I guess I’m starting to get to the point now where I don’t have to post or keep track of each one of these:

My team only took one point out of four.

The previous two days weren’t bad, but weren’t great. 829 (4) on Monday, and 589 Tuesday. In the Tuesday league, I needed a 606 to bring my average up to 200 for the season. Instead, I now need a 617 next week, which I can do.

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A friend of mine sent me a link to this video the other day, and I just had to post it here.

I write software for a living, so I don’t at all support piracy, but this thing is just hilarious. Rampant piracy still exists, and yet people still write new and more expensive (to produce) computer games. Anyway, it’s worth a watch.

Also, it made me go dig up this old button that I was sure I still had:

I’m fairly sure I got that at PC EXPO 1990-something. Crazy.

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(Though really, with how my internet connection’s been, it’s more like Cox -3, MLB 0)

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Well, I made it to New Jersey (and back) this weekend, but it wasn’t easy.

I got to the Santa Barbara airport around 5:30 for my 6:25 flight, checked in, went through security, and sat down. I checked the status of my flight from LA to Newark on my phone, and saw it was delayed an hour and a half from 10:10 to 11:40. No big deal. Not long afterwards, I get a call from Orbitz that my flight to LA is delayed until 7:23. Again, not a big deal, especially since the connection was delayed as well. Around 7, there’s an announcement at the airport that the flight to LA is canceled because the plane that was supposed to take us can’t land in Santa Barbara can’t land because of the fog. It flew here from LA, circled, and then flew back. The next one was delayed until 11, and there was a decent chance it might canceled as well.

I decided the best thing to do was to skip that flight and drive to LA. It was around 7:15 when I left, and while you’d normally think that’s plenty of time to drive 100 miles for an 11:40 flight, you never know what you’ll get driving into LA. I’ve learned to make up time early in the trip when there’s little traffic to plan for taking an hour to go 15 miles on the end. It was some of the best, and most fun, driving I’ve done in a long time. 🙂 I was in the LAX parking lot waiting for the shuttle to the airport at a quarter to 9. As it turned out, I would have made my flight to NJ even if it hadn’t been delayed.

Going through security, they found my $3 Swiss Army Knife from Amazon, which I had no idea was in my bag. I had the choice to either leave it with them, or check a bag. I decided to just leave it. Every airport the size of LAX should be required to have a USPS outside security in every terminal. Or at least a mailbox, and a machine to buy stamps, or something. Santa Barbara security hadn’t noticed it. If they had, I would have just brought it back to my car there, and would still have it. In LA, though, it’s a bus ride back to the car, and while I probably had the time for it, it wasn’t worth it for something I can replace for $23.11 if I decide I really need another.

Anyway, I got on the plane, it took off at 11:40, got in around 8 AM, and both of my brothers met me at the airport. So far, so good. Saturday, I was looking at my itinerary for my return flight Sunday night. My return flight was through San Francisco. My car was in LA.

Oops.

I called United, and they said the earliest they could get me from Newark to LAX was a Monday morning flight at 7am that stopped in Denver and got in at 12:55 Monday. I also had the option of leaving Sunday night out of La Guardia (and my parents could have driven me there from my brother’s place, as they were going to be driving past it on the way home anyway), but then I’d have had to leave sooner than I wanted. I had them book me on the Monday morning flight, and figured that would be it. Then, I tried to book a flight on united.com from EWR to LAX Monday morning, and it came back with an 8:15 AM direct flight that got in at 11:15. I called back, and they said there were no economy seats available, only first class. I asked if I could have that instead, and was told yes. I asked, three times, if there was any extra charge, and was told no.

I was sure something would go wrong, so I called back Sunday to confirm the flight. First problem, I was still booked on both the 7 AM and 8:15 AM flight. Second problem, I owed over $500 for the first class seat. I spoke to a supervisor, who said I couldn’t have the first class seat, but somehow gave me an economy plus seat that wasn’t available the night before. Annoying, but I really just wanted to get home. I also told him to cancel the earlier (but arriving later) flight, because I obviously wouldn’t be flying out of Newark twice on Monday morning.

Monday morning I get to the airport, check in, and find out that I’m actually booked through all the way to Santa Barbara. Not a big deal, as I just don’t use the second boarding pass, but thought it was a little funny. Also, Orbitz had been calling me all morning about all the flights. The flight to Denver was delayed, the flight to LA was on time. The flights from Denver to Santa Barbara, and LA to Santa Barbara, were both on time. I got into LAX at 11:15, got to my car at 10 to noon, and was at work by 2. For 3.5 hours, and then I went bowling, having been awake since around 2:30 AM local time, and having gotten about 4 hours of sleep.

