War on Terror?

What’s more terrifying than Pirates? We spend billions of dollars on the war in Iraq, while the true enemy is still out there! With all of our surveillance couldn’t we throw a torpedo or three this way quick and end a bad situation in a weekend? Send a submarine…that should be immune to cannonballs! Arg mateys One Eyed Willy hath sailed again…

Why the west-side Damon’s went out of business: The food sucks! I had a coupon for a free entrée so I went to the one remaining Damon’s. Tons of TV’s, Half price apps and Taps, Trivia, Sports Baresque menu, Damon’s should have it all. Well the only reason to go is to hang out in the bar. They should turn half the place into bar. I arrived at 5:30 and saw the other 3 cars in the packing lot. Now, don’t get me wrong, they have awesome appetizers and at half price (along with Leinie’s Red) I don’t know why the bar isn’t always packed. But then I ordered a burger. It was a typical bacon cheese burger with fries. Now I am a big fan of soft soggy fries…most people hate them. But these fries were too soggy for me. But that was the highlight of the plate. The burger itself was hardly ingestible. It was among the worst Burgers I ever had. The bun was terrible, it was some sort of hard roll and I can’t imagine anyone liking it. The meat itself was greasy but not in a good way. The taste was non-existent. Overall it was a terrible experience. This was the fourth time in two years I have eaten non-appetizers at Damon’s and the best time was average at best. Damon’s has a niche…it is the best place in town for Happy Hour but should be avoided at all costs outside the hours of 4-7pm. Oh yeah and I lost to the other guy playing trivia…stupid movie trivia!

On to the better part of my evening, after going to 8 stores I finally found the Karaoke Revolution Party (KRP) packaged without the microphone at the mall. I also bought a used Eye Toy. With my $55 investment in karaoke (I’ve now spent $195 on the KR series) I went home. I hooked up the Eye Toy and after futzing for about 15 minutes I was able to film my face and save it! Frickin’ awesome! I then created my character and was able to morph my face onto it and even mess and try to make my body type. The result is the Playstation version of me! While my outfit leaves a little something to be desired I have pretty smooth moves. The song list leaves much to be desired, 50 songs (15 more than other versions) but the amount of songs I like are less. The cool features are if you are perfect on a song you can go Diamond (twice so far) and there are dance modes that incorporate either the Eye Toy or the Dance Pad. KRP has the most potential and has some decent songs. I foresee a lot of singing this weekend! Everyone will have to come over and make themselves…especially Russ! Then Russ will be a character in the game and everyone can play as Russ!

A good day!

So far today has been awesome! I finally got my new triathlon frame. It retails for $2600 (I also got the $400 fork, and FSA carbon headset and seatpost.) My cost? $50 and a set of tires. This is why I love Pacific Cycle so much. This bike was given to the president of Pacific to try. I’ve talked to him about it a couple times and he said, do you want it? I said sure! It is one size too small which would make for a perfect triathlon bike. He said he’d give it to me a couple months ago when he got something new but I thought nothing of it. Until last week when he asked again and I said yes and yesterday I got an e-mail saying it was ready. He had to pay $50 for someone to take the parts off it and put it on his other bike. So all he wanted was that $50. I also traded him a set of tires in exchange for the oversized seatpost (31.6) So now I have to build it up and I also am working on scheduling a bike fitting with Robbie Ventura and I will be in the game!

Oh yeah…about the bike. It is a Scott CR-1 Team Issue. 1.94lbs. Fork is .79lbs. Wow, now that I look at the specs it is a Large bike…cool, perfect size!!! Mine has the Saunier Duval team package but has custom Pacific logos on it also (that may or may not be removed.) I’ll post a photo next time I get a chance. It can even be a good triathlon bike!

Chili- The Update!
Chili is a funny pup! He likes to torment Popeye, poop and pee inside and cuddle! He isn’t as hyper as we expected but he is certainly a very sweet puppy! He is starting to get some of this potty training done and Popeye and him are establishing boundaries. Jess and I have devised a good plan for crate training and are sticking to it and in only a couple days we have noticed a difference. I am very excited for Chili to be potty trained and in the mean time we have clean white spots all over the carpet and are keeping Resolve and Bounty in business!

Ironman Update:
Running: 43.6 miles in my first two weeks of running. I should be ready for the Berbee Derby on Thanksgiving Day and I am going to revise my goal to under an hour at some point as my training pace would be at an hour so race pace should be slightly faster. Jingle Bell run is in mid-December…might do that.
Cycling: I’ve ridden 2-3 times a week the past few but am tapering that. I’ve ridden 3450 miles this year so far, surpassing my goal of 3000…but I may be short of the 3650 mile mark (10 miles a day for every day this year.) But to my credit I haven’t counted any indoor miles, so I’d be right around 3650 if I did. Maybe I can eek out 200 more miles…but we’ve been fighting fall and winter for a while…I am not sure how much time will be left!
Swimming: I haven’t swam since August, instead right now focusing on my running (don’t want to burn out in November.) Once the ice hits though, swimming will gain its place in the rotation!

Personal update: Karaoke Revolution Party comes out today so my productivity at home will likely suffer!

I wonder what Hez is up to right now?

Introducing Chili! So we've been looking to get a boxer pup for quite some time now but we wanted to find a very reputable breeder who had fawn colored pups available. I get to work on Friday and Jess sends me an e-mail saying, would you go to Indiana (Michigan City-LaPorte area) today if this lady will be around and I say sure. At 8:15 Jess' was like, we can go. So I told Bel and was done with work at 8:30, ran home, picked Jess back up and we were off. We spent most of the time talking puppy names on the way there and thought about Slinky, Dunkin and a few others but decided that we were going to see how Chili worked as a name. We took the downtown Chicago route for a change (it was fast) and of course no trip to Michigan City would be complete without a trip to White Castle (actually had a couple pieces of fish at Long John Silvers washed down with 3 sliders with cheese. We got to Rolling Prairie, IN (right off of US 20) at about 1 and hung out with the breeder for an hour or so. We had a partcular pup in mind but got to meet the whole family! Boxers are beautiful dogs and it was cool to see them all! On the way home Chili was very chill choosing to nestle on my lap the whole way home. He kept putting his nose in my pits and everything. Once we were home the adventure would begin. First we intorduced him to Popeye who seemed to like him although he gave out a couple snarls as Chili crossed some boundaries. Then some of our friends came over to play games and Chili likes just being held or even sleeping on someone's foot or anything. Chili did however poop on the deck which I didn't notice until I took him out before bed and slipped on it. I guess poop on bare feet is like sneakers on fresh ice. On Saturday Chili pooped three times inside the house but we are getting there. This morning I got him to poop and pee outside (he first started trying to do both inside but I got him out there.) Chili seems very subdued for a boxer. His favorite thing in the world is to sit on a lap. He slept through the whole Badger game last night (shifting position every 10 minutes.) He has been accident free in his crate so far (I think he is too tall to pee in his crate) so that's good and he only whines for a couple minutes before falling asleep! I can't wait until we get him potty trained that is pretty much the biggest challenge at this point! :) Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend!