticut for my cricket match. It was a league match, important as we would like to get to host the final. I was expecting a tough game but it ended up being quite a one-sided match. We batted and scored 231 from our overs and bowled them out for 115. Tony would have taken 5 wickets if I could catch in the gully. Everyone chipped in in one way or another so it was a good team effort.
Now we are trying to get everything straight before our trip to Florida on Thursday. It should be a busy week.
Saturday morning involved a relatively early start to drive back down to Connecticut for my cricket match. It was a league match, important as we would like to get to host the final. I was expecting a tough game but it ended up being quite a one-sided match. We batted and scored 231 from our overs and bowled them out for 115. Tony would have taken 5 wickets if I could catch in the gully. Everyone chipped in in one way or another so it was a good team effort.
Now we are trying to get everything straight before our trip to Florida on Thursday. It should be a busy week.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Lucky Day
This morning, driving to work via my normal route, I slowed down at a Stop sign near my house. Seeing that no traffic was coming, I rolled through and continued on my way. Unfortunately, the one car off in the distance was a local police officer who was soon behind me with his lights flashing. Not exactly the best start to the day...but after reviewing my licence, registration etc he decided to let me off with a warning. So other than having to endure 5 minutes parked there with all passers-by staring at you, no damage was done. You really don't have any secrets though - while waiting for my details to get processed, I received a call from a friend to offer his "support" after he had driven by and seen me there. It was nice to be able to report the good news from the stop and not the amount of money I could have lost!
Monday, August 20, 2007
Atlantic City
Thursday night involved a trip to Atlantic City for a night of poker. Considering I was not working on Friday and Mindy's mother and sister were in town to keep her company, there was really not other option when I received the invitation to go.
Three of us drove down, arriving about 8:30 for a quick meal and then to begin a NL Holdem tournament that started at 9:00. None of us did anything much ... I lasted until the first break but simply did not get anything that I could play. I busted out when my all-in with 4-4 was called by Q-J, and a Q hit on the flop.
Now off to the cash tables to complete the night. I was playing a $1/$2 NL table and did OK. Again, did not really get many big hands...no sets; flushes or straights so no really big pots, but I ended up making a $40 profit here This covered half of my tournament buy in, so not too much damage done on the evening. I think next time I will stick to the cash tables - it was more enjoyable I think and you don't run the risk of playing well for a couple of hours and still have nothing to show for it.
An interesting hand happened at Gary's table. The board was showing 3-3-3-7-3; 3 players still in the hand with about a $12 pot. The first player pushed all-in for about $150 and was called by the other two players. Player 1 had something like 6-4; Player 2 had an Ace; Player 3 also had two rubbish cards. The dealer pushed the pot towards the player with the Ace (kicker breaks the tie), when the other two players jumped up and insisted that the kicker does not play in 4 of a kind. The poker room manager was summoned and he was able to confirm that the best 5 cards play, the kicker DOES matter and so the player with the Ace won the pot. Not bad to get gifted $300 like that when you were looking at $12 a few minutes earlier.
Three of us drove down, arriving about 8:30 for a quick meal and then to begin a NL Holdem tournament that started at 9:00. None of us did anything much ... I lasted until the first break but simply did not get anything that I could play. I busted out when my all-in with 4-4 was called by Q-J, and a Q hit on the flop.
Now off to the cash tables to complete the night. I was playing a $1/$2 NL table and did OK. Again, did not really get many big hands...no sets; flushes or straights so no really big pots, but I ended up making a $40 profit here This covered half of my tournament buy in, so not too much damage done on the evening. I think next time I will stick to the cash tables - it was more enjoyable I think and you don't run the risk of playing well for a couple of hours and still have nothing to show for it.
An interesting hand happened at Gary's table. The board was showing 3-3-3-7-3; 3 players still in the hand with about a $12 pot. The first player pushed all-in for about $150 and was called by the other two players. Player 1 had something like 6-4; Player 2 had an Ace; Player 3 also had two rubbish cards. The dealer pushed the pot towards the player with the Ace (kicker breaks the tie), when the other two players jumped up and insisted that the kicker does not play in 4 of a kind. The poker room manager was summoned and he was able to confirm that the best 5 cards play, the kicker DOES matter and so the player with the Ace won the pot. Not bad to get gifted $300 like that when you were looking at $12 a few minutes earlier.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Free Dinner!
I guess the only thing that beats a good dinner is a good, free dinner. Last night, due to the visit to the area of some product managers from SAP, we were treated to dinner at a local steakhouse. The food was excellent and while I was not up for the challenge of the 28oz porterhouse (about 800g), I did enjoy a quite large filet mignon, several beers and some red wine. You know it is a fancy place when all of the side dishes have to be ordered individually, costing from $5-$8 each. Hopefully we get another chance to go here over the course of my project.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Working Weekend
Not work in the paid sense, just getting stuff done around the house. Kind of boring really but it needed to happen. (Un)fortunatley, our cricket opponents for this weekend forfeited to us, so it gave us a chance to get this done.
I guess it started on Friday afternoon when my car would not start after work. This had also happened earlier in the week but that time it started on the 2nd attempt. 10 minutes of trying, and re-trying did nothing. AAA was summoned and I expected to have to be towed home. The driver took my key, tried it once and it worked. So, other than feeling like an idiot, I at least was able to drive home.
Saturday began with buying some deck cleaner and a power washer to try to clean up our new deck. There is an overhanging branch from our walnut tree that is home to several squirrels. Unfortunately, they sit above the deck and the scraps from eating the nuts fall down and unless you clean it off right away, it will stain the surface. While we were in Germany, it got badly marked so this was step one in dealing with the problem. It helped a little and the rest of the marks will (hopefully) fade over time. We also set up a temporary canopy to help protect it and plan to get the offending limbs trimmed to solve the issue.
We also had to buy another air conditioning unit for our spare room - Mindy's mother and sister are coming to visit for this week and with the recent heat, had to do the right thing to keep them comfortable.
Much of the afternoon was spent with friends at a kids birthday party. Great food, especially the fruit salad. We unfortunately had to leave a little early, right when we were getting into a serious discussion on worm composting, to pick up my car after getting a new battery.
Sunday was largely consumed with cleaning up my office. Huge stacks of paper where tossed and shredded and now it is getting close to being usable again. I also found time to watch several hours of poker, much to the annoyance of Mindy. Normally she does not mind it being on, but the sheer volume got to her this weekend. I am catching up on old recordings of a show "Poker After Dark" - 6 professional players, $120K winner-takes-all format, where you get to see every hand that is played. While this does reduce the excitement factor, it is interesting watching them play every hand from a poker perspective. As a result though, each tournament lasts about 4 hours. Due to catching up on this show, I am now behind with watching the WPT events. Add to this the fact that the 2007 WSOP events are also being shown now and there is not going to be much respite for Mindy in the near future!
Not to imply that it dominates my life, but I am 1/2 way through reading the book "Big Deal" by Anthony Holden, detailing his year as a professional poker player (a gift from Adam...who actually might be the only person still reading this!). In any case, it is a very enjoyable book and a nice way to fill in the hours between watching and playing.
I guess it started on Friday afternoon when my car would not start after work. This had also happened earlier in the week but that time it started on the 2nd attempt. 10 minutes of trying, and re-trying did nothing. AAA was summoned and I expected to have to be towed home. The driver took my key, tried it once and it worked. So, other than feeling like an idiot, I at least was able to drive home.
Saturday began with buying some deck cleaner and a power washer to try to clean up our new deck. There is an overhanging branch from our walnut tree that is home to several squirrels. Unfortunately, they sit above the deck and the scraps from eating the nuts fall down and unless you clean it off right away, it will stain the surface. While we were in Germany, it got badly marked so this was step one in dealing with the problem. It helped a little and the rest of the marks will (hopefully) fade over time. We also set up a temporary canopy to help protect it and plan to get the offending limbs trimmed to solve the issue.
We also had to buy another air conditioning unit for our spare room - Mindy's mother and sister are coming to visit for this week and with the recent heat, had to do the right thing to keep them comfortable.
Much of the afternoon was spent with friends at a kids birthday party. Great food, especially the fruit salad. We unfortunately had to leave a little early, right when we were getting into a serious discussion on worm composting, to pick up my car after getting a new battery.
Sunday was largely consumed with cleaning up my office. Huge stacks of paper where tossed and shredded and now it is getting close to being usable again. I also found time to watch several hours of poker, much to the annoyance of Mindy. Normally she does not mind it being on, but the sheer volume got to her this weekend. I am catching up on old recordings of a show "Poker After Dark" - 6 professional players, $120K winner-takes-all format, where you get to see every hand that is played. While this does reduce the excitement factor, it is interesting watching them play every hand from a poker perspective. As a result though, each tournament lasts about 4 hours. Due to catching up on this show, I am now behind with watching the WPT events. Add to this the fact that the 2007 WSOP events are also being shown now and there is not going to be much respite for Mindy in the near future!
Not to imply that it dominates my life, but I am 1/2 way through reading the book "Big Deal" by Anthony Holden, detailing his year as a professional poker player (a gift from Adam...who actually might be the only person still reading this!). In any case, it is a very enjoyable book and a nice way to fill in the hours between watching and playing.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Anniversary
Yesterday was our 8th wedding anniversary. A nice lunch with the kids was had and in the evening went down to the local park where there was a display to promote the local police, fire and rescue departments. The girls wanted to go inside the ambulance but then got a little shy so stood on the step and looked in. Free pizza and coke made the effort worthwhile.
