Corporate flunky

Tiger

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:13:00 +0000

A couple funny one liners I saw today about the incomparable Tiger Woods:

I heard Mickelson called Tiger's wife and said:"So that's how you beat him!"

A spokesperson from the Wood's camp has asked that he no longer be referred to as Tiger. From now on his new nickname is Cheatah.

Song lyric of the day "It's the eye of the Tiger!" Survivor

Until next time.

Ace

Welcome back welcome back welcome back

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 18:57:00 +0000

Hey peeps, I'm really still alive, just been caught up in the business of day to day life. I am mid-semester in my African American lit class, it's been ok so far. Unfortunately my classmates aren't as insightful as some of my previous grad classes and as such, I've gotten less from our roundtable discussions than I had hoped. But things are heating up with my term paper, a draft is due in a few weeks and I'm still torn on my topic. I expect great movement in short order!

I am absolutely crushed that I'm unable to disappear to Peoria tonight to check out Silversun Pickups. Unfortunately it is the closest they will be in many many months. On the bright side, got to check out Airborne Toxic Event (no, that's not a swine flu reference) over the weekend at Metro in Chicago. Love the venue, the show had ups and downs but glad we were there. It was great for the better half and I to hang with Q & Krissy, good times!

Work has been absolute madness, which is par for the season. I'm hoping calmness is on the horizon. And my first stint coaching kiddie basketball starts tomorrow night, coincidentally, the start of the Bulls season as well. Ah, serendipity.

I had an interesting discussion with one of my nieces last night, me giving her a sort of carpe diem speech about getting herself educated and stop procrastinating. I feel like I was convincing myself of the need as much as her. But I'm on my way folks, this train of mine is moving ahead at full speed. I'm excited and scared but hopeful.

Lastly, if you care about your money at all, check out mint.com. This site is really cool, let's you track all your accts (banks, loans, credit cards, 401ks, etc) and sends reminders when stuff is due. The budget features are really great. It only takes a very short while to set up and is very user friendly. And, bonus, I can play with it on my iPhone, which I am loving.

Finally, root for a tie so neither the Yanks or Phillies can win this year's world series. Glad to be back!

Song lyric of the day: "It's been such a long time, it's been such a long time" Boston

Until next time.

Ace

Back on the attack

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 14:03:00 +0000

A lot has happened since my last post. I've been to Vegas, San Francisco and a concert. I've spent most of my short break between summer and fall semester cleaning up a number of small, nagging things. But what I wanted to write about today concerns a recent visit to Wrigley Field.

The fam and I had an opportunity to visit Wrigley Field earlier this week as part of a fan appreciation event. The concept was cool and had me very excited. Fans get to go out on the field and visit any of the seating areas in the stadium also, including playing catch on the field and taking batting practice. Very sweet.

So the fam and I schlepped down to the big city and headed in. First things first, we grabbed some grub and decided to eat right behind home plate. Sweet! It was really cool to be able to hang out all around the stadium. We checked out where my season tix are located, took some pictures out near the ivy in the outfield and let the kiddies run the bases. The grass in the outfield was perfect, like the best fairway on a golf course you can imagine. And I even managed to get a couple pics taken in the Bartman seats, recreating that awful moment from 2003. So, there was a lot of fun stuff. But I had some problems with this whole event.

First, I was surprised how many people there were - kinda sucked but not the biggest deal. Unfortunately, the line to take batting practice (which occurred under the bleachers in right field) was too long so we never got to do that. But the bigger problem were the fans. For example, home plate was a popular area for pictures, with a line of probably 40 or 50 people. One group of guys decided they needed to literally slide into home for several picture opportunities, taking 10 or 15 minutes. The same was happening around all the bases, people literally laying on the ground taking pictures sliding into the bases. Not really a big deal unless you're taking forever while there is a line of people waiting to take pictures.

Another problem were the people who decided their need to play catch required them to throw the ball all over the field whether people were walking past or not. Again, no problem if you want to play catch but do you really need to throw it over the head of dozens of people across 80 or 90 feet? Really pretty awful.

I guess what it all boils down to is that you should never underestimate the rudeness and cluelessness of Cubs fans. Lesson learned!

Otherwise, I'm getting ready to head back to class next week. Also working on some things around the house, hoping to finish a long outstanding project in the basement and preparing for a couple of concerts in the next few weeks. With that, I'm off.

Song lyric of the day "Driving south on Lake Shore Drive, heading into town" Aliotta, Haynes & Jeremiah

Until next time.

Ace

Bored to tears

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:11:00 +0000

I realize that posts about running and my workouts are probably not all that interesting to anyone but me. So I promise this will be the last one that goes into detail. After my previous post about the Gov, I'd hate to leave everyone hanging about the big race last week.

First of all, it took me 2+ hours to drive from my class to Q's place. Weather sucked, traffic sucked, and I very nearly missed the race! But I made it to Q's, we jumped on the train and hurried over to the race. We got there literally 7 minutes before the race started.

I did not care much for the course. First off, the starting line was on a narrow strip of walkway that could handle approximately 10 people across. Not good for a race with 1600+ runners. So, after the quarter mile walk to the end of the line, we were finally ready. Well, kind of. You really couldn't hear anyone at the starting line, nor was there a starting gun we could hear. We just saw the mass of humanity in front of us start moving. So, we started moving too. Nearly 4 minutes later, we actually made it to the starting line.

