Noooooo!

The one flaw with my TiVo has been exposed.

Explanation: I rarely watch Monday Night Football. Last night the Eagles were playing the Cowboys, so I made an exception. After the most exciting first half of football I've seen in a long time, it was way past my bedtime, so I set the TiVo to record the rest of the game (plus an hour, because sometimes these things run over). Then I went to bed, knowing I wouldn't miss a thing.

This morning, I woke up excitedly telling my wife about the first half of the game. I went flying downstairs to watch as much as I could of the exciting conclusion before work, only to find that my recording lasted a whopping 7 minutes. After pulling my jaw back from the floor and recovering from the shock, I realized that my internet connection had been down as well. I went outside to check things out.

Sure enough, when moving a car last night, the temporary cable line in my driveway managed to get pulled from my house right before I went to bed. The TiVo works great, but you need cable for it to work.

So, as far as I know, the Eagles won last night by 6 points. Go Philly!!!

Veggies? No Thank You.

No thank you, I'm a meatatarian.

Source: This is from a Wendy's commercial for the Baconator - what may be the world's coolest* sandwich:



Explanation: It's a personal choice.

*The Baconator is not, I repeat, NOT the least healthy sandwich on the market. Not while Hardees still exists, anyway.

Get Rich Quick!

You can make a 79% return on your money just like I did!

Explanation: Yes, you heard me right. Seventy-nine percent. Forget public school for my kid - my child is going to and Ivy League school!!! I may get me a DE-luxe apartment in the sky with this kind of money, 'cause we're movin' on up!

Did I make this money on the stock market? Not likely. Commodities? No way. Money market? Nope. How did I make this fortune in less than a day? In less than an hour?? Without leaving the comfort of my own home???

Online poker, baby! Yeah, you heard me right. Last night, in under an hour, I made a big fat 79% return on my investment. Yep, I'm a high roller. I don't even know what I'm going to do with my windfall. Maybe I'll put it in inflation-protected securities for the time being just to be safe.

As a beginning poker player, I would recommend you don't play high stakes games like I do. Just start yourself off with freerolls or play money games. You don't want to sit down at a real money table with sharks like me, 'cause we bite. Nope. Build up your game. Then, when you think you're ready for it, I'll see you at the $0.01/$0.02 No-Limit table.

Don't expect that day to come anytime soon, though. Only gifted players like me can turn a $1 buy-in into $1.79 at a difficult table like that.

Salt Rocks!

Salt is the only rock that you eat.

Source: This "factoid" was actually the opener to one of the most painfully boring tales I've ever heard.

Explanation: A bunch of people at our church went on a weekend retreat where the guest speaker was a "rock enthusiast" or "mineralogist" or something like that.* It was the kind of weekend I wouldn't go near with a ten-foot pole. Then, the following weekend, one poor soul was nominated to stand up in front of the congregation and talk about how wonderful the weekend was. In my opinion, the only thing worse than actually going on that retreat was trying to make it sound interesting to other people. Anyway, she opened her not-so-exciting tale with today's status message, which I will forever associate with those poor folks who went on that retreat.

Counterpoint: Anyone who thinks that salt is the only rock you can eat has never owned a dog.


*I'm sure if you stretch it really hard, you can come up with a good religious explanation for why a church group talked about rocks for an entire weekend, but I think the real reason is that the retreat organizer just had a friend she wanted to bring along and that friend's most unique characteristic was her knowledge of rocks.

What Would Tom Do?

What Would Tom Do?

Explanation: I'll spare you the specifics, but yesterday I was trying to do something at work and I couldn't figure it out. There were two ways to perform my task - a short way, where a tool we use could have formatted some information for me, or a long way, where I would have to read through the information myself and interpret it based on how it was built. The short way would take mere seconds, provided I had the proper configuration to run it, while the long way would take ten to twenty minutes to work through. I, of course, tried the short way, but could not configure it properly. After five minutes of trying, I gave up.

At this point, I reached the age old question: Do I ask someone for help or just do it the long way? In this case I decided to just go for the long way, thinking it wouldn't be too terrible. Well, about five minutes in, I decided to give up and ask for help. I opened a Sametime window to ask Tom and started typing my question. Tom knows these things and he helps me out a lot, but I hate to bug him because he's usually all sorts of busy with bigger stuff.

As I typed, I imagined how Tom would reply. My imagination always starts his reply with "Jeremy, you're an idiot..." and then goes on to tell me why my question is stupid. Mind you, Tom doesn't ever actually say that, but one of these days he might if I ask him a stupid enough question. Anyway, in this case, my imagination said "Jeremy, you're an idiot because the key to your configuration is right there in the data you're loooking at." Sure enough, it was. Tom had answered my question without ever knowing that I had asked it.

By itself, this wouldn't be such a big deal, but this is not the first time Tom has answered a question of mine without me ever asking it. I would guess that four out of every five times I type him a question, I figure out the answer ("Jeremy, you're an idiot...") before ever hitting "Send".* So, I think it's clear what my options are here:

1. Get "WWTD" bracelets made up for the entire department. I'm sure I'm not the only one who should be asking that question. I could make one for Tom that says "WWID" just so he doesn't feel left out.
2. Tom claims he does it by a form of mental telepathy. I should have him studied.
3. I could just stop trying to solve problems on my own and instead start trying to ask Tom immediately. Perhaps the answers will come more quickly that way.
4. We don't need to see his identification. These aren't the droids we're looking for.
5. I could just stop bugging Tom and send the questions directly to myself via Sametime. That way there's no possibility of me actually sending him a question by mistake.

*Interestingly, this is not unique to Sametime. When I worked out of the office, I would often walk halfway down the aisle to Tom's office before realizing the answer to my question and turning around.

This is Sportcenter!

NFL Fun fact: Each of the last seven times the Minnesota Vikings have lost their first game, they have failed to go undefeated in a season.

Source: I heard it on Sportscenter, so it has to be true.

Explanation: It's officially that time of year. I can care about Sportscenter again! Here are some other interesting facts I learned:

• ESPN has a jovial announcer who has funny nicknames for all sorts of players.
• The "New York Football Giants" won the Super Bowl last year, yet apparently most people think they weren't a very good team then and aren't one now.
• The new quarterback for the New York Jets actually spent some time playing for another team before joining the Jets.
• OK, that jovial announcer is getting annoying.
• Apparently there is a player on New England who may have gotten hurt on Sunday. I'll keep you posted if I hear anything more about it.
• There is a player named Adam Jones on the Cowboys who goes by the colorful nickname "Pac Man"
• OK, there's nothing jovial about him, just get him off my screen.
• It turns out that there are other football teams from places other than Dallas, New York, and New England.
• That "Dancing With the Stars" guy with the terrible grammar is an analyst for ESPN.
• Player number eighty-five has a very poor understanding of Spanish.
• Must... kill... Chris... Berman...

The Fraternal Order of Delta Hand

"So, you're dealt a hand, right?" "No, I'm Alpha Omicron Pi."

Explanation: Recently, I've been pondering a probability issue in poker. I attempted to explain it to my wife last night, resulting in the above conversation. Now, to her credit, she was joking, and it was so funny I left the room to go write it down. That pretty much ended our conversation, though. Things like this happen when you marry someone who was in a sorority.

Now Down To The Nitty-Gritty: My problem is this: In Texas Hold'Em, what is the probability that my starting hand will win against n other starting hands. For example, if you are dealt pocket aces and are playing heads up, you have about an 85% chance of beating a random hand.

It's easy to design an algorithm for this. For a given starting hand, iterate through all other possible starting hands (or combinations thereof) and generate all possible combinations of community cards for those starting hands, keeping track of the total wins for your starting hand and the total number of permutations considered. On my home machine, given the best algorithm I've come up with so far, I think I can perform this computation for n=1 for all possible starting hands in under a day. Last time I did this was a while ago, so I don't remember exactly how long it took, but I've done it before in a reasonable amount of time.