Then I went home, and slept for 12 hours.

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I’m going to try to get in the habit of actually posting here once in a while. Nothing as ambitious as Shane’s 30 in 30, just… you know, actually writing something from time to time.

Tonight, I’m hopefully heading out to New Jersey, but the weather isn’t looking too good. JetBlue canceled most of their flights into the area because of a storm. As of the moment, United hasn’t canceled my flight yet. With any luck, they won’t.

Last night, I finally got sound working on my Windows desktop, and hooked up the line-out from that machine to the line-in on my Linux machine, so now I get sound from both machines out of the same speakers. It also let me record some music from a flash streaming audio app. Last month, I saw Bowling for Soup, and one of the opening bands for them was Melee. I bought their older CD, but the new one doesn’t come out for another couple of weeks (same day as GH2 for the Xbox 360, actually). They have three songs up in a flash player here, but I wanted them in a format I could take with me. I’m sure there’s probably some way to record streaming audio with a single PC, but this was a nice easy solution for me to do it. They’re now on my iPod. And yes, I’m actually buying the CD when it comes out (in fact, it’s pre-ordered at Amazon).

17 days until opening day.

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Last weekend, I actually went back to Chumash to play some poker, and made some money. Did I write up a nice report? Of course not. Not that there’s much to write besides boring some hand histories, and how nice it is to have music (on my Pearl) at places I don’t bring my iPod. I played 5/10 NL ($300-$500), thinking it was 3/5 NL (but still $300-$500) when I sat down, but staying anyway. Was up almost $700 at one point (photoblog image), but finished up $405. I really need to get back into the habit of actually going there from time to time.

I’ve been messing around with the data that comes out of Frames, which has basically every game I’ve bowled for over two years now. Early results are here, which at the moment just has every series listed, but eventually I want to make it filterable/sortable/searchable. With cool charts and pocket/spare/pinfall details. Why? Why not. This week wasn’t quite as good as last week, but still solid with an 855 (4), 613, and 611 series.

I’ve been playing MLB2K7 on the Xbox 360 a lot lately. It’s a fun game, and has me more than ready for baseball season to actually start again. Last night, I played my first few games online, against Ryan. He hasn’t played much, and the hitting takes a lot of getting used to. I beat him the first game, but he won the second. In my defense, I played the second game as the Royals. Mets (road) opener: 18 days!

I got an R4DS for my DS Lite. It’s nice. Now, I have all 8 games that I own on a single (free after rebate!) 1GB MicroSD card. Sadly, I had to resort to downloading the ROMs from eDonkey, because I have no way to get them off of the DS game cards, and I lost my save games, but it’s worth it. Combined with the BSE skin, I just throw the DS in my bag, and don’t need a case for any accessories or anything. I can just throw the charger in my cable stable, and I’m all set.

Tomorrow, assuming the weather cooperates, I’m flying to NJ. Evan’s first birthday is Saturday. I leave Santa Barbara at around 6:30 tomorrow night, and get in Saturday morning at around 6:30. Then I leave Sunday night at 6 and get in around midnight. 18 hours of traveling, and I’ll be there a half hour short of 36 hours. Fun! It’s worth it, though, cause.. well, this.

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Monday:

685 over the first three. So close to 700. Stupid pocket 8-10 split in the 9th frame of the third game cost me that one. And one more pin anywhere in there cost me a 900, but I’m still happy with the series. Took 3 outta my four points against someone who shot 228-255-278-201. I won the first game by a few pins with handicap, and lost the third one.

Tuesday:

Needed a 227 the last game for a 700 series, but left two pocket splits (4-9, 7-10), and just didn’t carry well or throw the ball particularly well. Still, 653 isn’t bad. My team only took 1.5 outta 4 points, though.

Wednesday:

700! My third 700 series in as many months. Before this year, I’d thrown exactly two. Now I have three this year, with a lot of time to go. The only disappointment in this series is the one open frame. I really want to throw a clean series at some point. Stupid ten pin.

Overall this week: 2259 pins over 10 games. Not bad at all.

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In these circumstances, it’s worth reminding ourselves that, like it or not, the enemy we face in the war on terror has made Iraq the primary front in that war. To use a popular phrase, this is an ‘inconvenient truth.’

–Dick Cheney

The Vice President’s message is clear: The Republicans and Bush administration are the enemy we face in the war on terror. The terrorists were not in Iraq before their war.

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Amazon one-click + prime is dangerous. This is so tempting. I haven’t ordered it… yet.

I really don’t have much of anything to say, as usual. Dammit. I need to come up with things to write about, and post more.

Now, back to BSG.

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I think I’ll just let the title stand on it’s own today.

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