As an aside, this is the first race I've done where the organizers utilized a timing chip that electronically monitors when you start and when you finish, taking all the guesswork out of it. It was pretty sweet and convenient. Anyhow, now we're running. I did this run with Wudchuk and Q, both of whom have been working out plenty lately. Wudchuk took off quite quickly right off the bat and Q dropped back as he was trying to stick to his marathon training pace, or at least somewhere near it. I took off at my own pace but had Wudchuk in my sights for pretty much the whole race, never being more than 25 yards behind.

There were a lot of people in this race and since we were starting near the end, a lot of the people in front of us needed to be passed. This caused the first couple of miles to be an exercise in dodging bodies while trying to maintain a good pace. In some ways, that helps keep your mind off getting tired or whatever but it's kind of a waste of time and energy and probably slows things down. Remembering that my run last month took 28:56, I was hoping to beat that time in this race.

One thing I worry about in each race is going out too fast and meeting the Governor or some other untimely demise. So I usually consciously try to hold back. But it's hard for me, I get pretty psyched up with all of the people and the race environment and the adrenaline gets going. As we approached the 1 mile marker, I was feeling good and crossed the marker at about 8:10. Whoa, that's quite a bit faster than usual. But I was still feeling ok so didn't worry too much about it.

The second mile was also not too bad, crossed the 2 mile marker at just over 16:00, not bad at all! No visit from the Governor so I'm beginning to think that I might not get to exchange pleasantries with him after all. I've still got Wudchuk in my sights and he seems to be slowing down a little bit. As such, I was able to finally close the last 10 meters on him at about 2.25 mile marker. With a clap on the shoulder I let him know I was there and helped him keep his pace up.

The things I didn't like about the course were a few. One, the width of the course we were running on. Get some streets blocked off or something, this is a big race! Two, the conditions of the path we were running on weren't the greatest. There were several areas where the pavement was thoroughly chunked up and kinda dangerous to run on. Three, there was no mile marker at the third mile (which we didn't know until the end!) and you didn't see the finish line until you had about 200 meters left in the race. Not good. So, I hope they change these things in the future, they were distracting and annoying.

I mention them because by the time we hit what was around the 3 mile mark, I was feeling it. At this point, Wudchuk helped me keep my pace up. When we turned the corner and spotted the finish line, we both dashed with whatever we had left and crossed that finish line side by side, gasping, panting, victorious! I knew it was a good run time but wasn't sure exactly how good. Well, the next morning, Wudchuk looked it up online and we both scored major personal records with a 26:06 finish! Whoa!!!!!!!!! I shaved almost 3 minutes off in a month. I would not have believed I had it in me. That is far and away the fastest I've run probably since junior high.

Very excited at the finish and now really looking forward to my next race (which hasn't been identified yet, sometime in August for sure). I would love to get down under 25 minutes by the end of the season. I believe this should be motivation for me to keep the training going. Thanks to Wudchuk for being a great running partner (and pacing beacon with that bright yellow shirt of his, very Tour de France of him).

Since then, I also managed to check out the Hangover for a second time (definitely funnier the 2nd time) and hit the local card room for a couple hour session Saturday night where I managed to crack Q's Aces and finished the session up nearly $150. Great warmup for my trip this weekend out to Vegas! I expect to be swamped between now and then finishing up my final project for class and hopefully getting in a couple of runs. As such, I probably won't be back for a bit to visit unless it is very brief.

Song lyric of the day "Running down a dream / working a mystery / going wherever it leads" Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers

Until next time.

Ace

Uh-Oh (or How I Learned to Love The Governor)

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 15:24:00 +0000

I recently posted about a race I did on Father's Day, where I achieved a recent personal record. By recent I mean my best since junior high / high school, which hardly even counts. So, anyhow, the good time has motivated me to keep running. And, seeing so many of my friends that have been dedicated to their workouts (including one who's lost over 100 pounds) has also been very motivating.

This motivation has manifested itself in me running pretty regularly. Not every day, because I don't really like running, I'm really just doing it to keep in shape. But, with the goal in mind of improving my times, I have been sticking to running more than just mixing it up with biking, elliptical, etc.

So, during my runs, the first mile usually sucks because I know I still have so far to go but eventually I just keep going and then I'm done. Some days are really tough - usually it feels tough to stick it out and finish the run. Others are just sort of mediocre. But every once in a while, you get one of those days where it just feels good. For me, these days are pretty irregular, I've really only ever had a few of them. One was maybe 3 or 4 weeks ago. Another was yesterday.

I'm preparing for a race on Thursday and so I wanted to do my final prep run yesterday, thinking I'd just do my normal loop, which equates to somewhere around a 5k. As an aside, I really have no idea why I haven't mapped out this loop to see how far it is, I've run it over 50 times and it would be nice to know how far I've gone and also track my times. Especially since I'm kind of a stat junkie, you'd think I would have done this by now. I digress.

For anyone that doesn't know running, you generally are supposed to take it pretty easy in the several days leading up to a race, I suppose it gives your body a chance to rest up and be in peak form on race day. So I went out last night just hoping to put my time in and be done with it until Thursday's race.

