Packing Up

Hey all,

If you actually read this with any frequency, you can find me over at http://maxres.wordpress.com

Expect more of whatever it is I do here, just with a new look!

Dave

New Shoes

Got the pictures from my shoot at Diane's back last night, and I'm pleased to report they turned out really well. Easily enough to fill my show in June, though I may hold back and make it a half farrier/half other stuff show. I'll have to get some feedback on the shots to see if there's enough to warrant 15 images from the session.

I hope to have the bulk added to my website tomorrow, but since I tend to not do that kind of thing well, I'll throw a few up here for good measure. No captions or anything, since it's late, and my hands are sore from the batting cages.

Quick aside: always make sure your window screens are in good shape, lest your cats punch them out and make an excursion outside without your knowledge. It's a bit disconcerting to open the back door, expecting George to come running, only to find him already on the back porch.

Also--Cardinals=blah.

Also also--one week until my first game as a Perfecto!

Now, onto pictures!















Dave

Why copy-editing is a good thing

Came across this little gem on a flier we received at work:

Basic Muzzle Loaders

This one-day course led by certifeid instructors will cover the history of black powder firearms from the development of black power to today's modern inline muzzle loaders.

Whoops.

In unrelated news, I saw The Princess Bride last weekend. It is, of course, quite funny. And I learned I apparently can't draw feet.

Also, you may have noticed the "Not That Bad" list over on the side. It has no real rhyme or reason--just things that I happen to be enjoying at any given time. And by enjoying Chris Duncan, I mean I'm enjoying his offensive produc---I mean....oh my. There's no graceful way out of that one, is there?

Well, you know what I mean. I hope.


Dave

Wait a minute...

So, General Mills thinks they can pull a fast one on me by making Trix round and claiming it as a "new shape," eh?

Well I can remember when they used to be round! That's right, they weren't always funky shapes! They're just bringing back something they used 15 years ago and hope we don't remember.

Well, I'm onto you guys, so be careful!

Silly rabbit.


Dave

I'm sure you knew this, but...

iPods are pretty cool.


Going to see Rush!

In............August.

Got a nice mini-vacation coming up this week: going to Diane's to do my little farrier photo-essay project I've been hoping to do. So that'll be nice.

Also nice is the return of the not-cold temperatures, even if it means the probable return of ants to my kitchen. I think I can handle it this time around. Maybe. I probably won't be saying that after having to spray the little buggers for the sixth time in three days. We'll see.

So, just to recap: iPods and Rush=cool. Yep.

And life is good.


Dave

I can't dig, yo.

This is one of our Summer Reading Club programs here at the Library:

Thursday, June 28, 2:00 p.m.
It’s All A Mystery! “Digging up Archeology”
When were the dinosaurs on the earth? How do we know they were here? How big were they? Come and learn about these interesting creatures. We will have lots of activities!

Nonononono.

Apparently we need a staff of six-year old boys to fact check our text from now on.

Sigh.


Dave

Flashbacks

I still think this is funny.


Dave

The Fence-Hopping Fox Hound

Wouldn't that make a kick-ass band and/or song? I only wish I'd come up with it.

So I did wrap up the ACPT puzzles earlier this week, but I think I had blogged myself out last week, and didn't feel like posting about them. Suffice it to say, Bob Klahn's puzzle knocked my socks off, and not in a good way. That thing was probably more of a hair-puller than anything else I'd solved. The theme was based around "spoonerisms," which I wasn't familiar with. So even with a lot of crossing words filled in, I still couldn't figure out what was going on. In the end, I think I only got two of the theme answers filled in, which is really frustrating, especially since I actually got about 90% of the grid filled in. I just hit a wall and couldn't get over it.

So after that, I tackled the last puzzle, and since my ego needed a boost, I used the 'easy' set of clues. Considering the fact that the hardest set of clues was just ridiculous, I don't feel like I missed out on much.

So, overall, it was a lot of fun. The puzzles were all enjoyable, even if they weren't at the time I was working on them. I can't wait until next year, when I can hopefully be at the tourney in person. I may need to start saving now, though, just to be sure. And it's in NYC, which oughta be fun.

I spent tonight cleaning my house. Always fun, of course, though it was nice to have a reason for the cleaning tonight. Company always warrants the removal of any and all cat hair from the premises, save for the hair actually on the cats, of course.

Daisies: Spring cleaning...
Virginia Wolfe: I'll sweep off this mat!
Newscaster: Spring-cleaning...
Peter Wolfe: I'll vacuum the cat.