Using the same algorithm for n=2, however, increases the complexity to the point where it can take days to consider a single starting hand. There are 169 possible starting hands, so the computation for all possible starting hands cannot be completed in a reasonable amount of time. I need a better algorithm, and that's what I've been working on.

Special Blog Bonus: This problem mocks me, as the snake mocks the snake charmer* in this Far Side:


*Yeah, my segue is a stretch. So what? You try connecting a snake in Groucho glasses to a complex combinatorics problem.

Comcast Rant

Is a flood-free yard worth 26 hours without Internet access?

Explanation: Over the past several weeks, I've noticed some serious water in my backyard. As we live in a neighborhood with a lot of water, including the woods behind my house, which I believe are classified as wetlands, I just assumed that I needed to adjust my lawn sprinkler settings. I slowly reduced the amout of watering I was doing in that area, but with no luck. Then I reduced the amount of watering in nearby areas, but again, the mud puddles remained. I can't even mow back there anymore, because it's just disgusting to take the mower through. It has frustrated me to no end and I was wondering how I got suckered into buying a house with a giant mud pit in the backyard.

Wednesday afternoon, Dan, our neighborhood landscaping guy came by my front door. We do not use Dan's lawnmowing services, but a bunch of my neighbors do, and the previous owners of my house did as well. Dan said that I really need to stop watering in the back corner of my yard, because it's just soaking wet back there. I told him I haven't watered there in a month at which point he suggested that I might have a bad sprinkler valve back there. Dan would know our sprinkler system - he installed it for the previous owners about 5 years ago.

So, Dan, his associate, and I went out into the backyard in search of the sprinkler valve. Sprinkler valves should be very easy to find - they have a circular plastic top about four inches in diameter and should be right on the surface of the ground. Over time, however, they have a knack for being overtaken by grass and dirt. After five years, only one of my 6 valves remains uncovered. So, the hunt began. The valves should be just below the surface, so a poke in the ground with a shovel would easily find them. We worked off a map I had of the early plans for the sprinkler system. Unfortunately, it didn't quite match what was actually in the ground.

The map indicated that there was a valve in the back corner, but after much prodding with the shovel, nothing turned up. So, they went deeper until they found the sprinkler main. Then, with numerous shovel pokes (easily cleaned up by a footprint or two) they traced the main toward the offending sprinkler heads. As he was very close to the largest puddle, Dan found a wire, which would indicate that the valve (which is electronic) was nearby. Sure enough, it was, and they were on their way.

At this point, I had been outside unexpectedly for about 45 minutes or so, so I ran back inside to make sure I hadn't missed anything, and to update my Sametime status so people knew I was playing in mud in my backyard. Unfortunately, my IBM network connection had reset. That was no big deal, so I just tried to reconnect. In the meantime, I went to load a web page on my home machine, but the page was hanging. Then my reconnect to the network failed. I tried to open another web page, but with no luck. I put two and two together and realized that my cable must be out. So, I checked my business phone (which is VOIP) and sure enough, there was no dial tone. Running downstairs, I flipped on the television to see that I still had channels, but they had lots of static. Something was wrong with my cable.

I went back outside, where Dan was elbow deep in a mud puddle and politely asked if he had been poking around in the front yard with a shovel, because my cable was out. He said, no, he hadn't. The cable from the street attaches to the front right side of my house and we were on the back right corner, so it didn't make much sense that there'd be any cable in the back. Dan was concerned, though, and looked again at the wire he found about 20 minutes earlier. "You know, I don't think that's a sprinkler wire" he said. This didn't do good things for my blood pressure. Sure enough, the wire had a little shovel damage to it. Time to call Comcast.

Just for the record, if there's one company in the entire world who I am afraid to call for service, it's the cable company. They are almost legendary for being pains in the butt when it comes to service. Just for the record.

So, I sprinted inside, looked up the Comcast number in the yellow pages (eeeeew) and called them up. The automated system thanked me for calling and asked me to input my ten-digit telephone number. So, I did. I worked my way through outage menus until I eventually found something that seemed like it would put me through to an operator. I finally got to talk to a human. "Can you please give me your ten-digit phone number?" This is one of my biggest pet peeves. If the stupid automated system is going to ask me for my number, I would hope that number could be magically transferred to the person who answers the phone. Oh well. I gave her my number, confirmed my name and address, and explained my problem. She was a very nice lady, but said she would have to transfer me to another department, and they would be able to help. The next woman picked up the phone and immediately asked, "Can I have your ten-digit telephone number?" At this point, without any other issues, I was thinking Comcast customer service was as bad as I imagined it. I gathered my composure, confirmed my name and address (again) and explained my problem. She was very polite and friendly and told me that they could have a technician at my house that (Wednesday) afternoon! I couldn't believe my good fortune! She went on to explain that I didn't need to be there because it was an outside issue, but I said I wanted to be around to show the technician the damaged cable and to warn him or her about the mud pit. I asked when they'd be coming and she had to put me on hold for about five minutes while she checked. Mind you, it was about 1:00 at this point. She came back on the line and said someone would be at my house between 1:00 and 5:00. That window didn't help much more than telling me that someone would be at my house "during the afternoon," but I thanked her and continued to marvel at my good fortune.

At about 5:45, with no sign of any technician, I stopped marveling and called Comcast again. In an effort to avoid the three people asking for my ten-digit phone number, I dialed the service number off of my cable bill instead of the 1-800 number. After entering my ten-digit phone number, I chose the "To confirm an appointment" menu, which happily explained to me that I had an appointment on Monday, September 8th. This was quite a shock, as I had just spent the last five hours offline, waiting for a technician to arrive. I worked my way back through the menus and after several minutes I managed to find one that would transfer me to a human... only it hung up on me.

I called the local number again, this time going directly for the same service menu I had used with the 1-800 number. Instead of transferring me to a human, it somehow connected me to the automated billing service, which told me that my recurring credit card billing was still working fabulously. I worked backward through the menus and tried again, only to find out AGAIN that my credit card billing was working. So, I hung up.

At this point I stopped and wrote down everything I could about what had happened up to this point. I was going to send a nasty letter to Comcast, but decided they wouldn't care and that it would be more productive to just post all of this on the internet. So here it is.

Let's recap: My yard is flooded, my sprinkler is broken, my Internet is down, my cable wire is cut, five hours of my life were wasted, Comcast gave me an appointment that never existed, I'm homicidal, but my credit card billing is just dandy. Good for me. Moving right along...

I went back to the 1-800 number, input my ten-digit phone number, and worked my way to a human. I gave her my ten-digit phone number, confirmed my name and address, and explained to her that I had been lied to, I had just wasted five hours of my day, I needed internet to work, and that I was about to summon up a posse to go hunt her down. She apologized profusely for the misunderstanding and told me that the first available appointment time for service was on Tuesday, September 9th. I explained again, more clearly, that the appointment I already had and DIDN'T WANT was for September 8th. September 9th, being AFTER September 8th, would not make me any happier. In my second explanation, I also may have included fun words and phrases like "livid," "seething," "incompetent," and "lying scumbag." After eventually getting my point across that I was willing to come to their office and do unholy things to them with their own office supplies, she eventually talked to her manager and managed to get me an appointment for Thursday afternoon, also between 1:00 and 5:00, where I would get a temporary fix. Then on my next appointment, which may or may not be on September 8th, they will give me a more permanent fix.

Yesterday the nice man showed up and performed the "temporary repair" which amounts to (this is amusing) running a really long cable from the street hook-up on the front left side of my house along the ground to the house hook-up on the front right side of my house. That's right - it's just laying on my front lawn, runs across my driveway, and runs along the mulch on the side of my driveway. It's not pretty, but it works.

So, I have internet, I hate Comcast, and my yard is now flood-free. Why the cable runs behind my house is still a mystery, which I will take up with Comcast if and when they try to bill me for this fiasco. Is a flood-free yard worth 26 hours without Internet access? It probably is, but you probably shouldn't ask me about it for a few more weeks.

