McCain clip from SNL

My New Gaming PC

I fired up my new computer system. It clocked in around $800-$900 after shipping.

I assembled it on the kitchen table with my brother-in-law assisting. It was great fun. The case has rails for picking it up and the fan glows blue. Basically, it is a quad-core system with 4GB of Ram and a top-of-the line video card. Here are the links from newegg.com for you dorks out there:

• Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz LGA 775 Quad-Core Processor Model BX80562Q6600 - Retail
• Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3500630AS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
• COOLER MASTER Centurion 532 RC-532-SKN1 Black Aluminum bezel, SECC chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
• APEVIA ATX-CW500WP4 500W ATX Power Supply - Retail
• Sony NEC Optiarc 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model AD-7191S - OEM
• SAMSUNG Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive Windows 98SE/ ME/ 2000/ XP - OEM
• EVGA 512-P3-N871-AR GeForce 9800 GTX(G92) 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail
• Kingston HyperX 4GB (4 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Quad Kit Desktop Memory Model KHX8500D2K4/4G - Retail
• GIGABYTE GA-P35-S3G LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

With All Your Power!

I finally did it.

I am updating Bongo.Gamer.2k3 to Bongo.Gamer2k8. After determining that there is only one game in existence that takes advantage of dual-video card SLI technology (Crysis) I decided to assemble a budget/power-gamer computer system.

I am getting a quad-core Intel processor with 4GB of Ram.

I have never spent $300 on a video card, but I did it for this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130339

I am going to feel like a professional gamer once I fire this baby up.

The parts should arrive throughout the week and I should have it in service by Friday.

Revenge

I had a moment of weakness today.

I had a chance to take revenge on someone who has repeatedly wronged me in the past. And instead of turning the other cheek, I took my vengeance.

It felt good, and now I get to laugh every time I see this sucker.

If given the same set of conditions I would do it again. If given a differnet chance to take revenge, I would take revenge again.

Forgive me for being weak.

Tracy Morgan on Weekend Update

Nathan's Hot Dog Regional

Cub is sponsoring the Midwest Regional Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest this Saturday, May 10th at the Apple Valley Cub store from 11:00am – 1:00pm. The winner of this event will go on to the Coney Island event on July 4th which is televised on ESPN. The #2 ranked eater in the world will be at this event, Pat “Deep Dish” Bertoletti from Chicago. This will be a family event with contests for kids and community involvement.

Joe Nathan of the Twins will also be there signing autographs and watching and/or judging the event.

Four WiiMotes!

We stopped at target yesterday for the usual things, like toilet paper and cards.

We purchased two more WiiMotes and a rechargeable battery charging station.

Wii now have the ability to do all four player games (although we still need two nun-chucks). So that along with Mario Kart will give us a hella fun time all summer long!

Jon Stewart comes to St. Paul during RNC

The Daily Show will film in St. Paul during the RNC. Request FREE tickets here.

Denny Heckler

A buddy at work bought his car from a Denny Hecker dealership. He has been doing all of his maintenance there in order to keep his car's records in one place.

Last year, he has a slow leak in a tire that his neighbor offered to repair. His neighbor owns three tire shops and knows things about where the rubber meets the road. He advised my work buddy that his tires had never been rotated.

This seemed odd since my buddy has been paying to have his tires rotated at the appropriate times.

Yesterday he took his car in for an oil change and a tire rotation to the same Denny Hecker dealership he has used since purchasing his vehicle.

Before service yesterday he placed a unique mark each tire using a ball point pen.

After picking up the car last night, each tire remained in its original position on the car despite the fact that my buddy paid for a tire rotation.

He then called the service manager who argued with him and refused to believe his story. I'm not sure why he wouldn't believe him when it's pretty simple to take your oil change business elsewhere - along with all future car purchases!

I'll keep you posted for any exciting updates.

Monday Haiku For Old Friends

I received some spam.
My heart lept! A reconnect?
Rats, just come Chinese porn.

Bonus Letter

For the first time working at my current company I have been awarded a bonus. It is small, but it will allow me to buy a new pumputer if I want one.

Of course, I still hate corporate America but this at least makes it slightly easier to come to work...for this week anyway. If I really wanted to play this game I would kick ass. I have a buddy who is going to work for Hennepin County. THAT would be a great job!

I don't even care what they would want me to do, just not being in the Southwest Suburbs would be enough for me!

Got Google?

This is my Step-Dad Greg.


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A Sucker for Star Wars

Well I got my tickets. I am going to the 11:00am movie followed by the Star Wars Exhibit at 12:15pm.

Hopefully my wife will go with me because it cost $50 for two tickets. They make you buy an All-Day ticket, a movie ticket, and a Star Wars ticket. I guess they need to cash in while the cashin' in is good.

Let me know if you are going. We are doing the 11am movie and the 12:15pm Star Wars exhibit.

May the Force be with you!

