Return Of Trivia Tuesday

While I'm not sure if I'm truly ready to make Trivia Tuesday a weekly feature again, I found this fun game titled Know Your States. Your challenge is simply (or not so simply) to place the U.S. state on the map

I scored a 90% with an average error of 13 miles in 401 seconds.

Please note that it's very possible that I shared this game here several years ago. If so, enjoy playing this again!

In addition, please feel free to share your results in the comments section below.

h/t to Josh.

Sean's Week 4 NFL Picks

Happy Sunday everyone. I am much better at picking games during even weeks than odd weeks. Want proof? After a 5-10-1 record in week three (I consider the Packers-Seahawks game a push), I am 10-20-1 in odd weeks and 9-6-1 in even weeks (week #2) for an overall total of 19-26-2. Regardless, that's not very good. Since it's an even week, I'm going to redeem myself. Here are my week four picks:

I was correct in my feature pick last week, so I'll highlight one game today. Houston is a 12 point favorite at home against the Tennessee Titans. While I'm not convinced that the Titans can win this game, I have a feeling that this will be a close game based on the fact that it's a division match up meaning that the teams know each other quite well. Please note that I didn't listen to this reasoning for the Ravens-Browns game on Thursday night. Interesting fact you may not know: The Titans are 14-4 against the spreads in games where every single fantasy column mentions how terrible Chris Johnson has been this season during the preceding week.

Enjoy the games!

Fall For Fairfax

If you live in the Washington DC area, have kids and are looking for something to do this weekend, I recommend attending the Fall for Fairfax KidsFest at the Fairfax County Government Center. Here's all the information you need to know:

When: Saturday, September 29th from 10 a.m. – 7 p.m. & Sunday, September 30th from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.

Where: On the grounds of the Fairfax County Government Center, 12000 Government Center Parkway, Fairfax, VA 22035. Plenty of free parking is available.

What: 3 stages of FREE entertainment. Activities include scarecrow making*, pumpkin painting*, public safety and recycling-themed exhibits, pony rides*, petting zoo, hay rides, model trains, and the KidWay MidWay* (with more than a dozen rides and attractions).

Plus more than 75 exhibits, activities and great festival food!

*Indicates program fee applies



I hope to see you there!

Truly Sean’s Ramblings

There is a lot I could complain about from the past weekend. For starters, Sears delivered a new dishwasher, but it was damaged, so we still have our old dishwasher. After several phone calls and a trip back to the store, we’re getting another new dishwasher in about two weeks. Although this situation is/was frustrating, it looks like we might save a little money on the purchase, so this could turn out to be okay.

Meanwhile, I could complain about the Pittsburgh Steelers performance in Sunday's 34-31 loss to Oakland. Neither the running game or defense looked good, but the Steelers bye week comes at a perfect time. Hopefully, Troy Polamalu, James Harrison and Rashard Mendenhall get healthy. Meanwhile, the team has two weeks to prepare for the next game. Use that time well!

Now I will complaint about the NFL, CBS and DirecTV’s Sunday Ticket. I purchased Sunday Ticket so that I can watch every Steelers game (and every other NFL game) from the comfort of my home. On Sunday, DirecTV blacked out the Steelers-Raiders game since the local CBS station decided to carry the game. (DirecTV doesn’t air in-market games.) However, instead of showing the Steelers game at the regularly scheduled time of 4:25, CBS showed overtime of the Saints-Chiefs game followed by the end of the Dolphins-Jets game. CBS did not start airing the Steelers game until the second quarter started which was after 5:00. Now, I understand not showing the Steelers-Raiders game on time in the DC market if the 1:00 game featured Washington or even Baltimore. I wouldn’t necessarily be happy, but I would understand.

So I have several questions here. Since the Redskins-Bengals game ended before 4:25, why switch to the Saints-Chiefs game instead of going with the Steelers game you already had scheduled? Since CBS wasn’t showing the Steelers-Raiders game, why can’t DirecTV show the game until it airs on local TV? The most important question though is why am I paying for Sunday Ticket if I can’t watch the Steelers?

Since Yom Kippur starts tonight, I hope the NFL, CBS and DirecTV atone for their sins! (This may be a bit strong, but they can at least treat their customers better.)

Sean's Week 3 NFL Picks

I did significantly better in week two than week one with a 9-6-1 record including going 2-0-1 in my "feature" games. I'm now 14-16-1 overall. Sadly, my winning percentage is now around the same as the Pirates. Anyway, here are my picks for week 3:

In full disclosure, I changed my pick (and announced it on Twitter) for the Thursday night game and selected Carolina. I guess the Giants really didn't miss Bradshaw, Nicks, etc.