If you've run any distance before, then you're familiar with the ache or cramping feeling you get in your stomach, especially if you run too fast. Well, I found in my last really good run before last night that I got that ache very early in the run but it never got bad or made me feel like I needed to slow down. Same thing happened last night. Within the first half mile, I could feel it. But I could tell it was the good ache, where it wouldn't get worse and I was in complete control of it. I kept pushing myself and I could tell as I adjusted my effort the ache would change accordingly. So, it was acting sort of as a governor on my speed, similar to how the go karts at your local track are limited in their speed by a governor placed on the cart engine. It was weird and empowering, but it felt like I could control the ache very precisely. Like I had my hand wrapped around it and could throttle up or down just like a motorcycle.

Well, me and The Governor (since he's mine and personal he really should be capitalized) had a very nice run last night. So nice that I decided to push beyond my normal loop, even more than I have been in previous runs, maintaining a nice speed for nearly the entire way. My last few runs I didn't feel good but had extended about another half mile past the normal loop, primarily in an effort to improve my endurance. I decided last night I'd go about a mile past the normal loop. Things went pretty well for the most part although about halfway through the extension I started to get pretty wiped out. I believe maybe I did a Blago and impeached the Governor. Anyhow, I finished the run and cooled down, happy to have a nice run behind me. I hope me and the Gov hang out again soon.

The real problem here is that after my last really nice run, I had several in a row that were very difficult. And of course, rather than taking it a little more easy (as described earlier), I overextended myself. And, oh yeah, my next run is my race. I really am quite dumb - I hope I don't turn in an awful time Thursday, that would be disappointing.

In non-running news, I only have 3 weeks of class left! Got a B+ on my big assignment from last week, have revised it for re-submission today. Big final project is just starting up but I expect to make significant progress on it tonight after class, we'll be doing an in-class workshop on Thursday and then have another week to pretty it up for another workshop. I think it should be pretty good. Then the last thing is our in class final. So, the end is near!

Heading to Vegas in a few weeks too, definitely looking forward to that!

Song lyric of the day "Wait - there's something up ahead / I've seen its claws / I can see the mark it left / Well fed and eating with a thousand hands" Cassino - Governor (I confess to not having ever heard this song or of this group but this seemed pretty good!)

Until next time.

Ace

Tales of Domesticity

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 22:24:00 +0000

Following is a real-life exchange between myself and the better half.

Better half: "I was watching TV and saw that having sex is supposed to improve your immune system. We should work on that."

Me: "That's funny, you already seem immune to sex with me."

Song lyric of the day: "I want your sex" George Michael

Until next time.

Ace

Keeping my head down

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:46:00 +0000

Well dear reader, things are going just fine. Work has been extremely busy, with some organizational changes that have been confusing and time-consuming. But hopefully at the end of the day it will all be better than it is today. It definitely has that potential. I've been travelling to visit clients locally quite a bit lately, which has kept me busy. More of that in the future, as well as some travel to visit my client out in Cali and probably a trip back down to Houston. Plus I've got a fun trip to Vegas in a few weeks, sweet!

I'm down to 4 weeks remaining in class for the summer term. We got our first grade in our last class period. It was really weird, the professor gave us a group of lines to read from one of Shakespeare's plays and we just had to do our best to read it out loud appropriately. The purpose was to practice scansion and enjambment, which are basic skills of knowing how to read along with the meter of the work and when to pause, etc. Kinda weird as it was done really on the spot but I did fine with it. We have a major assignment due today, I have a feeling I did ok on it but not great. We'll find out quickly enough!

Otherwise, just keeping on. Kid #1 turned 7 last week, wow I'm old. We're having her bday party this weekend, that should be fun. We attended a big celebration this past weekend for our friends who married in Mexico over the winter - there were a lot of people there. It was a fun time for all, or at least for me. I have been doing a decent amount of running lately, trying to beat my time in my last 5k. My next race comes up late next week, I hope it doesn't get too hot!

Listening to some fun new stuff these days, including MGMT "Time to Pretend", Band of Skulls "I Know What I am", Innerpartysystem "Don't Stop" and The Rifles "Science in Violence". Good stuff!

Song lyric of the day "Truckin', up to Buffalo, been thinkin', you got to mellow slow" Grateful Dead

Until next time.

Ace

Tales of Domesticity

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 18:57:00 +0000

This tale was relayed to me by the better half (and some of you may have already seen on Facebook):

Better half looks over and sees that kid #3 has put kid #2's bracelet in the ear.

BH: That doesn't go there, take it out!
Kid 3: (Takes bracelet out of the ear and inserts into the nose)
Kid 2: (Runs in front of better half, sticking booty out) I'm going to give myself a wedgie!

Good times!

Song lyric of the day"Insane in the membrane" Cypress Hill

Until next time.

Ace

Musically inclined

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 15:29:00 +0000

Hello loyal readers. I wanted to stop in and give a quick report. Only 5 weeks of my summer class left! Unreal, it is going so fast but I'm really enjoying the course so far. There has been extremely little lecture and lots of reading and interpretation of Master Shakespeare. Very enjoyable, especially compared to the boring courses I've taken in the last few semesters. It will be a race to finish but luckily I've got some long flights coming up that will let me stay caught up.

Speaking of which, just booked a flight to Vegas for the end of the month - woooohoooo! It's going to be a little weird as I'm going solo, for a pseudo-kinda-conference thingy but I'm certain I will get exhaustive amounts of poker played. It is going to be scorching hot there, not looking forward to that part of it. Also heading to San Fran in a couple of weeks. The scheduling kind of sucks as I fly out right after class Thursday night and don't get in until late, then heading back late afternoon Friday. Maybe I'll stay up super late on Thursday to at least get some fun time in while out there.