Comcastic

My life is Comcastic.

Explanation: The short explanation is as follows:

Shovel + Home Cable Line = Disaster

There will be a much longer explanation, but at this point I have limited internet time so it will have to wait. Let's just say that I'm not happy with Comcast right now.

Special Blog Bonus: Here's a Far Side depicting God's creation of Comcast:

I'm a Little Monkish Today

been have I lately Monk much too watching

Explanation: My status is "I have been watching too much Monk lately", but I thought it would look nicer if I put the words in alphabetical order. It does, too - I was right. Also, I think I have solved the crime:

The professor was upset about losing the grant to Dr. Wadsworth, but he knew that there was no way he could do anything about it without their coworkers becoming suspicious. But, he had access to the chemicals in the lab! He knew Dr. Wadsworth would need a 60-cent stamp to send his prospectus to the NSF, so he applied the E-coli to the back of the stamp and left it on Wadsworth's desk. Wadsworth took the bait, licking the stamp that very afternoon. It was a brilliant plan - everyone thought he had just fallen prey to the tampered chicken scare at the local supermarket. The professor had gotten away with murder, except he made two crucial mistakes. First, he did not know that Wadsworth, since his visit to the cattle ranch last summer, had recently become a vegetarian. Wadsworth would never buy chicken. And second, he did not know that the E-coli would break down the adhesive on the stamp, causing it to fall off. The post office returned the package postage due, but the stamp - the one piece of damning evidence, had apparently vanished. Except it hadn't. The stamp had fallen off in the "Out" bin in the department office and Lucy noticed it. She wasn't whispering about "infidelity" when we overheard her on the phone - she was talking about "philately". She's a stamp collector! We stopped by Lucy's house, and sure enough, the most recent addition to her collection is also the most valuable. It proves that the professor murdered Wadsworth!

Honk!

I don't mean to toot my own horn, but... HONK!

Explanation: I'm not trying to brag or anything, but when you've got it, you've got it. And I've got it. It's a little embarassing to be this good, but I manage. OK, I more than manage - I flourish. You can't stop me. You can't even hope to contain me. I am the greatest in all the land. Bring your finest meats and cheeses for all my people! The mustard is off the hot dog. I'm getting tired of making you look bad. It's hard work.

Special Blog Bonus: Hey, speaking of being exceptionally good at things, here's a Far Side depicting God on Jeopardy. OK, it's actually "Trivia Tonight," but let's face it - it should have been Jeopardy.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

It's college football season!

Explanation: That's right! The college football season is underway. I have reason to watch Sportscenter again! It's time for your Jeremy's Status Message Virginia Tech Football Preview!!!

Virginia Tech Football Preview

Offense: Well, last year's ACC champions lost three wide receivers to the draft, and the fourth receiver graduated. Last year's running game was pretty weak, and the starting tailback was kicked off the team for disciplinary reasons. Oh, and two other tailbacks were injured in the spring and got a slow start this fall. The two-headed monster at quarterback is going with only one head, as Tyrod Taylor will be redshirting. Of course, last year he was going to redshirt also until the LSU game, three games into the season. So, the team has no proven weapons. The offensive line, however, should be much better this year, so that's something. Grade: C

Defense: The heart and soul of the defense last year, Xavier Adibi, Vince Hall, and Brandon Flowers, were all drafted, along with two defensive linemen. The defense was pretty deep, though, and should reload again this year, with cornerback Victor "Macho" Harris being the feature player on this side of the ball. Grade: B+

Special Teams: Frankly, I don't care if they send the band out on the field - Frank Beamer always gets and A on special teams. I don't know who's kicking or punting or returning kicks or anything. Doesn't matter. Grade: A

Intangibles: Virginia Tech has spectacular intangibles. You can't quite see them, and they're just out of your grasp, but they are there and they are incredible. You can't find better intangibles if you try. If you could measure the speed of the Virginia Tech intangibles, they'd be really fast. If you could measure the strength of the Virginia Tech intangibles, they'd be really strong. If you could measure the intangibles of the Virginia Tech intangibles, they'd be off the chart. But, you can't, so just trust me on this. They rock. Grade: A+

Language Arts: Jeremy needs to show improvement in his comprehension of poetry, and tends to lose focus while writing long blog entries. Grade: B

Mascot: Our mascot is a giant turkey who does the bench press in the end zone after touchdowns. Who else can say that? Grade: A+

Final Prediction: The team will win more games than they lose, they will cause me more stress than I need, and they will have less players arrested than LSU. Oh, and they'll go to a bowl game for the 16th season in a row.

Beware of Doug

Beware of Doug.

Source: The source is this Far Side, which I find particularly amusing for some reason or another:



Explanation: Let's explore some famous Dougs throughout history, shall we? There's the Doug cartoon:


There's the magician Doug Henning:


There's the fictional Doug Heffernan from King of Queens:


There's the ever popular Doug E. Fresh:


Ummm... I'm already running out of Dougs. Oh, there was also former Redskins/Buccaneers quarterback and Super Bowl MVP Doug Williams:


OK, that's all the Dougs I could come up with. Beware of them!

Special Blog Bonus: You may notice that the salesman in the cartoon represents the ACME corporation. In case you were wondering, Fortune magazine lists ACME as the world's second largest fictional company. See the 2007 Forbes Fictional 15 for more details.

You Are Getting Sleepy...

"I'm getting tired of all this napping."

Source: My wife, 7 1/2 weeks into her pregnancy.

Explanation: So, apparently one of the annoying symptoms of the first trimester of pregnancy is the inability to maintain consciousness for long periods of time. At one point, between naps, my wife complained about it and I thought it was particularly amusing.

Special Blog Bonus: Since I can't find anything else worth posting about napping, here's a George Costanza* tribute:



*See, there was a Seinfeld episode called "The Nap" where George took naps under the desk in his office at Yankee Stadium. This is where the Costanza link came from.

What to Expect

If I wrote a book for people trying to have children, I'd call it "What to Expect When You're Expecting to Expect."

Explanation: See, there are a zillion books about pregnancy with convoluted names like "What to Expect When You're Expecting" and "What to Expect When She's Expecting" and "How Experts Expectorate Experimental Expectorants" (OK, I made that one up). Anyway, I think "Expecting to Expect" is a niche in the market that hasn't been overpublished yet. I'll let you know when I make my first million.

Special Blog Bonus: Need some excitement on your Tuesday morning? Here are a ton of couch scenes from the Simpsons:

Jeremy 2.0

Announcing Jeremy 2.0, slated for delivery in February 2009!!!



Explanation: Yes, that's right - today we at Jeremy's Status Message proudly announce the impending arrival of Jeremy 2.0, available for delivery in February of 2009. The estimated delivery date is February 13, but we all know dates tend to move in this industry.

Jeremy 2.0 is a highly anticipated feature-rich product, with numerous enhancements over Jeremy 1.0, including advanced food throughput, reduced emissions, enormous growth capability, and a "green" power-saving sleep mode.

To provide more information about this fabulous product and other exciting news from JeremyCorp (TM), we have launched SJROTTER.COM. Check it out!

A Special Message to Willie and Monica: You're going to be a Gruncle and Gramonica again! Although it's hard to believe that there could possibly be an improvement over Jeremy 1.0...

Que?

De las archivas:

Available in Spanish in SAP.

