OK, Extreme homemakeover is just lame. I thought it was kind of neat the first few episodes it aired. I was like, "Oh cool this is like Habitat for Humanity without Jimmy Carter... and with a few recruits from HGTV." And the first few episodes were wraught with drama and infighting and mistakes by construction workers that made the show have a little drama. And sometimes, I think they actually left the house standing and rebuilt around it instead of tearing it down and building a frame house from scratch like it was made of legos. I mean the houses are like model airplanes where you don't even need glue, they're steakin snap together homes, where's the fun in that!?!?
So early on the show was kind of interesting as the teams failed to get along and missed deadlines, one show the contractor walked off the job which was kind of cool. In fact Preston, a show regular, was a complete a-hole the first two episodes if i recall correctly. The show is so scripted, like most reality shows its not even reality any more....
My most hated part of every show is right before they start to get to work Tye goes, "Guys... (dramatic pause) We really (emphasis on really) need to get this one.... (another dramatic pause)... right!" Oh really Tye? Is that what you're going to do tonight? I figured you'd half ass this one and give the people a house that was worse than their original. In fact why not just give them a mobile home, and skip town before they can 'move that bus' and find another bus behind it.
That would be awesome... "Move that bus!" Family looks puzzled at another bus, "Well we couldn't do the home thing so we tore down your old home and bought you a tour bus like ours... without a tv, running water, heat or air, and only a quarter tank of gas. OH and there's this guy Gus, he sort of lives in it along with you, and he doesn't really believe in hygene, Enjoy!
I'd love to just hear Tye say, "Guys, we really need to screw this one up big time tonight..."
And what I found hilarious about tonight's episode: this family of 8 kids or so, and a single mom, that's not the funny part, well, All (the detergent folks) gives the family a 100K scholarship to send the kids to college... 8 kids, 100K, hope its in state because that won't last long, especially after books are purchased. I was like, "come on All, water down some of your detergent a little more and give the people a little more than that."
The show is so scripted you don't even need to watch it. Family in rough times, they're most likely saintable by the catholic church for either their troubles or their works, the crew comes in, fam goes out, crew tears house down to video tape that Tye sends to fam on vacation, each crew member picks a room and theme, gay guy goes to Sears and does all the shopping, bus is moved, family is moved and all is well with the world.
I'm all for less fortunate or people in need getting these gifts, heck what person wouldn't want a room with 5 plasma tvs... even if it can only get ABC. BTW, who needs 5 tvs in one room? Couldn't that money be given to charity or one of those tvs be given to say someone who lost a tv in a hurricane or something? But more importantly, I don't know how this ever became entertainment? I mean its the whole quandry of how reality became entertaining. I mean to quote my generation... or perhaps the one before me, Reality Bites. THat's why video games are fun. For me what I find entertaining on TV is the stuff that's usually way off base from reality. Like cartoons, Lost, and the Office... which is sort of like real life but taken to an extreme that makes it hopefully utterly unrealistic.
Iv'e ranted about reality tv before. Luckily most of the really crappy running shows are dieing. I haven't seen a bachelor for a while. You knew that would die as every season got trashier and trashier... not that I ever watched that crap... i'm a man I watch manly stuff like.... Gobots. Gobots, now that's reality TV.
So the high speed netzero isn't working very quickly tonight. There's a reason I haven't blogged in a few days. I set up the netzero, then turned in my cable modem and cashed out of comcast. Well I move the computer out of the kitchen because there was no phone jack in the kitchen that was accessible. We move it upstairs and i hook it all up and plug it in.. no dial tone.
Come to find out that basically there are two connections in this house, a good one and a bad one. I'm not sure why but half of the houses phone lines are dead, just so happens they were ones we never really tried before. So tonight I bought this At&T; thing that allows you to turn a plug into a phone jack. I think it works by using the electrical wiring in your house as a phone wire and you plug one jack into an existing phone and then it some how connects to this other one.
SO far its working but the internet is slower. I'm not sure if it was just fast the first time due to an off peak time 8AM, or if the "Instajack" is slowing things down. WE figure we'll give it a few days and if it doesn't pick up we might conclude its the Instajack.