I really wanted to just post about music though. I cannot tell you how addicted I am to the new Silversun Pickups CD, called Swoon. I haven't been this hooked on a disc in years, probably since Final Straw from Snow Patrol. If you're looking for individual tracks, Panic Switch, Sort Of (my fav) and The Royal We are strong, but really the entire disc is really good. I'm looking forward to checking out some of their other stuff. The better half and I are also digging Airborne Toxic Event and their tune Sometime Around Midnight. Several concerts/shows coming up in the next six weeks so I'm sure I'll be blogging more about music coming up.

Song lyric of the day "Does it make you nervous/when you hear my bones/animate my body/without my soul?" Silversun Pickups, Sort Of

Until next time.

Ace

Into the thick of it

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 16:27:00 +0000

Wow, class is going to be intense! Two sessions in and the reading assignments are quite extensive. The topic of the class is Shakespeare for Teachers, which is a very useful topic. The professor is less of a jackass than my first impression of him might have given but it's still early. The idea is to give us useful ways to teach the Bard in our own classrooms. Most of my classmates are already teachers so we'll see if that serves as any sort of disadvantage as we proceed. Anyhow, reading is eating up almost all of my time, especially on the days between the Tuesday and Thursday afternoon class. On the upside, this is looking like one of the classes that will prove most valuable when I begin teaching as many of the things we'll do will be directly portable to my class. And I'm getting to read a few plays I've not read before, I am enjoying that so far. Death to the boring linguistics classes, bring on the literature!

Also this weekend, I decided I wasn't hot enough in this scorching weather so I decided to run in a 5k in my town's summer festival. It was not as early as I would have liked, starting at 8:30 am. It was flipping humid so I fully expected it to be a tough go. I was planning to try and beat the 10 minute mile mark, which is essentially what I ran in my race earlier this spring. Instead of fighting 18,000+ runners, this one was only 448 people strong.

I set off and did my first mile way too fast, clocking at about 9:23. I decided I needed to slow it down a little so I didn't find myself dying in the last half of the race. I was able to find some people to keep pace with, which was very helpful. That stretch from 1.5 to 2 miles seemed to take forever! I get to the mile marker where the dude calling out the times yelled something around 17 minutes and 50 seconds or so. What???? I thought I slowed down, not dramatically sped up? This was not going to be good.

I started to feel it and definitely slowed down significantly in the last mile. The last 1.2 miles took about another 11 minutes, so I did slow down, but not too bad from my pace I was hoping to keep. Final time came in at 28:57, or 9 min 20 second miles. I think that's a personal record so I'm happy about that. I've set a nice high bar for me to try and surpass in my future races, awesome! Hopefully I can get under 9 minute miles by the end of the summer, we'll see. I'll need to be much more diligent about running between races if I want to do that. My next race is in late July in the early evening, hopefully it won't be outrageously hot. It has a Grateful Dead theme and while I'm not a big Deadhead, the tie dye shirts with the dancing skeleton are just too cool to pass up. More to report on this in the future!

Song lyric of the day "And I ran / I ran so far away" A Flock Of Seagulls

Until next time.

Ace

Back home

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 20:22:00 +0000

The big trip to Rocky Top was a success, albeit a very tiring one. Didn't get in until very late Friday night, annoyingly keeping our gracious hosts up half the night. Big thanks again to B & D for hosting and letting our children run amok and teach their little guy the fine arts of crazy kidness.

Saturday found us heading to the big family reunion. I could literally see kid #2 trying to translate the thick Southern accents mentally. Hadn't really heard anything like that before. It was really great to catch up with the aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, cuncles and other assorted relations. And the weather couldn't have been better. The scenery was also beautiful, the reunion was held at a local church tucked back in the hills and there were trees everywhere. Oh, and according to my unofficial poll, I believe Tennessee has the highest church per resident ratio in the world. I'm pretty sure there are 3 or 4 churches for each resident.

Anyhow, we cruised back home Sunday, arriving right around 11:30 or so. We got in about 23 hours of driving or so in a 60 hour span, really quite sweet. But all in all, the kids did great. I'm beginning to think they're pretty good at this road trip thing after this trip and our great New York expedition last year.

Not much else to report on at the moment, class starts a week from today. Tick tock, eight weeks of madness about to ensue...

Song lyric of the day "Time keeps on slippin, slippin, slippin'/into the future" Fly Like an Eagle, Steve Miller Band

Until next time.

Ace

Road Trip!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 14:08:00 +0000

Packing up the fam and heading to the beautiful Smoky Mountains this weekend. 10 hour drive is the best case estimate I've heard, we'll see how it goes. #1 has the last day of school on Friday, early dismissal and straight into the car for the trip. We're going to visit family on my side as well as a friend who recently moved to the area. It should be fun, although it's going to be quite short.

I've been trying to keep myself in shape for my next run coming up in a couple of weeks. They're fairly short (5k) so I don't really need to train per se, but would like to improve on my times as I make it through the summer. Hopefully dealing with a run in the size of about 200 runners will go more smoothly than dealing with 18,000+ in my last run. Last time I did this race it was quite hot so I hope that can also be avoided!

