UngsungBlog: A (Fantasy) Sports Blog

Quick-hitters:

- Further proof that I am impossible to please:  it was freaking hot today!  89F in late March???  I had to take out my tower fan out of storage today!

(How do I know that it is officially warm?  I’ve found mosquitoes in my house, dammit.)

- Props to Dell!  I received my restore disks from them on Friday, via DHL Next Day!  Awesome!

- So, as scheduled, the first UngsungBBQ of the season occurred on Saturday.  Beef spare ribs, chicken wings and drummettes, grilled Italian squash (I had tomatoes, but we were already full before I got a chance to cook them), and potato salad, oh my!  My sister and mom came by and stayed for the entire weekend, and although the BBQ was clearly the highlight, that wasn’t the only thing that went on:

1) We spent Friday and Saturday nights playing various flavors of Karaoke Revolution for the PS2 as well as some Rock Band.  My Wii was just collecting dust.  We had to respond to our upstairs neighbors with their darn kids pounding on the floor above us all night, so what better way to retaliate than with horrible singing and loud music?  My mom, who owns a karaoke machine, wanted in on the gameplay, but I didn’t think she would have fared too well on Here I Go Again or Against All Odds.

2) My local Costco never stocks Mexicoke, so I asked my sister to pick me up a case earlier in the week; she was already planning on going to Costco, and I knew that the Alhambra Costco stocked Mexicoke.

Sure enough, on Friday, she brought me my case!  In exchange, I offered to file her taxes via some Taxcut software I picked up earlier in the year.  Definitely a fair deal, IMO, considering that I only had to file a single W-2 and a single 1099-INT.

3) Right before it was time for me to light the grill, I grabbed the bag of charcoal, opened it, and noticed something strange about the briquets in the bag.  Apparently, I did not buy charcoal briquets; I bought a bag of actual charcoal!  One piece was about a foot long!

(For the uninitiated, charcoal briquets are usually formed from wood burned at extreme temperatures in the absence of oxygen, and then the resulting product is shaped into the briquets we know today.)

I decided to try lighting the pile of charcoal anyway, and I noticed that it took a heck of a lot harder to fully light the charcoal than typical briquets.  The charcoal also shot off sparks every now and then, which was, admittedly, kinda cool.  Unfortunately, the charcoal eventually burned too quickly, and I was only able to cook off it for a few minutes.  A quick run to VONS to get some Match Light solved that problem, however.

Note to self:  Never, EVER, buy charcoal non-briquets again!

4) Oh yeah…there was also a lot of basketball on.  In fact, most of Saturday was spent watching tournament action, especially the UCLA near-disaster (more on that later).

Did I mention that the food was damn good?

- My NCAA tourney thoughts, Days 2-3:

1) #1 seed recap:  UNC looks unbeatable; Memphis might get upset by Michigan St.; I would love to see Davidson upset Kansas, and UCLA…

2) I hope the Bruins learn to never relax against a second round opponent again?  Look at their recent history:  a furious rally against Gonzaga in 06, a near-collapse against Indiana in 07, and now a near-upset against Texas A&M?

They better not be resting on their laurels against W. Kentucky.  To say that Mbah a Moute was rusty would be the understatement of the century.  Talk about a horrible game!  Eight TOs?  Good thing Collison’s 3-point barrage in the first half, Love’s fadeaways down the stretch, and Collison’s layups late saved the Bruins’ butts.

BTW, who saw the parallels between this game and the game against Gonzaga?  Think about it; we had a furious rally, a late lead, and a key forced TO.

(Tangent:  I know this is coming, but after yet another favorable call for UCLA—Shipp clearly fouled the A&M player on the Aggies’ last shot—I’m worried that people are going to start slapping asterisks on the Bruins, should they finish this and win the title.  The last thing I need is some New England Patriots’ comparisons.)

Does this spell a third straight Final Four?  Well, with Duke and UConn out of the tourney, I’m only worried about Xavier.  Am I looking past W. Kentucky?  Yes I am :P.

By the way, I guess we can officially start the “Goodbye Collison” and “Goodbye Love” clocks.

3) Two 12 seeds in the Sweet 16?  Duke and G’town out, beaten by WVU and Davidson (???) respectively?  League parity, or overall weakness at the top?

I’m tired, so I’ll finish up with this:

4) After day 3 of the UngsungBlog bracket contest, my sister is up (32/48 correct picks for me, 34/48 for her, and she has a three point lead on me.

I forgot to mention this last time, but here is the scoring system we’re using this year:

Correct picks in the first round:  1 pt

Correct picks in the second round:  2 pts

Correct picks in the Sweet 16:  4 pts

Correct picks in the Elite 8:  8 pts

Correct picks in the Final Four:  16 pts

Correct championship pick:  32 pts

Until next time!

by Peter
1 Comment »

One quick-hitter:

- For (quite possibly) the first time in the history of my residence here in this condo, a non-UPS delivery person did not leave a package on my front door on Saturday!

Thank goodness the shipper required a signature on delivery on the package. Otherwise, a $100+ webcam would probably have joined the ranks of my 19″ LCD, my welcome mat, and the damaged tuba that was being sent away for repairs by a neighbor of mine on behalf of his/her kid.

I love this place, about as much as I love Buy.com (more on that another time).

- Saturday was my oldest sister’s birthday!

(Happy Birthday, Nancy!)

My sister and I had planned to give Nancy a birthday dinner at Saladang, a somewhat high-scale Thai restaurant in (South?) Pasadena. I’d like to once again thank my mom for ruining the surprise…

The food at Saladang was a heck of a lot better than any Thai restaurant I’ve ever tried. For starters, we had an appetizer plate full of various fare: egg rolls, fried won ton, shrimp on skewers, etc.. We also had this very interesting green apple salad with chicken and a peanut dressing. Good stuff! We also had a hot and spicy seafood soup, which was only pretty good.