El Sourceo: Oh, admit it. You've seen it on the bottom of your screen when your favorite program came on. Every once in a while, I bet you've even hit the SAP button (if you can find it) just to find out what Homer Simpson sounds like in Spanish. I know you've done it. If you haven't, this is pretty much what you'd see:



El Blogo Bonuso Especial: What happens when you give LEGOs to a photographer during the Olympics? You end up with a set of LEGO Olympic scenes, like this one of a swimming event:

My 2004 Olympic Programming Rant

From the archives:

NBC: The official channel of Olympic gymnastics. Is it just me, or does it seem strange that after an entire day of Olympic competition, NBC decides to fill a quarter of their tape-delayed prime-time slot with exhibition gymnastics. Haven't we just watched gymnastics for like a week straight? Haven't all of the gymnastics medals been given out already? Aren't most of us sick of trying to figure out what the judges are looking at? In an entire Olympic games, you're telling me that the best Day 11 had to offer was a freakin' exhibition? COME ON!!! And don't give me this "female viewers are only interested in gymnastics and diving" crap. Half of the athletes our country sent are women. You think they all hurry through their (apparently uninteresting) events so they can get home and watch tape-delayed NBC footage of exhibition gymnastics? Somebody, stop this madness! I don't want Paul Hamm and Svetlana Khorkina in my living room anymore. Jeez...

Explanation: I just wanted to prove that my quadrennial Olympic television rant really is a quadrennial rant. This is my post from 2004. I'm still bitter.

Special Blog Bonus: Regardless of how bitter I am, it's always cool to see LEGO Olympic creations. Here's a Stormtrooper doing the clean and jerk:


You can tell it's the clean and jerk because of his hand position. Of course, LEGO figures can really have only one hand position, so they're pretty much incapable of doing the snatch. Then again, they're also made out of plastic, so maybe I should turn down my reality-meter a little bit. Here are more Stormtroopers competing in other events.

Back With Full Chewing Action!

I CAN CHEW ON MY RIGHT AGAIN!

Short, Happy Explanation: I finally got a permanent filling this morning and now that the temporary filling is gone, I can chew on my right side again. This ends over a month of only being able to chew on my left.

Long, Pissed Off Explanation: Over a month ago, a chewing discomfort turned into a chewing pain, and since it was joined by a sudden sensitivity to temperature, I decided it was time to make a dentist appointment. I covered this first stage of my saga in this post. The only good news I got during that appointment was that there was still a lot of "useful tooth" left and he could use a permanent filling after my root canal instead of a cap.

Fast forward to this morning (yes, I'm conveniently skipping over my root canal). I sit down in the chair to get my filling and the hygienist and I had the following conversation:


Hygienist: [Looks at my file] So, you're here for a crown?

Jeremy: No, he said he was just going to fill it.

Hygienist: It says here that you're getting a crown. Did you get a root canal?

Jeremy: Yes.

Hygienist: Then you're getting a crown. We'll file the tooth down and take the measurements today, put a temporary on it and then you'll come back in two weeks and have the crown bonded on. Don't worry, we can match the color.

(At this point, I should mention how ludicrous matching the color is, considering it's tooth #2. The tooth is a molar so far back in the top of my mouth, I can barely see it when opening wide in a mirror. The freakin' thing could be purple for all I care.)

Jeremy: I HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO CHEW ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF MY MOUTH FOR OVER A MONTH. DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT'S LIKE??? He said last time that he'd fill it because there was still enough "useful tooth" there.

Hygienist: No, once you get the root canal, the tooth is dead and you can't fill it because it's delicate and you might crack it. I've seen cases where the tooth had to be extracted because it cracked, and there's nothing you can do about it. You have to get a crown.

Jeremy: I AM SICK OF ONLY CHEWING ON MY LEFT. HE SAID HE'D FILL IT LAST TIME.


At this point, apparently the homicidal thoughts I was having were visible on my face and in the smoke coming out of my ears. She wandered out of the room and came back with the doctor, clearly having explained my hostility. The doctor explained (before looking) that he could either crown it or fill it, and gave the reasons for both. Really, the big threat when filling it is that the tooth, now dead from the root canal, could crack so badly as to require extraction. Given the health of my teeth, though, this doesn't seem like a terrible threat. Sooner or later it will chip and I'll need a cap, but it could be years before that happens. After looking at it, he said, "If you were my brother, I'd recommend you just get the filling."

If I were his brother, I'd recommend he fire that hygienist.

Diving anyone?

I... We'll be back with this status message, but first let's go out to the diving pool... am... More of this status message to come, but let's see what's going on at the diving pool... sick... stay right here and we'll be back with more status message after the gymnastics gala... of... we'll take you back to the conclusion of today's status message in just a moment, but first the heartwarming story of a person with a disability who isn't an Olympian, but is nonetheless special.. NBC.

Explanation: It's time for my quadrennial rant about Olympic television programming! My daily schedule allows me only a few opportunities to watch the Olympics: in the morning while I eat my breakfast, at lunchtime for 5 minutes as I catch my breath from lifting, and in the evening after work. My favorite time to watch would be between 6:00 and 7:00, when we can eat dinner in front of the television. What is on between 6:00 and 7:00? Olympic boxing. That's it. Boxing. I hate boxing, why would I watch Olympic boxing? I can't stand it. The hour I'm most likely to watch the damn Olympics and all I get is boxing. I guess I should just be happy that it isn't Olympic baseball or softball instead.

Meanwhile, NBC holds the exciting events (like the big ticket track and field stuff) on tape for their prime time coverage. So, I'm stuck watching the eight to midnight slot... except I go to bed at 10:30. No problem. I can just watch from eight to 10:30, and then TiVo the last hour and a half for viewing in the morning. I tried that the first night. I plopped myself down in front of the television at eight o'clock, and by nine-thirty, I had seen ten dives, thirty minutes of commercials, and a half dozen human interest stories. So now I have a new strategy. I start recording with the TiVo at eight. I start watching at nine-thirty, which allows me to fast-forward through all of the crap (diving, gymnastics gala, human interest stories, commercials, and everything involving Bob Costas in the studio). I go to bed at ten-thirty, and I catch up with the rest in the morning. It isn't perfect, but it keeps me from sending death threats to Bob Costas, so that's something.

Special Blog Bonus: Here's video of Usain Bolt winning the 200 meter sprint:

It's Olympicednesday!

I particularly enjoyed the men's solo synchronized diving finals last night.

Explanation: Well, it's about time I mentioned that the Olympics are going on, huh? A week and a half in and I'm finally posting about it. I think I'm slipping in my old age.

I sure enjoyed the solo synchronized diving finals on NBC last night, but far and away my favorite event was the tramp final. The acrobatics these athletes perform atop the tramp are just unreal. I didn't know some of those maneuvers were even physically possible, but the competitors are limber enough to pull them off. When you see an Olympic athlete mount the tramp, you just know something special is about to happen. That's what the Olympics are all about.

I do want to mention that I think it's morally wrong that several of the Chinese competitors were plucked from their homes and have been forced to train on one tramp or another every day of their lives since they were three years old. That just doesn't sit right with me. Whatever happened to the good old days, when people went to the tramp on their own accord?

Echo! (echo)

Today (today today) I consider myself (myself) not so lucky (lucky) but not too unlucky either (either). I will keep you updated if anything changes (changes).

Source: See, I'm trying to do a parody of Lou Gehrig's famous farewell speech at Yankee Stadium.



I'm not sure if the echo effect comes across quite as well in print. Oh well. I tried.

Bacon vs. Tofu

I told my wife to bring home the bacon and she brought me a check instead. What gives?

Explanation: It's not that I don't like the check, it's just that I specifically asked for bacon. And yes, technically I could use the money to buy bacon, so that's not it either. It's just that I wanted bacon. BACON!!!

Special Blog Bonus: For fun at home, I suggest you pick up Mr. Bacon and Monsieur Tofu and pit them in a battle to the death.

Or, you can just put them together!

Thanks Again, Microsoft

The last thing you want to see on your screen during a thunderstorm are the words "Installing update 1 of 13. Do not power down or unplug your computer until installation is complete."

Explanation: Last night, a nasty thunderstorm was about to roll through our neighborhood, so I decided to power down and unplug my computer. As I shut down the last application, I saw the little warning icon on the bottom right of my screen indicating that there were Windows updates to be installed. After thinking about clicking on it, I decided it would be stupid to install updates during a thunderstorm, since a power outage could totally trash my operating system.

