Archive for the year 2007
The Best Day Ever
Posted on May 12, 2007 by Ching under Flickr, Poker, School.
Friday, May 11, proved to be the best day ever! Craft posted the grades for our Friendly Cards case study as well as our final exam scores. We got another great score on our last case and I got a 98% on the final so that gave me an A for the class. Last semester I took four classes and ended up with three A’s and a B (in DS also known as Operations Management). The work load was just too much for me to handle.
This semester I took Brian’s advice and dropped to three classes. He was so right. Three classes is just enough course load so that I can meet my target graduation date and maintain good grades. Taking four graduate level courses in one semester was a crazy idea.
My Finance grade was the last one I was waiting for — all A’s this sem! Go me! And, for the first time in a really long time, I don’t have finals during Riverfest week; which means Brian and I can actually participate in some of the week’s festivities. So far I have talked him into attending the swing dance/concert with me and also going to the Botanica on Friday afternoon. 🙂
Besides the good news I received about my grades, I also did great at poker last night. Last night was the first Friday night Blue Collar Poker Tour event at APL. I was short-stacked the whole way but luck was on my side (must be the good mojo from the great news I received earlier in the day) because I managed to finish 2nd.
The tourney started at seven in the evening and we didn’t finish until well after midnight. That was a long time to play poker. I think I might’ve had a shot to win the big one but my opponent had my stack covered 3-to-1 so I couldn’t make a move. When it was time for heads up play, I couldn’t catch cards to save my life. The one time that I had him out-kicked our kickers didn’t play so we had to split the pot. I was totally worn out and finally just gave up. Went all in on a stupid hand just so the agony would be over, and Brian and I could finally go home and go to bed. That’s the main weakness I have when it comes to final table and heads up play — I don’t have endurance. I get bored. I get impatient. I do crazy things. And I get knocked out.
Taking home $100 for 2nd place wasn’t bad, though. Brian and I invested $20 to play ($10 each for chair rentals) and so that’s pretty good ROI when you think about it.
P.S. The Dill’s are in town for the week. We found out yesterday at poker because they were there. We wouldn’t have known otherwise because Dill changed his phone number. =P
We went to Becca’s graduation this morning. I’m really glad that we found out about it (although not until last night) and could be there to show our support. You can view the photos we took here.
Anyway, Friday was the best day I’ve had in a long time!
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The Holy Grail of Footwear
Posted on May 5, 2007 by Ching under Life, Reviews, Travel.
I bought three new pairs of shoes over the last week. This is amazing for someone like me who rarely shops. I wanted to blog about shoes today because I want to brag about this amazing deal I found. The shoes pictured on the left are a pair of Tribeca Get the Scoop sandals, $72.99 at Zappos. If you’re wondering why they’re pricey it’s because Tribecas are made by Kenneth Cole. Anyway, I was convinced that I could find them cheaper elsewhere on the web. Mission accomplished! I found the exact same shoes at Shoemall (through Amazon)
Why the sudden shoe obsession? Well, shoes are an important part of our upcoming anniversary trip to Jamaica. I’ve read that shoes actually occupy the bulk of your luggage on these sort of trips. Even if you plan to pack light, somehow you end up having to bring several pairs of shoes. You’ll need shoes for horseback riding, water shoes for climbing the falls, beach sandals or flip flops for the beach, dressy shoes or sandals for fancy dinner night, sandals for your sundresses.. The list goes on and on and on. A lot of people will bring shoes for every outfit. On the other hand, Brian and I fully intend to accomplish our goal of packing light, so we plan to bring only a couple of pairs each. That got us thinking, could we find a single pair of shoes that would work for everything? Thus, the hunt for a pair of versatile shoes went…
The hunt began last weekend with trips to Payless, Shoe Carnival and Target. Payless and Shoe Carnival both had “buy one pair get the other pair for 50% off” (BOGO) sales going on. Brian and I tried our best to find versatile shoes for each other at one place so we could avail of the BOGO offer. Unfortunately for us, he couldn’t find shoes for himself at Shoe Carnival and I couldn’t find shoes for myself at Payless. We didn’t find anything at all that would work at Target so Target was immediately out of the running. Anyway, we still managed to take advantage of the BOGO offer because he found two shoes for himself at Payless and I found two shoes for myself at Shoe Carnival.
