1-31-08 (22:22)
  • cal upset washington state today, big win for them and upsets the balance of the pac-10 a bit. ucla is still on top, but it gets a little less certain after that. kevin love is so good, but not nba ready. he needs more muscle and quickness. hopefully he sticks around another year.
  • looking forward to the super bowl.
  • it seems like i spend more time in life dealing with everyday minutae than i used to. took almost half an hour to mail three packages at the post office today. only one person working and the line was a dozen people long. and unlike conservatives, i don't think things would necessarily be better if the postal service was run for profit by some corporation. the fact is they have a monopoly and there are plenty of for-profit companies that are poorly run with awful customer service. what it comes down to is employing intelligent people who care about doing a good job and are held accountable, for better or worse.


    • 1-31-08 (14:22)

  • "busy, busy, busy." cat's cradle is one of my favorite books ever.
  • last weekend we drove to la to surprise my mom for her 50th birthday. it was a success. everyone was there and she was definitely surprised.
  • also visited john and the new baby. meryl and i made an alphabet block toy for her (pictured below). i've already come up with a few fixes for the next time we make one.
  • this cold has been as bad as any i've had in recent years. lame. worked two days this week. not sure about tomorrow.


    • 1-28-08 (13:00)
  • skipped work today because i'm sick. i hate being sick.


    • 1-24-08 (23:47)

  • lots to do these days, busy as usual.
  • haven't seen many movies lately, should get back on track soon though.


    • 1-20-08 (22:05)

  • the patriots have the best offense i've ever seen. not necessarily the best team, but the best offense. i think the 95 niners were as good a team as i remember.
  • too bad about the packers today; pretty disappointing outcome. i'll be rooting for the patriots since i want to see history and i also bet my dad $10 (in week 15) that the patriots would win the superbowl.
  • worked on the bug a bit today. got the radio hooked up somewhat properly for the first time in at least 7 years. as long as i can remember it was either hooked up directly to the battery or to the ignition switch. i hooked it up the kill switch so that it'll only go on when the ignition is turned on. next project is getting an antenna and glove compartment (the original lasted 40 years, despite being made of cardboard, but needs to be replaced). also want to get new seat belts since one doesn't work and the driver's belt isn't the retractable type. that last one will have to wait, though, because new belts are expensive and i'm broke.
  • did get paid recently from both my jobs so i'm actually not too bad off right now.


    • 1-19-08 (11:31)

  • yesterday i crossed the quarter million mile mark on the camry.
  • rewatching this year's rose bowl. it confirmed to me that illinois didn't take advantage of their opportunities or, conversely, usc did a good job of stepping up when they needed to. for example, the interception that illinois had in the first quarter led to great field position. usc stopped them from getting into the endzone and then illinois missed the field goal attempt. later, usc bumbled a punt attempt. illinois didn't recover the ball (which would have had them deep in usc territory), instead usc's punter (woidneck) was able to recover the ball and get a good punt out of it.


    • 1-18-08 (22:00)
  • got some scrilla (scratch, dough, moola [the other john muir always calls it dough, but anyway...]) today, so that's good.


    • 1-18-08 (20:11)

  • listening to the new justice album. the track "phantom" rips off a goblin song from argento's film "tenebre" aka "unsane." the original is better. the goblins were awesome.


    • 1-17-08 (20:42)

  • had my first class today. the teacher was very cool and down to earth; salt of the earth kind of guy. the class was diverse and fun. it seems like it'll be a good learning environment, nice and laid back, free-wheeling, but still productive. very much a community college experience, and that's a good thing.


    • 1-17-08 (14:06)

  • diy network opened a new season of this old house to syndication. never seen the east boston project so that's good news for me. unfortunately, i think diy edits aobut four minutes of the show and they put little plugs for their website over the guys' informal banter at the very end of the episode. bad taste on their part. i'd say that 50% of everything i know about construction has come from this old house. everything else has come from trial and error, reading, other diy-type shows, and people i've worked with/for.


