Gayness in the Gym, Part 2

My friend ZackPe noted the gayness of dude at his gym doing handstands in the middle of gym.

I noted a less severe case last night, but figured I had to blog it.

I went to lift last night, but was going to warm up on the treadmill for a few minutes first. Of course, all the treadmills were taken and one by Dora the Explorer.

Dora. This dude was on a treadmill, kicked up to 15% grade, walking in his hiking gear. And by "hiking gear" I mean he had on his boots, a North Face day packed loaded up with whatever Dora loads her backpack with and his hiking cap. He'd walk straight up this thing for a while at a slow pace then turn and walk sideways on each side for a while.

Dude... no, I don't know what to say. I just hope your trek up Brokeback is a good one.

Nope, I'll Skip on the Workout Today

Physical activity is not a question in my life. My only question is "what will I do today? Lift weights, run, ride, swim, spinning class, elliptical machine, yoga?"

I went home for lunch and as I was making myself a tuna sandwich with apple and 6 Skittles I was disturbed to see the numbers in a Commerical-Appeal article:

Percent Adults Who Report No Physical Activity -- 2003
------------------------------------------------------
Nation: 23.1
Tennessee: 29.8
Memphis/Shelby County: 31.7

What? You mean, 1/4 of our country and 1/3 of my state/county DO NO PHYSICAL ACTIVITY?

At a time when we know how badly our schools are falling behind in math and science it also appears we're getting fatter. That obviously means that we're certainly not staying indoors to study.

Sorry. I was just very distressed by those numbers. No wonder our healthcare system is being crushed under the weight (no pun) of very preventable diseases that are obesity related.

That's How We Roll

American Muscle. Ford Tough. Chevy, grrrrr. Dodge, beasts. Toyota... err, huh?

Toyota made the big announcement that they will be entering cars in the NASCAR Nextel Cup and Busch Series races after a successful foray in the Craftsman Truck Series.

This is huge and will be sure to bring about unprecendented changes.

The changes include:
Toyota will enter ONE car at the beginning of the year and run that same car throughout the series.

Toyota's car will never be rebuilt or require any maintenance outside of an oil change every 3,000 miles.

Toyota's pit crew will consist of 1 person instead of a massive crew of men. Her job will consist of making sure the driver is topped off on his Big Gulp.

Even pushing 750 h.p., Toyota's car will get 35 mpg and thus need no fill-ups during the race. The car will also be as quiet as a vaccuum cleaner and meet 2050 emission standards set by Greenpeace.

At the end of the racing year, Toyota will actually sell its car (as a Certified Toyota, of course) on a used car lot for more than they paid for it. Ford, Chevy and Dodge will promptly scrap their fleet of vehicles to make sheet metal.

No HANS devices or special roll cages will be required for Toyota's car. The Camry is safe enough by using it's stock airbag and seatbelts.

'Cause the Boyz in Da Hood Are Always Hard...

Got home from work today to find this parked down from my house.



I often refer to Cordova as "New Hickory Hill." Hickory Hill is a place in Memphis that used to be really nice then had an invasion of Canadians and is now a shatty place to live.

My friend, Zack, also contends that a Chuck E. Cheese opening within 3 miles of your 'hood is a sure sign that things are headed downhill. I have one of those right down the street.

Busted up Maximas and Chuck E. Cheese. What's next?

Electronically Cursed?

My friend Danny suggested I make a list of the electronic equipment I've had to send back over the past few years. Let's see:

iPod (20 gig)
-------------------------------
1st iPod-- hard drive skipping
2nd iPod-- hard drive skipping
3rd iPod-- battery died
Status: 4th iPod still working, but out of extended warranty protection

Sony Video Camera
-------------------------------
1st repair-- tape not ejecting
2nd repair-- tape not ejecting
Status: still working to date

Nikon Digital Camera
-------------------------------
1st repair-- bad circuit board
2nd repair-- battery door fell off
Status: still working to date; will soon appear on ebay

Princeton Graphics LCD Monitor
-------------------------------
1st repair-- black lines on screen
2nd monitor working but with dead pixels

Bose TriPort Headphones
-------------------------------
1st superglue effort failed
2nd superglue effort still holding

Am I cursed or is this pretty normal for the course?

What a Start... What a Finish

Day started great. Made my usual awesome pot of Peet's coffee and got to work by 7am to knock out some code.

Also, today is LP's birthday, I remembered it, purchased appropriate cards and made a batch of homemade (sort of) biscuits for breakfast.

By 9:30am, which happened to be the exact moment LP was taking off for Orlando for a business trip, I get a call from Anna's school. She's throwing up and has to stay out for 24 hours. Drats. So much for getting anything done today.

Pick up Anna and write day off to running errands. Anna and I go drop a bill at Target buying groceries. Get the call that grandpa is available for watching Anna.

