Well, I thought coffee was bad, now this?

I posted a while back about Stephen Colbert proving that coffee was a horrible drug to be addcted to but I never predicted this....

Man, my school never did cool stuff like this!

I just came across this post on the LAist blog about UCLA and their apparent tradition of starting off Spring Break with an underwear run. Maryland was cool and all but dude, if this was in UCLA's brochure I think they would get a LOT more applications.

Read about it, well truth be told... just look at the pictures at: http://laist.com/2008/03/21/ucla_undie_run_winter_2008.php

Forget Belmont.... Huggins is back baby!

Yeah, I never liked Bobby Huggins and the thugs he got to play for him at Cincinnati but he is the MAN today baby!!!! Forget Belmont and my post from the other night, Huggins' West Virginia Mountaineers just beat Duke. Soundly. He is my new best friend.

And in honor of the occasion.... may I present Mr. John Denver...

And this is why I don't drink coffee...

Make your tired old computer go vroom...

I liked this article, all about making your same old programs run better and save you time and energy... http://tech.msn.com/howto/articlepcw.aspx?cp-documentid=6495373&GT1=40000

Beat Duke

1:03 left in the game... Belmont vs Duke. Belmont up 70-69. I honestly can't tell you the first thing about Belmont other than they are my favorite team in the world right now.

Go Belmont!!!!!


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Update... Dangit. They blew it. I felt like I was watching the Terps blow another lead. Oh well, nice try Belmont. Seriously though... where the hell is Belmont?

Healing through baseball

You can say want about the Yankees, and trust me, most of my friends often feel free about saying anything they want as long as it is as disparaging as possible. But when the Yankees have the ability to help the healing process of a hurt community - again (remember 9/11 anyone?) - you have to admire them for it. What am I talking about? Check this out...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/19/sports/baseball/19yankees.html?ref=baseball

Red's first year

I made this after signing up for Animoto a while ago. I haven't made many more but who knows, now that they allow you to load them to your blog I just might.

So, here it is... a year in the life of little Red. (It works just fine in Firefox so if it isn't showing up for you IE users come over to the light, I did and it is wonderful. Things work like they actually should!!!)

Hey - that was my idea!

So for some reason I had an idea a few days ago that, as typically happens with those not-too-important ideas we all have, I basically just pushed it back into the nether regions of my brain and went back to important stuff. Like basketball, and food, and wiping runny noses at home. But today, as I was doing more research into del.icio.us I came across this page that shows you how to create your own font. Really, I was thinking how cool it would be to make a font out of my own handwriting. Well, maybe not "cool" but certainly interesting. It could have been a really great project back when I was teaching my information systems class. There are multiple pieces of software and hardware being called for in this project that my kids really would have enjoyed. Oh well, too late now. :) But I thought I would post it here just in case some day I have some free time and wanted to experiment.

http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Create_Your_Own_Font

The men can play too!

After steeling myself for a woeful season at the start of the year the Terps really played with my emotions. They lost to American and Ohio for %$&#'s sake, then they show how well they can play by beating UNC at UNC!!!! So, you can imagine my frustration when they lost to Clemson at home, then to Virginia in Gist's last regular season game, then to BC of all schools in the ACC tournament. So, as I watched them play in the Not Invited Tournament last night against Minnesota (and by the way, who the hell builds a playing floor elevated 4 feet in the air? That is just stupid) I was fully prepared to have a horrible headache by the time I turned the game off in the second half. BUT.....

They didn't lose! I am not even going to go as far as saying they won, because they didn't. They tried to, oh yes, they tried to lose. But, the Gophers (I was going to make fun of their mascot until I realized that ours is a turtle of all things) apparently didn't want to win either. So, the team that didn't want to lose the most won. I think. Now my head hurts.

Yeah!!!! We didn't lose in the first round of the also-ran tourney!!!! Who do we play next? Gallaudet?

- Vasquez losing another ball.

- What foul?

At least the women can play

Congrats to the MD Lady Terps as they locked up a #1 seed in this year's NCAA tournament. I got our tickets to watch them open the tournament on Sunday, March 23rd on their home court in Comcast center. Poor Coppin State. This should be a great day. Four games, me, my dad and JAM... Boy's day out.

Yeah, they are beautiful, I know...

There isn't really any rhyme or reason to this post, it is just a blatant advertisement for my kids.

With a father like this how did they ever turn out so cute?