So, I ignored it and clicked "Shut Down." Next I saw a screen I've never seen before. It said that it was "Installing update 1 of 13. Do not power down or unplug your computer until installation is complete." Microsoft decided that the updates should be applied against my better judgement and started on its merry way, oblivious to the thunder outside.

First of all, let me just digress and ask how crappy your operating system has to be to require 13 security updates? It's not like I never download them. They're scheduled to be applied once a week. THIRTEEN? That's just stupid.

Secondly, if you've ever installed operating system updates before, you know that they can vary from a few seconds to twenty minutes apiece. So, 13 updates might take anywhere from a minute to an hour or two.

As the thunderstorm got closer and closer and the computer installed and installed, I got more and more nervous. The entire reason I shut down my machine was because I was scared of a power outage. Microsoft actually managed to make a power outage MORE DANGEROUS to me by compromising my operating system while the storm rolled through. The installation took about ten minutes or so, but it was the most stressful ten minutes of my week. When it was complete, I was thinking of sending a thank you note to my power company. Thanks, Microsoft. Next time I'm just going to pull the plug instead of shutting down properly.

That's a Fast Fastball

Olympic baseball players are better than you might think.

Explanation: Yesterday I turned on the only channel of Olympic coverage to find a USA baseball game on. As most of you probably know, I'm really not much of a baseball fan. In the five seconds I watched before changing the channel, though, something marvelous happened.

You see, in a brief moment of curiosity, I wondered if professionals were allowed to play, and if not, why, considering they can play in basketball. As I saw a few players whose names I didn't recognize, it was clear that they were amateurs... or so I thought. They mentioned that the American bullpen had yet to give up a hit in the tournament, and then it happened: the pitcher through a fastball that registered 152 on the radar gun. One hundread and fifty two! Our professionals only throw in the nineties! I was amazed! I didn't even know our Olympic team was that good. For a moment I marveled at how the catcher could handle such velocity without his glove and/or hand exploding. Then I changed the channel.

Special Blog Bonus: In completely unrelated news, check out this map.

One Fish, Two Fish, Goldfish, Blue Fish

My nephew has a solid blue goldfish named Spot.

Explanation: There really isn't much to explain here. He insists that his blue fish is a goldfish. He named it Spot. You can't argue with a three-year-old. Incidentally, he's also very excited that the fish swims occasionally.

Special Blog Bonus: Well, let's see. What haven't I posted here yet... How about Darth Vader doing the Thriller dance with Storm Troopers?

A Foray Into the Commodities Market

Commodities investing is harder than you might think.

Explanation: Given the rampant inflation we're facing and the unsteadiness in the stock market, I finally decided to reallocate a portion of my portfolio into commodities. After a lot of thought, I decided to avoid ETFs and market options, and make a direct investment, avoiding any of those annoying loads and management charges the exchanges will nail you with. While oil is clearly the hot mover lately, the volatility in that market scared me away. I considered some of the precious metals, gold, silver, and the like, but in the end I think I'd be buying at the peak right now. In fact, given the current commodities bubble, it was pretty difficult to find a position that wasn't already overvalued. I researched quite a bit, though, and finally found a commodity which I believe has a lot of upward movement in its future: iron.

So, I set my strike price at about 5.6 cents an ounce and eventually found a seller willing to meet it. I bought about 4800 ounces with the stipulation that I would complete the transaction in person: you do not want to pay handling fees for a transaction like this.

Monday was the set transaction date, so I cleared my calendar and headed down to the prearranged transfer location, where my prize was loaded up for me by the seller's agents. Everything went smoothly and I was looking forward to the ease of future investments until I got home and realized that the gentlemen who loaded my car were significantly larger than I was.

After quite a bit of work, however, I managed to move my new holdings into the safety of my garage. I am quite pleased with how everything went, and I plan to hold this investment into the future through many ups and downs.

So, for those of you out there who are considering jumping into the commodities market, I suggest that you follow my lead and go out and buy iron, like I did. Just remember - moving your new 300 pound barbell set into the house will be quite a workout.

Sometimes You Have To Brag

Best. Parking spot. Ever.

Explanation: After spending three nightmarish hours in the car trying to get to Irving Plaza in New York City to see the 2 Skinnee J's last night, the whole ordeal was made worthwhile when my wife and I found a spot on the street fifty yards from the entrance of the venue. Fifty yards! Right there on the street! It was amazing. You could see my car from the front door. This will never happen again, so I really have to enjoy it while it's still fresh in my mind.

Other important notes from last night:

1. It took three hours to get there and an hour and a half to get home... and the trip home included going 30 blocks out of our way to drop people off at Grand Central Station.
2. I don't know who picks opening bands, nor do I know what controlled substances they are under the influence of when they do that choosing.
3. Who forms a heavy metal Bee Gees tribute band, anyway?
4. Any concert with live Guitar Hero is a cool concert.
5. You can actually choke on a yawn if somebody punches you in the solar plexus at just the right moment. Thanks, Jim.
6. Giving drunk people glowing light sticks to throw at other drunk people isn't really a good idea.
7. The aforementioned car trip is not a good warmup for bouncing through a concert.
8. Sure, there were like 30 beach balls flying around and everyone got a few touches, but my touches were all legal contacts. I saw several lifts and doubles.
9. When a lead singer crowd surfs toward the end of the concert, before you attempt to help him on is way, you should remember exactly how sweaty he is.
10. Pre-hydrate, don't dehydrate.

Dyslexic Guesstures

Few things are more amusing than dyslexic Guesstures.

Explanation: Last night, we had company over and after dinner we played Guesstures. If you've never played it, it's pretty much charades, only with four different answers and a time limit. One player on our team, perhaps our strongest player, gave a very involved clue involving his... ummm... "groinular" region. There was much laughing and several amusing answers were given, but not the correct one. Finally, as time ran out, we were told that our word was "LOIN" and nobody had gotten it. A few minutes later, another player came across the card and commented that his word was actually "LION". There was much more laughing at that point.

I Survived!

Yesterday afternoon at my appointed time, I began the journey toward a place I often equate with the very pits of Hell. I headed off on my way, knowing full well that unimaginable pain and suffering awaited me there. My appointment did not disappoint. Through the use of various instruments of torture, my body... no, my very soul was torn and beaten down until all that remained was the mere shadow of the person I used to be. No human being should endure such intolerable pain. And yet at the end, with what little strength I had left, I walked away from it under my own power. I survived my leg workout. After that, the root canal was easy.

Explanation: In preparation for the fun that was my root canal yesterday, I gave myself a brutal leg workout. Conveniently, I had an hour or so to lay in a chair after the workout, which was nice, since I couldn't hold myself up. I have to say, for a little while the root canal caused more pain than the leg workout, but right now, the legs are ahead by a mile. (And not because they are a mile long)

Also fun about yesterday's trip to the endodonist was that it took me past both my dentist and my periodontist. To quote my wife, "I don't even want to know what's past your endodontist's office." I'm guessing it's Camden.

Filter + Holes = Happy Shower

The water filter doesn't work as well with holes drilled in it, but it sure improves the shower flow.

Explanation: So, over the past few weeks, the water pressure out of my shower head has decreased quite substancially. It actually got to the point where even with the shower head pointed sideways, the water still pretty much fell straight downward. I gave up taking showers in there and used the other bathroom because the low water pressure took too long to get soap and shampoo off of me.

Finally, enough was enough. I opened it up and cleaned the filter as best as I could, but with no noticeable change. Then I said forget it and put the shower head back on with no filter. Talk about night and day. My shower was like Kramer's experience with the Commando 450 in the end of that Seinfeld episode.