    • 1-16-08 (23:06)

  • added meryl's picks to the top ten movies of the year.
  • long day at work. 246 boxes, each weighing 40 pounds were delivered to our offsite storage facility. i got a couple students and we loaded them off the truck and into the storage unit. that took a few hours and now the unit is completely full and most of the stuff is fairly inaccessible. not wise to order 8,000+ books if you ask me, especially considering how slowly they anticipate them selling, but no one asked me.
  • back hurts.
  • alumni house work has been decent lately. been busy and it's nice to set my own schedule. the tile work has been sporadic and starts at different times so there's no regularity whatsoever. definitely learn more in that job though.
  • starting class at laney college tomorrow. will learn about residential electrical. i'm weakest in electrical and the class should fix that for the low low cost of $2 in campus fees. being poor can sometimes get you great deals (like not having to pay the $30 class fee for this class). then again, i'd rather have to pay the $30 and have a house than vice versa.
  • i'm pretty settled on leaving california at some point. this state is great in a lot of ways, but is strictly for rich people and i'll never be one of those so i have to find a reasonable place outside of the state where i can settle down. i don't see friends or family much more than 10-12 times a year anyway so the drop off wouldn't actually be that severe if i flew out from kentucky or something once a year.


    • 1-15-08 (00:14)

  • joe ferrante died not too long ago. pretty sad. he was my kind of guy. the good news is that his brother and son will be carrying on the family business and will continue to work with tom silva and this old house.


    • 1-14-08 (17:55)

  • busy day at work, made the day go quickly.
  • i've got about 5 columbia house memberships going right now. if you play the system correctly and find the right online referral codes, then you can average $6 per dvd. first shipment brings 7 dvds for under $13, with 2 to buy at full price. fulfill your obligation with the cheapest possible dvds, cancel membership, repeat. i've done this about 30 times over the course of the last 12 years.


    • 1-12-08 (16:57)

  • packers game was fun to watch. if the patriots went 15-1, instead of 16-0 then i would have voted for mike mccarthy (packers coach) as the coach of the year; but belichick deserves it for the perfect season. green bay looks really solid right now; i'm rooting for them to go all the way.
  • the ucla/wsu game was good. #4 vs. #5 and ucla won. the final score (ucla winning by 7) is a bit deceiving because ucla led by 10-18 for most of the game. wsu made seven 3 pointers in the last 3-4 minutes to make it kinda close. kevin love had his best game of the year. westbrook continues to look very good coming off the bench. they have a legitimate chance this year.
  • went to work today for a couple hours. probably going to have work on saturday for the next few weeks because of various projects.


    • 1-12-08 (13:37)

  • russell westbrook's dunk vs. cal.


    • 1-11-08 (11:38)

  • now lou dobbs and others are saying sorry for getting the whole "obama's going to win, hillary doesn't have a chance" conclusion. duh. are there any smart people in the mainstream media keeping these assholes in check? i expected charlie rose to be more skeptical when his guest was giving obama the victory after iowa, but he failed.
  • thinking about a trip to alaska in 2009.


    • 1-8-08 (17:56)

  • can't wait to get paid. all the hours i put in at the alumni house over xmas break will be paid out on the 21st and i should be back on solid ground by that time.
  • too much to do, not enough time or money.


    • 1-7-08 (23:25)

  • pretty pathetic that everyone, from a guest on charlie rose (from newsweek) as well as guests on npr and even more widely seen pundits, are counting out clinton and edwards at this point. i like obama as much as any of the other democrats, but i think it's fucked up that the media is completely sold on two counter-productive ideas: 1) horse-race politics are the only thing worth reporting on, 2) after obama's surprise victory in the only state that has held any sort of election thus far, he is the shoo-in; no one else has a chance. what the fuck? one state, 200k+ democrats have voted and some polls in new hampshire have been taken and everyone is serious when they say that anyone not named obama is in serious trouble. in the next sentence the guy from newsweek who was on charlie rose's show said that it is encouraging to see that every vote counts in this election. huh? not even two states have cast their ballots and they're not all that indicative of the rest of the nation and he's already anointed obama the victor. so much for voting. so much for every vote counting. the pundits (and truth) show that the victor will be decided on or before "super tuesday" on feb. 5th, despite the fact that plenty of states vote after feb. 5th.