I'm enjoying my last few days of break. Class starts up in about a week and a half, it promises to be a race since it's only 10 weeks long. It's been a pretty nice break.

Song lyric of the day "Good old rocky top / Rocky top Tennessee"

Until next time.

Ace

Cont'd

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Sat, 30 May 2009 01:35:00 +0000

Where was I?

Oh yeah, staying out too late on a school night. The next day took us to preschool graduation for #2. Hard to believe it's that time already, the time really does fly. It seems like just yesterday we were rushing to the hospital to try and get there before the little one joined us. Yikes, that was a tough time. But it has been extremely rewarding, despite any day to day stuff that goes on. We think frequently about how fortunate we are to have a healthy, happy family.

After an early evening Friday to catch up on some sleep, took the opportunity to get up early on Saturday and head down to the city and help J & Em move into their new condo. Congrats on entering the land of homeownership, next time we'd appreciate something a little higher up, maybe eighth or ninth floor? Just kidding, hope you are settling in nicely!

Sunday was quite a day. We started by heading to Chinatown, leaving #3 at home with everyone's favorite aunt. We decided to try a new place called Triple Crown on the recommendation of a neighbor. Place was really good! A really interesting calamari served as part of dim sum, had never seen that before. The food was good but it was missing a couple of favorite dishes from a few of the other places we frequent. That said, I'm sure we'll pay another visit.

From there, we headed down the street to US Cellular Field, to watch the White Sox take on the Pirates. The seats were exceptional, first row in the 3rd section past 1st base. Absolutely primo! The weather was beautiful, the kids were fairly well-behaved, and the game was quick. They have a really cool attraction out in the left field area where kids can go and do various activities, like race against a cardboard cutout of one of the Sox players on a track. Another area had a batting cage and another had the kids throw a few balls at targets. It was really cool and a great way to break up the game a little bit since the kids wouldn't be content to sit still for 3 hours.

After the game we headed home and went to a home poker game where at least I got to drink a few beers. That was about all it was worth as I played like garbage. It was actually a really fun time as it was with a new group of guys I didn't know very well.

After that, I finished the weekend off by putting in the new stuff for this year's garden in the rain on Monday. Not much fun as it was kinda chilly. But it's done and hopefully we'll have enough tomotoes and raspberries to save some for the winter.

Sheesh, now that I look back on it, maybe it wasn't all that exciting. But it sure as heck was busy. And I can hear the bell of school tolling once more for me, with classes set to start up again in a couple of weeks. Apparently I signed myself up for some Shakespeare course. I enjoyed the last Shakespeare class I had, so hopefully this one will be the same. One bad sign, I e-mailed the prof for a list of books so I could buy them online and rather than just telling me the list of books, he informed me how he had, sniff sniff, submitted the list weeks ago and I could obtain the list from the bookstore. How absolutely ridiculous of me to ask the professor! Good times ahead...

Song lyric of the day "We're movin' on up / to the east side / to a deee-luxe apt in the skyyyyy" The Jeffersons theme song

Until next time.

Ace

Flying!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 28 May 2009 02:11:00 +0000

Wow, this late spring is absolutely flying by. To close one piece of old business, I did ridiculously manage an A in my 2nd class this semester, despite logic dictating otherwise. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, pretty sure you have to tell the teacher to take a flying leap to score otherwise.

The last couple of weeks have been quite eventful. I'll start with last week, where Thursday I started my day heading to visit a new client of mine, one that promises to make life very difficult over the next 6 months or so. But we had a good meeting so it was a nice start to the day.

I headed from the meeting to my boy Q's place, where I would work the afternoon before the evening's frivolity would ensue. But before that, he and I went to one of his favorite little Thai joints for lunch and ate more broccoli than was previously thought possible by mere mortals.

After this tasty treat and an afternoon of work, I made my way to downtown Chicago to participate in the Corporate Challenge, a 3.5 mile run through the downtown lakefront area with 18,000 of my closest friends. This is part of the commitment I made to myself to run in at least one race per month during the spring/summer/fall, while the weather will bear it. While I've been working out some, it hasn't been as consistent as it should be, it has been enough. I wound up with a time that was right in line with what I was hoping, which was nice, given my nearly 16 minute first mile that consisted of a 5 minute walk to the starting line before beginning a light jog and eventually turning into a mini-jog where I was picking and choosing my steps to avoid running over / being run over. All in all, it was a fun time although I found it a little strange that most of the food my company's tent had consisted of cookies, potato chips, etc. This is a run, you think they'd have some healthy choices!

After the run, back to Q's where I got a quick shower and a tasty bite to eat courtesy of his far better half, and we met up with Duch for a rousing good concert, checking out Local H at a Chicago venue called Double Door, which is hosting a series of shows by different artists to celebrate their 15th anniversary. It was pretty warm in Chicago that day, low to mid-80s and it wasn't much cooler at night. Given that DD was sold out, the place was absolutely smoking inside. And this is not an easy listening show folks. I'll just say that after being abused for about 2 hours by that crowd, I thought I was going to pass out more than once. But man was it worth it. Hadn't seen the H in quite some time and they delivered, playing a ton of great rocking songs and the crowd was way into it. It was a great night even though I didn't get home until past 2 on a school night and my ears didn't stop ringing for several days.

I've got a ton of other stuff to update on but it's getting close to bedtime kiddies. I'll try to post back soon.