For no apparent reason, I feel like Jacksonville will win, or at least cover, today. I can see Maurice Jones-Drew (AKA "The Advertising Agency") having a big game and the Jaguars D forcing several turnovers. I can also see Russia from my house. Interesting stat: The Jaguars are 3-0 against the spread in games after I mention the team and seeing Russia from my house in the same blog post!

Enjoy the games!

Shooting at Woodland Hills High School: 20 Years Later

20 years ago tomorrow and over 6 years before Columbine, there was a shooting at Woodland Hills High School just outside of Pittsburgh. Fortunately, what could have been a life-changing event for thousands of people turned out to be a minor footnote at least for me. On Monday, September 21, 1992, I was in first period chemistry class extremely overwhelmed by the material. Although the bell rang to switch classes, my chemistry teacher, Mr. Nelson, didn't dismiss us immediately either to finish the lesson or to assign us homework. With only a few minutes to get to the next class and no flexibility from most teachers if you're late, you always wanted to leave immediately after the bell rang, particularly when you heard other students in the hall.

On this day though, the sounds of people walking and talking in the hall were interrupted by five loud popping sounds directly outside my classroom. To me, it sounded like balloons popping. It was not balloons. Either Mr. Nelson saw what was happening or was familiar with the sound of gunfire and immediately closed the door and put a rolling cart with a TV in front of the door. Although I remember the pops, I don't recall hearing any screams.

While we had no idea what was happening or happened outside the classroom, Mr. Nelson made sure that we didn’t go near the door. Although my memory about this event 20 years ago is a little fuzzy, I believe that he called the front office to let them know that he heard what could have been gunfire. My guess is that he knew what was going on but didn’t want to alarm us too much.

What did happen was that a sophomore (I think I remember the name, but I don’t want to write it here in case I’m incorrect) brought a gun into school and tried to shoot a specific person. Amazingly, in a crowded hallway he only hit one person and it wasn't the person he was attempting to shoot. He did shoot my classmate Rich who was coming from the physics classroom next door. The gunman then ran down the stairwell and exited the school.

At some point, maybe a few minutes later, maybe 30 minutes later, someone from the office announced what happened. The only thing I vividly remember from that day was that the office said this was a dispute that occurred outside school. For some reason, I thought this meant literally outside the school which was just down the street from my home. It was at this point that I started freaking out a bit until a classmate told me to shut up. That worked.

The gunman was caught later that day, and obviously, never returned to Woodland Hills High School. Meanwhile, I don’t remember what happened to us the rest of the day. I don’t think we got excused early, but no one was focused on learning and lessons that day. No one had cell phones and there certainly wasn’t internet at school in 1992, so most of what we discussed was rumors and theories. All of the local TV stations arrived at the school, so I got most of my information from watching the news that evening. Within a couple of days, the school installed metal detectors. Actually, I think that there was just one metal detector on the first day, and the school administration wanted 1000+ students to go through it. That plan didn’t work well since it was impossible for everyone to go through and start class on time.

Twenty years later, there’s not really much to discuss. Rich was shot in the shoulder, but returned to school on Wednesday, only two days later. A friend believes that the shooter died several years ago. Meanwhile, besides this minor synopsis (subscription required), I can’t find anything online about the incident since Pittsburgh’s two major newspapers at the time, the Pittsburgh Press and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, were both on strike.

If any fellow Woodland Hills classmates are reading this, please feel free to share your thoughts about the shooting in the comments section below. Is there anything that I’m missing? What were your experiences that day?

Happy New Year Videos

Happy Rosh Hashanah to those who recently celebrated the Jewish New Year! In honor of the New Year (besides eating apples and honey), here are two Rosh Hashanah videos to start your year.

This is what One Direction would look like if they were Orthodox and lived in Israel:



This is not what Psy would look like if he was born and raised in New York:



(Sean's note in 2020: Unfortunately, I don't know what this video was, but it's not on YouTube anymore.)

Don't forget to write 5773 on all of your checks. I'm sure it will take me months to stop writing 5772 on them!

Sean's Week 2 NFL Picks

In my first week of picking NFL games against the spread, I went a terrible 5-10. At least I have fantasy football where I went, um, 1-5. At least the Steelers, Pitt and the Pirates won, right? Let's just forget last week and focus on week 2.

My marquee, seven-star picks:

Cleveland at Cincinnati (-7)

The nickname of BenJarvus Green-Ellis is The Law Firm presumably because he has a long, hyphenated name instead of being a pre-law major or an actual lawyer. If you think about it though anyone with a hyphenated name could have the nickname of the law firm. Maurice Jones-Drew could be The Law Firm. I guess we'll just call Jones-Drew, The Advertising Agency. Meanwhile Cleveland lost last week despite the Philadelphia Eagles not using one of the game's best running backs enough because they would rather have Michael Vick throw 60 times resulting in 4 interceptions. Cincinnati is not that dumb and will win at home.