Brian’s versatile, all-purpose shoe find is a pair of black water clogs. They’re like Crocs but they’re made by Airwalk. The shoes can be worn as a slip on or with the attached back strap. He plans to wear the shoes for everything including horseback riding. He also plans to stretch the dress shoe rule at Le Gourmet by going to dinner wearing the water clogs. I’ve read in the Couples message board that this practice is frowned upon but a few have actually gotten away with it. Brian is not averse to going against the norm for the sake of packing light so he will try to do it. His other pair is a pair of canvas sneakers. He got them for no other purpose than the BOGO offer. Well, that and he’s wanted a pair of light canvas sneakers.
My versatile, all-purpose shoe find is Skechers Bikers Excursion. These sandals are the best. I plan on wearing them anytime I do any kind of walking on our trip, including horseback riding. I ended up getting a 5.5 size and they fit perfect. There was no break-in needed. The shoes felt great the second I put them on. I also walked a mile on the treadmill in these shoes to see if they would be uncomfortable at some point. That point never came.
The only downside to these shoes is that they look weird when worn with a swimsuit. So my second pair is a pair of Skechers sandals that I can wear with my swimsuits. It was tough convincing Brian to let me have my second pair because my first pair cost quite a bit more than we planned to spend on shoes originally. The BOGO offer helped, though. Anyway, I guess we didn’t completely accomplish our goal of finding the perfect pair. However, I think we came pretty close.
If we need to declare a winner of this shoe hunting contest, I’d have to concede that Brian wins this round. After all, he’s going to pass a pair of water clogs off as dress shoes. That’s going to be something to see. LOL.
While we’re no longer shopping for shoes (we certainly can’t afford to buy any more after this shopping spree), the perfect pair is still out there. Someday I will find it — the holy grail of footwear. But we’ll have to continue the hunt another time, when we are not so broke. =P
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Ching Recommends
Posted on April 27, 2007 by Ching under Reviews, Toys, Web.
I thought I would share some cool stuff with everyone. I’m sure you’ve probably tried some of these programs while you may not have heard of others before. These programs, web sites, and tools are all really cool and come with our seal of approval.
OpenOffice
OpenOffice consists of the following components: Writer (wordprocessing application) , Calc (spreadsheet application), Impress (for presentations), Draw (graphics package), Base (database application), and Math (to insert math equations into documents and presentations). It is the poor man’s MS Office. With Mr. Gates cracking down on pirated versions of his software, this OpenOffice is your best alternative. I don’t use it myself, but it is what they use at APL and it works quite well.
WordPress
Of course, I gotta plug WordPress. It’s what powers this blog, as well as mom and dad’s blog, as well as the MKMVPA web site. It rocks!
Flickr
The best photo storage, photo sharing, photo community, photo anything ever!
Google Notebook
The best way to take notes while surfing the web. It is a great research tool. It is my brain.
Foxit Reader
The best PDF viewer and printer there is. It is better than Acrobat Reader because it loads faster. Ask Brian. He will swear by this program.
RoboForm
This is yet another tool that Brian swears by. He loves RoboForm. Without RoboForm, Brian wouldn’t be able to login to anything. You know how you can’t live without your cellphones because all of your phone numbers are in it? Well, RoboForm is to Brian’s passwords as cellphones are to your phone numbers.
Google Calendar
Yet another Google tool I can’t live without. I keep multiple calendars on Google Calendar — my school calendar, work calendar, and personal calendar which I share with Brian so he knows what my schedule is like at any given moment. Brian also shares his calendar with me so I can see what he is up to. In addition, I participate in the MKMVPA calendar. Google Calendar rocks!
DVD Shrink
Brian swears by this program also. He’s been using it for at least five years. He loves it.
