UngsungBlog: A (Fantasy) Sports Blog

According to weather.com, Monterey Park was supposed to be a good 5-10 degrees cooler than Tarzana for the weekend. Well, it sure didn’t feel like that yesterday. Also according to weather.com, Monterey Park was supposed to be in high 70s. Well, it sure doesn’t feel like that today! Add on to the fact that both my sisters made me help them with washing their cars (at 2pm, a primo time to do it!), and it’s a surprise that I’m not in a hospital room right now.

(I should point out that I don’t do well with heat. To paraphrase fat man/comic John Pinette, on really hot days, my kidneys start to fail while others don’t even break a sweat!)

Here are a couple news stories that piqued my interest, while I was sipping on my morning coffee:

- An Inglewood man allegedly stole 26 different cars in order to visit his girlfriend since the month of January. He had apparently taken cars from Inglewood, abandoned them in Santa Barbara, and taken other cars vice versa. Question: if he stole a car to go from Inglewood to Santa Barbara, why didn’t he take the same car back to Inglewood? Why steal a second car? Also, how lucky is this guy to be able to find a car in each city to get to his girlfriend’s house and back, as the article suggests (if he had stolen an odd number of cars, that would suggest that he had to take alternate transportation, or perhaps he did wise up and take at least two cars on a round trip)? By the way, not only does the guy not own his own car–as if that wasn’t painfully obvious–but the guy doesn’t even have a driver’s license! My favorite quote from the article:

His girlfriend, who was not arrested, told authorities she had been trying to dump him.

Obviously, she didn’t do a good enough job! Maybe the crook can sue the girl, on the basis that she did not completely end the relationship, causing him to act irrationally? In this litigious world we live in, would such a lawsuit really be that far-fetched? And where’s Florida nutjob…er…lawyer Jack Thompson to argue that this guy was probably driven to steal (pun intended) by Grand Theft Auto?

- Can a car thief also win a Good Samaritan award? Police in Jacksonville, Florida are looking for a man who allegedly stole a 2002 Nissan Altima, only to return it when he noticed that an 18-month-old boy was sleeping inside the car. Quoted from the article:

According to the police report, the mother had gone into the store to buy some oil, leaving her sleeping son and the keys in her car. She was in the parking lot when the thief returned and yelled at him as he ran away.

According to witnesses, the thief yelled back, “That’s what you get for leaving your kid and keys inside of your vehicle.”

Another witness heard him say, “You’re lucky you had your kid back there. I ain’t gonna do that with a kid in the car.”

I guess the woman was using her kid as an anti-theft deterrent. Either that, or the guy didn’t want to have to deal with changing the kid’s diapers. At least the thief had a heart, but I gotta ask: if the woman left a puppy in the car, would the thief have had the same reaction? The “thief” is being charged with kidnapping and grand theft auto, while the woman may be charged with leaving a child unattended and leaving her keys in her car. Leaving your keys in the car is a misdemeanor? What about leaving one’s keys on one’s front door (something I, admittedly, have done in the past)?

by Peter
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It looks like Hank had a close call on Thursday, nearly getting himself disqualified from the IMBC! Since I’ll have a long day ahead of me later today, I might as well get a blog entry in for today right now.

- Quick rant: I cannot believe how much Baskin Robbins has raised their prices. My local store no longer offers two pre-packed quarts for $8 (and this was 2 for $7 not long ago). A regular ice cream shake is now $4.39! A banana split is $4.99 by comparison! Also, my local Baskin Robbins charges for whipped cream! My sister ordered a milkshake, and the girl who helped us asked if she wanted whipped cream. My sister answered affirmatively, and the girl mentioned that there would be an extra charge. My sister quickly decided against the whipped cream, and the girl had a “what a cheapskate!” look on her face.

What’s next? Is Subway going to charge extra for salt and pepper? Will Starbucks start charging for cream and sugar? When will El Pollo Loco start charging for salsa? Look, Baskin Robbins, you guys are getting $4.39 for a couple of scoops of ice cream, some milk, and the right to have that mix blended in your cool hand-blender thingy. You can’t spare a few cents for some whipped cream?