Whole Lotta Lovin'

The weekend recap included falling asleep watching movies Friday, a Nordin family breakfast on Saturday, seeing Kraftwerk LIVE on Saturday followed by a Twins game on Sunday.

Whew!

I also picked up some Hush Puppies and a couple of new shirts.

It's not easy being this hawt.

Thursday Night Home Cookin'

So our friend Graeme usually swings by on Thursday for dinner. He is single and never cooks so we try to get him one non-fast food meal per week. He came by last night and we had invited another friend who has class in St. Paul on Thursdays. He came over and brought three folks total. So counting the three of us who live there and our four guests who came to watch TV we ended up with a nice little impromptu party.

We watched The Office, of course, and also some of the other TV rigmaroles that are broadcast on Thursdays. The Office is always the Main Event for us.

My guild dropped Magtheridon last night which is a nice accomplishment but even nicer considering that I was the tank and several of our better geared players have recently quit playing or moved servers.

We got into an argument about the Coriolis Effect. I stated that the washtub draining theories propagated in pop-fiction are bogus. Nobody believed me but Wikipedia backed me up.

It was a really great Thursday actually.

Oh, and I found a dead bird in the basement this morning. If you are reading this and you don't want to see a dead bird, do not go into the basement.

I assigned corpse cleanup to my bro-in-law (the one who is also our roommate) so we'll see if he gets to it. If not I will do it when I get home.

Got Me Werkin'!

I had my work headphones at home for a long time. I was using them for gaming and they worked fine but I made the conversion to USB headphones so I had no purpose for my work headphones at home anymore.

I figured, "Huh, I guess I should bring them back to the office."

I had them at home for about thirteen months and enjoyed every minute of it.

I had them back in the office for about ten minutes and they broke. They still work, but a small shirt clip snapped off so I can't clip it to my collar for cord control. Guess I should have just kept them.
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My Mom's Turbo Tax online filing got hosed up. I have e-filed using Turbo Tax since 1998 or so. Sometimes not until 11:59PM on April 15th. I have never had any issues. My Mom came over and tried it for the first time this year and she didn't get her money back and had to sit on hold for an hour and a half to talk to someone from Turbo Tax who helped walk her through filing properly. They never could tell her what she did wrong.

I told my Mom it was because she was suspicious of e-filing and The Internets sensed her frustration and emotions, thus, The Internets responded by sending her e-filed taxes to iPurgatory instead of the iIRS.

Well she got it taken care of and I hope she trusts The Internets again next year but if not, we'll figure something out.
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It would be horrifying to be working in a foreign country and die because you took a wrong turn. I am not really a fan of outsourcing American jobs to the lowest bidder, but I don't really want anyone to die because they are trying to make a better life for themselves. Although it is odd that all of these employees have been working in America for over four years. I would think that in that amount of time a company would be able to find an American worker willing to do an "analyst" job...if they were actually looking anyway.
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Oh, and I got The Call awhile back. It was put on hold until a requisition was approved. This time The Call happened yesterday in the line for chow. The hiring manager gave me an impromptu interview and asked some specific job-related questions. If it posts I will certainly apply but I am not holding out for anything. I will continue to watch for all positions, internal and external. The key for me right now is to modify my reporting chain and I will do that any way I can. Fortunately, I am employed so I can be a searching slacker. If my wife goes to work for a firm I may try harder but for now I will be a casual searcher.

Spelunking

I am not too proud to let a seventeen year old girl lead me into a cave. She was only seventeen, but she had been a cave guide for three years, so I was fine with letting her lead the way.

On Sunday April 13th, 2008 my wife took me on a surprise day trip. About an hour south of Rochester there is a cave called "Niagra Cave". They have an hourlong tour that atkes you into the depths of a cave where you see underground waterfalls, streams, and various rock types and geological formations. It is pretty damn cool, but you have to be prepared to walk for a mile and you have to be prepared to go down about two-hundred and fifty steps. That;s not the hard part, the hard part is coming back up the two-hundred-fifty steps.

Um, after we walked our asses off and did the stairmaster climb from hell we opted to skip going to the gym and counted the cave tour as our workout. Cop out? Maybe, but it was pretty intense. Plus, when the other tourists let me lead I started jogging just to mess with everyone.

They either thought the fat man couldn't keep up, or they thought they were missing important cave details since my wife was talking to our tour guide. Once they dropped back I think they realized they were only missing small talk because they didn't utter a word to our tour guide and I sped ahead about five-hundred feet or so in a quick trot.

It was a great day and a fantastic surprise. We even noticed a former Minneapolis mayor's name in the guest book from the previous weekend...so it could mean that my wife and a former mayor both read the same magazine article.

Great minds think alike.

Our tour guide only nailed a 22 on the ACT. It's too bad really. She wants to go into Environmental Sciences. This is what my wife and the tour guide were discussing as they were walking out of the cave. Too bad her in-depth knowledge of geology and the effects of time in a living cave simply cannot be captured on a standardized test.