Monday, August 6, 2007
Poker, Beer, Cricket, Picnic, Beer
This last weekend had all the necessary ingredients for a good and busy time.
Friday night was poker night. 6 friends gathered together for a night of beer drinking and holdem tournaments. We played 4 tournaments and I managed one first and one second place finish. It was a lot of fun. Next on the agenda is trying to plan a trip to Atlantic City for more of the same.
Arriving home at 3:30 gave me about 4 hours sleep before the kids woke up. I also received a call from Daniel, a longtime friend who recently was married. It was good to hear everything went well for them. Cricket was the next item on the agenda, a good game which we lost by 1 run, in the baking sun. Always difficult to get so close and lose but it was exciting watching at the end.
Sunday was off to a picnic with a few friends. This was another enjoyable afternoon in the park with the kids, some beer and some good food. The weather could not have been better for this. The kids had a great time running around and it was a nice way to end the weekend.
Friday night was poker night. 6 friends gathered together for a night of beer drinking and holdem tournaments. We played 4 tournaments and I managed one first and one second place finish. It was a lot of fun. Next on the agenda is trying to plan a trip to Atlantic City for more of the same.
Arriving home at 3:30 gave me about 4 hours sleep before the kids woke up. I also received a call from Daniel, a longtime friend who recently was married. It was good to hear everything went well for them. Cricket was the next item on the agenda, a good game which we lost by 1 run, in the baking sun. Always difficult to get so close and lose but it was exciting watching at the end.
Sunday was off to a picnic with a few friends. This was another enjoyable afternoon in the park with the kids, some beer and some good food. The weather could not have been better for this. The kids had a great time running around and it was a nice way to end the weekend.
A New Phone
My mobile phone broke on Thursday. This was a phone I had owned since 1999, apparently there have been a couple of advances in this technology over the past 8 years! :-) It had become the subject of many jokes from friends over the years and even an x-ray security screener at Chicago airport stopped the belt and held up screening passengers while waving my phone around in the air to show her friends, laughing while saying "I haven't seen one of these in a while!".
However, in the interests of time and also because I would have found it amusing, I had hoped to simply transfer my number from this phone to another identical old phone that I had. This proved to be a much tougher task than I had first thought. The conversation with the Sprint representative went around in circles along the following lines for about 20 minutes:
Rep: "Enter the following code into your phone and press the 'OK' button".
Me: "My phone does not have an 'OK' button".
Rep: "All phones have an 'OK' button".
Me: "Apparently not".
Rep: "Do you see the navigation keys?".
Me: "Yes".
Rep: "The 'OK' button is the button in the middle of the navigation keys".
Me: "There is no button in the middle of the navigation keys".
Rep: "Please hold" (5 minutes later) "Enter the following code into your phone and press the 'OK' button".
etc...
Eventually, she gave up and told me I would have to go to a Sprint store to get this switched. I figured that if I had to make the effort to go to the store, that I probably should upgrade at the same time, so armed with a $150 discount for extending my service contract, I went to the store.
The sales rep saw my phone, smiled and then asked me "Well, what would you want your new phone to do". I replied that "Clearly, I am not particularly fussy". Due to being able to get another $50 rebate I settled on the Motorola Razr model, a considerable improvement on my previous model. The post script to the story is that when the salesman offered to download my contacts into the new phone, he had to admit that they did not even have a cable that could fit it! So basically, my phone was so old that even the Sprint store could not maintain or support it. Perhaps it was time for something new!
However, in the interests of time and also because I would have found it amusing, I had hoped to simply transfer my number from this phone to another identical old phone that I had. This proved to be a much tougher task than I had first thought. The conversation with the Sprint representative went around in circles along the following lines for about 20 minutes:
Rep: "Enter the following code into your phone and press the 'OK' button".
Me: "My phone does not have an 'OK' button".
Rep: "All phones have an 'OK' button".
Me: "Apparently not".
Rep: "Do you see the navigation keys?".
Me: "Yes".
Rep: "The 'OK' button is the button in the middle of the navigation keys".
Me: "There is no button in the middle of the navigation keys".
Rep: "Please hold" (5 minutes later) "Enter the following code into your phone and press the 'OK' button".
etc...
Eventually, she gave up and told me I would have to go to a Sprint store to get this switched. I figured that if I had to make the effort to go to the store, that I probably should upgrade at the same time, so armed with a $150 discount for extending my service contract, I went to the store.
The sales rep saw my phone, smiled and then asked me "Well, what would you want your new phone to do". I replied that "Clearly, I am not particularly fussy". Due to being able to get another $50 rebate I settled on the Motorola Razr model, a considerable improvement on my previous model. The post script to the story is that when the salesman offered to download my contacts into the new phone, he had to admit that they did not even have a cable that could fit it! So basically, my phone was so old that even the Sprint store could not maintain or support it. Perhaps it was time for something new!
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