Amazingly, the shower without the filter was too powerful for a confined space like that. I showered as quickly as I could, just out of fear. Plus, I could imagine how quickly my water meter was running at the time. The answer came in a trick my father once showed me. I used my power drill and a tiny bit to put a few small holes in the filter. Sure, it doesn't filter very well anymore, but the water pressure is just right.

Laptops vs. Desktops

You know, laptops and desktops handle brief power outages in very different ways.

Explanation: Last night we lost power for about a second. Everything went dark and then everything was back to normal and that was that. Here's a summary of how my laptop viewed the situation:

Well, I'm just sitting here waiting for Jeremy to come back to me, so I'll... Oh boy! I've been unplugged! I'm mobile! Wait a sec, I seem to have lost my network connnection... nope, I'm plugged in again - there's the network. I thought something exciting was happening there for a second, but I guess not.

Meanwhile, my desktop handled the situation a little more like this:

Teeth Are Overrated Anyway

Nothing beats waking up in the middle of the night and thinking about... dental work.

Explanation: The other night I woke up in the middle of the night thinking very clearly about dental work. I was not dreaming, unlike some other Jeremys. No, I was wide awake. It took me a few moments to realize why.

Last week I went in to have a filling replaced and walked out with a referral to an endodontist. I was not familiar with the word "endodontist" before last week. It's never a good thing when you walk out of a doctor's office with a new word. In this case, "endodontist" is from the Latin for "one who inflicts pain." It turns out my filling had cracked enough for a little cavity to form under there. As the dentist continued to drill down, the little cavity became bigger and bigger. Now I have a root canal scheduled for Wednesday. Even worse, he couldn't replace the filling, so I have to go back in a few weeks to have the filling done, after the root canal is deemed successful. This is just buckets of fun, I tell you. Buckets.

To hold me over until my root canal, my dentist gave me a temporary medicated filling. The tooth doesn't hurt, but late at night when the mint from my toothpaste wears off, it tastes like dental work. Oh, and I'm not supposed to chew on my right side until I get the new filling, so that's just wonderful. I'm already a slow eater. This doesn't help.

Special Blog Bonus: Speaking of not helping, here's a very appropriate Far Side about dentistry. I think it's safe to assume that the dentist is using a medicated temporary tennis ball here:

The World Is Flat

"I would rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in Poughkeepsie" - Bill Gates

Source: OK, I'll tell you. The book is The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century by Thomas L. Friedman.

Explanation: So, today's quote is taken somewhat out of context. Here's the excerpt:

And as a result of China's drive to succeed, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates argued to me, the "ovarian lottery" has changed - as has the whole relationship between geography and talent. Thirty years ago, he said, if you had a choice between being born a genius on the outskirts of Bombay or Shanghai or being born an average person in Poughkeepsie, you would take Poughkeepsie, because your chances of thriving and living a decent life there, even with average talent, were much greater. But as the world has gone flat, Gates said, and so many people can now plug and play from anywhere, natural talent has started to trump geography.

"Now," he said, "I would rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in Poughkeepsie."

But enough about Poughkeepsie. The following was by far the most amusing and bizarre quote in the entire book. It is a testimonial from a Google user:

I just want to thank Google for teaching me how to find love. While looking for my estranged brother, I stumbled across a Mexican Web site for male strippers - and I was shocked. My brother was working as a male prostitute! The first chance I got, I flew to the city he was working in to liberate him from this degrading profession. I went to the club he was working at and found my brother. But more than that, I met one of his coworkers... We got married last weekend [in Mexico], and I am positive without Google's services, I never would have found my brother, my husband, or the surprisingly lucrative nature of the male stripping industry in Mexico!! Thank you, Google!

And on that note, we'll bring this week to an end. Have a great weekend, everybody!

Breaking News: Hawkwatch 2008

It's Hawkwatch, 2008!

Explanation: We interrupt our mystery status week to bring you this exciting news update:

This morning as I looked out my window to see if it had rained last night, I saw this on my driveway:

 

Given the coloring, I thought it was my neighbors' cat, who often hunts on my property. I've never seen the cat resting like that, though. After looking a little closer, though, I realized that it wasn't the cat.

 

Yes, it's my hawk. I call it "my" hawk because I know it lives in the woods behind my house and I often see it hunting as I gaze longingly out the window during work. I love this hawk. It's majestic and glorious, and (perhaps more importantly) along with the neighbors' cat, it pretty much eliminates any rodent problem the woods might present.

It appears the hawk has an injured wing. As my wife backed her car down the driveway (thankfully on the non-hawk side) it rose to its feet and appears quite capable of walking, and perhaps thrashing neighborhood pets as well. It does not, however, appear capable of flying. I put some water out for it, which prompted it to waddle off in the other direction. It is now resting lazily under a tree in my front yard.

I have made numerous phone calls this morning and will continue making them until somebody actually answers. I'll keep you updated on this breaking news.

Oh, and for those of you who are concerned about my theme week, have no fear - it will continue tomorrow.

Update, 10:50am: After finding several people to contact for raptor rehabilitation, I figured I should make sure the bird was still around before I tried calling again. Apparently, my feathered friend wandered his way back into the woods, because he's nowhere to be seen outside. Oh well. I hope his wing gets better. So ends the excitement of Hawkwatch 2008. We thank everyone who called/emailed with their thoughts and prayers.

Update, 11:12am: Hawkwatch is back on, people!!! The hawk has been located, I repeat, the hawk has been located. I have left a message at one of the local rehabilitation places and hopefully they will call me while I still know where the bird is. For those of you who called/emailed with your thoughts and prayers, get back to work! Think and prey harder!

Update, 11:14am: I just realized that I used "prey" instead of "pray". See, I was thinking "bird of prey" when I typed it and I got all confused... yeah, that's it.

Update, 8:24am, Friday: Zippy (as I have named him) is lost. I last saw him wandering about the woods behind the house. Hopefully I'll see him again soon. Also, I should mention that Zippy is a fully grown red-tailed hawk. You can't see exactly how big he is in the photos above, but he's probably about 20 inches tall. So, even without wings, I think Zippy could take down a yippy neighborhood dog or two. Here's hoping...

Would You Like Snow With That?

Yes, I'd like a Big Mac, a large fries, and a Diet Coke... in Missouri, please.

Source: This, too, is from the book I'm reading, which I will reveal on Friday.

Explanation: In an effort to improve service, a McDonald's franchise owner in Colorado created a call center to handle his drive-through orders. Anyone who pulls up to one of his numerous franchises to place an order is actually talking to an order taker in his call center, who relays the order via computer back to the franchise where the order was placed. Having highly trained professionals handle orders trims the average order time by more than 30 seconds, and puts his franchise among the fastest in the country. Seeing his success, other McDonald's franchises have started paying to use his call center as well. So, if you pull up to McDonald's just off U.S. Interstate 55 near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, you will actually place your order through the Colorado Springs call center. Scary, huh?

Not So True, But Interesting Factoid: In honor of this innovation, all of my Sametime responses today will actually be processed through a computer lab in Bangalore.

Sadly, This Factoid Is True: A not-so-stable friend of my college roommate worked at McDonald's during high school. Somebody placed an order for a Big Mac, a large fries, and a Diet Coke, and he went off on them: "You're getting a Big Mac and enough fries to feed three people. That's like 1500 calories! You think a Diet Coke is going to help you???" After some more colorful ranting, the customer responded that she was diabetic and could not drink regular Coke, at which point the enraged employee gave up and cooled off in the walk-in freezer for a while.

Mystery Week: Outsourcing is Cool (As Long As It Isn't Your Job)

I think I'm going to hire an outsourced administrative assistant.

Source: Yes, the source remains a mystery.