    • 1-6-8 (17:13)

  • had an eventful day today. saw the tail end of a car chase that ended in a shopping center across from a bart station in el cerrito. there was a chp helicopter, chp cars, and bart police cars as well. it was quite a production. didn't see anything too exciting, but we did see the cops scrambling around, presumably to seal off escape routes, and the suspect being walked to the back of a police car. later on we saw the car, which was up on the curb and had run into a sign in the bart parking lot.
  • later, we were in downtown oakland to get some stuff from the library when we saw a toyota hit a lexus after the driver of the lexus decided that the red light didn't apply to her. the toyota driver t-boned her, but wasn't going too fast at the time as he had come to a screeching stop before the impact. both cars were pretty messed up, but no one appeared hurt and the air bags didn't deploy. gave the guy our phone number as witnesses and then left.
  • went to the ucla/cal basketball game yesterday. about an hour before the game it looked like i was only going to have one ticket and then the phone rang. before i picked it up i said "hopefully this is another ticket for the game, if so do you want to go?" meryl said yes and my powers of prognostication were affirmed shortly thereafter. we went to the game and had a good time. ucla played well. they had their typical offensive lull and let cal get back to within 2, after leading by 11 at the half, but pulled away again later and ended up winning by 12. the highlight of the game was russell westbrook's huge slam in the middle of the lane (which went on to win sportscenter's top play of the day). the people around us (we were in the ucla section, fittingly enough) roared and i think it was one of the best dunks i've seen live; and they're always better live.


    • 1-3-8 (22:12)

  • got the day off tomorrow. yay, but bad for money.
  • it rained most of the day and is supposed to rain for a week. boooo.
  • va tech lost which is too bad because i was rooting against kansas and the big 12. it was close, but give credit to kansas for keeping it together.
  • great pete carroll profile.
  • should be getting at least one free ticket to the cal/ucla game on saturday. that's great news. going to see if i can find a cameroon flag to hold up every time aboya or mbah a moute do well. i'm a "cameroon crazy." moute kicks boute, as they say.


    • 1-2-8 (19:31)

  • some good bowl games this season. the michigan/florida game was great. i was surprised by michigan's timely defense and ability to recover from so many mistakes (4 turnovers). i also liked the wisconsin game, though i didn't like the outcome. i hate the sec.
  • the usc game was a bit of a surprise for me. i figured they'd win by about 10-14, but i'm also a pessimist when it comes to the teams i like. some have made the argument that usc could win the ap title, but i don't think it will or should happen. georgia, who i think usc would beat, has a better claim to it because they were ranked higher going into the bowl game and beat a higher ranked team by the same margin as usc's victory over illinois. on the other hand you could say that georgia beat an overrated hawaii team coming out of a weaker conference (wac) than illinois (big ten). you could also point out that georgia didn't even win their conference, whereas usc did in spite of extreme injury problems. i think usc will be about as good next year, though they'll lose several key players, especially on defense. that said, the injuries from this year will pay dividends next year when you have guys who will be quicker to step into the starting positions vacated by exiting seniors and juniors.
  • watching the wvu/ok game right now. i hate the big 12 and oklahoma so i'm happy with the score thus far. it's half time, though, so i can't get too happy yet.
  • ucla basketball lose michael roll for probably a couple months from what i hear. it's too bad because he's good with the ball and shoots the long ball well. that said, ucla is a cinch for the tourney and should have a good shot at the pac-10 title. their weakness so far as i can tell is their offense, same as always. i actually enjoy watching them as much as i enjoy watching any basketball team since the divac/webber kings.
  • going to see "there will be blood" on friday. fuck yeah.
  • luke, ryan, and claire came over last night to see the last half of the usc game and some of the hawaii/geogia game. fun was had by all.
  • oklahoma sucks in bowl games lately. they've had one win with 2002 i think. they've been overrated all year for some reason. they lost to colorado and texas tech without dropping much in the polls and without legitmate reason (as opposed to usc which lost because of severe injury problems to the most important elements of a team: offensive line, qb, rb, as well as db). i'm not really sure why oklahoma was given the benefit of the doubt throughout the year, but they were. i wrote about oklahoma being overrated on 11/22 and stated then that i didn't think they deserved to be ranked above usc despite having the same record. i mean is oklahoma really the third best team in the nation? even after their victory over missouri for the big 12 i wouldn't have ranked them that high. i think that the big 12 was the most overrated conference this year. the big 10 was weak as well, but everyone knew they were suspect because of their weak overall non-conference schedule.
  • looking forward to the osu/usc game in week 2 next year. usc taking on big schools out of conference is nothing new, but it's nice to see osu going back to a tough schedule after taking this year off. a couple years ago they played texas, so it's not as if osu is afraid of playing a tough schedule, it just worked out that this year's schedule was particularly easy.
  • updated the movies list, incorporated all the movies from 2007 into the chronological/alphabetical listings. also inserted the geeky charts for year and gpa trends. working on the film stats next.

    • watched over 300 movies for the fifth year in a row. film stats are now updated.