Shouzer

As I watched the first week of NFL games on Sunday, I realized I was getting a little tired of it all. I remember last season being so stoked on opening Sunday. This year, I felt a bit blah about it. I spent most of the early games playing on my computer instead of focusing on the “action”. I am starting to find college football more interesting *gasp*, even though I used to be a pretty big hater of it. I guess living in SE Michigan makes a difference there, where U of M football is king, and the Lions are horrendous. So here is a short list of my major gripes with the NFL:

1. They focus on controversy and call it entertainment. I’m mean seriously, if I wanted all this drama, I would watch a soap opera. Whiny, annoying players would go away if the media stopped talking about them, but instead, the media focuses all of their attention on those particular players. Then the have the audacity to complain about how annoying those players are. I’m not going to name names here, but you know who I’m talking about.

2. Game selection is biased towards large market teams. Living in Detroit, I obviously get the Lions when they are on and not blacked out, read: Lions road games. We often get the Browns or the Bengals as well do to their proximity. Usually, the third game is one they consider to be of national interest. For example, we got Giants vs. Redskins for the late afternoon NFC game on Fox. Why not the Cardinals vs. 49ers? The Cardinals are the defending NFC champs and were crazy entertaining last year. Where is the love? I assume this is carryover from last year when the NFC East was considered to be the best division in football, though I would argue that point. It felt like they aired every inner-division NFC East game last year. I’d like a little variety please. I shouldn’t have to buy a satellite dish to get a decent variety of games.

3. Commercials. There are too many of them. After the score, after the kickoff, every timeout, every injury, 2 minute warning, in between quarters, etc. This was ok when I was in college because I was usually working on homework during the less interesting games, especially the first few quarters. Now though, I’m just there on the couch watching football, and lots and lots of beer commercials.

4. Vested interest. This is probably the crux of the issue, if I’m honest. I think that sports are often provide a sense of hometown pride. I love to cheer for the local team because I associate with them. If they are winners, then so am I. Isn’t that why people refer to their favorite team in the first person plural? (Our defense stopped the run well in the first half, but we got worn down in the 4th quarter.) Well, my current hometown team is the Lions, current worst team in the league. My former hometown and current favorite team is the Rams, soon to be worst team in the league. I hardly want to associate myself with either of these groups. If the Rams lost because they were no good, I could live with it, but losing because of 10 penalties is excruciating. Not to mention the fact that the only game I’ll get to see this year is when the Rams come to Detroit. However, I’m not a fair weather fan so I’ll stick with them, but if they leave St. Louis as they are discussing, I’m not sure if my heart will go with them.

I can understand why people prefer college football. The places it is really popular often don’t have a pro team or at least not a perennially successful one. Plus, it is easier to associate with a University, especially if you or your friends went there. I’m not going over to the dark side completely, but it’s starting to look very tempting.

Guess I could be nice and post a video instead of just making a comment.

EDIT: I didn’t have my speakers on the first time I watched that. WOW. Nice use of the ’80s.

Yeah, I was planning on waiting until we got everything cleaned up and put in its permanent place, but it’s looking like that’s going to take far longer than I anticipated.  So, I decided to go ahead and snap some pics of the new house to finally get something online.

I’ve tried to take them in an order that should hopefully let you get a feel for the layout.  I plan to take some pics of the outside tomorrow.  Without further ado, here’s the album.  Feel free to ignore any messiness. 

Usually, I don’t care all that much what other people do.  Everybody seems to be obsessed with Facebook nowadays, and while I haven’t jumped on the bandwagon, it’s not a big deal to me that anybody else has.

This story has me feeling a bit differently.  Seriously, people panicked when Twitter went down?  I could definitely understand a reaction like that to Hotmail or Gmail–any big email provider.  After all, you get bills and other important things there.  What Ashton Kutcher is doing at this exact moment is not important.

Here’s an obligatory Penny Arcade on the topic.

Of all the stupid things our government has done, this has got to be close to the top of the list:

They bought 3 luxury jets

After seeing this story, I finally got angry enough to write my congressman for the first time. They pushed my off the edge of indifference. They have unleashed my wrath in the form of a polite letter to an authority figure. God help them.

I’ve had the opportunity to do some pretty cool stuff in the last few weeks:

First off was the Paddle to the Symphony event. The Detroit Symphony Orchestra played a concert in the park one evening, and a charity group held a dinner and canoe event as a corresponding fundraiser. It was really cool. We had dinner, and then paddled the canoe across a lake. Then, we sat in the canoe while the orchestra played a collection of marches. It was fun to see a symphony in such a relaxed environment.

The day after that concert, I took off for a two week trip to Thailand. I hung out mostly in Bangkok visiting old friends and returning to all my favorite places. Got a nice massage, saw a few movies at the fancy theater with recliners, and ate tons of good food. Walking around Bangkok felt odd because it is so drastically different from America, but at the same time, it felt like home.

