My genius wife is self-installing Verizon FiOS.
Did I mention she is a genius?
Month: April 2014
San Jose Sharks Clarification
The Bruins have already won their first round series, and they already know they will be playing Montreal in round two. Game one is tomorrow night.
The first round will come to an end tonight after the completion of three game sevens. New York and Philadelphia, Colorado and Minnesota, and the game I want to talk about right now, San Jose and Los Angeles.
I beat on the San Jose Sharks a lot. One of my golden rules for playoff predictions is to always pick against the Sharks. One might think it’s because I hate them. No, that is not the case. In fact, I think they are awesome. During the regular season, in the days before the last lock out, I would often find myself dialing in Sharks games on the radio (by radio I mean iPad) when I couldn’t fall asleep at night.
Why then do I give them such a hard time? Simple. Playoff history. There was a stretch 5-10 years ago where I picked them to at least make the Western Finals if not win the Stanley Cup every year. They were a powerhouse. They owned the West during the regular season, year after year. They were awesome to watch. Then the playoffs would come and they would turtle and get their asses whooped by some clearly inferior team and I would have a big black mark on my playoff predictions.
At some point along the way I instigated the Sharks doctrine. Now I only pick them to win a series when their opponent is supremely awful. More often than not, when I pick against them I am picking right.
It just so happens that this year they matched up with the Kings. The Kings and the Sharks (and the Oilers, although not recently) have been the Western Conference teams I followed, again prior to last year’s insulting lock out. The Kings have an A-list goalie. I would have picked them against anyone. It was just a nice deal that I could pick them over San Jose.
Game seven is tonight, and I have one more huge reason to root against the Sharks.
We all remember the mental breakdown all Bruins fans suffered in 2010. The B’s took that magical 3-0 series lead over Philly and it turned into a curse as we watched in horror as Philly won game seven. It’s only happened three times in NHL history. Three times, a team has blown a 3-0 series lead and lost the round 4-3. The Bruins are just the most recent example.
Tonight, however, history could be made once again. The Sharks murderlized the Kings in the first two games. Then they won game three in overtime. Since then? The Sharks have lost by three goals scores in games four through six. The series is now tied at three games a piece. The Sharks have home ice advantage in tonight’s game seven, but I am optimistic that both the Sharks doctrine will be upheld, and that the Bruins will no longer be looked at as the last team to blow a 3-0 series lead.
The Kings. The Los Angeles Kings. They must, MUST win this game tonight. They must put the Sharks away. They must score early and often and break their spirit. Not because I hate the Sharks, not because I am rooting for the Kings so much (the Bruins are winning the cup this year, therefore I will not have to pick a back up team to root for like I did two years ago), but because the memory of 2010 still stings me, and I want another team to go through the same misery in the hopes that it will serve as a buffer between me and the memory of the Bruins failure. Not even winning the Stanley Cup in 2011 could erase the agony of 2010. Maybe this will at least ease it a little more.
I honestly hope that some day Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau will hoist the Cup in front of their Bay Area faithful. I mean it. Despite everything, I still consider myself to be a big Joe Thornton fan.
I just don’t want it to be this season, and I most definitely do not want to see them win tonight.
Go Kings.
Oh yes, Go Kings!
Random Camera Phone Moments
First:
I met our company’s latest hire on the way back from the cafe. I assume “gobble gobble” translates to nice to meet you.
Second:
I saw this truck yesterday and took a pick. I saw it again today. I have probably posted something like this before but… I just can’t imagine that their parties are all that much fun. Why do I think that?
Nervous and Bummed Out
The kids are going away for a few days with their father and step mother. Every time this happens Jen and I get really sad. We worry about their safety, even though we are both sure that nothing bad will happen. That part of it makes me feel like a completely irrational doofus but you feel what you feel, right?
Mostly though we are just going to miss them like crazy while they are gone. I’ve said this before. We miss them during the normal course of a week when they are at Daddy’s house instead of ours. We always miss them. Now though, they aren’t 15 minutes away. It makes a huge difference. We’re both going to miss them like mad until they come back.
Another Night, Another Song
Alonetone is having all sorts of trouble these days. I wonder if I am going to get this one posted.