The main course consisted of a bunch of typical Thai restaurant dishes: Pad Thai, Pad See Ew, two different curries, and a typical fried rice. Everything was ordered with chicken, even though I wanted the Pad See Ew with beef. Oh well.

(Note to self: Never, EVER, order yellow curry again. Saladang’s yellow curry was ridiculously sweet; I wasn’t sure if I was eating a soup or a dessert.)

All in all, the food was quite excellent, and the bill was quite reasonable.

- After dinner, my cousins came up with the great idea of playing pool. After a bit of deliberation, and a trip back home to drop off the *ahem* baggage, we went to Cue Ball(’s?) on Valley Blvd. I thoroughly dominated; granted, I played my sister three times, and a pairing of my sister and a cousin (clearly, the pro of the group) once.

(I’ll admit it; I got damn lucky on a couple of matches, including a late scratch by my cousin, and a fluke shot that led to a perfect shot on the 8-ball).

I can’t believe that it had been over a year since the last time I played pool, until Saturday.

- After a couple hours of pool, we came home, and the birthday girl found a cake dropped off by her friend last night.

I never knew sugar-free (Splenda) cakes were so damn good! The cake had sugar-free icing topped with shredded coconut, and the cake itself was a yellow cake with pineapple. Honestly, I couldn’t taste the difference between that cake and a regular birthday cake.

I wish I had some of that cake right now.

Next time: my first thoughts regarding the Dance, as well as how Buy.com nearly shot up “The List.”

Happy blogging!

by Peter
3 Comments »

Quick-hitters:

- Hey KFC…any time now, you can stop airing those stupid commercials advertising your “sauceless” hot wings. I don’t know what bugs me more: the annoying as hell actors, or the fact that the hot wing has been sold at KFC for years.

I almost miss the “I’m lovin’ it!” McDonald’s commercials.

(Almost.)

- Since when have Twizzlers tasted so good? I bought a pair of bags from—where else?—CVS on Saturday (they were BOGO and I had a $2 ECB I needed to spend anyway), and my sister and I have already polished off one bag.

I can’t wait for the day after Easter, when stores start clearancing their Easter candy :P.

- So I had a hankering for some meat loaf over the weekend. While running errands, which included Costco (evil!!!) and CVS, I got what I needed to make the loaf on Sunday. A non-health emergency forced me to wait until Monday to cook, but I didn’t mind.

(Adding half a bulb of garlic to a 2lb meat loaf isn’t too much, is it?)

I served the meat loaf with the usual fare: mashed potatoes, gravy, and a boatload of steamed veggies. Methinks I will be making another loaf later this week.

I would have enjoyed my meal a lot more if not for…

- …the fact that I discovered a series of cracks in my living room wall a few days ago, as well as a leaky bathroom faucet, prompting me to give my landlord a ring. Unfortunately for me, I had to move the computer desk and bookshelf blocking the cracks, and now my file server is out of commission for the time being.

Worse, my LCD HDTV was also sitting there, and that is also out of commission for the time being. Unfortunately, I have no space anywhere else in the house to put the TV and computer, until the repair job dries and is painted over.

A week without ESPN HD???? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Well, at least the repair guy did a nice job patching the cracks, and I was able to vacuum the area behind the computer/TV desk. And it was kinda fun to cook a whole dinner while sidestepping repair men as they went back and forth through my house.

- So after the Bruins got away with another victory—and the “win” against Cal might have been even more ridiculous than the one against Stanford—I have to say that I can see the Bruins not making it out of the Sweet 16 this year.

(Tangent: As bad as the Josh Shipp miracle-that-shouldn’t-have-counted shot was, the non-call on Russell Westbrook on Cal’s Ryan Anderson was even more egregious. Cal needed to call in CSI to fingerprint the back of Anderson’s jersey. That’s as close to a legal mugging as I’ve ever seen.)

Sure, the Bruins probably locked up a #1 seed. And yeah, they’ll probably play in the West. Still, I can easily see the Bruins not making a third straight Final Four, for the following reasons:

1) The Bruins can’t seem to stop anybody in the paint. I thought Kevin Love was supposed to give the Bruins an interior presence, but for some reason, guards have been able to penetrate the Bruins D with ease lately. Good passing bigs (the Lopez brothers of Stanford, e.g.) seem to be giving the Bruins fits as well.

2) The Bruins can’t shoot. Josh Shipp better find his shooting stroke, or the Bruins are toast. He’s been looking good lately, but who knows what will happen in the tourney? Ben Howland’s a great coach, but he really needed to give some PT to other players to find a capable zone-buster (the role Michael Roll was supposed to fill this year). The boys from Cameroon have proven to be less than capable shooters, and they can’t be depended upon offensively.

3) Darren Collison is going to have an off-night. Collison is a great shooter, and an even better distributor, and sometimes his shots aren’t going to fall. On those nights, who is going to pick up the slack? Love? Not if the opposition is playing zone. And as nice as Westbrook has been this season, I cringe when he tries to go one-on-all for consecutive possessions.

4) Depth, or lack thereof. Seven deep? I really worry about fatigue.

Speaking of depth, I can see four members of the starting lineup (Shipp excluded) leaving at the end of the year, along with the graduation of Lorenzo Mata-Real. How the heck are we going to replace all that in one season?

Anyway, I can’t wait for the tourney to start!

Until next time.

by Peter
2 Comments »

Quick-hitters:

- Somebody clearly turned down the thermostat outside this morning, because it was freezing cold!

