Final 3 Costume possibilities

1. Brett Favre's Cell Phone

2. Cleveland fan with a knife stuck in the back of my LeBron Jersey.(in the interest of full disclosure - I really don't care that he chose to live in a city that he wanted to live in and to work for a company that he wanted to work for...can't he decide those things? I just think it'd be a funny costume)

3. A hot dog with a hole in the middle.  You see...it's a play on words.  It's a hollowed out weener...like holloweenie...never mind.  I'm not doing this one.  This is stupid.  I hate this!

3 (for reals yo). Eduardo Saverin with a knife stuck in the back of his suit jacket.

You see what I did there?

My phone is not an honor student

I'm slowly realizing that my cellular telephone is not that smart.
For awhile I really thought it was a Mensa level phone.  It was getting good grades, could do all sorts of fancy stuff and all the other fellas were always telling me how great it was.

Just to point out one feature.
This device can carry my voice from Cincinnati, Ohio all the way to Dublin, Ireland.
Yup.
I'm serious.
Not only that (I know I said one feature, but I'm gushing) this thing can take photographs.  I can push a button and it will capture IN COLOR a digital recreation of the very thing it's pointed towards.
It's true.

Stevie's Self Portrait

Lately I've been reading and hearing about all these "smart phones".  At first I thought they were talking about Stevie (my cellular device).  After all, if they're talking smart...who's smarter than Stevie?  Soon I realized they were talking as if we were living in the future.  They mentioned games, video, electronic mail, buying corn through Facebook.

That's when I realized that Stevie wasn't all that gifted.  He's actually kind of average.  Sure, he doesn't cost me an extra $400 a year to buy fake corn on Farmville...but who wouldn't pay an extra $30-$40 a month to have a gifted electronic device like that.
Well, for right now...it looks like me.

But you should know...I love Stevie.  And to me he IS special.  He might not get into Mensa.  He might not have HD video or fake Zippo lighter applications...but he's mine...and that's enough for me.

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The countown starts...again

We are refinancing the ol homestead.*  We had a 30 year mortgage in Middletown, a 30 year mortgage in State College, a 30 year mortgage in the Dub C...and then a 25...and now we're making the shift to 15 years.

It's our way of saying, "we're not sure we want to owe you any money in 16 years, fella"

I blame most of this on Dave Ramsey and a little of this on my constant desire for discounts.
The difference in overall payments going from 30 years to 15 years is....well it's a lot...I actually haven't done the math, but I'm told that I'll save literally dozens of dollars.

I love a good deal.
If you're looking for a good local (Cincinnati) mortgage fella, I got a guy (and a silly rate).  Just let me know.
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* This entire post was an excuse to use the word homestead

How about them politics

I have one rule when voting in an election.
It's more of a formula actually.
What I do (and this might not be a bad system if you're still undecided) is I count the yard signs for each candidate. 
You get one point per sign
- 2 points for a sign that's larger than my oven door
- 3 points if it's larger than my miniature van's back door
- Bonus point if it's a colorful sign that's pleasing to the eye
- take one point away if it's not parallel to the ground (seems mean to our O.C.D. friends)

This is just basic science.  The candidate with the most money has the most signs.  That candidate is probably best because they had the most money (look at the last couple big elections...the rich people won 'em).

This has also energized me to engage in the political sign display arena.  What better way is there to create tension with your neighbors, or convince absolutely no one who to vote for????

Here's the issue - I just want the signs...and don't want to mess up my math based election process...so I can't actually have political signs in my yard.  

So I'm working on some basic yard signs that will be awesome - but not mess up my system.

I know they're not colorful...they're still a work in progress...quit judging me and go out a Rock the Vote - it's what P. Diddy would want you to do...

something I just read

The good thing about staying up all nght is you get to catch up on some reading...Yesterday Annie sent me a link to a Poker weblog.
Weird, right?
Yup

I didn't pay much attention....but I just found the link and gave it a shot.
Turns out it's a review...or at least an endorsement of Joe's movie.

It was a fun read from a poker perspective.  Check it out...

Fine Roger Goodell

I'm a fan of Roger Goodell and his tough love policy.
He once fined me $25 because my "handshake feels like a fish"
whatever

Anyhow, overall I think he's doing good things for the league.  He's taking hits like Guiliani did when he cleaned up New York...but everyone seems to agree that it's a much nicer city now...and soon we'll say the same about the National Football League.
Not that it's a nicer city...that'd be silly...

Anyhow, I believe that leaders lead by leading.
Not just talking.  Not just writing.  They lead by going first.  Doing the stuff that they're talking about.

This is why I think Roger should fine himself.  He screwed up.  He fined three guys for tackling people.  O.K....I guess???  Even if you think we should be more gentle with your tackles - it's probably a good idea not to then profit from the very thing you're seeking to eliminate.

Roger is selling pictures of some of these nasty hits.
Hypocrit?  Absolutely.
We all are, by the way...Let's not get on him too hard.
Maybe just $100,000 would do?

avoiding havoc

If you're part of a crowd and you're walking through a doorway...keep walking. When you stop to have a conversation, you're creating havoc. Nobody likes havoc. Why would you do this? Just walk another 14 feet and have your conversation there.   It's silly to keep people behind you waiting while you talk about how much the world of baseball misses Mark Lemke.  We know!  Rehashing the same tired sports talk fodder in the doorway is just keeping people from their important endeavors.  Why are you keeping people from endeavors!?!?

Same thing applies to steps at a ballgame. I was at an event recently that had people walking up the steps and having to cross over to the other side of the steps to keep walking. The people talking on the steps only needed to walk 2 or 3 feet into their row and they would have avoided havoc. So simple.