Well, the thing I've been putting off for a year now is finally happening, I'm getting rid of my cable modem/cable broadband internet. We just start calculating the costs of it and looking at last year's heating bills it just doesn't seem wise or feasible to incur $200 heating bills and pay 50 bucks for fast internet. But I did download Netzero Highspeed for 10 bucks a month. So far so good its not too slow and is faster than comcast sometimes is, though that's cause comcasts has all those outages and what not.
Shoot to save forty bucks I figure its worth it. And plus now I have internet access at work so i do most of my internet there and only blog at home really.
So I saw doom this weekend. I must admit I was in the mood for a dumb action movie and it filled my lust for violence and gore. I have been graving a good action flick and frankly hollywood is just not delivering. I mean i realize the age of action is sort of over, T2 I think marked the peak of this and ever since its sort of been in decline. The Matrix (which I rewatched last weekend) was great and even provided more depth in script (not in Keanu's acting) than the norm action flick. But overall hollywood is sort of rejecting the good well done action flick. I suppose Sin City was an action movie but I couldn't bring myself to see that one.
Doom overall was decent, well done and nice and violent. Though the biggest complaint is (semi-spoiler) the demons aren't demons. They're not hell spawn creatures from a nether gate opened on Mars. But rather they're genetic creations created by genetic engineering.... the rest of this will be filled with spoilers so read at your own risk...
Yeah so their is a gate that takes people from Nevada to Mars, that this ancient civilization created many moons ago. Their is a giant complex on Mars that is researching the civilization, testing weapons (easy to test weapons in a place where earth's laws don't come into play), and testing various other stuffs.
The Rock and his crew are sent after a science team goes missing deep in the lab on Mars. They transport via the gate (kind of like stargate i guess) and then go to work trying to track down the missing scientists. They encounter one who is a little odd and tears his own ear off. It basically develops and it comes to be known that the scientists were doing genetic mutations on prisoners there. The ancient civilization apparently had 23 chromosones (we have 22), this extra chromosone gives people either super human powers (if they're good), but if they're bad it turns them into monsters with super human strength and what not. So its sort of a predestination chromosone that determines whether you're good or evil. This plot line is a little lame and I thought the whole opening a gate to hell idea was much better.
So once this becomes known in the movie you could kind of hear people get annoyed in the theater... all three of us. So basically they go tracking these monsters down, people die, a show down ensues and a few plot twists occur.
They employ a first person view for part of the movie where its like the game and you see through the eyes of the soldier as he makes his way killing zombies. That part was ok but gives you a little bit of vertigo and luckily is only 15 minutes long. I was afraid they'd make most of the movie like this but they only did it for a few minutos.
Overall is was violent, lots of language but generally a good mindless action movie in the history of Arnold and Sly Stalone. The Rock is a great action hero and I generally like him more every time I see him. He actually is a better actor in my opinion than Arnold and Sly. His dialogue leaves much to be desired but he just delivers it. The part where he finds the BFG (Big 'Freaking' Gun--strait from the game) is pretty cool, and what it does is even cooler.
In the end though they could have made a better movie i think if it were truer to the game. It would have been cooler to have a big final showdown with a giant monster boss man. But i recommend seeing it if you A. like the rock, b. want action, or C. want to see a BFG.
Well they put up a good fight... well not really, but who could with Oswalt pitching the way he did. I mean he was amazing in both games, that sinker sinks to no end. Not sure what theyre' going to do this off season. Last year they fired i believe the hitting coach, well can you do that again? No not really. And you can't fire the third winningest manager in baseball. I don't think Larussa is necessarily the problem though I have always thought his teams lack motivation. That is a pretty common complaint about him, not very inspirational.
I'll be interested to see what happens in the offseason. My thoughts are to get rid of Marquis, never been a fan of his really. I mean as my atlanta fans friends put it, "If Bobby and Mazone pass up on a pitcher you know that they got some problems." I mean if Mazone couldn't get him to pitch well then I don't think Duncan's going to make him into a dominate consistent guy. He'll always be descent enough but not good enough to be a number two or even possibly a number three pitcher.