Song lyric of the day "Hey, I made a promise to love myself" Local H

Until next time.

Ace

Summer of baseball!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 12 May 2009 19:08:00 +0000

It's the semester that wouldn't end! My instructor from my 2nd class e-mailed me last night to let me know that she hadn't received my final so I was receiving an Incomplete as a grade. What???? I 2 day mailed it to her last Tuesday so no reason she shouldn't have had it. That's what happens when the instructor refuses to accept e-mail attachments. Anyhow, she found the grace in her soul to let me e-mail it to her, sounds like we're all set. But she sure got my heart racing there for a stretch.

I hope all the mothers out there had a great Mother's Day. Ours consisted of some travel and a nice cookout, which was good. We also had a party for my nephew Josh who just got his bachelor's degree. I was beginning to wonder if the line of family members completing college had come to an early end but thankfully not. Also celebrated 13 years of wedded bliss with the better half, bringing to mind joyful memories of our nuptials in the courthouse in our youth. Good times!

Greatly looking forward to another fun summer tradition, heading to the ballpark(s) to check out some major league baseball. I've currently got a couple trips to beautiful US Cellular field on the schedule, as well as the annual trip to check out the Mets at Wrigley Field. Also trying to sneak in a visit to Cincinnati to check out the new ballpark there on the back half of a road trip. We'll see about that one. I'm sure I'll try to sneak one or two more games in over the course of the year also, especially if I manage to do any more travelling for work. It's a great way to waste time when you're on the road by yourself!

Enough for now, back to it!

Song lyric of the day "Meet the Mets, greet the Mets!" New York Mets fight song

Until next time.

Ace

Bwahahahahahaha!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 07 May 2009 19:44:00 +0000

Wow, I am really laughing today, because the patron saint of gift grades (I believe his name is Cannabis) is smiling down on the professor of one of my classes, who, despite his very specific grading scale, decided to give me an A-on my term paper and A for the class. Absolutely sick! I am not one to look a gift horse in the mouth so I'll take it. But I am doing so with the full knowledge that this one is absolutely grand larceny. Guess I shouldn't have given a half-effort on the final in my other class - I only did so because I assumed this class was a B as a forgone conclusion. Woohoo! We'll be cracking open a cold one tonight peeps.

Up next, tackling my very long to do list during the class break. Here's hoping I get a lot done, only a couple weeks of soccer left, that will definitely help. Wow, #1's team is really quite awful. 2 boys that are good, #1 is decent and the rest are just not very good at all. They have been getting annihilated every week, really not much fun for them. But, so be it. They have been improving a bit each week, hopefully it'll be better by the end of the year...

Song lyric of the day "Insane in the membrane, insane in the brain!" Cypress Hill

Until next time.

Ace

Sweet relief!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 05 May 2009 20:40:00 +0000

Hallelujah, the final has been completed and I am officially done (at least for six weeks until summer semester starts up). I'm not all that optimistic to be honest. I've got a major streak of A's going that I fear may be broken. Guess it's not really a big deal but I'd rather have an A than not.

To waste time before I finished my final, I've been working on many dalliances, including a trip last Wed to see Flight of The Conchords with the better half. The show was quite good. After seeing them last year and again last week, it is evident the fellas have been touring profusely. Their show was much more entertaining, I could tell they were more experienced. I'm told the second season of their HBO show just wrapped up so I'm eagerly awaiting its release on DVD. Haven't seen any of it yet :-(

I've also seen quite a few movies in the last few weeks. On my trip to California, I got to see Seven Pounds with Will Smith during the flight. This was a decent movie, meant to be suspenseful although it was pretty predictable. Smith is good, the premise is just a little silly. But, it was much better than what they usually show on flights so I was glad for that. On the way home, the movie showing was Yes Man with Jim Carrey. This was kind of similar to Liar Liar except instead of being unable to lie, he was unable to say No. This leads to all sorts of nonsense and tomfoolery (highly underutilized word). All in all, this was a very funny movie. I also thoroughly enjoyed the role played by Rhys Darby, who is Jim Carrey's manager at his job and I originally came to know as Murray, the band manager on Flight of the Conchords. Good stuff!

I also saw I am Legend a couple nights ago, another Will Smith joint. This was a cool movie, a zombie movie that didn't focus on schtick or attempting to be too scary. Instead, it was a sort of smart thriller about a cure for cancer gone bad, wiping out most of the population of earth. Smith is an army general/doctor who is a survivor, trying to find a cure for the virus causing zombification. Some very cool scenes of a deserted NYC where Smith lives. Cool movie.

And the other way I've been wasting time is by watching way too much Bulls basketball. Guess I don't have to worry about that anymore but it was a fun ride. As I described to a few friends, this was a fun team to watch but frustrating. Kinda like your kids - they do dumb stuff but at the end of the day you still love 'em and are proud of what they accomplished. I look forward to what's in store for this squad.

Song lyric of the day "Zombie, zombie, zombay-ay-ay-ay" The Cranberries.

Until next time.

Ace

Let the summer of music begin!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 21:37:00 +0000

I promised a post on the happenings of last weekend. What better time than now to blog it out!