Anna and I pick up some lunch and head to g-parents for a nosh session of Chick-Fil-A.

I decide to head home and work verus heading straight back to work. Man, am I tired. Lemme take a 20 minute nap before I work. AHHHHHH, I'm waking up and it's 2pm !!!

Time to get humping. Can't connect to internet because home computer is on the fritz. Can't renew IP address and I know dick about networks, routers and whatnots. Where's Chuck Norris to roundhouse this damn thing when you need him?

My friend Big Bill calls me and I commence to yell about phucking networks dis and dat, blah, blah, blah. Bill was actually calling to let me know I have a 19 inch monitor on my desk at work and it'll be there when I arrive tomorrow. Oooof, sorry for being a dick, Big Dog.

But let's set the record straight. Only 2 things will send me over the edge: LP telling me the internet connection does not work because that then leads to #2, me having to find either an excuse or a fix for the damn thing.

3 hours later I determine that Winsock has been corrupted. Delete 2 registry keys, re-add them and BAM it works like magic. In fact, I think it really was magic.

In the process, I actually get my laptop and desktop set up in a network, sharing files and a printer and all that other cool networky shat.

About to head to the g-parents to pick up Anna and get some yummy dinner.

See, you start the day with Peet's and stuff will just take care of itself from there on.

Non-Technology Users... You Slow the World and I Don't Like It

I'm not waxing advanced here. Let's keep it simple. Online ordering, email, etc.

I really don't have patience when folks can't master those simple forms of communication. A lot of folks like to say that email is not personal, not effective, etc. However, I believe that the inability to use such mediums is a form of illiteracy.

You phuckers who can't make use of simple, mainstream technology; don't bash the technology and then say shit like "I'll just call, it's more personal and direct and gets the job done." You should just say, "I'm a fuggin' tard" and leave it at that. No, the world is not revolving around your slow arse and you're not all kickin' it nostalgic-- you're getting left behind dip shits.

My fuggin' 2-year-old can nearly text message her cap' order into Starbucks. In a few months I'm sure she'll be able to Google anything to find the answer to just about any query. What's your fuggin' excuse caveman?

Why Is "That" In There?

In the men's bathroom at ILS, there is a large dispenser of hand lotion. And I'm not talking Wal-Mart or Target large, I'm talking Sam's Club, use a weight-lifting belt and dolly to move this thing around, large. It's so big that one person has to jump up and down on the dispenser while another catches the lotion.

But size is irrelevant, right?

My point is that hand lotion in the men's bathroom is kinda creepy. It would be okay in the women's bathroom because women seem to understand that lotion is made to moisturize your hands. The amount of time it stays on a guy's hand is directly correlated with how long it takes them to grab their weiner and start the choking games.

I reckon the next time I go in the bathroom I'm gonna take the lotion in a stall with me. When I hear someone come in the bathroom, I'll come out of the stall with my clothes disheveled and the lotion bottle in one hand and declare "oh man, I needed that."

I bet they'll remove the bottle, or me, at that point.

Face Down, Ass Up That's the Way We Like to... Code?

Well, at least I do.

I'm nearly through the phrase of a project's life cycle where we take all the documentation of what we're supposed to do (Detailed Requirements Specification or DRS) and create a technical explanation of how we plan on doing it (Technical Design Specification or TDS).

To me, this is the most boring part of the project. I do a bunch of research then determine how much 'splaining I can do without actually doing any coding. A reasonable amount of explanation is necessary so that the higher-ups don't ask "are fuggin' crazy? how are you ever gonna make that work?" However, to much makes you feel like you're swimming in peanut butter-- it's just kinda drudgery.

However, now I'm floating into the coding/implementation phase where I actually get to code-- the Crue rocks, gnats bother folks and coders code. It's part of the natural order of things.

And when I code I like to get into Flow. A guy named Csikszentmihalyi wrote a few books explaining the concept of flow, or optimal performance. It's that thing you get into where you lose track of time and before you realize it you've expertly assembled 1,0000 widgets and now it's quitting time.

So I like to go heads down, don't mess around with too much other shat, lock on the Bose headphones (making sure enough super glue is in place to hold them together) and just start a tear.

Flow-- it's not just the thing under your feet.

One Up for Stupid Public Officials

I think Memphis Mayor Herenton is losing his battle to be the country's most idiotic elected official.

Check out Major Nagin of NOLA.

If You Were Still Somebody, They'd Just Give You the Damn Cars

LOS ANGELES - It's not Guns N' Roses but cars and cash that have rocker
Axl Rose suing a Beverly Hills auto dealership.
ADVERTISEMENT

The suit, filed Thursday in Los Angeles County Superior Court, claims the dealership failed to deliver two luxury cars after receiving $20,000 in deposits and also failed to give the Guns N' Roses frontman any money after selling his Ferrari.

