Chris

Where do the miles go?

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Since buying my 1 year old Subaru Outback in February of 2006, I decided to keep track of how I put my miles on it. I don’t know how I have managed to be on the verge of putting 56,000 miles in 3 years. This averages approximately 50 miles per day. The significant increase from 07-08 lines up with graduate school. The car has also only taken 3 significant trips: Maine, Toronto, and The Outer Banks.

outback_miles

For the Birds

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Birders rejoice, as there is at least a 50% chance of seeing a bird team win the Superbowl. Go Eagles!

Football

Bird teams in the NFC: 4 (Eagles, Falcons, Seahawks, Cardinals)
Bird teams in the AFC: 1 (Ravens)

Baseball

Bird teams in the AL: 2 (Orioles, Blue Jays)
Bird teams in the NL: 1 (Cardinals)

Hockey

Bird teams in the Eastern: 2 (Penguins, Thrashers)
Bird teams in the Western: 1 (Ducks)
Other teams with bird sounding names; 2 (Red Wings, Blackhawks)

Basketball

Bird teams in the Eastern: 1* (Hawks)
Bird teams in the Western: 0

* does not include the Raptors, even though they are diapsids

Why don’t people use Last.fm?

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I’ve been using Last.fm for almost 4 years now. I don’t understand why more people are obsessed with it like I am. It’s not complicated: create account, download and install plug-in, start enjoying trending your musical preferences, listen to very good streaming radio based on what your like to listen, add friends (real and virtual) and find new music to drown out the boredom of life.

They’ve also added features to help maintain tour dates of bands, cities, or venues… which can be read in .ical format.

Turning off the Twitter plugin

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TwitterTools plug-in is just not that helpful if you need some differentiation of tweets vs posts. 

TwitterTools needs:

• a way to distinguish tweets from a typical blog post

• needs ability to have a fixed title or at least a flexible title which is not just an abbreviated form of the content

• also would be nice if a WordPress theme could distinguish them and format them differently

Biomet Uniflex Femoral Nail

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A few days from now will mark the 16th anniversary of my first time skiing. It also marks the 16th anniversary of me breaking my right femur. In honor of that glorious month of 7th grade I missed, I decided to see if the surgery I had to repair the bone  is still being performed.

uniflex_fema

The answer: yes. Pretty much nothing has changed if you break your femur in the same manner: Intramedullary Fixation for non-comminuted mid shaft fractures. It’s a pretty straightforward procedure: knock me out, cut hip open, drill a hole into the head of the femur, ream out the center marrow-y part, drive in 13.4 inches titanium nail, insert two proximal screws at the top end to hold the rod in place (keep it from moving up and down in the bone), put the end cap in place, and stitch and staple shut.

Read the brochure, and note the odd choice of text/graphics ala Ralph Steadman.

Being a thirteen year old, and having expectation to continue to grow for 5 more years,  I had the femoral nail removed after a year. I have it next to me as I type this.

2008 Highlight Reel

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• saw Leonard Cohen perform in Toronto

• saw Jonathan Richman perform in Philadelphia

• finished my masters degree

• Phillies win the World Series

• saw Stella live in Glenside

• visited Chicago and Toronto for the first time

• went to the beach twice

• Rudy Giuliani stakes it all on Florida

• Mitt Romney let the dogs out

• Hillary recalls being shot at by terrorists

• Obama keeps his mouth shout

(these are not in any particular order)

The Wrestler in Scranton

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No, the film is not yet playing in Scranton. There is however a Scranton reference in the opening credits:

scranton_wrestler

Randy “The Ram” Robinson vs.Corporal Punishment – 1987

1987 would have been about the time I would have seen a few wrastlin’ matches at the good old CYC. I never did get to see Randy “Macho Man” Savage or Hulk Hogan, but I did get to see The Iron Sheik, Jake “The Snake” Roberts, and Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat.

Trailer for The Wrestler

Twenty O Nine

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I am excited that this is the last year I’ll have to refer to as an O-something. It’s been very cumbersome and annoying. This was something they didn’t warn us about. For me, this was the real Y2K bug. It would have been nice if my great-grandparents passed a warning down through the familial lines: “Watch out for the 200-‘s! the The 190-‘s sure were a bother.” We should consider passing this warning on to our children and grandchildren (to pass onto their children and grandchildren) for 210-‘s.

Nah, nevermind. With all the futurey technology (and mind control) they’ll have to make their lives easier – they can use a good decade of a trivial annoyance. Screw you, great-grandkids.

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The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny. 
– Albert Ellis