(Damn, that might have been one of the weakest rants I’ve ever made!)

So a couple weeks ago, tfinch from the Anandtech forums offered a bunch of spare computer parts–an Athlon T-Bird 1.2GHz, an MSI K7T266 Pro, and 512MB of PC2100 DDR RAM–for the cost of shipping. I couldn’t resist, so I PayPal’ed $10 to him, and got the parts. I was thinking about making this computer a Linux box, but I decided to use it as a DOS/ROM box instead (think “older games”). I had most of the other parts for a computer at the ready: an old ATX case, a 300W power supply, an old CD burner, and a NIC, the last of which was necessary because the board didn’t have one on board.

(Tangent #1: I really don’t have a need for this system. I already have two desktops, and there are a pair of laptops in this house as well. I understand a 5:2 computer:person ratio is unhealthy.)
(Tangent #2: the last time I ever installed a NIC on a computer was back in 2000 :P)

All I needed was a hard drive, and I acquired that in a trade for a leather wallet worth $12. It was some junky wallet I had, and I was pretty happy to get a 20GB Maxtor HDD out of the deal. 20GB isn’t much, but I didn’t need a really big hard drive; as long as the drive comfortably held Windows XP and the games I was going to install–(S)NES ROMs, mostly–I would be fine with a smallish drive.

For some reason, the board will only detect 384MB of the 512MB of RAM. That’s not a big deal, as far as I’m concerned, although I will probably try to figure out the problem eventually. Installation of Windows XP took a while, and once that finished, I began the process of transferring a bunch of stuff from my other desktops onto this box. I used a USB 2.0 external hard drive to get the files I wanted, and that’s when I ran into my first problem: the DOSBox had USB 1.1 (read = S L O W) ports. I decided that a network transfer was the best idea, so I put all the files I needed on my desktop hooked up via Ethernet. That made the transfer go about 50 times faster than if I tried the transfer via USB.

Once the transfer was done, I moved the DOSBox into my room, and hooked it up to my Sceptre 32″ HDTV. After making all the necessary connections, I fired up Tecmo Super Bowl (NES) and began running amok with Lawrence Taylor and the New York Giants. I have an itch to play some Chrono Trigger (I LOVE that game!)

By the way, for those of you keeping score at home, DOSBox + NES emulation + 32″ HDTV = semi-geek. As Krunk pointed out, had I installed some flavor of Linux on the DOSBox, I would have earned tons more geek points.

Gosh it’s hot here! I may never fall asleep!

by Peter
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I’ve got some ground turkey meat thawing in my fridge right now. Turkey burgers FTW!

Before I get to the topic at hand…

- Finders keepers! Finders…um…felons? It seems a bank in Nebraska errantly deposited $106,000 into the account of Mr. George Costa, and Costa did what 99% of the population would do with that kind of found money: he went on a shopping spree. Apparently, he was able to spend $80,000 of it, before he was “charged with theft of lost or mislaid property. It is a crime to take money that’s been ‘delivered under a mistake.’”

Krunk and I talked about this story in length, and our thoughts were excellently summarized in his blog entry here.

Cliffs:

• The bank had six months to catch their mistakes. The article suggests that the bank had made multiple, errant transfers, so how did the bank not catch their mistake the first time around? Surely there had to be some sort of error checking protocol used by the bank to avoid making these mistakes.
• A felony is way too extreme, especially if the guy had nothing to do with the “theft.” Yeah, maybe it was morally wrong for the guy to spend found money, but is this really any different from going to a restaurant, getting the bill, noticing that you weren’t charged for a dish, and paying the bill anyway? Sure, the number of dollars is way different, but the principle, IMO, is the same.

Here’s one question I gotta ask: what, exactly, is “mislaid property”? Let’s say I lost my wallet at a Macy’s. If a person picked up my wallet, took the cash out of it, went on a shopping spree, and all of this was captured on Macy’s security cameras, could I sue the guy for theft? Worse, would he get charged with a felony? Perhaps it’s my idiotic a$$ that should be at fault for losing the wallet in the first place. With regards to this case, I think the people responsible for the mistake need to be fired, and the bank should have to eat (at least) part of the loss. I wonder if the terms and conditions of the account in question had a clause saying that errant funds could be reclaimed at any time.