I can’t wait for Spring.

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,850.

Current unfiled-rebate-o-meter: $775. Damn I’m a lazy ass :P.

- (from Consumerist) Apparently, retail renting, where a person buys something from a store with the intent of returning the item after using it, is becoming (or already is?) a serious problem in this country (original article here). How there is any debate as to whether or not this is ethical astounds me. It’s one thing to buy a product, and then change your mind and return it. It’s a wholly different matter to buy something, with the intention of using it once, only to return it later!

(By the way, the term “retail renting” isn’t quite correct. Krunk and I have decided to name this “retail borrowing.” How is it “renting” if a person gets his money back?)

My two favorite arguments heard in favor of retail borrowing are:

1) [A store] sucks, so they deserve to be retail [borrowed]!

2) If the store didn’t have such a lax return policy, this wouldn’t happen!

Please. Stop. It’s the same customers that see nothing wrong with retail borrowing that probably ruined Costco’s awesome return policy. And I don’t want to hear that stores can charge a restocking fee, and just put the item back on the shelves. Not everything can simply be put back on the shelves; these returns have to be marked down, returned to the manufacturer, or destroyed/donated. Never mind the fact that the store has to waste their time processing returns on these borrowed items. And what if stores, in an effort to curb retail borrowing, decide to start charging restocking fees on all returns? How is that fair to those who are returning products for legitimate reasons?

Please do not confuse retail borrowing with what I call the delayed return/rebuy: a person buys a product from store A, buys the same product from store B, and then returns the item purchased from store B using the receipt from store A. I have no problem with this, as long as store A is getting the exact product back in brand new condition. In fact, I’ve done this before to get an item immediately from store A, while saving some money by buying it cheaper from store B (and usually, store B is an online outlet, requiring me to wait a few days to get the item).

Clearly “the customer is always right” has gone way too far.

- Have you ever sung a song, only to find out some time later that you were single one line (or part of one) incorrectly this whole time? Up until recently, I thought this line from the song “Hard to Handle” by the Black Crowes went:

Hey little thing let me light your candle
cause Mama I’m sure hard to handle, now,
Yes, I am

Click on that link above, and you’ll see that the line actually is:

Hey little thing let me light your candle
cause Mama I’m sure hard to handle, now,
Gets around

Several other lyrics sites confirmed the “Gets around” line, but I was 99% sure that they were all wrong. I went to YouTube, found the video of the song, and sure enough, I was wrong! That being said, “Gets around” makes no sense at all to me. I just cannot get myself to sing the line correctly, so much so that I will continue to sing the line as “Yes, I am” even though it’s wrong :P.

Loyal readers (all none of you): is there a song lyric that you continue to sing incorrectly, because it sounds better than the correct lyric?

- What a game between the Lakers and Suns last night! I think I’m going to go ahead and Ung-hex the Lakers by calling them the favorites to win the NBA Championship this year, Bynum or not (more on that another time). As long as Kobe’s finger doesn’t get worse, and Odom or Gasol don’t get hurt, who’s going to beat this team?

Shaq looked terrible for three quarters, but he looked pretty good in the 4th, so much so that I’m starting to think that the trade won’t be as awful as I first thought. As long as teams insist on doubling on Shaq, Amare and Nash are going to get great looks at the basket. It appears that the Suns’ chemistry—not something to be overlooked in the NBA—is much improved, and I previously mentioned that addition by subtraction was, perhaps, the key motivating factor for the trade:

It almost sounds like the Suns are taking the addition by subtraction approach: by dumping Marion, that frees up valuable PT for Diaw and Barbosa. Or maybe the alleged Marion-Stoudemire chemistry issues boiled over, forcing the Suns to move Marion for Shaq!

We also saw how bad the Suns’ defense was, especially against the pick-and-roll. We also saw how big losing Marion was; do you think the Suns could use his perimeter defense and three-point shooting? And I thought Shaq was supposed to clog up the paint! How many points did the Lakers score in the paint?

We’ll see how the Suns handle the next couple of games on their schedule: v Bos, v Det, @ Mem (yawn), and @ NO. That gate at New Orleans should be especially good; I expect Chris Paul to go for 40 and 15 in that game.

Until next time.

by Peter
3 Comments »

Lots of stuff happened this past weekend, but I have a few other things I want to talk about first.

I’ll try to keep this entry as short as possible.

Quick-hitters:

- On Friday night, my meteorologist of choice—in other words, the the weatherperson I happened to be watching at the time—said that warm weather was “coming.”

She didn’t mention that Saturday was going to be 10-20 degrees hotter than Friday.

(It’s not as if I didn’t appreciate the warmer weather.  I just like my temperature changes to be gradual, not immediate.)

- Happy (way overdue, I know) Chinese New Year!

- One more issue I have with my DIY iPod mini project:  it seems to be leaking juice at an abnormally high rate.  I had the iPod locked and sitting in my pocket all day on Saturday, and when I got home that night, the battery meter appeared to decrease by 2-3 “ticks.”  Hopefully, I was just imagining things, or the problem goes away after a few recharging cycles.

- While cleaning up my desk on Friday night—that was seriously long overdue—I heard a loud *POP* (think glass shattering) followed by a sizzling sound coming from the kitchen.  I ran there, thinking I had left the stove on, but I found nothing out of the ordinary.  Strange, I thought to myself, as I walked back into my office.

About an hour later, I went back into the kitchen to grab a drink, and I happened to glance at a set of AAA batteries that were sitting on my kitchen counter.  For reasons unknown to me, I decided to inspect the batteries, and when I picked them up, I noticed a tiny brown puddle where the batteries used to be.

Apparently, one or more of the batteries popped and leaked acid, while sitting on my kitchen counter.