I think Grudzielanek will go and I'd let him. He was great this year and after his performance he'll get some nice offers, none the cards should match though. In the end I think his post season performance (sub par) and the money he'll probably be worth puts him out of the price range of a desirable 2nd basemen for the cards.
With Larry gone I think they should make a big sign and try to find someone to bring some life and youth to the outfield. I've heard Brian Giles name come up as I think he's a free agent. At first I thought this was good but then I just checked, he's a good 35+ years old. That's not what we need. I hope they don't put So into a regular role, I just think he lacks a lot of power and speed. He's just too small to be a big time outfielder/hitter.
I'd make an attempt to get Reggie back, he's been a good fit for the cards and I think he's happy with the team. Plus Larussa needs a black guy on the team to combat the theory that he's a racist.
Taverez... he's ok good reliever, not as good since they took his pine tar hat away, but he might be worth keeping around. We lost Kline last year, and King was out so the bullpen is pretty bare for middle relievers.
I'd let Morris go, hard to say that after all he's been through with the team. I think the cards need to make the hard move though and move to aquire some different kind of pitching. That was my big complaint with the Mulder for Haren trade. Haren was our one fast ball pitcher, Carp's got some speed but he and Suppan rely more on mixing it up. Morris and Marquis sort of go out and throw an average game and try to mix it up but miss their locations a lot. I wish they had held onto harren at all costs because frankly we don't have a guy that can throw the heat like an Oswalt can. That's the genius of Houston is you have three amazing pitchers who all pitch differently. They each have a different pitch that's their strong point. I think part of the cardinals problems is they have four pitchers that are all similar to some degree in their style. After a few games the other team figures out how to hit them pretty easily.
Superficial Side note: Thompson on the cardinals (the reliever) he scares me. He almost looks like a down syndrome guy or something he just looks odd. Now I'll feel like a jerk if he is or got severely burned as a child.
As far as pitching potential, Burnett has the most potential but like Marquis I think he's got some sort of attitude or something that's keeping him at the level he's at. John Thomson's an option out of Atlanta if he's healthy but I'm not a fan of picking up after Atlanta's leftovers.
But I'm not sure, I've heard maybe Reyes will come up and pitch for the birds though as a starter, not sure. There's always next year. Go white sox!
OK, funny note, before I turned the Cards game off in the 8th Inning, I thought to myself after Berkman chipped a homerun over the closest wall to home plate in the bigs, "Why can't any of the cardinals hit a stinkin blooper over that wall that is a stones throw from home plate?" Apparently one cardinal could and thus did. Way to stick it up the their poo holes Albert.
I watched the first few innings tonight, the cards were up 2 to 1 when I turned it off. I feel like the cards will have to earn me back this year... that and i'm tired. I'm not trying to be a fair weather fan but my blood pressure seriously can't take much more of this. I was swearing and yelling so much this weekend I really just want to go to bed one night where I'm not fuming and insomniatic because of poor baseball.
Arrrgh!!!! Ok the cardinals are done. OK my biggest beefs with the game.
A. I'm not trying to make excuses, but that homeplate umpire was just plain awful. I'm sorry but if you call them up and in, then you're a complete moron. There is no way a hitter can hit a pitch up an in, thus in my opinion its not a strike.
B. The cards managing was awful.
Larussa, I respect your getting kicked out, you stuck up for Marquis, even though he sucks, and you did what you had to do. However, make sure your supporting staff knows how to manage. Retarded Oquendo should not have sent Pujols home, he's slow and unless he plans on ramming the catcher he should have stayed with the bases loaded and one out. But then again why are you leaving Marquis in? He's not a reliever and with your post season on the line wouldn't you want freakin Izzy in???
Note to Edmonds: Edmonds, that was not a strike, don't worry. But you can't drop F bombs on an ump that was just dumb.
C. I don't think the cardinals team knows how to desire to win the World Series, I mean i've never seen a bunch of guys less psyched up to win. I mean they look asleep out there.
D. You are power hitters, hit homeruns, freakin Mabry hit the ball the farthest and he plays once and a blue moon.
Kyle, I'm there with you man, but frankly this team doesn't deserve to win, they're not playing championship worthy baseball.