(warning: the following may contain sports-like substances)

- So the NFL Draft has finally arrived. I’ve only heard hype for the draft for the last six months (consider that the NFL season ended in early February). A couple quick thoughts on the draft:

• People say the NFL Draft is the most unpredictable of all sports drafts; basically “there is no such thing as a ’sure thing.’” If that’s so, then why is everyone saying that the Raiders MUST take LSU QB JaMarcus Russell? Because he’s a once-in-a-lifetime player? Last I checked, Daunte Culpepper was that same type of player. Big arm? Sure. Good decision making? Sure. Sure thing? Who knows? Also, maybe the Raiders do need a QB, but they also need tons of help elsewhere.
• Also, why is WR Calvin Johnson labeled “a sure thing”? ESPN analysts have insisted that the Lions will be making a huge mistake passing on Johnson; never mind that the Lions have a history of busting when it comes to drafting first round WRs. As with the Raiders, the Lions need a ton of help too.

I’d like to see analysts use “a sure thing” less and phrases like “the best choice” more often to define draft picks. Unlike the NBA, where you were pretty sure that Lebron James was destined for superstar-dom, you can’t say the same for NFL prospects. For every Peyton Manning, there is a Ryan Leaf, after all.

My ground turkey is almost completely thawed. I can’t wait!

by Peter
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Quick-hitters:

- Some more Google Analytics keywords fun:

“pocket kings + acquired”
“emarketer williamson april 26 breakfast” <-- WTF???

- Apparently, “beefing” up one’s resume is bad, but outright lying on one’s resume is perfectly acceptable, says the MIT dean of admissions!!! This is a classic case of “listen to what I say, not what I do” syndrome that is all too common these days.

- I knew nobody was going to be eliminated from American Idol this week (yes, I’ve become an Idol degenerate). As soon as host Ryan Seacrest began talking about a “shocking result,” I was pretty sure about my prediction. It makes perfect sense; why put a damper on a charity show by eliminating one contestant?

So I enjoyed Hank’s blog entry yesterday–about pork tenderloins–and I was tempted to try to make that myself (by the way, Hank, thanks for putting a link to my blog on your site; I have returned the favor). I ended up making a baked spaghetti dish, with tomato sauce made from scratch.

(Tangent: I will not lie and suggest that I am an awesome chef, but I do enjoy cooking and can make a reasonably tasty dish every now and then. Most of the meals I cook, though, are simply rice- or spaghetti-based.)

I cannot stand Prego, Ragu, etc., and I only have a jar of Prego in my cupboard for emergencies–any time I don’t feel like making sauce from scratch. These prepared pasta sauces are way too sweet for my taste. My sauce consists of a few basic ingredients:

• Canned tomato sauce (not Prego, Ragu, etc.)
• A can of crushed tomatoes, or about two cups of fresh tomatoes, cooked down
• Half a large onion, chopped, and sauteed in olive oil
• Fresh chopped garlic, dried basil leaves, a pinch of black pepper, and other spices to taste.

I had no canned tomatoes, but I did have some cherry tomatoes that were about to go bad, and that worked quite well.

(Tangent: I used some Del Monte canned tomato sauce, which tastes pretty bad by itself. In fact, most canned tomato sauces I’ve tried are pretty awful. There was one brand that I used once that was damn good; if only I remembered what brand of sauce that was. Del Monte, Hunts, store-branded…they’re all quite terrible. However, adding the extra spices, onion, and garlic makes the sauce rather tasty.)

The result is a tomato sauce which I use for spaghetti, lasagna, and sometimes even pizza. I decided to make my version of baked pasta by cooking up some spaghetti that I bought from Costco for a bit less than al dente.

After draining the pasta, I tossed it lightly in some extra virgin olive oil, and then tossed the spaghetti in the tomato sauce. I decided I wanted some meat in my baked pasta dish, so I was going to make turkey meatballs. Unfortunately, I had no thawed ground turkey. Browsing through my fridge, all I found was some Kielbasa sausage. I figured that the sausage wasn’t going to taste that bad, so I sliced it up, tossed it in the pot of spaghetti, sprinkled some Parmesan cheese on top, and threw the entire pot in the oven at 325F until the sausage was cooked.