I’ve seen batteries leak acid before, but usually this occurs inside a device, and I’ve never had quality (Duracell, in this case) batteries leak acid before.

- Yet another update regarding my ZoneAlarm rebate fiasco:  a check for $40 from Fry’s Corporate Office showed up in my mailbox on Saturday!  Thanks Fry’s!

I’ll be especially happy if the $25 for my American Telecom Systems phone shows up in the next couple of weeks.

- So awhile back, I mentioned that my credit score took a murderous fall, and it was partly due to Citibank no longer reporting the credit limit on two of my cards, totaling over $15,000 in “lost” credit:

According to my credit report, Citibank only is reporting the limit on one of my cards, and the limit on that card [(a Diamond Preferred Rewards card)] is a paltry $1,000.  So, I have devised a plan:  I’m going to re-allocate most of my total Citibank credit limit on to this one card, and hope that Citibank reports the new limit to the three bureaus.

One thing I forgot to mention about that incident was the fact that, months prior, I had shoved most of the credit limit from the card that now has a $1,000 limit on to the PremierPass card.  I don’t recall exactly why I did this; I might have taken out a balance transfer.  Anyway, my lazy ass decided that now was the time to call Citibank and request a reallocation of credit.  Unfortunately for me, the rep I spoke to could not help me out.

The rep explained that even though my PremierPass card has a $16,000 limit on it, the line of credit is what’s called a “revolving” line of credit aka a “no pre-set spending limit.”   She then explained that the Diamond Preferred Rewards card had a fixed line of credit, and since the two lines of credit were different, I could not reallocate any part of my credit from one card to the other.

Fan-freaking-tastic!

After the thorough explanation, the rep then tried to sell me a personal loan (it might have been called a personal line of credit; I honestly don’t remember) at a fixed rate of 9.9%.  I quickly refused, and the rep continued to push the loan on me.  I explained that I had no need for a personal loan, and the rep all but insisted that I was passing up on the opportunity of a lifetime.

(It’s not as if I was going to tell the rep “If I needed a loan, I’d take out a 0% balance transfer, not a 10% personal loan!”  Maybe I should have said that…)

This wasn’t the first time Citibank tried to sell me this personal loan; I miss the days where they would just try to sell me their Credit Protector service.

- On the heels of the latest Citibank saga, I think it’s about time for me to update “The List:”

1) Bank of F’n America (still in a class by itself)

2) AllRebates/Ohana Companies (and yet I still insist on doing business with them; at least I now know that I have backing from Fry’s)

3) Citibank (thank you, Citibank)

4) Time Warner

5) (tie) Parago/USPS/Buy.com

Yes, CompUSA has been removed from the list, due to their closing.

by Peter
3 Comments »

Yeah, I know…four days between posts?

Be quiet.

Quick-hitters:

- My Wii friend code is 1963 4549 4969 1019.

- How about them Lakers?  Andrew freaking Bynum is a stud!  Jordan Farmar has been a spark plug off the bench.  And Kobe’s happy!

(Did I just jinx them?)

- One quick sports take:  how about this ruling that the Hawks and the Heat have to replay the last 51.9 seconds of OT because of a miscalculation in the number of fouls Shaq had?

Questions:

1) What the heck took so long for this ruling to come down?  Shouldn’t this have taken a couple of days at the most?

2) What if Shaq is hurt when the replay occurs?

3) What if players on either team get traded before the replay can happen?  I would love to see the NBA mandate that a traded player has to return to his original team just for this one minute of action.

4) Um…the Heat are one of the worst teams in the entire NBA!  One extra win (should they pull this game out) isn’t going to make a lick of difference in where they finish!  Besides, if I were Pat Riley, I’d strongly consider tanking the rest of the season starting now…that is, if teams actually tank games to better their draft position in the first place…

- So what else did I do during my prolonged absence?  Like I mentioned in my last blog entry, I took a trip up to Elk Grove, CA, to visit my cousins and nephews.  They were staying in Reno on the 26th, and we planned on meeting them up there for the night.

We drove up there, and somehow got from Tarzana to Stockton—we stopped for a lunch break—in a bit over four hours.  Stockton to Reno via Sacramento and Lake Tahoe took another four hours, though, and the precipitous drop in temperatures got me sick.

(Great, huh?  The first day of my vacation, and I got sick!)

Amazingly, while in Reno, I did no gambling.  I got the joy of following two ultra-hyper kids through Circus Circus’ kiddie land, while feeling sick as hell.  I might have gotten an hour of sleep that night; it didn’t help that one of the brats woke me up at 7AM.

Thursday was spent sucking on cough drops one-at-a-time for the entire day (to hell with the dosage recommendations!) while going on a second tour of duty through Circus Circus’ kiddie land.  After that, we headed back to Elk Grove, but not before stopping in Truckee, CA (just south of Tahoe, if I’m not mistaken) for an unforgettable experience.

And by unforgettable, I mean I’m never doing it again.

My uncle thought it would be a fun idea to do some sledding (sorta; basically, we’re doing down a snow-filled hill on a board, sitting down.  Anyone wanna let me know what that’s called?  In the meantime, we’ll go with “sledding”).  I emphatically announced that I would not be getting anywhere close to one of the boards, knowing full well that riding one of those things would probably have killed me.

(Totally off topic:   I’m placing some online orders while typing out this blog entry.  Should a random string of characters—some random digits, my credit card number, etc.—appear on this blog, let me know, yeah?)