Yeah, any excuse for a Rocko quote around these parts.

We're getting close to the first game of the season for the Perfectos. We had practice a couple weeks ago, and I actually hit the ball pretty well, which was encouraging. Interesting, though, is I'm a dead pull hitter. Everything was going to right field, save for a few that went to right-center. And almost our entire team is that way. We rarely bothered to have anyone in left during practice. With that in mind, I may hit the cages (ha!) in an effort to work on taking the ball the other way on occasion. Seems like it might be of use.

And how about those Cardinals, eh?

Eh?

Yeah, I can't decide either. The pitching's been pretty good so far, but man, I hope the offense decides to, I don't know, do something. I don't think we can count on Gary Bennett to get 3 hits every night. Though it would be pretty cool.

Noted elsewhere in the Cardinals' blogosphere is the Birds' knack for destroying NL closers this year. Weird. Though I will admit to feeling sorry for Brad Lidge at this point.

And that's all for now.



Dave

ACPT 5/6

Huzzah and hooray--I finished both of these puzzles with time to spare. 26:44 on Merl Reagle's 'Gender Bender,' and 19:33 on Maura Jacobson's 'What Are They?'

I really like Merl's puzzle. I think I got the theme fairly early on--I had Frito Lay originally, but once I got the first half of the theme clue, 'sex change,' I caught my error and was on my way. What I wasn't expecting, though, was the theme meandering its way into the clues. So 84-across, 'fay,' and 10-across, 'Sox fan, often,' made no sense with their respective answers--send and vegan. I'm not saying there aren't any vegan Sox fans, of course, but it didn't make much sense in the puzzle. Actually, I don't think I picked up on that little trick until I'd been done with the puzzle for some time. I went back to look at it, and then it clicked. Well played, sir.

Maura's puzzle was another case, as has been the norm through this, it seems, where I was getting theme answers and not instantly knowing what the theme actually was. Once I got 'Ball Rooms' as an answer for "Lucille Chambers," I got the last name/synonym theme. Alas, there were a number of last names I didn't know off-hand, but between crossing fill and the second part of the answer, I was able to figure out. Though I will admit to having 'Hardy Guys' as opposed to 'Hardy Boys' for the longest time.


And hey, the Cardinals scored 10 runs today. 10! That's more than the first 5 games of the season combined, so maybe we've turned a slight corner. Nice to see Pujols get himself a HR, and the 3-5 day from Yadi was a nice bonus.

I'm really hoping the cold snap breaks this week. It's just getting annoying at this point.


Dave

ACPT 3/4

Do you think Cathy Millhauser would appreciate the irony if I felt like strangling her while working on her puzzle? This is not to say it was a bad puzzle. Far from it, actually. It was, as usual, a wonderfully punny theme, and once I got the idea, it wasn't too hard. There were just a lot of moments where I was staring at the grid, not knowing the answers, and I needed to lash out at someone. And it was either her or the cats.

Interesting thing about the puzzle (which I almost finished)--it seemed to have two themes going on. The first was the obvious 'death' answers like "Looney Tombs" and "I'm a bereaver," but then there seemed to be a sub-theme in two of the other answers: Bier One Imports, along with Morgue and Mindy had the 'one' and 'and' both rebused-up in a single box. At least I think so. Since there's no other bagged candy that is M__M's besides M&M's, it had to be the case. And that threw me for a loop, making me think there was something like that going on throughout the puzzle, which I didn't seem to notice. So....it should be interesting to see how I did on that in the end.

In the end, I can say I enjoyed the puzzle. I liked 'kookier' as fill, along with the ore/o'er/oar trio. And it's odd, because a lot of the puzzles I've been doing outside the Tourney stuff has been popping up in the Tourney puzzles and vice-versa. Just before I did these two, I worked on a puzzle with 'skiff' as an answer. And there it was in Cathy's puzzle!

I actually finished Mike Shenk's puzzle before time was up, so that was nice. I liked the visual rebus spelling out the word rebus at 40-across. And "pass go" as a way to earn $200 was really clever.

So two more on tap today. Can't wait.


And how about Root Beer last night, starting that DP with Yadi? And yay for Chris Duncan, who seems to be the only guy who has remembered how to hit.


Dave

Celebrity Watch/ACPT 2

I saw Nelly at Strike 'n' Spare tonight.

Yep.