On a thursday afternoon, I had a very short time for my lunch break. I decided to sneak in a lyrics and a vocal. The topic of deadlines came to mind and this stinker was born. It is meant to have a sound byte at the start of the song but I couldn’t get my mitts on it. Picture it: The movie Highlander. Connor and Castigere are on the bridge in Central Park. Castigere says, “Time has almost caught us, my friend” and then punches the railing five times.
That. That is what I want leading into this song. That is what became the title of this little suck fest of a crap dog.
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/time-has-almost-caught-us-my-friend.mp3%20Alonetone continues to shit the bed tonight. If the player above doesn’t work and you must, must, must here this awful song, click here.
The Big Three Are Officially Back
It was announced today. The cast of Star Wars Episode VII.
Click the image for the mashable.com article.
John Boyega
Daisy Ridley
Adam Driver
Oscar Isaac
Andy Serkis
Domhnall Gleeson
Max von Sydow
Anthony Daniels
Peter Mayhew
Kenny Baker
Harrison Ford
Carrie Fisher
Mark Hamill
Max Von Sydow! The bad guy from Bob and Doug’s Strange Brew! Awesome! He’s 85 years old and I hope his role is awesomeness personified.
Anthony Daniels, Peter Mayhew, Kenny Baker all had to come back. I mean, you can’t have Star Wars without R2 and 3PO, and Chewy just rules. Also, Mr Mayhew is pretty much a Twitter all star.
Still, the important thing here is the confirmation of the worst kept secret in Hollywood. The Big Three are all back. Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and Mark Hamill. I’ve been waiting 31 years to see the three of them together again. Even if the new movie is an utter stink burger, it will still be the greatest thing in movies ever to see the three of them on screen together.
Kick. Ass.
April Ends Tomorrow?
What’s this? The last day of April is tomorrow? So much for finishing the April music thingie on time, eh?
I have already decided that I wasn’t going to do one of these idiotic things in May. There’s a holiday, there are two birthdays, there is a certain fifth anniversary to celebrate, and my wife and I are planning to go off the grid for a few days. It was going to be a short month as far as music time goes, so I am just not doing an album in a month next month.
I will, however, still bore you to bloody tears of boredom by posting more music. Now that April won’t be finished before May 1st, I will first be finishing April. There are still seven songs to go. Once that is done, I will finish off the leftovers from March. There are still 10 songs to finish there.
That is the musical plan. Somewhere in there I will also be watching lots and lots of hockey, as the Bruins continue their march to the Stanley Cup.
April Song #3
Another one about science denial. This time we have a denier questioning his belief but receiving a pep talk from a more faithful denier. Interesting, I know.
I was going to keep everything this month above 100 beats per minute. This one is 59 beats per minute. I can never keep to my own goals. It’s kind of pathetic, you know?
There might be issues linking to this alonetone file. They are having some performance/server issues tonight. Just be cool, the site is awesome even if the song is not.
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/believedeceive.mp3%20Dumpster Recap in Pictures
We rented a dumpster for the cellar/garage clean up. It was delivered on Friday. On Saturday morning (after using a crow bar to pry the damn door open) it looked like this:
On Saturday evening when my legs and back couldn’t take anymore and the cellar clean up was put on hold for the night it looked like this:
On Sunday afternoon when the cellar and garage were as done as they were going to get, it looked like this:
Now that the all of the storage spaces in the cellar are completely empty, the next job is to take all of the stuff that can’t be thrown away but needs to be stored some place and re-fill up all of the cellar storage spaces. After that it will be time to clean the holy hell out of the floors, walls, and ceiling, with a focus on getting rid of the dust and spider webs and making the whole place as unappealing to garter snakes as possible. Then we can look into figuring out why two of the light fixtures don’t work. If turning on the lights actually lights up the whole cellar instead of just part of it, then it will be more appealing for the family to use. There is also the question of getting cable hooked up so Robbie can watch hockey in the cellar while the kids watch on demand in the living room. The Bruins vs Montreal second round series should be starting sometime this week after all.
Kitty Bed
Patches has been less than overwhelmed by out attempts to spoil her rotten. The cat tree has been investigated, but mostly ignored. She’s tried playing with most of the toys but she usually runs away like she’s in terror.
The cat bed though… Success! Partly because she likes to sleep on piles of laundry and I made sure there weren’t any around tonight. Still… Success!
Inside the Red Head's Head 