I also went to the beach for 4-5 days. I stayed on a small, remote island called Koh Mak. (Koh = island in Thai). The resort was very secluded; it was basically in the middle of the jungle. The beach had the jungle on one side and the ocean on the other. The water was crystal clear as well. I saw quite a few sea urchins when I got in the water though so I didn’t swim much as my previous encounter with that animal was rather painful. I don’t think the island I was on had a hospital either. I would have sucked to take an emergency boat ride with needles sticking out of your body.

I got back to Detroit on Sunday, and then I went to Green Day’s 21st Century Breakdown concert on Tuesday night. Considering my jet lag, it probably wasn’t the wisest decision to go to that concert. I almost fell asleep at the end of it. It was a really great concert though. Billy Joe is a really energetic guy. They played a 3 hour set, and he was going full out for the duration. I was really impressed.

Following my trip to Thailand, I accumulated enough frequent flier miles to achieve Silver Elite status with Northwest. The main perk of this is I don’t have to wait in line any more. I now have access to the first class check in counter and the priority boarding lane. I can get on the plane first when they call for Skyteam Elite passengers, though I have no idea why anyone would want to get on the plane first. I have always felt the last one on first one off is the best policy as I don’t want to be on the plane longer than necessary. I also get complimentary upgrades to first class on domestic flights if that section is empty. I doubt I will see that happen very often, but it’s still cool that it could happen.

I was looking at cars recently, not with any real intent to buy, but just to see what interested me.  I thought to myself, “Hey, with those American car companies failing, maybe I’d see what they had.  Maybe I’d try to support them, even if only in while perusing.”

The problem, as I quickly discovered, was that American cars aren’t appealing–they just don’t look good, imo.  I have no idea how their build quality or reliability compares, and I probably never will.  If there’s not a single car that can make me say, “I’d like to be driving around in that,” there’s not a single car I’ll look into in detail.

I even figured maybe they’d have a some competitive hybrids or something, since that seems to be the way the world is going.  Well, you know what?  From what I saw, they don’t.  Unless I want to start paying $30k or something, but why would I bother with that?  I can get a brand new Honda Insight for under $20k.

Like I said, maybe American cars are all built better and are more reliable, but frankly I doubt it.  That’s exactly one of the reasons Honda and Toyota became so popular.  Even if that is true, though, they’ve gotta have some street appeal too.  Hopefully Fiat can change that for us…

I love me some Denver Broncos.  It’s a fact.  Recently, they’ve been a bit crazy–I don’t think anybody could deny that.  ”Oh my, our starting QB has only been in the league three years, but he’s already been to the pro bowl and led the #2 offense in the league?  That boy needs to be traded!”  ”It was our defense that sucked last year?  Ranked 29th while the offense sat at 2nd?  No way…  Let’s draft a bunch of offensive players this year.”

Seriously, they’re crazy, but until the team plays a game under new head coach Josh McDaniels, I was generally willing to just wait it out.  He’s certainly crazy, but maybe he’s just crazy enough to be a genius.  However, I happened to read this article in the Denver Post, and I couldn’t agree with it more.

Essentially, Brandon Marshall has asked for a new contract (and subsequently for a trade), and Dave Krieger is arguing that he deserves it.  Well, you know what?  He’s right.  Typically I don’t like players sitting out OTAs or camp for new contracts.  If you signed the first one, be a man and stick with it.  That’s what I said when T.O. got a whiny in Philly.

But to me, a rookie contract is different.  Depending on where you’re drafted, you generally don’t have much choice in the matter.  Generally the thought is to go out and prove yourself and you’ll get paid.  Well, in three years in the league, Marshall has already established himself as a legitimate #1 and arguably one of the best in the league at that (he went to the pro bowl last year, too).

Pay him what he deserves.  Life’s short in the NFL, and in this case, he really is doing what’s right for his family.  I love Eddie Royal and Brandon Stokley, but neither of them are #1s.

My contract with AT&T runs out at the end of June, and, frankly, my iPhone is starting to piss me off. It’s gotten slow, it’s had visible hotspots on the screen for at least a year now, and iTunes is the biggest pile of shit I’ve ever had to deal with on a regular basis.

With that in mind, Megan and I picked up a pair of Pres when they were released.  So far (and this is coming from somebody who stood in line for the iPhone the day it was released and has talked it up previously), I’ve got to say the Pre is better.

• The keyboard on the iPhone is better than a lot of people would have you believe, but a physical keyboard is just better.  And a slider is just slick. 
• The browser is much faster.
• The plan is better.  I was paying $60/month for 450 minutes, 5000 night & weekend, 250 txt msgs (NOT picture messages–the iPhone will but still doesn’t support them), and unlimited data.  Now we’re paying a combined $103 for 1500 minutes, unlimited nights & weekends starting at 7pm, unlimited txt (including pics and video…), and unlimited data.  Inflation’s got nothing on Sprint.
• Multitasking, anyone?
• A crisper, brighter screen.

You could probably make the argument that some of my iPhone complaints would be placated if I were to wait for the 3G S, but frankly I don’t want to.  Apple’s exclusion of picture messaging has irked me from day one, and their dumbass decision to not support it on the original phone doesn’t do much to inspire confidence…

Oh yeah, Palm stock is up nearly 1200% percent since December.  Coincidence?  Not a chance.