The spaghetti came out just about perfect, though I could have done without the sausage. I had also made myself a salad with iceberg and romaine lettuce, some unidentified greens, and some cherry tomatoes. I topped off the salad with a bit of Italian dressing. Unfortunately I never did get a chance to taste the salad, as I stuffed myself full with the spaghetti.

Ugh…I ate way too much. I feel a food coma kicking in. zzzzz…

by Peter
2 Comments »

A couple quickies before I get to my review:

- I love helping people in finding hot deals. I really enjoy spending other people’s money! Unfortunately, sometimes shopping for other people has its drawbacks. Case in point: my cousin is looking for parts for a new PC, and I’m more than happy to oblige. Unfortunately, shopping for these parts is only tempting me even more to build myself a new PC! Argh!

- Ultimate Bet, a poker site that I used to frequent–before online gambling became illegal–now offers Roshambo, or Rock, Paper, Scissors. As silly as the thought of playing Roshambo for money sounds, the “Remembering Roshambo Rules” section of that page is ten thousand times more ridiculous:

Rock
Beats – Scissors
Loses to – Paper
How to remember – Drop a rock on a pair of scissors, the scissors will break. A piece of paper, on the other hand, has rock covered. Scissors
Beats – Paper
Loses to – Rock
How to remember – With its sharp blades, a pair of scissors can destroy a piece of paper. But drop a rock on the scissors and there’s a good chance you’ll break the scissors.

Paper
Beats – Rock
Loses to – Scissors
How to remember – A piece of paper can wrap a rock. But a pair of scissors will cut right through it.

LOL!!!

I still think it’s stupid that paper beats rock. Throw a rock at a piece of paper, and the rock goes right through it, right? The people at Budweiser sure agree with me.

On to the review:

So I picked up the RA-P10 Portable “BoomBox” a couple weeks ago, because my sister wanted an iPod speaker system with alarm clock functionality. For months, she’s been wanting an iHome iPod speaker system, similar to this one, but for less than $99. So when I found the RA-P10, she gave me the OK to purchase one for her.

The RA-P10 comes complete with an iPod dock connector (iPod not included :P), as well as little plastic bases that are fit with whatever flavor of iPod you’re using: the regular iPod, the 30GB Video, the 60GB Video, the Nano, or the Mini. The RA-P10 also features a bright LCD display with a built-in clock/alarm, as well as a calendar and thermometer with Celsius and Fahrenheit readings. Also built in to the RA-P10 is an FM tuner; I’ve not played around with the FM tuner, though, as I hardly listen to FM stations. The RA-P10 comes with a handy little remote control, and when I mean little, I mean little. I find myself misplacing that remote frequently :P.

The RA-P10 itself can be powered by the included AC adapter or 6 AA batteries. Should the main power be cut off to the system, or the master power button not be depressed, the clock/alarm/calendar settings are retained by a single CR2025 “button” battery (included). Note that the only way to charge the iPod while using the system is with the AC adapter plugged in. Songs playing on the iPod can be changed via the remote, the back/forward buttons on the RA-P10 itself, or on the click-wheel of the iPod.

One really neat feature of the RA-P10 is the fact that you can set the alarm to a different volume setting than that of normal playback. That way, you could listen to your music at a low volume (say, before you doze off), and have the music play at a much louder volume to wake yourself up.

(Tangent: I haven’t had a new alarm clock in years, and perhaps this is a feature that currently exists in newer alarm clocks.)

The RA-P10 also has a buzzer, if you prefer a buzzer rather than an FM station or music from your iPod.

Sound quality is pretty decent; the two speakers output a cool 4W of power. All in all, the RA-P10 is a pretty nice system, albeit a bit bulky; it’s quite wide, and a tad on the heavy side, especially if you have AA batteries installed. Then again, how often will you be moving around your alarm clock?

by Peter
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I had an idea for today’s blog entry, but I decided to save it for another day.