GIMP
The next best thing to Adobe Photoshop if you don’t have any money to invest in software. Great tool. Used this for a while, but I have Photoshop now. =P
Google SketchUp
A good 3D modelling tool. Another winner from Google.
ZSNES
An open-source Super Nintendo emulator. Great for video game old school fans.
Addicting Games
Speaking of games.. You can find some cool games here.
Alright. That’s it for now. Don’t say you never got anything out of reading this blog. Until next time.
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Not Your Typical Saturday
Posted on April 21, 2007 by Ching under Flickr, Life.
The day started out pretty uneventfully. Brian and I took our time getting up. Once up, we showered and headed off to run errands. But before that we decided to stop at Red Robin for lunch. Not as good as it usually is, but it served its purpose. I need to eat something in order to take my medication. The doc recommended it be taken with food.
Our next stop was Craft Country. CC is quickly becoming our favorite gift shop. We picked up Mother’s Day gifts for Brian’s mom, Brian’s grandmother, my mom, Jenni and Jen without breaking the bank. I love that place!
Then we hit Lowe’s for some Quikrete. We went to the Lowe’s in Derby since it is closest to Craft Country. Our mailbox keeps falling over because of the high winds we’ve been getting so Brian said that the first time it dries up he’s going to set the post in Quikrete. That’s what we were there for.. We were supposed to go to Dillon’s after that, but that’s when things veer toward the unexpected.
We were driving North on the Canal Route when we witnessed this car wreck (more pictures are available on
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Advocate for Unaccountability
Posted on April 17, 2007 by Brian under Family, Games, Life, News.
OK, I know I don’t Blog much but every now and then I come across something that I just can’t keep my mouth shut about.
If you have been under a rock I’ll fill you in on the latest happenings so that my rant will make since. The other day aĂ‚Â StudentĂ‚Â of theĂ‚Â Virginia Tech SchoolĂ‚Â woke up and decided that it would be ok to shoot 33 students. That’s the short and skinny of it and that’s all you really need to know for my rant to make since. So here’s my rant!
Jack Thompson one of the largest protestors of video game violence and video game sex is claiming that this incident in VirginiaĂ‚Â is caused by video game violence. That this grown man (I consider anyoneĂ‚Â 18 or olderĂ‚Â grown enough to know right from wrong) played some video game like “GTA”, “Bully” or “The Warriors” (yes this was modeled after the 70’s film of the same name)Ă‚Â and then went insane and shot up all of these people. Here is one point that good-ol Jack seems to forget! If the shooter seriously was affected by video games then he wouldn’t have shot himself. That’s right; you can’t commit suicide in video games. Instead he would have run out of the building in front of all the cops and started shooting at them thinking that he still has the ability to start the level over again, only to realize in the last minutes of his life that he is not in a video game. But these thoughts do not come to Jack, no! Instead Jack blames the video game industries and the distributors of the video games for contributing to the violence that he feels is caused by video games.
On Jacks web site he posts that he has tried to sue video game companiesĂ‚Â (and other various companies that he feels is offensive) for too much violence and too much sex. He admits in his site that he had sued Rappers; video game companies like RockStar Games and has yet to win a case. He goes on to show that other cases that he has fought for like the Columbine High School and Washington Sniper Shootings have been dismissed as well. He even goes as far as stating that the “God Mode” cheats available in some games that make you invincible lead to extreme aggression and violence. He even states that he uses a “Games Made Me Do It” defense when defending violent murders. Here is a direct quote from his site.
Ă‚Â Ă‚Â Ă‚Â “Jack is also one of the foremost proponents of the “Video Games Made Me do it” defense, which has so far failed to convince any judges. This defense is employed in an attempt to lessen the sentence of violent murderers, shifting the blame over to video game makers and distributors.”
How messed up do you have to be to try to get Violent Murders off and free by blaming video game companies. Why are we not blaming the murders for the events that they caused, what happened to taking responsibility for your actions? What happened to accountability for ones own mistakes? What happened to blaming the parents for the improper upbringing or telling the world that he was a good kid but fell into the wrong crowd. (more…)
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