Anyway, the highlights of that day include:

• My seven-year-old nephew went down the hill first, and I immediately noticed he was drifting left, right towards me.  Instinctively, I jumped over him and to the left, to avoid certain death.  Thank goodness for my cat-like quickness and agility, even for a person my size, and especially considering I was sick!
• Twice, my cousin was ready to slide down the hill, only to have the board slide down…with him not on it.  Both times, he decided that he had no choice but to slide down on his shoes.  By the way, he was wearing dress shoes.  The second time he went down, all I remember was him barreling down the hill.
• I also distinctly remember watching my sister go down the hill twice.  Each time, she (the lightweight that she is) couldn’t stay fixed on the board, and she kept bouncing off the board as it was going down the hill.  And I’m not talking about coming off the board slightly!  We’re talking 3-6 inches!
• In my delirium, I may or may not have been forced to go down the hill once.  I honestly cannot remember.

(*whistles*)

- The rest of the trip was pretty boring, even though every morning was started with coffee and a donut from my cousins’ donut shop.  I did get a ton of recipe ideas, cooked them some tasty steaks—could you believe my sister wanted to serve them London broil???—and thankfully, I got over my sickness…when the trip ended, naturally.

We returned home on Christmas Eve, and just about nothing happened between then and now.  I did get Super Mario Galaxy for the Wii, though, but I haven’t even ripped off the shrink wrap on the case.

That’s all I have for now.  Until next time!

by Peter
1 Comment »

(Warning:  Today’s blog entry may run a tad long.)

I’m such a slacker :P.

I hope everyone enjoyed their Christmas and New Year’s.  I know I did.

Despite the fact that there is so much in the sports world to talk about—the Cheat-riots going 16*-0, Roidger Clemens, LSU winning a national title, the Lakers and UCLA Bruins rolling, etc.—I’d much rather talk about what I’ve been doing lately.  I’ll save my thoughts on the big sports stories for another day.  But first…

Quick-hitters:

- Current rebate-o-meter:  ~$1,300.  That number will probably rise with tax software deals now available.

- CVS has a deal running through January where you get $4 ECBs when you buy 4 SoyJoy bars (limit 5 offers).  Combined with various coupons—$1 off 4 bars, $3 off 10 bars, and freebies—my sisters and I made a killing off these bars.

Has anyone tried one of these bars?  I tried one, and let’s just say the thing tasted like a nastier fruitcake.  Just thinking about how bad it tasted is giving me the chills right now!  However, my sisters actually enjoyed them, and even my brother thought they weren’t terrible.

*gag*

I’d almost rather down an entire bottle of castor oil than have to eat one of these bars.  I’m thinking about leaving them outside the local gym, for anyone to take :P.

- It’s good to see some of the late night television shows back on the air, even though the shows aren’t quite what they used to be.  I thoroughly enjoyed Jon Stewart’s monologue, though.

- So I made mention in my last blog that I had a hot date a few weeks ago.

Krunk happened to swing by for our annual meeting of the minds, and we spent all day chatting, Wii-ing, and watching TV.

(I’m a boring host.  I am aware of that.)

After Wii-ing all day, we went to an all-you-can-eat Korean restaurant for dinner.  Damn place raised their prices!  Good stuff, though.

Freaking Krunk brought me a Christmas present:  a Wii remote!  Being the bad friend that I am, I have yet to reciprocate (no, Krunk, dinner doesn’t count!).

- On the 24th, my sister and I went to my cousin’s house—thank you, Ellen and Darren—for a Christmas Eve dinner (I was asked to bring the entertainment, in the form of Guitar Hero III).  The night was memorable; unfortunately it was more memorable for bad reasons than good :P.

• Dinner was great.  It was the quintessential potluck:  roasted chicken, tamales, a Honeybaked ham, a shepherd’s pie, spaghetti with broccoli, steamed veggies, etc.
• Both of my mom’s sisters attended, but my mom did not, which led to one of the more traumatizing incidents of the night.  Those that attended the party know exactly what I’m talking about.  Let’s just say that my aunt says some really strange things when inebriated (and by “inebriated,” I mean “had one sip of beer.”)
• I cannot play Guitar Hero without an HDTV with Progressive Scan enabled.  I have no idea why.  I think I’m going blind.
• I almost died when I nearly took a tumble down a couple of steps.  Actually, I almost killed Ellen; I tumbled right into her, nearly knocking her down.  No, I did not have a drink that night.
• The night ended on one really traumatizing moment, right before we left for the night.  Again, those of you at the party know exactly what I’m talking about.

Good times.

- The Ung family Christmas dinner, on the 25th, was also quite excellent.  We brined our turkey—thanks, Alton Brown!—and it came out juicy and tender, though quite salty.  Green bean casserole, stuffing, steamed veggies, and mashed potatoes completed the meal, and my sister made some pumpkin bread as well, which was very good, even though she really cut back on the amount of sugar the recipe originally called for.

Sadly, we could not take any of the leftovers home.  That’s because I went out of town the next day, on a trip to see my cousins up in NorCal.

More on that next time.  Later!

by Peter
1 Comment »

I’m such a slacker…

Quick-hitters:

- Argh!  Watching the Pats-Ravens game was so aggravating!  I was SO hoping for the Pats to choke!

Full commentary on that game tomorrow, along with yet another reason why I hate Fantasy Football.

- I could not believe that my Bruins lost to Texas on Sunday!  What an awful first half!  I hope UCLA coach Ben Howland does something to fix the slow starts that the Bruins have had in recent games.

- Current rebate-o-meter:  $2,600.  That includes the $400 or so in rebate checks I got over the last two weeks, and I have yet to file over $300 worth of rebates.

Anyone wanna bet on whether or not I’ll hit $3,000 again by the end of the month?

Speaking of rebates…seriously, Symantec, why even offer upgrade rebates if you’re going to reject every single one I try to claim?  I filed four more upgrade rebates in the past month, and all four were rejected for various reasons.