So, it all started up with Friday's trip to lovely Aragon Ballroom in Chicago to check out Death Cab for Cutie. This would be the first time the better half and I could see them for a full show. We did see them last year at a short set private event that was outstanding, as chronicled here. The place was sold out but we were able to get a spot with a decent view and saw a nice show. The lead singer was very energetic and they sounded great, although they only played about 90 minutes or so. Highlights included a bass-thumping extended version of I Will Possess Your Heart and a moving I Will Follow You Into the Dark. Lowlights included "that guy" and his special lady friend who spent the entire show cool-kidding it with their iPhones. Really? You had to go to a concert for that? Money well-spent my friend!

The next day was opening day of the soccer season, with a game bright and early at 9 am. The weather could not have been better, probably in the 60s at that early hour. Definitely better than last year's freeze fest in the galing winds. And the 5 year olds are a little further along that the 4 year olds from last year, although we still had a few tears and kids clinging to mom or dad. Must have been the hockey mask I was wearing. Tomorrow promises even better weather, what a good workout.

After soccer, we had a brief respite at home before embarking on another soccer adventure for kid #1. These were the first graders and they got annihilated. But it was a lot of running and more good exercise for me chasing them around. After the game, we headed over to C's 1st bday party, arriving a fashionable hour plus late. Happy bday bro, keep throwing that frosting on mom and dad. Directly after that, I packed up the monkeys and headed for home while the better half headed back to Chicago to House of Blues to check out Rocco DeLuca and the Burden. Apparently the crowd wasn't that great but the music was. Rocco is an artist on Jack Bauer's, pardon me, Kiefer Sutherland's record label and according to JTB the boy can shred the six string.

While that was going on, it was decided that hosting a sleepover with a few of the kids and a poker extravaganza with several of the fellas was a good idea. So we played until about 3 in the morning or so while the kids passed out from too much booze by 11 or so. Unfortunately, I got the unenviable task of getting up with all the rascals at 6:30 (the kids, not the poker players). After a long morning of fighting over Wii controllers, we packed up and headed to #2's 5th bday party at the neighborhood civic center. It was a lot of fun and included lots of gymnastics, rope climbing and riding down a hill in a padded barrel, and I'm not even making any of that up. We wrapped up by jacking the kids full of sugar with cake and fruit punch and a spirited game of duck duck goose.

Afterwards I grabbed a snooze and finished up my paper that I turned in on Monday night. Then dinner for #2's bday and followed that up with my trip out to Cali, complete with a lovely 4 hour delay on the return trip, sweet! And with that, here I sit, ready to start it all over again with soccer tomorrow and more homework. Greatly looking forward to next week's trip to see Flight of The Conchords and other upcoming shows I'll be sure to chronicle at some future date.

Other music notes - songs the better half and I are glued on right now include Pale Bride from Von Bondies (just missed their show a couple weeks back because of class!), Wolf Like Me by TV On the Radio although the whole fam agrees Scott Lucas' cover is better, the new Silversun Pickups CD, and Carolina Liar's I'm Not Over. And, oh yeah, I'm so freaking sick of U2, can you say overexposed? Sheesh.

Song lyric of the day "Wasn't all that great/back in the summer of boats" Local H

Until next time.

Ace

Valhalla

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 04:05:00 +0000

Look peeps, I usually am a good Ace and try to live right. But ever since my fascination with the Dude in Big Lebowski began, I cannot help but treat myself to the goodness that is the In N Out burger anytime I find myself in the western part of the great old US of A. I've even tried to justify how it's healthier than other fast food garbage. That, my friends, is classic denial. But I'm not going to lie. As I sit here in my lonely hotel room in a rather seedy area of beautiful San Francisco, I just finished polishing off a delicious cheeseburger, fries and strawberry shake from the old In N Out. And I wasn't even hungry. But when would I get another chance? Gotta strike while the iron is hot kid!

School update - paper has been submitted, except for the final page which I conveniently left on the printer. Oops. No biggie, the prof will get it via e-mail tomorrow. Not too encouraged with my coming grade though after my presentation Monday when the prof asked a question about something I didn't cover in the 20 page monolith. Oh well, what's done is done. As previously mentioned, I'm pretty sure a bad grade will equal a B at worst. Just a couple more things due in my other class and then I'm done until summer semester. Looks like 1 class this summer and 1 this fall, both being Lit classes which I've found I enjoy immensely more than awful stuff like Linguistics or Rhetoric.

Tons of stuff happened this weekend, I'll try to post about it before another weekend comes and goes!

Song lyric of the day "A Big Mac, a BLT / Quarter pounder with some cheese" Skee-Lo, the Burger Song. I'm not going to pretend I knew that one, had to google something for that topic...

Until next time.

Ace

Yeeeha!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 19:07:00 +0000

Hey all, the semester is nearly over and I am nearly done with my term paper. I will return to our regularly scheduled posting soon, including a huge music weekend coming up in a couple days! Hurray!

Song lyric of the day "Welcome back my friend to the show that never ends" Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Until next time.

Ace

Steer clear!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 14:04:00 +0000

A belated congrats to R & N on successfully completing the arduous process of adopting a little girl from Russia, which happened around Christmas time. I can't wait to meet her!

The Great Fever of '09 has hit our house in full effect. It started with #1, who missed a whole week of school. 3 days later #2 & #3 got it, along with the better half. Thankfully this week is spring break for the kids from school so we've been ok on that front. Hopefully I won't manage to catch it, so far I've steered clear. I think my bout with something similar about a month ago immunized me!