Quick-hitters (warning: may contain sports-like substances):

- It’s a good thing that online wagering is illegal here in the states, or I could have lost a ton of money on Miami +4, Lakers +9.5, and Utah straight-up over Houston in Game 2. Not to mention, there were a few baseball games I would have wagered on that would have lost me money as well. Whew!

- I have the itch (again) to upgrade my computer. It’s a good thing I have a wonderful antidote: my empty wallet. I’ve been told that having kids is also a great way to avoid needlessly spending money, but I don’t need that much help.

- I’m having quite a bit of fun with Google Analytics. One of the neat features of Analytics is the Top 5 Keywords section–keywords that web surfers searched for which led them to your site. The most prevalent keyword used to find my site is “MX3200 review” (the Logitech MX3200 keyboard/mouse combination, which I reviewed a couple weeks back). There were also a couple hits from searches related to turkey burgers (mentioned here). Oddly enough, a search for “ungsunghero” was used to find my site once, probably by me

Some of the more peculiar keyword hits:

- food-induced coma <– easily my favorite
- cingular
- Garoid Probation Services (???)
- World record for green bean casserole (WTF?)

By the way, try a Google search for “scroll lock location mx3200.”

- Did you see the story about the four-year old kid getting clipped by a football player during a Colorado State intrasquad game? The video was frightening to watch; the poor kid got hit pretty good. I wonder if the parents will let their kid play pop warner football, and if they will, will the kid start injuring the other players? I can picture the kid playing free safety, obliterating any opposing player that dares to come down the middle of the field. Or maybe the parents will be so afraid of contact sports that they’ll force him to play a musical instrument. By the way, I love how CSU gave the kid a phone call and a signed football as their apology. Come on! At least spring for season tickets for the family! Or at least a signed jersey! Those go for far more on eBay than a signed football!

In all serious, it’s sad that a collision with a helmeted football player likely will be one of the first memories of this kid’s childhood. I’m very glad to hear that the kid did not sustain any serious injuries.

Next time, I’ll be making a “Diet UngsungBlog” (all the taste of regular, zero sports!) entry, as I review another tech product. I also plan, sometime in the near future, a blog entry about the FX Network’s show, The Riches.

by Peter
2 Comments »

(Warning: the following blog entry may contains sports-like substances)

And you dont know how it feels
No, you dont know how it feels to be me

You’re right, Tom Petty. I don’t know how you feel. I can’t say I know how these guys feel either.

- The Bulls beat the Heat in Game One of their first-round playoff series, and The Big Can’t-Win-One-Without-A-Sidekick blamed the refs, as usual. I love the photo in this article; someone award the photographer of that picture a medal of some sort! Shaq whined:

“My intention was to come out and be myself, until Eddie Rush derailed me,” the big man cried. “I’m used to just outplaying somebody and just playing hard, but I guess that’s what you got to do to stop Shaq.”

Sure, perhaps one of the fouls called on The Big Overrated was bogus. Still, Shaq’s whine rings hollow, especially when whining about the officials is a huge no-no in the NBA. By the way, Shaq, I think you meant to say “playing rough” rather than “playing hard.” I will not deny that Shaq is an athletic freak, and I do agree that he gets beat up a lot in the post. On the other hand, he deals at least as much punishment as he absorbs, and it’s no stretch to say that he gets away with quite a lot.

(Off topic, but TNT just showed that new T-Mobile commercial with Charles Barkley and Dwyane Wade. LOL)

By the way, as a former Laker fan, I got to enjoy a bunch of those calls that went in Shaq’s favor. Don’t get me wrong; he’s an awesome player. If only he would shut up sometimes. Then again, perhaps I just don’t know how he feels.

Speaking of Dwyane Wade, check this quote out, from this MSNBC.com article:

”Coach [Pat Riley] expects the world out of me,” Wade told the Herald. “He expects more out of me than anybody probably ever expected.”

Am I reading the quote incorrectly, or does this sound like Wade is whining about having to guard Luol Deng? Oh well, at least Shaq didn’t whine that Deng had one lucky game, or something like that.