I hate houston, "lets make the lamest smallest baseball park ever..." But what I hate even more is the fact that the Cardinals have hit close to ZERO Homeruns out of the crappiest smallest park in the world.
Suppan, hats off to you you were awesome, its too bad you got a bunch of batters who don't care enough to swing the bat. I"M SORRY BUT THE FIRST PITCH, IF IT COMES STRAIT DOWN THE MIDDLE SWING AT THE BLOODY SODDY THING!!!!! This is the same complaint last year. FIRE THAT BATTING COACH AND HIRE SOMEONE WHO TELLS THEM TO SWING AT STRIKES NOW PITCHES THAT OUR AT THEIR HEADS!!!!
I wonder how those white sox are doing.
ICE TO SEE YOU!!!
Guh, at least the Blues are good this year.... oh wait they suck too! And so do the Rams.... DANG IT! AND FREAKIN NOTRE DAME LOST TOO!!!! I HATE MY LIFE..... well the sports aspect... everything else I'm blessed in and don't deserve anything that I have. But it'd be nice to have a freakin team that could win a championship.... disregard the fact the Rams won back in whatever.... though that was really cool and still remains the best super bowl i've ever seen. I mean it came down to the last play with inches saving the Rams, great, classic. Hmmm... from now on I only watch ESPN Classic, less depressing.
Pretty much this is the make or break game for the redbirds, if they don't win tonight they don't have the intensity in my opinion to come back 3 to 1. What I've noticed so far in 4 innings is the strike zone is really off. Nothing low, and lots of high and outside pitches are being called strikes, a lot different than some of the previous games in this and the AL series. I think its bad to call high pitches strikes because it forces a pitcher to throw high which allows hitters to crank them out of their.
The most frusterating thing though is by far the lack of power in the cardinals bats. I mean Pujols has hit one of the few homers in this series and it was a solo shot. This small ball and sac fly stuff is good but not when the opposing team has a better pitching staff than yours. The cards should be exploiting their power and cranking balls out of the park because that is the one thing they really have over the stros, a more powerful offense that is capable of more. Oh well.
Also my thoughts on the Falcons game: The Saints got robbed, I hate the saints but to call a holding call on a field goal with 3 seconds left is a joke. I saw no holding, and to decide a game like that is rediculous, they should have just let it go to OT, granted there its decided by a coin toss for the most part, but at least its not a ref making the call.
Man just got back from church @ LMPC where Joe dropped a good old Atom Bomb of a sermon, man it was amazing. Though I must say any time you have a sermon involving Judas its going to be interesting. Judas is just one of those guys that facinates me, I mean U2 wrote a song about him. So anyway its a beautiful mtn day. We'll probably just sit on the porch, yell at cars that drive to fast and chill like its 1999. On a sad note coppertop has injured his left paw/toe. I think he must have stepped on an Acorn wrong so he's limping around. Its kind of cute but sad too. He should be fine, hopefully I won't have to do some invasive surgery. He looks like Tiny TIm hobbling around the front yard.
I hate when you need a new tooth brush but you got a dentist appointment coming up so you wait to just get the free one they give you. Then you go to the dentist and they say, "Oh sorry we're out of tooth brushes here's some floss and scope...."
Yeah like I'm ever going to use floss and scope tastes terrible. So i go on using my moldy old toothbrush till the next appointment sometime in 2006.
Well my irish almost did it, just goes to show the luck of the irish is with USC. The cardinals, well they stunk. I didn't see all of it as i was watching the Irish mostly and i ate dinner so no TV during that period of time so I missed what happened to Nuni (nunez). Its going to have to take some sort of win one for the gipper inspiration i think to get the cardinals going. Its frusterating watching the games because they just don't seem to be inspired that much. I remember the team back a few years ago when Kile died, they were inspired and played better than they were, they wanted to win it for Kile. But last night they just seemed like a team that couldn't hit a ball out of a bag. I don't think Clemens was very sharp (morris wasn't terrible, he was as good as he gets for the most part) but Edmonds, Walker, Eckstein, Gruzalenk especially, were just sort of sitting on their thumbs. Pujols tries to do it all himself but he can't. Also if I were Larussa I'd put Mabry in for Reggie, I think So is good but lacks true power on the bat and is about the least intimidating guy out there. Mabry has so much more experience and has a little bit more pow behind the bat. Plus he looks like Ross from Friends.
