Kev

…it’s best not to open your umbrella, as there’s a very good chance it’ll get blown open the wrong way. Further, bringing the umbrella close in to minimize the lifting surfaces exposed to the wind can assist in mitigating the risk of being blown open, but increases the risk of walking into other pedestrians (like say, me) because you can no longer see where you’re going.

Did you know that some people don’t take kindly to mental lapses? I was talking to a woman I met through running last night, and had a momentary brain fart and confused her with another woman at running (there are a lot there). I recognized my error, apologized, and was told not to worry about it (uh-oh). Forty-five seconds later she let me know she was tired from a long day, and had to go (riiiight). Five minutes later I got an e-mail telling me not to bother calling her back or talking to her (surprise!).

Umm, ok.

I admit it, I got confused for a sec, it happens a lot with me. I was mortified when I realized my gaffe, and said so. I found the reaction pretty funny, though. If that’s all it takes to get crossed off a list, I think I will stick to beer and videogames. I mean, it was the first time I had ever talked to this person outside a “you still breathing?” question while running.

I’ll be sure to keep a notepad on me and by the phone… oh wait, no I won’t.

I am plumbing new depths as I continue on my record-setting pace in our fantasy football league. I am 0-8, and managed to leave 57 points on my bench in a 76-73 loss this weekend. It’s been the way the year has gone – out of eight losses I had the ability to win six of the games had I selected an (more) optimal lineup. League bitch I am and, since none of my players are consistent, will probably hold the title through the completion of the season. I’m almost at the point where I’ve been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. Yay me.

Moving forward, I will probably use some form of random selection to pick my starters. Attempting to use my brain to pick them is clearly the wrong way to go about it.

Woo-hoo! I am an uncle times three!

My little sister Ange had a little boy last night (sometime around 11pm Eastern, I believe). Kieran Daniel Kealey weighs in at 6lbs 13oz. Details beyond that are sketchy, but I am told mom and baby are doing fine, and daddy’s all freaked out 😉

I was surprised by the selection of the name Kiran, although I really like it. It’s a Hindi name meaning “beam of light” (this, of course, assumes that I got the spelling right). The meaning made me just about die, because of a private joke my sister and I have shared for a few years. I can’t tell the story here, because Ange would kill me, but it made me laugh.

Congrats to the sib and adopted sib, and welcome to my new nephew! We’ll hopefully get some pictures posted to their site in the next few days.

Update: I can’t spell. Kiran is Hindi, Matt is Irish. I should put two and two together sometimes and attempt to get something other than 7. That should have clued me in that I had the incorrect spelling. I’ll wait to get the “official” spelling, but it’s most likely Kieran or Ciaran.

We played our weekly game this eve, and it was a bit of a blowout. The abnormal part about the blowout was that we were on the winning side. I kinda ran up and down the sidelines, but didn’t do a whole lot. We had decided to stick to short throws, because the long throws were killing the opposition, and it really wasn’t fun.

Of course, in typical “do as I say, not as I do”, I ended the game by throwing a 25yd bomb to coop. As soon as I let it go I remembered, and everyone on my team reminded me that I wasn’t supposed to do that. It did look pretty from where I was standing, though I still felt bad.

I’ve noticed a new tactic being employed, and I’ve mentioned it in the rules discussion forum on the OCUA site. It’s very annoying, but there is a loophole which makes it a grey area. The game which originally triggered the question was cool – I discussed it with the team members, and we figured it was a defensive pick (best analogy I can come up with) and probably was obstruction.

Last night was a little different. I was faster than the guy who was marking me all night long. Every time I started to cut, he’d raise his arms and try to step in front of me before I ran by him. The disc was never in the air, and was usually at least 10 yards away from either of us. When I asked him to stop, his response was “I’m allowed to make a play on the disc, so it’s my right”.

Dear Doofus – that’s obstruction, knock it the fuck off. A few things:

• You were watching me, not the disc.
• The only time your arms came up was when I started to make a cut to get open, not when the disc was being thrown to me or in the air.
• When you raised your arms, you reached out in front of me, not towards the disc.
• Not once did you have position on me; you only did this as I was running by, cutting off my lane and forcing me to avoid making contact.

We were way ahead, so I didn’t want to call anything, nor did I want to run into you just to call the foul/make a point. Instead of resorting to tactics that attempt to interfere/slow me down then saying you were making a play on the disc (a pretty good indicator you’d contest anything I’d call), how about playing positional D or actually waiting until the disc is thrown to try to make a play on it.

If the disc is still in the handlers’ possession, it’s really fucking hard to claim you’re making a play on a block. But, if you play lawyer, you probably have a loophole. I’ll just have to run faster, is all. 🙂

No booze ’til Christmas, with the exception of American Thanksgiving weekend. I looked in my blue bin and was appalled at the amount of empties that have appeared there over the weekend. Couple that with sleep patterns that are all buggered up, too many fuzzy thoughts, five pounds of weight gained, and a craving for beer as soon as I get home, and I think it’s safe to say that it’s time to take a break.

…it looks like they have a new toy. The 7100-series looks a lot more like a phone than the old style Blackberry unit. They’ve changed the keyboard significantly, and from the demo it appears that they’ve taken the best of T9 and blended it somewhat with the QWERTY layout. It even has real phone features that are fun (like polyphonic ringtones), and have a form factor and battery life that is pleasing. I wonder if this is the phone McK’s been playing with across the pond.

I hadn’t even heard of this little unit, but it was announced back in September. Sadly, it seems that RIM still refuses to add a touch screen. With a device that touts itself as a browsing device, I really have to wonder what they’re thinking when they design this stuff. I wish I knew someone that worked there, so I could throw heavy objects at them while shouting “add a touchscreen and stylus already!”. That’s my major beef with my 7750 – it’s great for email and scheduling, and pretty much sucks for everything else, mainly because of the input system and ridiculously slow software.

I’ve been playing with the new Treo, and am very tempted. Of course, I still think PocketPC is the way to go, but have yet to see a decent implementation of the phone/PPC combo. Ok, enough babbling. Cool looking toy, I wonder if my provider will pick it up, or if Rogers – a company I will never buy services from willingly again – has an exclusive.

Now this is a bike tour. Apparently there are parts of the tour where you get your very own armed guard (like in Sudan). Pretty sweet though, and 3 months of fun for around 10.5k is not so bad.

Seen Hackers? The opening credits kick off with Orbital’s Halcyon and On and On set to a flyover. I had a moment like that this eve at twightlight. The light was just right, the road was completely deserted, and the tune came on via random play. The next thing I knew, I was doing 140 in a 60 zone.

Oops.