Random fact: Cleveland is 0-7 against the spread in games the week after the week after (I guess "2 weeks after" would have worked too) the team's former owner that moved the team to Baltimore died.

Dallas at Seattle (+3)

Dallas looked good last week winning at the defending Super Bowl Champions. Something called Kevin Ogletree had a monster game and was then picked up in 90% of all fantasy leagues. Meanwhile, Seattle has a rookie quarterback and lost at Arizona, a team that will not be compared to the New York Giants. Therefore, how can Dallas lose against Seattle? I have a feeling people have said that all week. Playing in Seattle can be difficult, and I think Marshawn Lynch will have a big game.

Random fact: Dallas is 0-5 against the spread in games following the debut of an eyeglass cleaner product by the team's owner's son-in-law.

New York Jets at Pittsburgh (-5.5)

Is there any pre-game show that won't show replays of the Tim Tebow-Demaryius Thomas touchdown from last year's Wild Card game this weekend? If a show does NOT replay this play, please let me know and I will start endorsing that show. Anyway, I don't have much analysis on this one. The Jets aren't as good as they played last week at home against Buffalo. The Steelers aren't as bad as they played at Denver last week. Pittsburgh wins.

Random fact: The Steelers are 11-2 against the spread in games against New York/New Jersey teams that feature non-starting University of Florida Heisman-winning quarterback.

Other games (my pick is in bold):

Chicago at Green Bay (-5) (Woo Hoo! I got one right!)
Kansas City at Buffalo (-3)
Minnesota (-1.5) at Indianapolis
Oakland (-2.5) at Miami
Arizona at New England (-13.5)
Tampa Bay at New York Giants (-7.5)
Baltimore at Philadelphia (-2.5)
New Orleans at Carolina (+2.5)
Houston (-7) at Jacksonville
Washington at St. Louis (+3)
Tennessee at San Diego (-6)
Detroit (+6.5) at San Francisco
Denver at Atlanta (-3)

Enjoy your fooball weekend!

Cholesterol Update

In the months before I started this blog, my weight was at its highest, and my doctor was concerned about my cholesterol levels. I guess regularly eating bagels and cream cheese, Little Debbie Swiss Cake Rolls, cheese sandwiches and always having Chewy Chips Ahoy cookies around the house were contributing factors. As I’ve shared before, my doctor suggested that I start taking fish pills, and I significantly reduced the amount of the aforementioned foods that I ate. At my annual physical this summer, I got my cholesterol results and feel the need to share them here in a fun and exciting chart. Please note that the totals were significantly worse in 2005, but I only seem to have the records easily accessible for the following dates:

With the exception of picking NFL games (more on this tomorrow), I’m awesome (though you know that already)! To celebrate Swiss Cake Rolls for everyone!

Ryan Reynolds & Unpaid Taxes (Express Fail)

In Tuesday's edition of everyone’s favorite free daily newspaper handed out at Metro stations,* Express shared information about the Ryan Reynolds-Blake Lively wedding.

Clearly Reynolds looks much older than his actual age. Otherwise, how can you explain why an 11 year old Reynolds looked to be in his early 20s when he started on Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place in 1998? He must have been the Doogie Howser of pizza place employees!

Meanwhile, every month Express publishes a section titled “Ahead” which is a continuing education and career advancement guide. This month’s eight-page edition included this article that was previously published in The Washington Post, Express’ parent company. If you don’t want to click on the link, the story is about two Washington-based restaurants that owe more than $100,000 in unpaid taxes and wants its customers to pay the taxes through website donations. How exactly is this career advancement or continuing education? I don’t pay my taxes and we might close, but you can help us stay open by paying our bill. Um, no.

Please click here for all of your Express Fail needs.

* Unless you like the Washington Examiner more than Express.

9/11: 11 Years Later

While today is and should be a solemn day, today doesn’t seem particularly different than any other. I took my child to daycare this morning and didn’t even realize that it was 9/11 until I heard it on the radio. I planned on publishing a post today about another "Express Fail" but that seemed disrespectful. Of course, then I picked up today’s Express and the cover featured a picture of a MARC train with an introduction about how MARC train regulars treat rush hour like happy hour. The front page also included information about Robert Griffin III, the Chicago teachers’ strike and the question “Can you keep up with the world’s oldest yoga instructor?” Except for three events in the “Entertainment Lookout” section and a four-paragraph story about cancer types added to World Trade Center-related illnesses covered by health programs, the newspaper gave no indication that today is 9/11. There were a couple of police officers at a police dog at the Metro station, but that’s not abnormal.