- Floyd Landis may be a cheater after all, after his second set of urine samples tested positive for synthetic testosterone. Of course, Landis is in full whine mode, insisting that the lab that tested the samples did so with some improprieties. In Landis’ defense, his first set of samples (the “A” samples) were cleared months ago, which should go a long way towards preserving Landis’ Tour de France championship. I would like someone to explain this quote to me, though:

“This [the leaks of the test results] represents a massive failure on the part of WADA to manage the critical fight against doping,” Landis said of the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Huh? What? Quoi? I guess I just really don’t know how he feels.

Oh joy! HEROES is back on tonight! I can’t wait! And if you think I’m lame because I’m excited about a television show, then you don’t know how I feel.

(The “you don’t know how it feels” theme sounded like a good idea when I thought of it this morning! :P)

by Peter
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Hot dogs, beef and turkey burgers, the occasional carrot stick, dim sum, a delicious cream puff, birthday cake, potato chips, a can of soda, maybe a piece of celery…that’s a not-so-exhaustive list of what I have ingested in the past thirty-six hours. The worst part is, I still have one more large meal left this weekend–my mom’s birthday party. I think I’ll order milk of magnesia as my drink tonight, and order a dinner salad with TUMS.

Some quick-hitters:

- Damn Dodgers couldn’t come back against Pittsburgh today. Even with chances in the eighth and ninth innings, we couldn’t pull it off. Oh well, I’m still happy with a 13-6 record.

- I stopped watching the Lakers game for a bit, when they held a big second-quarter lead. Not long after, my dad told me that the Suns had tied up the game. At that point, I figured the Suns were going to win, and of course, they did.

- A man drowned in a moat after trying to flee casino security officials in Missouri. He ran after being questioned about an existing bench warrant. Talk about an overreaction! I figured he tried to attack the dealer because the dealer hit three consecutive blackjacks, or because the dealer put out an ace on the flop against his pocket kings. If any of those happened, then I would understand the guy’s reaction, especially if it cost him a big pot.

(I could probably dedicate an entire blog to crummy casino-related jokes about this story, but to avoid sounding overly insensitive, I’ll jump to another subject.)

- A South Carolina woman has smoking to thank for saving her life. Apparently, she took a smoking break outside her house when a tree fell through the roof. The woman’s daughter, who was also home, managed to avoid injury as well. I wonder if Philip Morris will use this story as a PR campaign entitled “Smoking DOES save lives!” I really love how the article says the house is not inhabitable; yeah, I would imagine a tree crashing through your house would render your house so. On a serious note, thank goodness that the family avoided serious injury.

I had a few other things to blog about, but I have to go get ready for the par-tay. I may have to reserve a room in the hospital before dinner, just in case I continue this stretch of gluttony.

Happy blogging!

by Peter
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So I can’t sleep, and because I’ll be occupied for most of today, I figured I’d make a blog entry now to keep myself in contention for the title of IMBC champion.

By the way, you’ll soon notice that the title of this blog entry may be considered a pun.

- So I was playing some more online poker earlier–play money, of course, because online gambling is illegal. I put $10 onto a $20 no-limit table. An hour later, I was down to my last $2, not because of bad play or bad beats, but because I was completely “card-dead.” The best hand I saw for this session was a pair of deuces, until the final hand I played.

I held pocket nines, so I threw in my last $2. I got called by one player, who held A5. Of course, the flop held an ace, with two clubs (my opponent held the five of clubs). The turn, miraculously, came a nine! It was the nine of clubs, but still, I now had the best hand. All I had to do was avoid another club on the river.

Oh well, at least I was up overall for the day, thanks to my profitable session earlier. Of course, the day would have been even better if I made the call with my pocket kings, as mentioned in the last blog entry.

- After that, I played some blackjack switch, which is similar to regular blackjack, but with a couple key differences:

1) You play two hands simultaneously, instead of one. Therefore, you need to make two bets instead of one.
2) The second dealt card in each hand can be switched with one another (hence the name of the game).
3) You can still split and double down. Blackjacks pay 1:1, not the usual 3:2. Blackjacks can be made after a switch, but not after a split (i.e. you have AA, split them, and end up with A-J and A-K; neither hand is considered a blackjack at this point).
4) A dealer 22 pushes all non-blackjack hands <-- the real stinker to this game.

