Today as I was driving home from work, I heard the news on the radio: Minnesota Twins' setup man Juan Rincon has been suspended for ten days for violating baseball's substance-abuse policy. I was disappointed to hear that one of my favorite ball players failed a drug test. Losing this guy for ten days will hurt the Twins' chances of holding on to late-inning leads. Now it wasn't reported which drug he had been caught using. (He will hold a press conference tomorrow.) I...
I usually do my IMing via MSN Messenger. I like it because it is popular among people I know, and it has lots of features. My wife has access to a different computer now, and she downloaded the new MSN Messenger 7.0. (I didn't even know that it was upgraded.) Once I saw what she could do, I rushed to download it on my own computer. The new MSN Messenger allows for: handwritten text, personalized emoticons, moving graphics (called "winks"), a buzzer (called "nudge"...
As many of you know, I have been watching American Idol faithfully (and writing about it) since the second season. It is a fun escape in the middle of the work week. It really starts to heat-up during May Sweeps. Yay! Last week as I was flipping through the channels on my television at work, I found a program called "Idol Chat" on the TV Guide Channel. (I didn't have the TVG Channel on my "favorites" list on my satellite tuner. I do now.) "Idol Chat", c...
Click here for my latest article. Tonight's show was an interesting one. Vonzell and Anthony , two of the best singers last night found themselves in the bottom-three. Scott Savol , who should have been eliminated, made it into the top-three. Ultimately, last night's poorest performer: Constantine Maroulis was sent home. Seems like America finally saw through his thing. All sizzle, and no steak. (Paula didn't take it so well, did she?) Now we...
Click here for my latest article. The theme of tonight's show was "Songs from the year 2000 on." I wasn't really optimistic about the entertainment value of tonight's show, considering that I wouldn't be familiar with many of the songs. Sure enough, I only recognized Constantine's and Vonzell's songs. The Performances: 1) Carrie Underwood sang Lord knows what. Sometimes I wonder what happens during the sound check at rehearsals. The music was so loud that C...
Tonight my wife and I took the baby to our local pizza/ pasta restaurant. They have really good pizza! When we go, Kenny likes eating spaghetti. He usually eats everything, but he really gets messy. It is cute.
Hi there. It is a Sunday. My wife is watching a Japanese DVD, my son is playing with plastic animals, and I am listening to the "Sunday Morning Sports Huddle" while playing on the computer. One of the things that I have been playing with this morning is Microsoft Terraserver . At that website, you can type in an address (in the US), and then you can get an aerial photograph of that place. I looked at an aerial photo of my neighborhood from 1991. The area certain...
In Japan, English words and phrases are used decoratively on clothing, packaging, and other things. Frequently the English that is used it a bit awkward. (I believe that this is intentional.) The use of over-prosaic, colorful, nonsensical, and oftentimes funny English is an underappreciated artform in Japan. The best source of "strange English" is children's clothing. I have read some good nonsense on clothes at the kids' store. Take my son's t-shirt for example: "Beloved: I'm glad ...
Click here for my latest article. Tonight's results show was the most entertaining one to-date. A bunch of stuff happened, and then the bottom three finalists were seperated from the top four finalists. The top four sat down, and the final results were announced rather quickly. A nice change-of-pace. This week's bottom three were Scott Savol , Anthony Federov , and Anwar Robinson . Ultimately, Anwar was cut. Like Nadia last week, Anwar was one who would ha...
Click here for my latest article It is nice as the competition winds down, because I have fewer contestants to write about. Having fewer contestants also means better performances, as the figurative fat has been trimmed from the competition. Tonight's show, featuring 1970s dance music turned out really nicely. The contestants as a group performed as well as I have seen them since the first "big stage" show. The Contestants: 1) Constantine Maroulis sang "Nights...
As I write this I am watching the Twins/ White Sox game on television. Tonight's game is the fourth between the two teams this year. Early on, the White Sox lead the season series 2-1. This year's Sox team is said to be built on speed and defense more than previous teams. There has been a big turnover of personnel, and so far it seems that it is paying off. (The White Sox are among the best teams early-on.) (Thank goodness Jose Valentin is gone to Los Angeles. He'd always hit a few ho...
Click here for my latest article. Tonight's Idol results' show was a one-hour affair. The first half hour was just filler that allowed me to: wash the dishes, clean the bathtub, and then fold some laundry. In the second half hour, we learned that the bottom three finalists were: Nadia Turner, Bo Bice, and Scott Savol . I wasn't surprised that Scott and Nadia were in the bottom three. I was mildly surprised that Bo was in there, even though last night's song wasn't ...
Click here for my latest article. Tonight's American Idol theme was an interesting one. The songs tonight were supposed to be from the contestants' birth-year. I looked into the songs of my own birth-year, and I decided which songs I would have attempted if I were an Idol contestant. My criteria were simple: I have to like the song, and I have to know all the words for the song. (And it would have to be relatively easy to sing, knowing my voice limitations.) My two possible choices...
Usually I pride myself in keeping things under control. I try to prevent having a lot of things to do from "stacking up". Generally speaking, I am good at keeping my slate clean from day-to-day/ hour-to-hour. Today however it is a different story. There are people I have to call, things that I have to do, things I need to prepare, things that I need to finish, and things that I have just remembered to do for home and for work. I find this to be mildly stressful. (As...
The other day was my birthday. My wife and I were both busy, so we'll celebrate by going to an Indian restaurant sometime this weekend. (Indian may be my favorite kind of food.) I received some nice presents. My wife bought me a workbook to help me with my Spanish studies. It has a lot of good vocabulary that I need in my job. I also received a DVD of the second series of "Men Behaving Badly." (The first series should be coming soon in the mail.) I am lo...