With the exception of Ground Zero, the Pentagon, Shanksville and the family and friends who lost loved ones 11 years ago, has today really become just another day? I hope not.

Steelers-Broncos LiveBlog

New season, new liveblog! Let's go (even if we're starting in the second quarter)

Sean's Week One NFL Picks

For the 2012 NFL season, I want to see how smart I really am.



While I spend significant time each fall watching football and following my fantasy football teams, I wonder how I would pick football games against the spread. This could be a running set of posts throughout the NFL season or it could turn into my irregularly scheduled Found In My Basement series. Anyway, let’s start by focusing on three games although you can click here for all of this week's odds.

Miami Dolphins (+12.5) at Houston Texans

Houston is coming off a season featuring an AFC South division title and has a healthy Matt Schaub and the consensus #1 fantasy draft pick, Arian Foster. Meanwhile, the Miami Dolphins are coming off a successful training camp thanks to HBO’s Hard Knocks and with new coach Joe Philbin, who may or may not one day reclaim his family seat on Live with Regis and Kelly and Michael Strahan. Here’s an inside statistic that you may not know: The Texans are 0-0 against the spread in week one home games versus a starting rookie QB that appeared on Hard Knocks with a very attractive wife and does not know the NFL divisions.



The Dolphins had the 15th ranked defense last season, so they’re not terrible. Plus, I’m likely watching this game with a Dolphins fan meaning that I’m choosing Miami to make things more fun.

Washington Redskins at New Orleans Saints (-7)

ABC’s Washington affiliate aired a special on Tuesday evening about the Redskins. The show started with a several-minute video featuring still pictures of new QB Robert Griffin III set to inspiring music. You can see a similar video at many Bar Mitzvahs or retirement ceremonies. Anyway, I worried that something tragic happened to RG3 and that the station aired some type of tribute. Fortunately, RG3 is fine. Unfortunately, he doesn’t play cornerback or safety because the Redskins secondary without Brandon Meriweather is not a good match-up against New Orleans.

Inside statistic: New Orleans is 17-1 against the spread in week one home games with an Interim Interim head coach. (This stat may not be accurate.) My pick: New Orleans

Pittsburgh Steelers (+1) at Denver Broncos

There’s a lot of talk about this being a rematch of last year’s Wild Card game. Although true, both teams are completely different from last season. Peyton Manning, Tim Tebow, Todd Haley, Bruce Arians...you get the idea. I haven’t heard much discussion this week about the fact that nearly the entire Steelers defensive line was injured during the Wild Card game. At one point, the Steelers played Joe Greene and L.C. Greenwood who are both in their 60s.

Inside statistic: The Broncos are 0-0 in games started by Peyton Manning.

I’m a homer, so I’m going with the Steelers.

Here are my other picks (in bold) for this week:
Indianapolis at Chicago (-9.5)
Philadelphia (-9.5) at Cleveland
Buffalo at N.Y. Jets (-2.5)
New England (-5) vs. Tennessee
Jacksonville at Minnesota (-3.5)
St. Louis at Detroit (-7.5)
Atlanta (-2.5) at Kansas City
San Francisco vs. Green Bay (-4.5)
Carolina (-1) at Tampa Bay
Seattle at Arizona (+3)
Cincinnati (+6) at Baltimore
San Diego at Oakland (-1)

Feel free to make your own picks in the comments section below and check out all of this week's odds here. Enjoy the first week of the NFL season!

Interview With Laurie Koozer: Author of What Happens On Sunday

Laurie Koozer is the founder of YinzR Readin and recently published her first book, What Happens on Sunday available on Kindle and at Smashwords. She is also a fellow Steelers fan and competition in one of my fantasy football leagues. Laurie was kind enough to answer some questions about her new book. Enjoy!

Sean: Let's start with the standard question. Tell us about What Happens on Sunday. (Yes, I realize that this technically is not a question.)

Laurie: What Happens on Sunday chronicles the lives and relationships of six women - Patty is a divorced mother of two who sends panties to a player each week, Angela is a high school senior who hates the Steelers and wants to get away from Pittsburgh, Megan is partying too hard and upset that her closest friend is ditching her for a boy, Shannon is in love with her sister’s boyfriend, Jen is pregnant and feeling unsure about her marriage and Desiree is a stepmom whose worried that it might be too late to have kids of her own. The book follows each of their journeys through the season and how some of them intersect.

Sean: Without reading the book yet, What Happens On Sunday seems to feature six women during the Super Bowl XL season. Why did you pick that season rather than any other season such as the most-recent Steelers' Super Bowl season?