Things are heating up class-wise. Fortunately, one of my instructors decided to ditch one of our assignments, leaving me with really just one short paper to write in the next couple weeks until the end of the semester, when there are a couple of things due. But that frees up time and space for me to work on my term paper, which I expect is going to be quite an effort. That's due in 3 1/2 weeks. I've written some but really need to dig in and get my research done. Where will I find the time?

One fun thing coming up this weekend, taking #1 & #2 to see the Chicago Bulls. We watch a lot of the games and they especially love the animated opener the Bulls do. It should be fun although I'm not expecting that we'll stay all that long. We'll see how it goes, I'm getting the cheapest possible tickets since I know we won't be watching the game much.

Song lyric of the day "Get down with the sickness" Disturbed

Until next time.

Ace

Cinema

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 19:50:00 +0000

I'm sad to say that spring break has come to an all-too-hasty close, capped off with a very fun St. Patrick's Day party this weekend. Time flies when everyone gets together and heckles a drummer who can't drum on Rock Band. Also managed a trip to Wrigleyville during the weekend where it was teeming with partyers all decked out in ridiculous green regalia. Good times!

One of the ways I wasted a lot of time during spring break was to watch some movies. The better half and I managed to head to the local multiplex and check out the buzz-y Slumdog Millionaire. With a movie that won so many Oscars, I expected it would be quite good. And I wasn't disappointed, this movie delivered. It may have gotten a little too triumphant in the end but it was a feel good movie, well-acted and it was extremely well-written, particularly the way that the story was told via flashback. Very cool.

Another excellent film I've wanted to see was Eagle Eye. This one was quite good also, extreme amounts of action and pretty smart. Billy Bob Thornton was really good in it (kinda reminded me of Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive remake) and Spielberg managed to avoid spoiling it in the end with an unnecessary love story, although he got very close. I think this was the first time I've seen Shia LeBouef or however you spell his name, he was okay. But I love how the trailer did not spoil this movie - too many do these days. This kept everything quite suspenseful for a good portion of the movie. I would highly recommend it if you're looking for action and suspense.

Finally, I got around to checking out Appaloosa, a western written and starred in by Ed Harris. Other actors in it were Viggo Mortenson, Jeremy Irons and the ever annoying Renee Zellweger. This one was okay although it was pretty predictable. There were definitely some cool moments in the movie, particularly a couple of shoot out scenes, but there was a little too much nonsense in it for my likings. Another cool thing was a song during the credits performed by Mr. Harris himself. The lyrics get a little silly at the end but actually a pretty cool song and he's got a nice singing voice. Who knew? This flic is probably best reserved for big western fans as it's really only kinda meh.

OK, enough of my Ebert routine.

Song lyric of the day "You can't pick the apple til the seed becomes the tree" You'll Never Leave My Heart, Ed Harris

Until next time.

Ace

Got jokes?

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 15:01:00 +0000

Here's an exchange that took place yesterday in House of Ace.

Kid #2: Mommy, want to hear a joke?

Mom: Sure.

Kid #2: Knock knock

Mom: Who's there?

Kid #2: Banana

Mom: Banana who

Kid #2: I played baseball with a strawberry.

The end.

Song lyric of the day "Everybody know / Strawberry strawberry is the neighborhood ho" NWA Dope Man

Until next time.

Ace

Book time!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 19:13:00 +0000

“Let me introduce myself,” the figure spoke. His voice was soft, almost effeminate, but carried such an edge to it that it left no mistake as to who was in charge and what was about to happen. “I am your doom.”

The above is a brief excerpt from the new novel Dying Moon by Shawn Oetzel, who describes the book as "a crime drama/fantasy tale I like to describe as Terry Brooks meets CSI". Check it out peeps, this is good stuff. You can order your copy here.

In the meantime, I've been busying myself with a re-reading of the Hobbit, good material while I'm hitting the treadmill. I really think this will be an excellent movie. Unfortunately, it looks like it won't be out until 2012. I guess I'll have to wait but if Peter Jackson gives it the same treatment as the Lord of The Rings trilogy, we should be in for a spectacle.

Song lyric of the day "So I'm packing my bags for the Misty Mountains" Led Zeppelin

Until next time.

Ace

Spring Break!

noreply@blogger.com (Ace) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:34:00 +0000

Well, at around 8:40 tonight I will embark on spring break. I thought about celebrating by heading to a tropical locale and filming a Girls Gone Wild extravaganza (Snoop Dog still isn't taking my calls to host it!). Then I thought I might do what I did last year, head to glitzy Las Vegas to donate to the ailing Nevada economy. Finally, I thought, maybe I'll just drown myself in the bottom of a bottle somewhere (this one might actually still happen). But then I decided to go full rock-star and just hang out at home, working, chilling with the kids, taking the better half out to see some movie about a canine that lives in the slums and wins a bunch of money or something, and maybe just work on a couple of projects I've lined up for myself. Yep folks, that's how I roll.

Actually, I will likely spend a good amount of time working on my term paper. It's due in April and I got my prospectus back last night. Sickening how little thought I put into it, and to prove my point from my last post, I still got an A on it. No one in the class got below a B. Sigh, keep that bar high educators!

I may try to sneak off and actually see a rock show this week, we'll see. It's been way too long since I've done so and I'm anxious to hear some live music.

Song lyric of the day "Mom and Dad went to the show / dropped me off with Grampa Joe" Nirvana, Sliver

Until next time.

Ace