SO it was a dissappointing day in sports, Penn State lost too which is a bummer, I'm a fan of old senile men coaching sports teams. A funny story about Joe Pa from the Pickle.
I've been struggling my way through RebelStar Tactical command, its tough because they put you on boards where aliens come out of nowhere, well you know where they'll come from but they pop up throw a grenade at you and kill all your guys in one swoop. So Its a little frusterating. Makes me want to dive into Final Fantasy, but Rebelstar is cool and i like it, I just wish it was so dang annoying sometimes.
I simulated the rams game again, granted it was the rams of 2003 vs the colts of 2003, Rams were good, Colts were so so. But I was winning heftily at the half and then I turned it off because I had two cheap things happen back to back that just ticked me off. Warner fumbled the ball on the 1 on a QB sneak and then the Colts beat me on a play that led to a 80 yard touch down. I hate crap like that.
I don't know why, but I like watching movies on saturday morning/afternoon. Maybe its because its a perfect time to do house work and I revolt against that responsibility and watch a movie spurning both my calling as a home owner and ignoring the beautiful day outside.
This weekend's flick was memento. I'd never seen it... not sure if I even saw it today or not, my memory's not too good. Anyway, I have no idea what happened in that movie, kind of like total recall. So I guess like total recall i'll figure it out 10 years later. So I'll blog more about it when I'm 35.
Other than that I'm gearing up for the Irish USC game. I'm just going to sit back and cheer my Irish hopefully to victory. I'm pretty beat from a week of work. I worked some long hours in nashville and just feel like being lax and chewing gum on the couch. Wifey's taken care of by a friend up for the weekend, so i"m good to chill. Copper's sunning himself outside watching the traffic and barking at the fat kids that walk by our house from time to time.
Cards play at 4, not sure how they'll do. I knew they'd lose the second game, call it cardinals fan intuition. My feeling today is sort of mixed, the usually play well in day games, but its morris vs clemens, not a good match up. So we just have to hope the Rocket is getting to old to amount to anything.
I thought about doing something today, but frankly, just not feeling it. I got my thick socks on from the Sock Shoppe and just feel like chillin.
Wow, i haven't blogged much lately. I've been pretty wrapped up in the playoffs of baseball. This past weekend I watched practically every game, even the Cardinals midnight madness to sweep the padres. I can't get that excited about sweeping the pads... because they stink beyond all get out. Though Buster Olney (ESPN GUY), should eat it since he thought the pads would beat the cards. I hate how people get on these trends where they think "Oh this would be a great upset so I'll pick it..." Ignoring logic and reason. But now the cards have a stiff challenge yet again from the Houston Astros. I hate the Astros... not sure why but I haven't liked them in a long long while. Maybe its because their uniform changes more than any other team.
I think the cardinals will be able to do it, their hitting has been on, they're more determined than the Braves, and their pitching staff is better than the braves. The braves really just lacked a bullpen, i mean that was their whole problem all year and everyone knew it was going to eat them alive in the post season. Tonights' game was just sad to see them blow a 6-0 lead. I mean the cards blew a few leads against the padres but they'd still pull out the win. It will be another tough series and will all hinge upon if the cards can continue to light up against the astros. They seem to do well against good pitching. So we'll see. Though i wanted the braves to win because I like Bobby Cox, Smoltz, and Franco and a few others, their loss helps me get closer to a 20$ bet I placed at the begining of the season> I bet a guy at work that the Cards would make it the World Series, he bet me that the Braves would make it to the World Series. So now I got nothing to lose on that bet.
In other news I got the floors sanded well and good this weekend. I took thursday and friday off and hit it with an orbital sander for an entire day on Friday. My back is still sore from all the work. Basically you use all the muscles in your body to move this giant machine in the opposite direction it wants to go in. But the floors look pretty good, I'll need to get down on my hands and knees to get the edges and a few trouble spots that wouldn't come up. Then I'll have to varnish it good, or what ever the stuff is called.