Laurie: The A answer is that I started writing this book in 2006 so that was the obvious choice! As a Steelers fan, you probably remember the infamous guy who suffered a heart attack during Bettis’s fumble during the Colts play-off game, right? Well, that guy was my friend’s uncle and after that happened it really got me thinking about the different experiences that fans have during the season. I was in the MFA program at Pitt then so I used some of those ideas for a short story, Any Given Monday, based on three of the book’s characters (Patty, Angela and Desiree). Around the same time one of my writing professors, Cathy Day, was writing a memoir built around the 2006 Indianapolis Colts season and she gave me the idea of using the entire season instead of just writing character-based short stories which was what I was doing.

As luck would have it, the 2005 season was really interesting from a narrative perspective – coming off a 15-1 season and that heartbreaking loss to the Patriots in the AFC Championship game the year before, there was a definite expectation that the Steelers were going to do really well. And although they started out doing just that, the team was plagued with injuries and key players like Roethlisberger and Bettis were out for weeks at a time. Then, they suffered a late season slump, losing to 3 other AFC teams in a row and literally had to win the next four games to even get a shot at the wild card. And as you well know, they went from sixth seed to winning the Super Bowl. Now if that isn’t an exciting season then I don’t know what it is!

Sean: Do you see yourself or some of your personality/traits in any of the six woman featured in the book?

Laurie: I feel like this isn’t the professional writer answer to give, but for me part of the reason that I write is to try to make some sense of the world around me and maybe to give a voice to those things that I’ve felt that maybe I don’t like to talk about – so yeah, have I ever felt lonely and alienated like Patty, Shannon or Angela? Yes. Have I ever felt like I’m being left behind by friends like Megan does? Definitely. But would I handle any of those emotions by sending my panties to football players (Patty) or falling for my sister’s boyfriend (Shannon) or partying so hard my safety was in jeopardy (Megan)? No, but it’s very therapeutic to experience those things through the safety of my characters.

Sean: As someone who dreams about writing a book someday, how long did it take you to write What Happens on Sunday?

Laurie: It took about six years total. The first two years I was writing short stories based on the characters and once I got the structure and really started the novel in earnest it took me about a year to get my first draft and then about three years of editing and revising. That being said, I was working full-time and going through a lot of life transitions at that point so there were a lot of periods when I wasn’t working on it at all just because life was so crazy. Having already published the short stories on the characters really helped me though because a lot of people who had read those would occasionally contact me to find out what had happened to the characters and that was pretty motivating for me to actually finish the book. If you’re thinking about writing a book, all I can say is never give up!

(Sean's note: 6 years! I don't think I'm ever going to write a book.)

Sean: You're a Pittsburgher (woo hoo!) and the book seems geared to a Pittsburgh audience. Do you think the book could appeal to a wider audience or will non-Pittsburghers get lost trying to figure out what Yinz means?

Laurie: I definitely wrote this book with Pittsburghers in mind and obviously that’s kind of a risky thing to do as far as book sales go but it was also really liberating to feel like I really knew my audience. Pittsburgh’s such a special place and many of my initial readers have said that I really captured its essence and to me that feels like one of the highest compliments I could ever hope to get. That being said, even though the setting the narrative frame of the Steelers season is extremely specific, the themes of this book—love and family and friendship—are pretty universal so I feel like at the end of the day if I’ve really done my job at creating an authentic Pittsburgh experience, then other people would be able to read it and enjoy it too. They just might not get all of the Easter eggs I left for the Pittsburgh reader.

Sean: Any predictions for the 2012 Steelers season?

Laurie: Well, I’m pretty sure they’re going to win some and lose some. How’s that for a non-answer? I’m really not one for predictions, especially in a year like this when we’ve had so many changes during the off-season. But what I will say is that I definitely don’t agree with this analysis that the Steelers are going to experience to a huge drop-off this year.

Sean: Since we may be in a fantasy football league this season, do you want to share any potential sleepers?

Laurie: No, but only because I’ve been so busy this month I haven’t really had much time to even think about it but when I did an automated mock draft 5 out 6 analysts said my team would be number 1 overall. So as long as the rest of the league thinks like computers, I’m set!

Please make sure to check out What Happens on Sunday as well as Laurie's blog!

Message To The US Open

Dear US Open,

First, let me congratulate you on another exciting US Open. Now that I got the obligatory nice sentence out of the way, let’s get down to business. I wrote you several years ago about your silly final set tie-breaker system. With Andy Roddick retiring after this year’s tournament, do you know the match I’ll remember him most? That would be the 2009 Wimbledon final where Roddick lost to Roger Federer 16-14 in the fifth set. What an amazing match that could never occur at your tournament. You have your reasons as to why you keep the final set tie-breaker unlike the other three Grand Slam tournaments which is why I want you to consider changing the bracket for next year’s tournament. Let’s take a look at this year’s men's bracket, shall we?