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The Greatest Show on Earth

My father called last weekend and asked if I would like to grab a few of the kids (when you have so many you can just indiscriminately grab a few as a representative sample) and join them (he, Ava, and my brother's sons) for the circus. The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus was going to be in town and he was planning on getting some tickets and wanted to know if we could or would join them. It has been almost three decades since I last saw that show, and JAM's only experience with the circus was this pitiful affair up at the MD State Fair about 4 or 5 years ago, so I said of course! I mean, who wouldn't want to go see the show right? Well, to be honest, I was a bit apprehensive about going, especially since I heard the news story (also) that talked about the study done that proved that kids are just plain scared of clowns. But, being father of the year I thought I would see how it all worked out and on Friday I packed up JAM and Red, Pudge being a bit too small to really enjoy it, and headed down to Dad's house in Williamsburg.

And you know what? It really did end up being The Greatest Show in Earth! I had a blast, forget about the kids!!!! :) But, they really enjoyed it too. JAM was just the right age and Red was in awe of everything. And, after so many years having not gone to the circus it was so much different than I remembered. I am thinking that Cirque Du Soleil must really have had an impact on the way even regular circuses do their thing. Gone were the bears riding bicycles and poodles riding motorcycles. And I think we can all say a prayer of thanks for that. They still had the elephants and the tigers, although I hope we, as a society, are getting close to not liking or allowing that anymore. But still there and better than ever were the aerials and the motorcycles in the circle of doom (!!!!!), and no, they thankfully didn't crash.

Here are some pictures from our day.

Update - 3/5/08: And now, the flip side of things. After reflecting on my time at the circus certain thoughts have been recurring to me. I can't profess to be an animal expert but I have to agree that some pretty bad people are in the position to do some pretty haneous things to some wonderful animals. Makes me wonder why I went and supported the circus at all. Maybe Cirque Du Soleil really does do it the right way. Do they use animals? Nope. As if you needed evidence that the practices of these common circuses aren't the safest and most nurturing places for animals...

Connecting with your past.

The title of this post is a bit incomplete. What I should call it is: "Connecting with your past, even if you are terrified to do so." The reason for this is that I am not all that comfortable with certain parts of my past. It's not that I've ever really done anything that I wouldn't want my mother to know about... well, maybe a few things. But, there are certain times that I much prefer staying where they are.

So why write about this now? Tonight I was briefly put in contact with someone that I knew way back in high school. She was one of the nicest people you would ever hope to meet. But myself, we'll just say that I am still not sure I have grown into myself. While wifey and I struggle to find JAM all the help we can to deal with his ADHD I spent the first 28 or so years woefully unaware that there was any help available for people like me. The same things that JAM deals with, I dealt with and in some respects still do. I, then and now, have trouble with social situations. I don't know how to read or react to people in the same way that "normal" people are able to do. I am loud when I don't mean to be, or when it is obviously inappropriate to be, I act a bit over the top when I don't know I am, etc. etc... All of this really affected me growing up, as it does for JAM, because other kids just didn't know how to react to me, or if they did react it was appropriate for them to think I was a nutter or a moron. Often both I imagine. I was not treated very well in my mind but in everyone else's defense how they treated me was most likely absolutely appropriate considering the circumstances. That is one of the biggest reasons we have sought help for JAM... I cry thinking that he will go through the same things I went through. I know he already is, even with all the help we are trying to get for him.

So again, why do I write about this now? Because this wonderful person, who I just found out is doing amazing, awe inspiring things with her life, was looking for me to contact about a high school reunion. The thought of that scares me more than anyone should have to admit. It isn't that I don't want to see some people, it is that I don't want to be remembered for the person I used to be. I have worked so hard at becoming the person I am today that I want to literally throttle anyone who still thinks of me as the "old me." My close family included. They are the worst if truth be told. But they aren't the point of this post. The point being, before my hand falls off for the length of this post, that I want to be the new me, but how does that work when I haven't spoken to, seen or otherwise interacted with any of these people in a decade and a half?

Time will tell, but it still scares me far more than it should.

And yes, I did reach out and contact that old 'friend' even though it was one of the scariest things I have done in a while. If it was any other person I am not sure I would have done that, but for some reason the person I knew then, and added to that what I learned about her from her blog, she is a wonderful, caring and (I really hope) forgiving person, and it seemed appropriate to contact her. It might be the beginning of accepting my past and reconnecting with a world that I thought lost and burried forever.