Rose contends that Beverly Hills Classic Cars took his deposits but violated oral agreements to get him a 2004 Lamborghini Gallardo and a 2005 Porsche GT3.

The suit also contends the dealer sold his consigned 1999 Ferrari Marinello but never paid him a promised $135,000 of the proceeds.

After-hours calls to the dealer and its owner were not immediately returned Thursday.

With Rose as frontman, Guns N' Roses reached superstar status in the late 1980s after the release of "Appetite for Destruction," which includes hits such as "Paradise City," "Sweet Child O' Mine" and "Welcome to the Jungle."

The band split in a bitter fallout, leaving only Rose and keyboard player Dizzy Reed to soldier on under the Guns N' Roses banner. Former members Slash (Saul Hudson) and Duff (Michael) filed a suit last August against Rose for allegedly naming himself sole administrator of the group's copyrights.

Memphis Cops... You Guys Have Got to Chill the Phuck Out

Count this is near death #2 for me caused by Memphis PD chasing someone.

I'm getting ready to pull out of a gas station onto a busy G'Town Parkway when a Caddy and Chevy SS truck come shooting down the emergency lane at no less than 70mph. Couple of a-holes racing I figure.

After about 1.5 miles down G'Town, though, I see the cops downing a brother in the Wal-Mart parking lot and some other blues scooping up some goods from the middle of the road-- drugs maybe?

Since the red SS was driving off by the time I arrived I'm assuming he was undercover.

But now that the Memphis PD has put me in dangerous situations like this twice, I have to ask how important it was to nab these cats. Let me rephrase, G'Town was BUSY, so was it worth endangering the hundreds of people that the perp and the cop were weaving their way through?

Yeah, yeah, yeah we gotta catch the criminals but why don't you guys look at how many lives you're putting on the line to catch a dime store dealing pot head before you drop that bitch into overdrive and give out a good Duke boy holler.

And let's suppose this was not a small timer. Maybe this was the phucking Don Corleone of Memphis drug dealers. Well, if you were dealing with someone this big I figure you'd have helicopters and enough support staff to keep this guy from moving his ass crack in his underwear, right?

As a police officer once asked me after I was courteous enough to keep him out of harm's way: "What the phuck were you thinking?"

Where the Phuck Is 91745 ?

I sent my LCD monitor back about 6 weeks ago for replacement as it went bad.

I sent it back to Princeton Graphics in City of Industry, CA 91745.

FedEx does not correlate 91745 with City of Industry-- they instead shipped it to La Puente, CA; a neighboring town.

So when I call Princeton Tech Support to ask where my monitor is they have no clue.

We track it and sure enough it's gone to the La Puente address.

I call FedEx and they're all like "well, we delivered to where the zip code resolves" and I'm all like "but that's not the phucking city I addressed it to."

So I go to MSN.com for help. Jeepers, 91745 resolves to Hacienda Heights, CA.

PHUCK!!!

I call Princeton Graphics back. They check around and find out they have heard of stuff getting delivered to the wrong city.

No one really knows where my monitor is but Princeton is satisfied that I at least sent it back so they are supposed to get a new one back to me while they try to find my other returned monitor in 91745; whereever that is.

Exactly How Long Does It Take

One day, LP was out of town with Anna.

I woke up, took a shower and dressed, drove to Kroger for Starbucks coffee, sat down for breakfast there (Kroger has an okay b'fast setup if you're into eggs, ham, biscuits), then drove to work.

Total time: 45 minutes

When I'm alone with Anna, it takes me roughly 1:45 from the time I wake up until the time I arrive at my desk at work.

Damn, is that normal? Does it really take that long to get Anna ready and out the door?

Did You Forget Someone?

Gary Cismesia extra point MISSED.
Kevin Kelly 29 yard field goal MISSED.
Gary Cismesia 48 yard field goal MISSED.
Kevin Kelly 38 yard field goal MISSED.
Gary Cismesia 38 yard field goal MISSED.

This was in Penn State's 3 OT win over FSU.

I love to see football players joke about how the kicker is not really a "player", he's just this odd little guy on the team. He's the nerd, the chess club president that you only allow to hang out with you because he knows weird trivia like how many legs a spider has.

But check it out. In a high end division 1A football program, it's unacceptable to not have a bad ass swinging an iron foot. The Florida teams are great for being 3 deep with 4.3/40 guys but they historically have crappy kickers-- except when FSU had Janokowski who was great when you could keep him off the X.

And look at my school, Auburn. John Vaughn misses 5 FG's against LSU. That's the difference between Auburn losing by 3 or winning by nearly 2 touchdowns. That's 15 points he left on the field!! He went 1-6 that night. Hell, had he just shot 50% Auburn would have won the game.

So guys, don't forget your kicker. He not only knows the number of hairs on the average human's head, he can also win some games for you.