If the higher seeds advance, the semi-finals will feature #1 Roger Federer vs. #3 Andy Murray and #2 Novak Djokovic vs. #4 David Ferrer. Now Ferrer is a very good player, but I’m sure that Djokovic would much rather face Ferrer than Murray. I don’t necessarily want Federer to win, but it seems unfair to me that he, as the #1 seed, should face the #3 seed in the semi-final. That is a huge disadvantage!

Now, US Open, I’m pretty sure that the other Grand Slam tournaments have similar brackets. Therefore, be different and seed arrange the bracket so that the semi-finals feature #1 vs. #4 and #2 vs. #3 like any other non-tennis tournament.

Sincerely,
Sean

P.S. For this suggestion, I'd be happy to accept tickets, airfare (or a train ticket from DC) and a hotel for next year's tournament.

Friday Video: Different Sean

There is a video (actually a VHS tape) from my Bar Mitzvah somewhere in my basement. While it is doubtful that any part of the video will ever appear on this blog (unless someone wants to convert it from VHS to DVD to an online video), nothing on the video compares to Shaun Sperling's Bar Mitzvah dance. Enjoy!



What a shirt!

The Inside Of A Lemonade Stand

In his opening statement at the Republican National Convention on Tuesday, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said, “President Obama has never run a company. He hasn't even run a garage sale or seen the inside of a lemonade stand." Since I generally try to avoid politics on this blog, I’m not going to support or debate Prebus’ comment about President Obama. However, I have an issue with his statement about the inside of a lemonade stand. Since when do lemonade stands have an inside? Was Priebus privileged enough to have a lemonade stand with a roof? Maybe he had an original version of the Melissa and Doug Grocery Store/Lemonade Stand available at Target for $129.99.

Is there even an inside of this Melissa and Doug lemonade stand? Regardless, how do you expect to make money selling lemonade when you have to put out $130 for the structure before you even purchase cups, ice, lemonade, etc? I guess that you could sell lemonade for $10 a cup, but who would want to buy such an expensive cup of lemonade?

When I was a child, my brother and I sold lemonade on a table on a street corner. I don’t even think we had chairs. The only inside was the inside to our house where we went to eat dinner. And yes, we walked uphill both ways to get to school. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go yell at kids to get off my lawn.

The Belt Story

Whenever I go away, I always tend to forget something. Hopefully, the something is minor like toothpaste, which I can pick up at my destination, rather than something significant like my cell phone, glasses, or spleen. On my trip to Florida this weekend, I thought I had everything when I left my home. I knew that I didn't have a fantasy football magazine but figured that I would find one at an airport newsstand.* After arriving at the airport on Friday but prior to going into the security line, I realized that I didn't pack a belt. While this wasn't a problem for the shorts I was wearing, I definitely needed a belt for my jeans and another pair or shorts I had packed. Fortunately, Washington National Airport has several clothing stores. Unfortunately, I couldn't purchase a belt at Brooks Brothers, Jos. A. Bank or even the PGA Store for less than $50 or $60. Therefore, I departed from Washington without a belt.

When I arrived in Charlotte, I had a clear mission: eat lunch and find a belt and fantasy football magazine in the one hour before my next flight. Mission accomplished thanks to Burger King on the lunch front, but the belt situation looked dicey with more stores like Brooks Brothers. However, after finding a fantasy football magazine, I stumbled into something called Bijoux Bellagio. While the store looked to sell only women's clothes and accessories, I inquired about men's belts. Amazingly, they did sell men's belts and the cost was only $10. Success! I was so excited about finding a reasonably priced belt that fit I didn't even care about the look. I only slightly regretted my purchase after putting on the belt.

I really hope that this belt becomes fashionable soon! By the way, since this belt is both brown and black, can I wear this with brown and black pants? I'll probably just wear this with jeans and make sure my shirt covers the belt.

What is the most random and/or obvious item you forgot on a trip?


* This turned out to be extremely difficult search. Although every airport store had dozens of magazines, none had any fantasy football magazines. Fortunately, I found one fantasy football guide at the EA Sports store (?) at the Charlotte airport.

How I Escaped Tropical Storm Isaac

Did you know that I travelled to Florida this past weekend? Probably not since I posted nothing about this here, on Twitter or on Facebook. I arrived in West Palm Beach on Friday afternoon just in time to see only the third film I’ve watched in the theater this year, The Expendables 2. I didn’t see the first film, so I worried that I wouldn’t be able to follow along. It turns out that there wasn’t much plot to follow other than lots of shooting with people and things getting blown up. (Should that have been a spoiler alert?)