Went to the Covenant homecoming this past weekend. I'm not sure why they brought the number 3 team in their division or NAIA or whatever but they did, and got beat 2.0. I missed most of the game but it was good to see people i know.
After the game we went out with some friends and then came back and watched the Interpreter. Nicole Kidman and Sean Penn are great actors but a really boring movie doesn't help them out. The movie had an interesting political drama story but in the end it was like most political dramas... dull, slow, and boring. I wouldn't recommend it, I feel that it in no way improved my life status or even entertained me... in fact I think i fell asleep for some of it. It needed more Arnold Swartznegar... "PREPARE TO BE INTERPRETED.... WITH MY MACHINE GUN!!!" Now that would have been cool.
Today we churched, and then just relaxed. I watched Gross Pointe Blank which despite what my highschool news writing teacher said, was a greatly funny movie. I'd seen it before but its humor and irony were all the more funny the second time around. Sometimes John Cussak delivers his lines with too much of an ease that its unnatural. His wit in the movies comes off to witty and is hard to believe any one is that quick on their feet with funny lines and witty banter. But nevertheless it still makes for a hilarious movie.
I'm going on a short business trip this week so you know what that means... new gameboy games. Whenever I go traveling I invest in a gameboy game. Since money was tight though I traded in my entire Super Nintendo and all the games to give me some dough to buy some games. I ended up getting two, I could have gotten more but kept the store credit for later.
I got Rebel Star Tactical Command, which is a gameboy version of the popular X-Com series on computer. The game plays much like those games, though I never played them personally, I'd watch my RA at Covenant, James, play them all the time. So far its kind of fun, has a bit of strategy and RPG elements to it. It can be kind of difficult especially after getting used to the Fire Emblem series and how it does combat, its hard to get used to this combat, where a wrong step can end your person's life. But basically the plot is you're sort of a young kid who signs up for the resistence to fight the alien lords who have enslaved humanity. You know typical affair. You get a squad and go around trying to outsmart the aliens in south america (i think that's where it takes place...)
I also got Final Fantasy 1 and 2. They combined both into one game and though it was expensive I figured two games for one was decent. I think its 1 and 2 of the gameboy version from the original gameboy, not the nintendo, but so far from the two second i looked at it, it looked good.
I think though I won't get rid of any more gameboy games. I traded in Mario kart and realized the little money i got from the store wasn't worth it. Though i really didn't like mario kart at all.
Well other than that most of my thoughts are on baseball right now. Work's good, this trip to nashville will be nice get me out of the office and get me busy on a project. Wifey will be a little bummed though, but at least she'll have copper.
EAT IT RED SOX EAT IT!!!! HAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA!!! Should have passed on Renteria.... hahahahaha. I don't care about last year. This year you lost!
Ok that was a good lost. I at least feel like we got somewhere with that episode. Though I must say those others are smarter than they look.
This was off a reliable source. (FYI, I can't stand by everything on this website, viewer discretion advised... though most of its very funny)
Padres swept by Cardinals in divisional playoffs
As the Padres look to eek out an N.L. West division title this week with a sub-.500 record, the team was informed today by major league baseball that they have been swept out of the first round of the playoffs by the St. Louis Cardinals, three games to none.
“We didn’t really see the point of delaying the inevitable,” said commissioner Bud Selig. “We don’t want any Cardinals players to get hurt playing those pointless games.”
The league record books will show that the Cardinals won Game 1 of the division series 9-1 behind strong pitching from Chris Carpenter and four RBIs from Albert Pujols. St. Louis took Game 2 by the score of 11-0 thanks to seven errors by the Padres. Game 3 went to the Cardinals 7-1, as the Padres allowed five runs to score by wild pitches and passed balls.
“It’s disappointing to get knocked out of the playoffs, but I can’t say it’s surprising,” said Padres manager Bruce Bochy. “God knows, baseball didn’t want a team as terrible as we are tarnishing the good name of the major league playoffs. At least this way it will be a little less embarrassing for us since our complete destruction at the hands of the Cardinals won’t be played out on national television. And heck, the fact that we were only outscored 27-2 in the three games is much better than I would have expected had we actually played.”