If you're standing in front of a deli that flies fast and loose without a number system - when they ask, "who's next?" it's customary to take a quick look around before claiming that title.  There's an assumption that there will be a slight nod by the other customers assuring your place in line.  It's just that simple.  Take a quick look to make sure you're not jumping line.  Nobody likes the line-jumpers.

Line dancers either.

Last thing - stop putting the money down on the counter when you're paying for your canned food items.  It's saying, "you're beneath me in life and I'm not going to put this in your hand" instead of, "Hello Friend!  I just wanted to give you these three dollars along with this coupon for 50 cents off Campbells soup.  I trust that that coupon will be doubled and that you will have a great day!"

Wouldn't you rather not be that first guy?

That guy is the underlying reason for much of the havoc that we see on the internet news reports...

homage to young Brad

Sometimes I wish I could take a camera back into our post Alpha leader's meetings just to record what's said. Last night was one of those nights. I was meeting in the atrium with our coaches, so I missed most of Brad's talk...but the leaders couldn't stop talking about how great it was. I tried to call him and let him know what people were saying before I forgot all of it...but he's unplugged. He's off to our 50th state and is officially unavailable. So he won't get my calls or electronic mail messages...or read this. Still...I feel like I must do something in his honor. So I'll leave you with this: before you read too much into this - No, Brad's talk was not full of dark sarcasm. It was full of honesty and depth of insight. No, I'm not referring to the teacher that won't leave the kids alone. I'm more referring to him as the young fella who gave a great talk last night and appreciates things being mashed together like an old timie Reece's commercial.

movie mania

I live on what most people would consider tip money.  Not tips at a swanky restaurant that serves funny sounding French food - more like tip your barber kind of money.

Having said that, I should also mention that we pay a few shekels to the local sports leagues when our kids decide that they'd like to join a team.  So what we have here is limited resources meeting almost unlimited wants.  We buy the kids all of their needs, and we pick and choose the wants.

This necessitates having to decide between this little girl's wants...

and ours.  She often wins.

She lost this week.  One of my wants is to go see movies.  Lots and lots of them.  Sadly I've seen five movies in the past two years (in the theater).

This year is different.  In fact, this week was different.  We went to the world premier of Hitting the Nuts on Saturday.  This was approximately 65 minutes after we finished watching Saturday Night.

James Franco's Saturday Night was an interesting behind the scenes look at the making of Saturday Night Live.  I've read a half dozen books about the show and it was interesting to see if come to life.  Hitting the Nuts (an improv poker movie) was a lot of fun to see.  There was a huge crowd (maybe 15 times the size of Saturday Night) and laughter throughout.  They showed it at a theater in Clifton last night and apparently it sold out so quickly that they had to move it to a larger theater.

We weren't there for the sold out performance because we were watching The Social Network.  (That's three movies in three days for those of you keeping score at home...)  This was a great movie provided by the greatest Aunt in the world and her magical movie gift card.  We both "liked it" (see what I did there?)

I'm guessing it'll be months, or years, before I get back to the theater...but it sure was a fun run...

Here's what we did...

We went here and clicked on the 8 o'clock movie.
Actually, we also bought tickets to the 5 o'clock movie with James Franco (we haven't formally set up a time to meet...we'll probably just keep it casual).

I've heard that there are still tickets available.  Should be a fun night...

It'd be silly not to go.

what's the difference?

At what point does a food become "gourmet"?
Is it the quality of ingredients?
The quality of a chef or kitchen?

Is it the deliciousness of the food?
If not - it should be.  In fact, I'm going to make the argument that ultimately that is the marker.
Delicious = gourmet.  So, having said that...we have too many words for delicious.

Let's eliminate gourmet all together.  It's a wasted word on an arbitrary scale.

Is a McDonald's breakfast gourmet?  Doesn't matter...we already eliminated that word, don't you remember?

And what's the story on Homemade?
I've been to dozens of restaurants that have "homemade" on their menu?

Does this mean that they made it at home and brought it into the restaurant?  Does making it in an inferior kitchen a good thing?

And what's the deal with "restaurant quality"?  Which is better - homemade or restaurant quality?  Can it be restaurant made or home quality?

These are but a few of my food related questions...

one

"I'm not against anything, I'm just for Jesus"
-Brother Andrew
I'm 84% sure I'm mangling that quote, but I'm 97% sure I'm too lazy to go and look it up.

There's something simple about brother Andy.  He's focused on the thing that is number one for him.
I imagine if he was trying to reach out to kids in the city and they were really into basketball...he'd hang out at basketball courts. 

If he wanted to follow the typical path -he might even build a few...and it's even conceivable that he'd get "strategic" and really pour himself into building bigger and better basketball courts.  Pretty soon he'd need locker rooms and maybe even a pool...and he could invite people to join his Young Men's Christian Athletic chapter... It's easier to get wrapped up in projects than people.  It's easier to raise money for stuff than it is to mentor someone.  Why not build gymnasiums and recreation centers?  It's a good thing, right?  It's certainly impressive..

But Andy didn't do this sort of thing.
He wasn't a hater...he just kept his one thing first.  He kept on point.  He was focused.  He was a world changer.

I'm not.

I get side tracked.  I get wrapped up in projects, little and large, that often look and feel spiritual.  In fact, I can rationalize ANYTHING as being a good thing.  I defy you to name something that I can't spiritualize and somehow use to help me feel better.  I'm pretty good at it.

I often lack focus.  I'm exceptional when it comes to distractions.  If I could somehow flip a switch and put my time into what's #1...that would move me in the direction of a changed world.

I'm not sure I can change everything today - but I can try for a couple of minutes.  It's something, right?
So I'm making a list - and working on a few things...for a couple of minutes...and I'll add a minute tomorrow...and another the next...we'll see how it goes...

Here ya go