Anyway, on Saturday afternoon, it appeared that Tropical Storm Isaac would cause havoc on South Florida meaning possible flight cancellations. US Airways posted a travel advisory that you could change your flight without a change fee, but that only applied to flights departing on Monday or Tuesday. My 1:30 Sunday afternoon flight was still on time, but I had some doubts. Finally, around 8:15 on Sunday morning, I received an automated call from US Air notifying me about my flight cancellation, wishing me good luck in getting out of South Florida and expressing disbelief that I spent $64 between quarterbacks Cam Newton and Matthew Stafford as part of an auction draft in a one QB fantasy football league. The recording didn’t actually state the last two sentences, but I know the voice was thinking this.

Time to evaluate options. I needed to get back Sunday night to see my family and to get to work on time Monday morning. Every flight out of Palm Beach or Fort Lauderdale to Washington, either Dulles or National, was booked. US Air could get me on Monday morning flight, but there was no guarantee I would get out particularly since the worst weather was expected for Sunday afternoon/evening and most school districts already cancelled school for Monday.

My solution: rent a car and drive north. The US Air agent admired my resourcefulness (though she didn’t comment on my fantasy football drafting results) and even though everything was booked from Orlando, there were seats for me on a flight from Jacksonville to Charlotte and Charlotte to Dulles. Daytona Beach is actually closer than Jacksonville, but who knew that they had an airport? (Apparently, not me. I ended up calling US Air on the road and learned that a flight out of Daytona Beach would get to Charlotte earlier, but I would still be on the same Charlotte to Dulles flight.)

So I had a relatively uneventful 275-mile drive to Jacksonville Airport. I arrived at the US Air ticket counter around 2:05 with plenty of time for my 3:30 flight. However, I decided to ask if there were any possibilities to get into DC earlier. The agent stated that there was a 2:30 flight going directly to National (I’ve been on this flight several times), but that since it was after 2:00, boarding already started, and it was too late to get on the plane. Jacksonville isn’t that big of an airport, so I figured that I had a chance to arrive at the gate before the plane doors closed. I walked briskly to security and amazingly made it through security in record time. It was at this point that I realized that I had a legitimate chance to make the flight. Therefore, I channeled my inner OJ (minus the “alleged” murders).



I made it to the gate as the last group got called and approached the gate agent…who informed me that the flight was full. Oh well. I ended up flying into Dulles through Charlotte and was able to see my family before bedtime. Then, I picked up my car from National Airport on Monday morning before work.

I should have an exciting conclusion or morale of the story, but unfortunately, I have neither. I guess I can share that US Air's customer service folks and gate agents were extremely nice and quite helpful. Actually, I do have a unique experience that occurred on my trip down to Florida, but I’ll save that for tomorrow.

My First Figure Skating Blog Post

It's the middle of August with the Pittsburgh Pirates in playoff contention and the NFL regular season only a few weeks away. So this is a perfect opportunity to write about, um, figure skating. The London Olympics concluding recently, and the biggest "stars" to emerge from the Olympics were Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Missy Franklin, and Gabby Douglas. What do these Olympians have in common? They all won multiple gold medals. This got me thinking about figure skating. While this sport is always one of the most watched during the Winter Olympics, I wondered if the figure skaters ever got upset at not having the opportunity to win multiple medals like their gymnastics, swimming and track counterparts. I proposed this idea to two friends who are HUGE figure skating fans. We'll call them Kelly and Marino since they are also Bills and Dolphins fans respectively.

Sean: I assume that you're following the Olympics and the gymnastics competition. I'm sure that you saw Gabby Douglas win two gold medals, one for the individual all-around and the other for the team competition. In addition, Aly Raisman won three medals, gold in the team competition and floor exercise and bronze on the beam. These two gymnasts now have as many or more Olympic medals than arguably the greatest American figure skater, Michelle Kwan (silver in 1998 & bronze in 2002). While Kwan has done quite well for herself off the ice including some type of Royal Caribbean competition with Greg Louganis, do you think she should have more medals? Let me put this another way, should she have had the opportunity to win more medals?

In gymnastics, you can win a team medal and several different individual ones. Should figure skating have this? Why not a team figure skating competition? Why not separate events for the short program, long program, that silly figure 8 thing they used to have, lutz and Salchow. (I had to look up the spelling of Salchow. Who knew that the H is silent?) Feel free to call me an idiot for these suggestions if warranted.