- I’m not sure if my loyal readers knew this, but I love CVS.  ECBs + rebates FTW!

(Rite Aid Single Check Rebates don’t suck either.)

I got eight bottles of Febreze, a bottle of Tums, some soda and Doritos, four bottles of mouthwash, a Gilette Fusion razor blade, and a stick of Degree “Clinical Strength” deodorant.  Net cost:  about ten bucks, and it would have been three bucks less if the cashier had followed my simple instructions of scanning my ECBs in the order I stacked them.

(Yeah, I know I’m whining about three bucks here, but WTH?  I handed him three ECBs–a $10, a $5, and a $2–stacked on top of one another.  What gave him the idea to scan the $10 first (on the top), then the $2 one (on the bottom???

Note to self:  hand the cashiers coupons and ECBs one at a time from now on.)

So why so much crap?  The Febreze worked out to about a buck a bottle.  The Tums made me a buck after rebate (minus tax and the stamp, of course).  Each bottle of mouthwash netted me $1.50.  The razor and the deodorant were free after Rite Aid SCR.  I rest my case.

- I hate this time of year, weather-wise.  It’s kinda warm in the daytime–there’s enough sun to make it not cold–but it gets ridiculously cold and windy at night.   I almost long for the ~120 degree summer days again.

(I know, I know; I shouldn’t be complaining about night time temps in the low 40s.)

Rain is in the forecast in the next few days…fantastic!  And I’m considering a trip up to NorCal at the end of the month?  I must be insane!

(Tangent:  Until last night, I have never heard “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” sung by Rod Stewart and Dolly Parton.  My ears are still bleeding from hearing the song last night.

If I hear the song again, I might just pass out.  I’d rather listen to a record of chalkboard/fingernail scratching on infinite loop than hear that song one more time.)

Somebody get me an electric blanket.

- If you are the only coffee drinker in your house, and you do not brew coffee with a coffee press of some sort, you must be insane or only drink coffee five minutes before you leave the house.  No thanks to my sister, who was kind enough to give me a canister of Folgers Simply Smooth coffee, I am now hooked on coffee.

(Tangent:  I don’t want to be chewed out for suggesting that one can make a “perfect cup of coffee” using Folgers.  Go away.

And by the way, yeah, you’re right.)

I have one of these Vietnamese coffee presses, and all I know is that this Folgers coffee tastes like crap when brewed in my sister’s Gevalia coffee-maker, and it’s quite tasty when brewed with my press.  Water quality doesn’t explain the difference; my sister uses water filtered through her refrigerator–quite tasty water, by the way–while I use Brita pitcher water, which is drinkable only if I pass the water through the filter 2-3 times.

Drool…typing this up just tempted me to brew another cup of coffee.  Yes, I’m an addict.

Later.

Tags: baltimore ravens, coffee press, cold weather, cvs, folgers, new england patriots, rain, symantec rebates, texas longhorns, ucla bruins by Peter
5 Comments »

Hello again, loyal readers!

Quick-hitters:

- Current rebate-o-meter: $3000, and dropping fast!

(W00t!)

- Why must oatmeal raisin cookies be so damn tasty??? I baked a batch last Thursday, and thanks to myself, my sister, her co-workers, my mom, etc., I’m down to five cookies.

(Four.)

Next up: a batch of chocolate chip cookies. I’ll put the over/under on how long those cookies will last at three days, and I’ll take the under.

- Trader Joe’s is evil. Costco is evil.

Going to both stores? Wallet homicide.

(I dare anyone to convince me otherwise.)

- OMG! The NBA season starts tomorrow, and I haven’t even signed up for a Fantasy Basketball league!

- So the big news story, which I just heard about a few minutes ago, is the report that the Los Angeles Dodgers (actually of LA!) are going to fire incumbent manager Grady Little and hire former Yankees’ manager Joe Torre!

THIS. MUST. HAPPEN.

Yes, Grady Little got a bum rap for the 2003 Boston Red Sox debacle. Yeah, he’s probably going to be unfairly fired for what happened last year with my Dodgers (the locker room fracturing, I mean). Still, it’s awfully hard to trade in Little for a four-time World Series-winning manager. I’m really looking forward to see who the Dodgers will end up signing, now that Torre appears to be on board?

(No, I’m not going to be myopic enough to believe that Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte, et al., will be donning Dodger Blue next year.)

Great statistic mentioned by SportsCenter, by the way: in 2003, Grady Little was fired by Boston; the Red Sox won the World Series the next year. In 1996, Joe Torre was hired by New York; the Yankees won the World Series the next year. Hmmmm…

me *crosses fingers*

- Speaking of fingers…I was filing some rebates about a week ago.

(I’m usually quick when it comes to filing rebates; it helps to use pre-printed address labels.)

(By the way, the squeamish might want to stop reading here.)

Anyway, I was attempting to flatten one tri-folded rebate submission, getting ready to stuff it into an envelope. I ran my hand across the stack, and proceeded to flatten the submission (five 24# sheets of paper are pretty thick!). That’s when I noticed that my hand had quite a bit of blood on it.

Yeah, somehow, while flattening the rebate submission, I had managed to slice my pinky like a Ginzu knife through a tin can. I shook it off immediately, telling myself “eh, just another paper cut.” Ten seconds later, I was screaming and running towards the nearest sink.

I give myself 25,000 Stupid Points.

- It’s time for UBMe #3, aka “Shopping Cart Obstructions.”