So I was playing a few hands at $2 each ($4 per round), and was losing pretty badly. I then bumped up my betting to $5 a hand ($10 per round), and started making a recovery. I was actually in the black, when I played my last hand.

I was dealt 5-10 and A-6 against a dealer 6. If you remember the rules I mentioned above, you can see that this is an ideal situation to switch.

5-10, A-6 –> 5-6, A-10

Now I have a double down opportunity–made even juicier by the fact that the dealer has a 6 showing–as well as a blackjack. At this point, I’m guaranteed nothing worse than a loss of a single bet, assuming I double down on the 11 and end up losing that hand. Sure enough, when I doubled down, I was dealt a face card to give me 21. On top of that, the dealer’s down card was a ten! All I had to do was avoid a 5 or a 6, and I was going to win 3 bets, or $15.

When the 6 came, I was kinda ticked off. I still won a single bet for the blackjack, but I felt like I got robbed. I stopped playing after that hand, only because I felt that my momentum was slipping, and I was pretty happy to finish in the black after my horrible start.

Then again, why should I be so annoyed? I was playing with play money, after all. I would gamble online with real money if it were legal.

Good night…er…morning!

(So…did you figure out the pun?)

by Peter
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A couple quickies:

- I folded pocket Kings to a huge raise, and not only would I have had the best hand before the flop–the other two guys in the pot had 99 and 55–I would have made a full house. The pot was $60 too! Then again, you try throwing in $20 pre-flop (at a $20NL table) with Kings facing two all-ins.

I should point out that this was play money, as online gambling is illegal, and I would never consider breaking US law to gamble online!

- Quick NBA first round playoff picks:

Pistons in 5 over Magic. I’ll give Orlando one win at home.
Cavs in 4 over Wizards. I don’t see the Wiz winning a single game without Arenas and Butler.
Raptors in 6 over Nets. I’m so looking forward to hearing Raptors fans heckle Wince Carter.
Heat in 6 over Bulls. I just can’t pick against a motivated Shaq, even with a less than 100% Wade.
Mavs in 6 over Warriors. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Warriors pull the upset, though.
Suns in 5 over Lakers. The over/under on Kobe’s PPG should be 45, and I’ll take the over.
Spurs in 6 over Nuggets. AI and ‘Melo should be able to steal a game or two against the Spurs.
Rockets in 7 over Jazz. This series should be the most entertaining one of the first round.

- Watching a little kid falling off a piece of furniture should never be funny. Witnessing the tumble and laughing uncontrollably isn’t cool, either, and I know that. However, when your two-and-a-half year old nephew stands on your sofa, rolls forward, lands on a sofa cushion wedged in the gap between your sofa and coffee table, falls through the gap (as if the cushion was supposed to hold his weight), smacks something on the table during the fall, and is able to get up and laugh about it, then you should be allowed to laugh hysterically. If only I had a camcorder ready to record the fall.

(me <-- looks out window to see if anyone contacted the authorities)

- Check out the specs of this crazy computer (link ripped directly from Anandtech). Wow! Dual Geforce 6200 video cards? Crazy! The people over at Michael’s Computers think this guy is ripping people off.

For those of you unaware, this computer isn’t worth close to $1,500, even if a legitimate copy of Windows XP Professional SP2 is included in the install. For all we know, the CPU could be overclocked. “Very fast from experience”? “Will run anything you throw at it with ease”? Look, just because the darn thing loads Internet Exploder in less than five seconds doesn’t make your computer fast. Yes, two Geforce 2 6200 video cards is better than one, but that’s like saying two pieces of gum you found on the street is better than one. I’d like to see this thing run The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion on the highest settings; it’ll probably run 0.3 frames per second. I must say, though, that the case is pretty nice.

Well, this blog was supposed to be about a product I recently acquired, but I think I’ve said enough for today already. Plus, I’m getting my butt kicked at online poker, so I think it’s time to take a break.

Until next time!

by Peter
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