Kelly: I do think it would be cool to have a team event for figure skating, nation against nation. But since the skaters are doing the very same routines over and over again, I don't see the need to have separate events like you do in gymnastics, where there are individual apparatus events, in addition to the all-around, and team competition. Since FS did away with compulsories (those silly Figure 8's, as you call them), I don't see them bringing them back. The only growth I could see in terms of adding another event would be Team Synchronized Skating (which they do have) as there is precedent for this with synchronized swimming.

I know it's been done, but it really doesn't seem right that events like synchronized swimming and rhythmic gymnastics and trampoline (!) are in while baseball, softball and golf are out (although coming eventually, right?).

I think a better analogy for Michelle Kwan's Olympic results is Roger Federer. You can argue that both are the GOATs of their sport, and neither have gold (unless you want to count Fed's doubles gold with Stan Warwrinka in 98). For GOATs, nothing but gold is acceptable. You can't blame Roger for this time around, he went 19-17 in the third against Del Potro. In Beijing, he lost early to Berdych. Kwan played it conservatively and got surpassed by jumping beans/tiny mites in the long program.

Kelly (again before I was able to reply): Got the skinny from someone in the know:

There is now a team skating competition (men (2), ladies (2), pairs (1) and dance (1) all represented), not a group of ladies and men like in gymnastics though. It’s held after worlds now and it will be included in the Olympics in two years! It should be interesting to see how this added event changes the dynamic of the individual events. The format is still being decided (if the team event will occur before the individual events, etc). Clearly the main focus is still the individual events so I wonder if some of the big named players will back out of the team event based on results from the individual events. Hey – its another chance to watch skating and for the skaters to win a medal. Pretty neat.

Also, after watching some of the rhythmic gymnastics yesterday (which is easy to make fun of, until you watch those girls perform!) I do believe there could be a category for cheerleading at the Olympics. If there international participation level were there. Think about it. Those girls are athletes just like synchronized swimmers or rhythmic gymnasts (aka Cirque du Soleil training grounds). Then, we could pave the way for drum corps to be part of the Olympics, too. Anyone who has been in marching band would agree that there is equal amounts of athleticism and artistry in drum corps. OK, I realize this'll never happen.

Sean: Interesting that figure skating is considering a team event. I think the top skaters would enter for a chance to win more medals. Someone the caliber of Kwan probably wouldn't participate in the pairs or dance event, but I think they would also compete in the individual portion of the team competition.

Before you sent me the e-mail, though, I wanted to reply to your comment about skaters doing the same routines over and over rather than the separate events gymnasts compete in using different apparatuses. I have suggestions! 1. Spinning competition. Specifically, who can do the most spins in 20 seconds? They go so fast, so you might as well see who does the most in a specific period of time. 2. Obstacle course. I don't know the format since it's not speed skating, but maybe the skaters have to skate a routine with various obstacles on the ice. 3. Hardest slap shot. This is fun in the NHL skills competition, so why not see how fast 90-pound figure skaters can shoot a puck.

Between the current individual competition, possible team competition, compulsories (figure 8s) and my other three ideas, figure skaters could earn up to 6 medals! Please propose this idea to the person you know that is in the know!

Besides using cheerleaders at some events in London (ex. beach volleyball), is cheerleading really big around the world? Since baseball and softball are no longer in the Olympics, is cheerleading more popular that these sports globally?

Marino: I am just catching up on personal e-mail and this whole conversation had me giggling my head off.

You have to think about Michelle Kwan in terms of winning 9 national titles. There will NEVER be a gymnast that has the endurance to come to 9 separate national championships and win medals at each one at the elite level.

I don't think there should be separate things like a spinning comp. And I agree with Kelly about cheerleading being a sport, and should be at the Olympics, the same way I would encourage dance to be there too. Dance would be like gymnastics with ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, lyrical, etc.

Kelly: to Marino's point, Nastia Lukin, the defending All-Around champ, didn't even MAKE this year's US squad.

I would support Marino's motion to add dance to the Olympics. Competitive ballet? Bring it on!!!

Sean: With the introduction of dance, I think we've ended this conversation. The Olympics would be just like one of those Step Up movies! Why not go with chess, Scrabble and Connect 4 as Olympic sports too?

Marino: oooh yeah they could dance battle like the Step Up movies. I love those movies, [my husband] hates them. He categorized all dance movies this weekend as: 'someone is poor, needs a lot of money, discovers they can dance, finds other people who can dance with them that are also poor, magically there is a dance contest where they can win a lot of money, they enter the contest and win.' :)

The conversation dissolved even further from there. Anyway, the morale of the story: It looks like the Figure Skating Organization listened to me, although it would be nice if they added a hardest slap shot competition among the figure skaters!