While in line at Costco, you realize that you forgot an item on your shopping list! Knowing that the item–no, it was not Mexicoke–was located at the back of the store, you realize that nothing short of a power walk would get you to the back to the registers in time. You proceed to semi-jog to the back of the store, and realize that there are way too many people there for you to be jogging. You slow to a brisk walk, reach the refrigerated section, grab your item, and head back.

Like a running back in football, you keep trying to hit holes between shopping carts and their owners, trying desperately to get to the front of the store as quickly as possible. Halfway on the return trip, you hit a snag: you reach a section where nobody is moving! Out of the corner of your eye, you quickly notice a small gap opening, so you beeline towards it. That’s when some stupid woman pushes her cart through that gap, beating you to the spot. As if that isn’t bad enough, she then proceeds to leave her cart right there in the open, walking away to go check out some items an aisle away!

UBMe! Do you gently push her cart aside, and continue on your way to the front of the store? Do you patiently wait for another opening (which was unlikely, as the obstruction occurred in front of a smoothie display, and there was a big line of people waiting for samples)? Or do you do something more drastic, like walking across an aisle to get to the much less crowded perimeter of the store?

You decide to gently push her cart out of the way. You reach out, and a split second before you come in contact with her cart, you notice some guy coming in the opposite direction with his cart. You immediately realize that he is approaching you with a good deal of speed, and you know something is going to happen. With his cart, he literally swings his cart into hers, hitting the blockade with such force that the offending carts rolls away about 5-10 feet. Eventually, the cart coasts to a stop in front of a display of pillows, as the guy continues through the newly-opened gap. You turn around, and see the woman head back towards her cart, clearly pissed off! You grin in the direction of the guy who cleared your way, and continue towards front of the store.

You reach the registers, just as the cashier starts ringing up your order.

Seriously, that was awesome. The look on the woman’s face was priceless!

Until next time!

Tags: cookies, costco, joe torre, los angeles dodgers, oatmeal, paper cut, raisin, rebates, shopping cart, stupid points, trader joe, UBMe by Peter
7 Comments »

First of all, prayers go out to everybody affected by the fires here in SoCal, especially those in San Diego County. What’s going on here is eerily reminiscent of the fires of 2003–I was a UCSD student at the time, and one of the fires was burning no more than ten miles south of where we were. I remember waking up that Sunday morning, wondering why I could see bright orange rays of light coming from my window. Although I had a midterm that Tuesday–it was subsequently postponed by a week, as the campus was closed for a couple of days–I remember doing nothing but playing video games all day, just to get my mind off the fires.

When the campus re-opened, I returned to my volunteer position at the Preuss School (a charter school adjacent to UCSD) and I made it a point to ask the students how their families were doing, fully aware that most of the kids lived in areas affected by the fires. Talk about a humbling experience; it made my whining on Sunday look awfully pathetic by comparison.

I noticed that the winds have died down here significantly; hopefully that helps the firefighters out there in controlling these blazes. And as far as the arsonists that caused a couple of these fires are concerned, I think we should use those fire-fighting planes, pick them up by their legs, and drop them head-first into the Pacific Ocean…or an active volcano.

Let’s get on with it.

Quick-hitters:

- Current rebate-o-meter: $3300. That total includes the $150 or so I got in the past few days. Sigh…

- I can’t wait for Halloween!

Well, I can’t wait for the day after Halloween, when Halloween candy is clearanced :D.

- Somebody please remind me to watch the World Series with my TV muted. Between Tim McCarver, John Mellencamp, AT&T (’tis a shame they dumped the name “Cingular”; I can’t call them Crapular any more.), and that XBox 360 commercial with the kids absolutely f**king up Poison’s “Nothin’ But A Good Time,” I’m this close to buying a TiVo.

More on baseball later.

- In an effort to make my blog a bit more interactive, I am introducing a new feature here: UBMe! Every now and then, I will blog about an interesting event that happened to me, and let my loyal readers (all none of you) decide what they would do in my shoes.

(Please refrain from posting your “Create Your Own Adventures was so 1980s!” comments).

Yes, you loyal readers can now advise me on how I should have handled a particular mind-numbing situation!

Presenting UBMe #1:

You’re sitting in front of your computer, enjoying your tasty ham-and-cheese sandwich (the meal of champions!), when all of a sudden, someone pounds on your door.

You open the door, and see a teenage girl holding a box of candy. Nothing special about the candy; it looks like something that you could buy from Costco. The girl, without any introduction, asks “Would you like to buy some candy for one dollar?”

You immediately identify this as a fundraiser, and ask the girl to wait while you go fetch your wallet. When you find your wallet, you open up the currency compartment…to find nothing but receipts!

Knowing that you’re going to disappoint the girl, you go back to the door and tell her that you don’t have even a single dollar in your wallet. The girl then tells you, “Well, can you look around your house for a dollar?”

If you decide to slam the door in her face, you’re either really really mean, or really really smart. If you decide to politely tell her again that you don’t have a buck, go on.

You decide to tell her, even more politely, that you just don’t have a buck with you. After the girl pleads for you to find a freaking dollar, you show her your wallet, empty the contents, and give the wallet a shake, in an effort to prove that you don’t have any money in your wallet!

To your amazement, two quarters drop out of your wallet and roll away. The girl, giving you the “you dirty liar!” look, points out, “Look! You have money! Can’t you look around your house for more?”

If you decide to slam the door in her face, you’re a heck of a lot smarter than I am. If you decide to politely ask her to come back later (when, hopefully, you actually have a buck in your wallet), read on.

For some really dumb reason, you ask her to come back later tonight. The girl, obviously disappointed, tells you that she can’t, but she would like to come back tomorrow. You say sure. She responds, “And you’ll have a dollar then, right?”

If you decide to slam the door in her face, you’re just being human. If you say “OK, I’ll see you tomorrow,” go back to the beginning.