Just finished (well, almost) Patrick Merrell's puzzle, Faulty Keyboard. I thought it odd at first when I saw two U's back-to-back, but left them, since I had a hunch the theme was built around something sneaky like that. And once I saw it pop up again, I knew what was going on, thought the Elvis song itself didn't come to be at first, mostly because of one damn word--I had heron in instead of egret, and it threw off that entire chunk of the puzzle. Solutes was salines for God knows how long. I also had magna instead of summa, but once I got the theme, I was able to fix that and the SW corner fell quickly. The NW fell almost as fast once I got the long cuumuuluus clouuds, which is really hard to type.

NEVER heard of little Sambo. Had 'sits out' for awhile, which didn't help matters. I felt really bad about not getting Sunbeam sooner, considering how much I'm in the kitchen. But for the life of me, all I could think of was Kitchen Aid. Grr. And I used to have a Sunbeam mixer!

Randomly wrote 'In G' for Chopin's "Nocurne ___ Major," which had me stumped for "prepare for surgery." Scrug up doesn't make much sense. Bad idea, just sticking letters in like that.

Alas, I couldn't wrap up the puzzle. 49, 57, and 61-across never came to me, so I'll have to take a hit there. Everything else though, as far as I can tell, is correct, so that's good.

But it's bed time now, so I'll take on Puzzle 3 tomorrow. Apparently it's a toughie.



Dave

ACPT--Puzzle 1

My packet 'o fun from the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament arrived today, and despite the assurance I could work these at my leisure, I had to get cracking. I've been waiting too long for this to just let it sit around.

So I'll try and post thoughts about each puzzle as I work them.

#1 was by Paula Gamache. The theme wasyin/yang, clued as "opposite principles in this puzzle," though I'll be damned if I can find any examples of such in the grid. The two longest answers are 'misery index' and 'johnny angel,' which have some opposite-ness, I guess. But beyond that, I'm kinda lost.

I tore through about 2/3 of the grid, then got hung up on some answers I didn't know. Names, mostly, and a couple terms I hadn't come across before. With a fifteen-minute time limit, I finished in 13:15, with about 5 minutes spent trying to force those remaining answers out.

SOme fun fill included etyma (as in etymology), Olmecs, and lisps.

Maybe I'll get the theme, eventually.


Dave

If You Lived Here, You'd Be Home By Now

So, according to this little sidebar at the Yahoo! homepage, one of the most sought-after places to live, along with cities like San Fransisco and Seattle, is, um....Valdosta.

Now, I lived near enough to Valdosta for a couple years, and as far as I can remember, the only thing that town had was a mall. Oh and plenty of clay, Which was weird for a Yank like me, since I was used to seeing dirt everywhere. Looking at the ground and seeing red was pretty weird.

Said mall was also the site of mom, Steve, and me getting locked out of the car one day. Steve, I believe, was about to experience some motion sickness as we hit the lot. In the flurry of everyone hopping out of the car, the keys stayed in, and we all locked our doors. Whoops. Much freaking out ensues, and in the end, a kindly mall security guy uses some fancy contraption that probably looked a lot like a coat hangar to open the door. Much rejoicing.

But is all that enough to warrant its desirability? Maybe people like fire ants. I dunno.


Dave

Thanks, Mr. Eck-steen

I never thought I'd say this, bu David Eckstein would make a pretty good straight man in a comedy duo.

Yeah, so I'm basing this off one commercial. It's still pretty amusing.

No baseball thoughts just yet, though the Cardinals are doing their best to not hit some more.

Update: 8:20 p.m.

Also: I don't care what anyone else thinks, I like Joe Buck. For whatever reason, he and Al were talking about American Idol, and he said that his girls were home, glued to the TV, "and they ain't watching me."

I like a little bit of self-deprecating humor. And Lord knows the game hasn't been all that interesting tonight.

But hey, Looper's pitching well, so that's nice.

Update: 8:21 p.m.

Carlos Delgado just hit one out. 2-0 Mets. Natch.



Dave

Whoosh.

I feel I should clarify a point from last night: I'm not saying that Hrabosy was necessarily wrong in his claim. He could very well be right. But the way he sadi it made it pretty clear that we wasn't saying this because he felt a strong conviction about the matter. Rather, it just sounded like he was trying to make some kinda joke about something topical.

Bascially, I'm saying Al Hrabosky is kind of dumb sometimes.

But I do like Joe Buck.

Kip Wells looked pretty good last night. A couple defensive lapses made the score worse than it could have been. One of them was his own fault, but beyond that, I think he should be fine. If we can get something resembling an offense together, maybe we'll be able to scrounge up a win. And I know it's only been two games, but still. Ugh.


Dave