Explanation: In the book I'm reading, I discovered that there's a gentleman who created a company that will give you an Indian administrative assistant for $1500-$2000 a month. You may ask why on earth you'd want an administrative assistant in India instead of the United States, and I'll tell you why. India time is about a half day ahead of the United States. If you need a PowerPoint presentation created ASAP, you can make this request of your Indian administrative assistant as you leave for home in the evening. Your assistant is just starting his or her workday, and can spend the next 8 hours churning away on it while you eat dinner with your family, play with your kids, tuck them in and enjoy a nice quiet relaxing evening. When your assistant leaves for the day, he or she emails you your presentation and it's waiting for you first thing in the morning when you get in to work. Nobody has to put in any extra hours or anything! It's brilliant! I think I'm going to hire one.

Interesting Factoid: Outsourced telephone operators are taught that the letter T in American English is pronounced almost like a D, not nearly as crisp and sharp as the British pronounce it. To practice, they get to say exciting things like:

A bottle of bottled water held thirty little turtles. It didn't matter that each turtle had to rattle a metal ladle in order to get a little bit of noodles, a total turtle delicacy... The problem was that there were many turtle battles for less than oodles of noodles. Every time they thought about grappling with the haggler turtles their little turtle minds boggled and they only caught a little bit of noodles.

Mystery Week: UPS

On any given day, 2% of the world's GDP is being transported by UPS.

Source: Ah, therein lies the mystery.

Explanation: I just got back from vacation, and on vacation I like to read. The book I'm currently reading is loaded with some interesting facts, just like the one above. So, this week I'm going to use some of those facts as my status. On Friday I'll reveal the source. Until then, feel free to wager a guess.

For those of you who don't like UPS, you probably don't want to read the next factoid. But don't worry, I won't mention the army of brown shorts again this week.

Another Interesting Factoid: If you own a Toshiba laptop and need it repaired under warranty, UPS will collect it, ship it to a workshop at its Louisville hub, repair it, and ship it back to you. Toshiba never even sees the machine - they train the UPS technicians and then UPS can perform their repairs for them. This is a side of UPS that I never knew existed.

Happy Birthday To Me!

Happy Birthday to me!

Explanation: That's right! Today is my birthday! And I'm at the beach. And I'm working a half day. So, I'm excited about my birthday, but not so much about the work part.

Maybe when I'm done with work, I'll watch 2*(16 Candles)+1. Or for something a little less wholesome, I'll catch Eddie Murphy in 6022.5*48 Hours. Or for something risquee, maybe 180.632*9 1/2 Weeks? Or, I can put down the calculator and go down to the ocean. Maybe that'll be my best course of action...

Since I'm still on vacation, regular posting will resume on Monday.

*Please send all gifts care of Jeremy at statusmessage.blogspot.com. Thank you.

Vacation Day

I'm on vacation today. Be back tomorrow.

Waffles!

The early bird may get the worm, but the night owl gets to go out for waffles at 3:00 in the morning.

Explanation: No, I was not up until 3:00 in the morning last night (or recently, for that matter) nor did I have waffles this morning. I have had waffles recently, though. Sweet, sweet waffles. Wait, what was I talking about?

Oh, my point is this. Would you rather have a worm or waffles? I'm all for waffles.

It Wasn't So Grand

If a movie has a gimmick, and all you've heard about is the gimmick, it's probably not going to be a great movie.

Explanation: I saw The Grand last night, which was was a poker movie about a ten million dollar poker tournament where the winner takes all and second place wins nothing. The gimmick of the movie was that, from the final table on, the tournament was decided by real poker playing and not by the script.

Yes, that's right. The exciting conclusion of the movie was based on the poker expertise of actors. Movies need scripts, people. That's the difference between movies and reality television.

I first heard of this movie on ESPN's Poker Edge podcast, where Phil Gordon gave it the following praise:

Well, the early reviews have come in from the poker players that have seen the movie, and uh, I think most of them have agreed that the poker playing was actually uhhh... adequate... and... and good.

You can download the whole podcast (all about the movie) here. The movie trailer is here.

Special Blog Bonus: Moving on to something cooler... Apparently this has been done before, but this is my first exposure to it. Behold, a LEGO Mindstorms Rubik's Cube solver:

(721)

Yeah! Yeah! 7/21!

Source: This is the chorus to the 2 Skinnee J's song (718). Well, sort of...

Explanation: I missed July 18th because I was at the shore, otherwise I would have been singing about 7/18. You may notice that I never warned you, my adoring public, that I was going on vacation. There's a very good reason for that. The reason is that I desperately needed a vacation. My apologies. Oh, and I had internet access while at the beach and I still didn't mention anything. Again, I needed a vacation. So, in case you haven't noticed, the moral of the story is as follows:

I needed a vacation.

*By the way, there is no 721 area code.

Well, the Lama Does Dilly-Dally

Some silly Sallies dilly-dally like the Lama.

Source: Wild Kingdom by the 2 Skinnee J's.

Explanation: Why am I posting Skinnees lyrics? Two reasons. First, I have an insane amount of stuff to do today and no time to come up with something better. Second, today is 7/16, which makes it two days until 7/18, which is the official date of all things Skinnee. So there you go. Need to hear something more creative? Ask Nihad why he's half Italian.

Special Blog Bonus: Here's a comic for you to make up for my lack of creativity:

Jeremy's Diner

I am sitting in the morning at the diner on the corner. I am waiting at the counter for the man to pour the coffee. And he fills it only halfway, and before I even argue he is looking out the window at somebody coming in.

Source: This is the beginning of Tom's Diner by Suzanne Vega, which I consider to be one of the catchiest (and therefore most annoying) songs of all time.

Explanation: If you read my status message and you got the tune in your head it will stick there and it won't leave and you will get kind of crazy. And with most songs, soon they leave you, and your head returns to normal, but with this one it just stays there, and so you go insane.

Da da daada da da daada da da daada da da daada
Da da daada da da daada da da daada da da daada

At this point I don't even need to type with the rhythm - everything you read from now on will sound like this freakin' song. So have yourself a nice day and I am sorry for the trouble, but it might help if you find somebody and you pass it on.

Da da daada da da daada da da daada da da daada
Da da daada da da daada da da daada da da daada

Lemmings Get a Bad Rap

You know, nobody ever mentions lemmings in a positive light.

Explanation: This weekend I heard a speaker reference lemmings, and guess what? He was referring to how they plunge off cliffs to their deaths in the icy ocean. I was not surprised. Nobody ever mentions the positive aspects of being a lemming. In fact, I don't even know anything positive about lemmings. I'm sure there are just some good-natured downright personable lemmings out there who are totally unappreciated because of the belief that they are stupid enough to commit mass suicide into the icy deep. Be nice to lemmings!

Special Blog Bonus: I could somehow tie this to lemmings, but I'm not going to bother. Check out this Lego concorde:

Fill In the Blank

From the archives:

Fill in the Blank. "Seeing Jessica Simpson and Willie Nelson act in the same scene is like __________________________."

Explanation: Let's just say that The Dukes of Hazzard was a very scary movie, thanks to the acting talents of Miss Simpson and Mr. Nelson.

He Had His Own Bible, Too

Who controls the British crown? Who keeps the metric system down? We do, we do! Who keeps Atlantis off the maps? Who keeps the Martians under wraps? We do, We do! Who holds back the electric car? Who makes Steve Guttenberg a star? We do, we do! Who robs cavefish of their sight? Who rigs every Oscar night? We do, We Do, We do!

Source: This is the Stonecutters' song from the Simpsons.

Explanation: As I was flipping through the channels this morning, I stumbled across the fine piece of cinema that is Police Academy IV. Like any sane movie viewer, I started to ponder why exactly Steve Guttenberg was a star in that film. Then I remembered this song.



Special Blog Bonus: Mr. Jellyfish can thank the Stonecutters for this as well:

DON'T Leave the Light On For Me

While a nice gesture, sometimes leaving the light on for somebody is a horrible mistake.