Wasn’t that fun?

- Here are my super-quick MLB/World Series thoughts

1) The sight of [that Boston RF that I refuse to name] hitting that clutch grand-slam was absolutely nauseating. I’d rather see 1,000 Chevy/John Mellencamp commercials end-to-end than to see that replay one time.

2) Stat that summed up the Boston-Cleveland ALCS: touted pitchers C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona combined to win ZERO games in the series.

3) Cleveland rocks! (Nope!) Cleveland rocks! (Nope!!!) Cleveland rocks! (Wrong!) Cleve-land rocks! (WRONG!)

4) Josh Beckett: man. That RF: ()#*$)(#*$#@*(#@(*)!!!

5) As much as I love watching the Rockies play right now, I cannot pick them to beat Boston. The thought of that RFer with a ring, though, sickens me. Boston in *puke* *gag* 7 games.

- Here are my Week 7 (Fantasy) Football Thoughts:

1) F**k you Heath Miller. F**k you Travis Henry. F**k you Chad Pennington + Jerricho Cotchery. Despite getting 33 points from Cincy RB Kenny Watson, I’m now 3-4 in the BargainShare league, riding an awesome three game losing streak! At least I won in my other three leagues, running my records to 2-5, 3-4, and 4-3.

At least I’m over .500 in one league @@. And I’m pretty sure there are a few Joseph Addai and Travis Henry owners that were screaming at their TVs this past weekend.

2) I guess the Colts can’t be called a “finesse” team any more, eh, especially after the drubbing of the Jags last night. Next week: Pats v Colts!!!

(Well, at least the media is acting like these two teams play each other next week. I wonder what Washington and Carolina think of the media coverage of that Nov. 4 tilt.)

3) Sage Rosenfels owners (all none of you) and Rod Bironas owners had to have been really really happy this past weekend. How the hell did the Titans give up 29 fourth quarter points to the Texans?!?!??!

4) Go Rams! Let’s go for 0-16! An NFL record + the #1 pick! W00t!

(Naturally, the Rams are going to break my heart, and actually win a game soon.)

5) Pats 7*-0. Colts 6-0. I’m surprised people aren’t calling the Pats better because they have a better record.

This leads me right into the final topic of today’s blog:

- I am be-freaking-yond sick and tired of hearing members of the media insist that the Pats are playing with such a big chip on their shoulders (I’m looking at you, Kornheiser). Yes, it’s clear that the Pats are in “screw you” mode after PatriotGate (Week 1 against the Jets); obviously this is their way of flipping the bird to the rest of the league for all the negative attention they’re getting. Vilify us, and watch us kick the asses of every team we play! Make us look like the bad guys, and now we’re going to play the rest of the season with a HUGE chip on our shoulders!

I gotta ask one thing, though…

*clears throat*

WHOSE FAULT IS IT THAT YOU GUYS ARE GETTING ALL THIS NEGATIVE ATTENTION???

(Hint: It’s your team’s fault, Patriots’ myopics.)

I know! It’s the fault of Eric Mangini, right? If he didn’t catch you guys cheating, you wouldn’t be acting this way, right? No, wait, it’s Roger Goodell’s fault, right? If he didn’t levy such a steep penalty on you guys for cheating, you wouldn’t be so angry. Or maybe he shouldn’t have made spying on your opponents via the use of technology illegal in the first place, right? Nah, it’s certainly because we’re jealous of all your successes. Yeah, that’s it!

(I’ll allow for everybody’s sarcasm-o-meters, New England myopics excepted, to cool off before I continue.)

And who knows how many of those Super Bowl wins were tainted? Can anybody, beyond a shadow of a doubt, tell me that the Patriots won three Super Bowls without even a tiny bit of assistance? Myopic New England fans might respond, “We’re so good that we don’t need to cheat!” If that’s true, THEN WHY DID YOU CHEAT AGAINST THE JETS???

Why do some kids copy other kids’ homework? Why do some kids try using crib sheets during exams? Why do some people not file taxes? Because they can? Because they enjoy it? Or because cheating gives them an advantage over other people?!?

By the way, if you Patriot fans think the rest of the country hates your team, you’re right! Do we hate you for your successes? Sure! However, I believe there are a number of other reasons to hate you guys:

1) Your arrogant coach who refuses to shake hands with former proteges, makes nothing-apologies after being caught cheating, and likes to ignore league memos reminding teams that video surveillance of your opposition is illegal.

2) Your pretty-boy QB who once uttered to the media that he “hates” all the attention he gets.

3) Randy Moss.

(Tangent: I think it was Keyshawn Johnson, on Monday, that said that some teams didn’t want Randy Moss.

WHAT

THE

F***???

Teams didn’t want him BECAUSE HE STOPPED GIVING A DAMN!!! He stopped trying! He gave up on routes! I’m surprised he didn’t go Vince Carter on his former teams and tell the other team what play his team was running!

W T F?)

4) The fact that you guys play the “We’re so unselfish” card as much as you do. If you’re so unselfish, why do you keep saying this? To selfishly gather more attention on your team?

The reason why you guys have this chip on your shoulders is YOUR OWN DOING! Don’t cheat, and nobody wants to label you the “NFL Yankees!” Tell your coach to stop looking like an arrogant ass, and nobody will liken him to Darth Vader! Most importantly, stop messing with football karma and the NFL Gods, and you will be rewarded in kind, because the way you guys are acting, I fully expect a full-blown meltdown to occur in the AFC Championship game.

I’m just about convinced that Belicheat got caught cheating intentionally, just to find a way to motivate his team. It’s the only logical explanation I can think of.

Until next time.

by Peter
2 Comments »