I took my first vacation time of my career last week, flying to Rome for a much needed vacation. I found a great deal, and I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I spent about 7 days in Rome with a 2 day side trip to Florence.

By the end of the week, I was saturated by beauty, becoming numb to the abundant Italian eye-candy. Their culture puts an extreme emphasis on the aesthetics, la bella figura. Art museums there are full of masterpieces; even simple, out of way churches, would be considered behemoths of marble in other countries; and the people themselves look like they walked out of a magazine and on to the metro. The saturation caused me to change the way I looked at the beautiful world around me. Walking through and art museum, I found many great artworks to be bland and uninspired. Only world famous works like Michelangelo’s David could take my breath away. While strolling through churches with marvelous mosaics and marble, instead of standing in awe of the magnificent frescoes on the wall, I stood in pain, focusing on the soreness in my feet. These smaller churches simply could not compare to the size and scale of St. Peter’s Basilica at Vatican City.

Similarly, the food was indescribably good. Suffice it to say, everything lived up to the hype. The freshness and quality of the food was incomparable. The fresh fruits, vegetables, cheese, and bread that I bought at the market was bursting with flavor, making it easy to understand how the restaurants could make such great food.

The tiny effort I put in to my appearance became glaringly obvious to me. Walking around in short and old T-shirts amongst a nation of cover models made me question my lifestyle and fashion choices. I am a guy who has sported the same hair style for more than a decade. Maybe more like 1.5. I’m not even sure any more. I stopped in a shop at the airport to kill some time, and while browsing sunglasses, I was not sure which were for men and which were for women. Are they unisex now? How can one tell? As I stood there trying not to look foolish as I browsed the eye-wear, I realized that I needed a makeover. I know the queer eye guys don’t do that any more, but maybe they can come out of retirement for a straight guy with no fashion sense.

In the engineering world, appearance receives very little notice. It is not uncommon to see such travesties as white socks with dress shoes and slacks. Some people look like they go out of there way to look unfashionable, but I would like to distance myself from the stereotype of engineer. Perhaps it’s time to finally start worrying about the superficial.

The food aspect is worth considering as well. I do fairly well here, eating a lot of “fresh” fruits and vegetables. When I say fresh, I mean I bought them raw at the grocery store. After eating truly fresh food though, I think I need to seek out farmers markets for fresh produce. Partially green bananas and prepackaged tomatoes just don’t seem good enough any more.

I love traveling because it changes me. Thrusting myself into another culture and perspective forces a reevaluation of life as I know it. When I see other people who live life in a different mindset, I like to adjust, fine tuning my own outlook on life.

This is not to say that everything about Italian culture is fabulous. I got frustrated at times by the hours of operation on many of their shops. Many small places opened late, closed for 2-3 hours at lunch, and then shut down early in the evening. I think they were open about 5-6 hours a day. It became inconvenient. It is easy to shrug such problems off as a traveler, but it gave me a greater appreciation for the most convenient place on earth, America.

So will I turn into an Italian supermodel who only eats the freshest of foods? Probably not. I’ll probably gradually slip back into the status quo of American culture. Frankly, I’m not too worried about it. It doesn’t diminish the fun and excitement of exploring and experiencing a different way of life.

Apparently the Church of Scientology has been editing Wikipedia articles in a self-serving manner, so Wikipedia has responded by banning all edits coming from their IPs.  Honestly, I know very little about Scientology.  The few things I’ve heard sound nuts, and Tom Cruise seems crazy*.

Frankly, though, all this does for their reputation is enforce it, in my mind.  Really, Wikipedia is fairly “neutral” from the things I’ve read.  Given that, if you really need to edit articles to make yourself sound better, you must be doing something wrong to begin with.

* Crazy funny…  Have you seen Tropic Thunder?  The man is surprisingly funny.

The NBA Playoffs have been pretty great this year.  Aside from the Lakers, the only teams left are teams that haven’t been overly successful in recent years.  Sure, the Cavs and the Nuggets have made the playoffs a few times recently, but they’ve never had any sort of major impact.  This year, along with the Magic, they’ve both got a legitimate chance to go to the finals.  Not just that, but every game in the semis has come down to the wire and regardless of who you’re rooting for, they’ve been fun to watch (albeit likely very nerve-racking).

Honestly, it just doesn’t get much better than this:

Since Scott posted about joining Facebook recently, I figured I’d link this article.  Basically, it’s a study that says Facebook users tend not to do as well in school.  Admittedly, the researcher herself admits that it might be some other third variable, but there is definitely a correlation.

Well, I finally broke down and joined Facebook. I can’t say I’m proud of it, but I felt that I was missing out on too much socially. I also think it provides a decent means of staying connected with people I went to college with, which could help me further my career. Networking never hurts. That’s how I got my job at GM.

My biggest concerns were always privacy. I know that’s ironic considering I write on a blog, but I didn’t like the idea that other people could post stuff on my page. I also feel that a lot of gossip happens over the “relationship status” part. I won’t be using that particular feature.

You can find me under my email address: scottp16@gmail.com I hope everyone adds me as a friend because my self worth is now directly tied to the number of Facebook friends that I have.