Explanation: Last night, due to circumstances I will refrain from ranting about (for now), I unexpectedly had to return to the cabin my family is camping in for another night. Having been at work until pretty late, I wasn't going to return until after 10, so my parents were kind enough to leave the porch light on for me. It is a screened in porch, and the front door was shut, so it wasn't really any different than somebody would do at home... except for one minor detail: the cabin is in the woods. Furthermore, the cabin was the only source of light within a radius of at least a hundred yards.

When I got to the porch screen door, I saw (no joke) hundreds of moths circling the light. It was like there was a cloud of bugs in the porch. Apparently the screening on the porch wasn't moth-proof. I had to run through this cloud to reach inside and turn off the porch light, slamming the door immediately, leaving myself on a dark porch with all the bugs. On the way out to the car again, I spent some quality time making sure that there were no moths in my mouth, nose, and ears. Even worse, I had to go back through the porch again with my second load of stuff. Needless to say, I won't mind sleeping in my own house tonight, far, far from nature.

Stinky Winkles

From the archives:

If you have a deaf dog named Periwinkle, you can call her "Stinky Winkles" without any fear of offending her.

Explanation: As I said, Peri and I spent a lot of time alone together. I talked to her quite a bit. She didn't hear much. This led to me coming up with numerous nicknames for her. "Stinky Winkles" was one of my favorites (her breath wasn't so pleasant). Also popular were "Stinkles," "Stinklebopper," "Stinklesaurus Rex," "P-Diddy Puff Stuff," and numerous others that I can't recall right now.


In case you were wondering, stuffed animals are also good gifts for the dog who sleeps all the time. Can you find the real dog in this picture?

Deaf + Old = Impossible to Wake

From the archives:

WHO WOKE THE DOG UP? WHO? WHO? WHO?

Source: I'm paraphrasing the Baha Men, if you didn't know.

Explanation: As you know, I work from home. When Sarah was off at work, that would leave me and Peri alone in the house. You have to remember that Peri was both deaf and old, which made it very difficult to wake her. So, several times she was so deeply asleep we suspected that she might have died. Even worse, when we did make a noise loud enough to wake her, she'd practically have a heart attack because she was so startled. It was a tough life for an old dog.

So, naturally, at lunchtime, when it was time to let the dog out, I would walk through the house singing "WHO WOKE THE DOG UP?" as loudly as possible. That usually did the trick. If you never witnessed it, here's a photo of Peri in a rare moment of consciousness:


That pawprint pillow was another item Sarah gave the dog in hopes that she might like it. Imagine it, buying a pillow for a dog who slept 23 hours a day. She liked it. I was shocked.

Oh the Humanity!

From the archives:

A new house and a 14 year-old dog with digestive woes. Who thought this was a good idea?

Explanation: Sweet sweet Periwinkle never went in the house. Ever. She was so well trained. Unfortunately, sometimes the food didn't go through her in the right direction. Now would be a good time to mention that our entire house was carpeted in a very light easy to stain beige color. Resolve became a very important item on our shopping lists.


Yes, apparently she woke up once in a while to wreak havoc on our carpets.

The Excitement of Dog Ownership

From the archives:

New and improved! Now with deaf-dog action!

Explanation: When my wife and I got married and moved into our new house together, we had an immeediate addition to our family: Periwinkle. She was just an adorable old lady and I was very excited to have her in the house. Of course, I didn't know her little quirks at that point. Really, could this dog possibly be difficult?


My wife picked up this dog bed for Peri when shopping one day in hopes that she might like it. Peri apparently was never big into dog beds. So, Sarah laid the bed in a corner downstairs to see what the dog would think. I think the dog had spent an entire week straight sleeping in the bed when we decided that cutting the tags off wouldn't be a problem. Luckily she would change positions once in a while so we knew she was still with us.

Ah, Summer Vacations

From the archives:

Let's see. There was a cabin, a lot of rain, some really annoying horseflies, a trip to the CIA, a little volleyball, a dog funeral, seventeen family dinners, a piece of a Danish musical instrument, a strongman competition, celery, fireworks, Liz was late, my toenail was ripped off, a parade, a pool, more dominoes than I could ever imagine, my Intranet password expired, and now I'm back at work.

Explanation: Well, in honor of my vacation this week, I thought I'd bring back the wonderful memories of a vacation two years ago. Of course, our trip was cut short because our dog died, but that's beside the point. Actually, that kind of is the point. Since I'll be out of the office until next Thursday, I figured I'd bring back a few posts about everyone's favorite fifteen year old deaf Sheltie, Periwinkle. So, for the next few days, that's what you're going to get.


By the way, my toenail injury occurred during an intense game of Cranium. Not many people can say that, huh?

Friday Morning Live

From the archives:

LIVE FROM NEW JERSEY, IT'S FRIDAY MORNING!!!

Source: See, I'm ripping of the whole Saturday Night Live intro thing. I can do that because today is a holiday and I'm too lazy to come up with my own material. Of course, if I'm using an old "Live from New Jersey" message, is it really live? I have no idea. Don't think about it. Just go to a picnic today and try to enjoy some fireworks.

Hey - speaking of fireworks, my life insurance is active today! Just in time for me to do something stupid! Woo-hoo!

Kick Some Alien Butt Toda... Tomorrow

From the archives:

In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world, and you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. Mankind, that word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty differences any more. We will be united in our common interest. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom. Not from tyranny, oppression or persecution, but from annihilation. We're fighting for our right to live, to exist, and should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day when the world declared in one voice: ‘We will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! TODAY WE CELEBRATE OUR INDEPE...' Wait... that's tomorrow... Never mind.

Source: This is paraphrased from the big motivational speech* in Independence Day. You know, right before they easily uploaded the computer virus onto the alien spacecraft. Now, if you'll excuse me, as a self-respecting software engineer, I have to go bang my head against the wall for a few minutes.

Explanation: For those of us who are actually in the office today, I thought that we could use a nice motivational speech. Yeah, I said "us." I'm in the office and rerunning an old status message. Maybe tomorrow I'll come up with a new one to make up for it. Maybe...

*I believe this speech was much more effective than the more traditional "Rah rah ree, kick 'em in the knee! Rah rah raft, upload a virus to their spacecraft!" cheer.

The Fire Truck Stalks Its Prey

The fire truck can consume eight times its bodyweight.

Source: On Family Guy, this is a factoid Peter Griffin learned on a National Geographic special about firetrucks. The fire truck is a lone hunter which silently stalks its prey. Fire trucks launch into high-speed pursuit and take down their dinner using their deadly extension ladders. While feeding, they use their deep horns to ward off scavengers. This segment was so funny, I may spend most of Friday's Fourth of July parade giggling at the emergency vehicles.

Leaving it to YouTube to suck the funny (in this case the comedic timing) out of pretty much anything, here's the best clip I could find... at high speed.

Whirling Minion of Overhead Evil

Curse you ceiling fan, and the house you rode in on!

Explanation: Our bedroom ceiling fan is possessed. Well, either that or there's a short in it that causes it to behave erratically. I prefer to just assume it's possessed. The fan has an overhead light and six speed settings in each of two directions. Only one speed (the top speed) works. In order to attain the top speed, you have to hold down the "Fan" button while it cycles (slowly) through the five non-working speeds. When you turn the fan on, the overhead light comes on automatically. When you push the "Light" button to turn the light off, sometimes the light goes off and sometimes it doesn't. This is an irritating feature at bedtime during a heat wave. The light is quite bright and is not something you want on in your bedroom all night.

Anyway, last night, after about five minutes of trying, I managed to get the fan on and the light off. We went to bed with a comfortable breeze in a comfortable room. Life was good.

Then, at 3:00 in the morning, the power flickered and the overhead light turned itself on. It is a bright light. On top of that, it was a very dark room. Furthermore, I was in the middle of a dream where I was using a microwave* and I awoke thinking the room was on fire. That got my heart racing a bit, and as a result I did not get back to sleep for quite some time. I'm a little bitter about that this morning.

*Don't ask, I've given up trying to understand my subconscious.