Much Ado About Nothing
After all that posturing and threatening, the Senate easily confirmed John Roberts to be the next Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. He was sworn in yesterday and will preside over his first session beginning Monday.
I've said before that I'm not sure how I feel about having a man whose views are pretty much unknown running the Supreme Court, but I guess I'll give him a pass like everyone else has done. The Chief Justice spot is mostly administrative anyway, and as we've seen in recent rulings, it's not like everyone goes along with the Chief's opinions either. I'll be very interested to see how Justice Scalia reacts though, since we know he was lobbying for the job. Will he be ticked off, or will he go about his business?
Hopefully, we can continue this non-rancor-filled process and get the next Justice up and running soon too.
Groovin’
I've got my weekend scheduled. How bout you?
Tonight at 7pm is the Big Damn Movie, "Serenity." I'm taping the Yankees/Red Sox game though, don't worry. I'll come home and catch up and watch the end.
Tomorrow at noon, ABC is actually showing a Big Ten game in ACC country. That's right, the big one: MSU vs. Michigan. Go Green! Ellie and I will be getting home from art class just in time to have lunch and get ready for the game.
It'll be tough at 1pm, and I'll have to flip between the Spartans and the Yankees, who suuposedly play on Fox, but I haven't been able to confirm that.
Finally, the Yankees play on ESPN at 2pm on Sunday (maybe ESPN2?).
A very busy weekend indeed! The couch will be getting a nice ass groove.
Almost Famous
Our family is honored to be the Fairfax County Area Agency on Aging's "Volunteers of the Month." That means we're featured in this month's "Golden Gazette." You can get right to the October issue of the "Golden Gazette" PDF from here. I'm still impressed they spelled our names right.
The Web-based Office will have its day
AJAX is coming. Soon you won't need to worry about installing the latest version of an application and having it crash your machine. It will run on your server and upgrade seamlessly the next time you use it. AJAX has a lot of potential, but most of the below-mentioned apps seem to be getting bogged down on the server-side by a lot of interest right now. They'll have to get past that to become really successful.
Richard McManus on ZDNet provides a list of the currently available AJAX apps. Did you know there was AJAX word processor, AJAX spreadsheet, AJAX calendar, AJAX presentation-building software, AJAX e-mail client, AJAX note-taking software, which do not need installation and just work in a browser window?
Forget yesterday
Yesterday was a crazy day in baseball. The Red Sox won the early game of a doubleheader to pull back into a tie with the Yankees. Then both teams had their bullpens fall apart in night game losses. Add to that the fact that the Indians lost to the Devil Rays and the White Sox lost to the Tigers, and it's a messy playoff picture. Boston and New York are tied for the AL East lead. Both of those teams are tied with Cleveland in the wild card race. Chicago is only 2 games up on Cleveland in the AL Central.
Here's the juciest part for the Red Sox/Yankees upcoming series:
Because of Monday's rainout, Schilling will start the regular-season finale against the Yankees and Mike Mussina instead of Saturday's game. Wakefield will start on three days' rest on Saturday and face Randy Johnson. David Wells and Chien-Ming Wang will pitch Friday's series opener.
Buckle up!
Pre-Friday Freebie
The Nationals are long out of the playoff race, but they face the Phillies this weekend with a chance to spoil their chances. The Nats are running a "buy one, get one free" ticket special too, which is a pre-Friday freebie, since they start play on Friday. Go to Nationals.com, and follow these steps to get a freebie:
Step 1: Click the "T" link below for the game you wish to attend
Step 2: On the order page, select the quantity of tickets to purchase next to "BUY ONE, GET ONE FREE"
Step 3: Enter the discount code "FANWKD" in the box stating "Enter Special Offer Code or Password"
Step 4: Select your Upper Level section preference
Step 5: Click "Look For Tickets"
Next book
Almost forgot to mention the next book I'll be reading: Superstud
The Historian Review
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
My review
My rating: 2.5 of 5 stars
I finished the 642 page The Historian last night around 1am. I don't know if I couldn't sleep because I wanted to finish the book, but for whatever reason, I tossed and turned for an hour before deciding to get up and just finish the last 30 pages. It was a long slog to make it through this book. At times, it drags a little. It starts out with the narrator switching between her father telling her his story, and her telling the readers what is happening in the present. It's an interesting way to work in first person narration with several characters (A Long Way Down offered another). Eventually though, we are expected to believe that her father wrote out the rest of his story in a really really long letter to her. It takes a little getting used to the quotation marks at the beginning of every paragraph, but it didn't really get in the way too much.
But I digress, enough about the writing style, on with the content. Various historians keep finding these mysterious books planted in their workspaces, which leads each of them to research Dracula, the myth, the legend. It turns out that Dracula is a bit of a (an?) historian himself. I liked that the book was "smart", and that I didn't feel like every single little thing was being explained to me (like I think The DaVinci Code did too often). I was a little disappointed with the climactic scene, but not with the ending itself. Recommended, but make sure you have the time to read 600 pages.
Also, this week is "Banned Books Week." It's worth checking out the list and picking up one of the books to read. I did that a couple of years ago and really enjoyed the books I read. You'd be surprised what people don't want your kids to read.
My Name is Earl review
We watched "My Name is Earl" last night. We actually enjoyed it for the most part, but the sappy ending ("You changed my life, Earl! Thanks!") was more than a bit lame. The rest of the episode made up for it though. It was a lot of hick jokes (apparently that's a group that you don't have to worry about offending yet), but it showed promise. We've got a season pass for now, so we'll see how the next couple of episodes go there.
"The Amazing Race: Family Edition" starts tonight. The most fun reality program on TV right now. There's a reason it keeps winning the Emmy over "Survivor" and those other shows.
I watched the season premiere of "Lost" last night. Don't want to give anything away if you haven't yet watched it, but hopefully it will silence the critics who last season complained that nothing ever happened on the show. I actually kinda though too much happened. But it was definitely worth the wait, and I've gotten hooked right back in.
The season "finale" (actually a mid-season finale, as they come back in January) of "Battlestar Galactica" was a bit disappointing. Nothing really happened that you didn't already see in the previews of the episode. Still, it gave them quite a few things to resolve when they return in January, and I'll be anxiously counting the days.
Advantage?
Two baseball games last night with similar situations. Both the Red Sox and Yankees had rain coming down when their games were supposed to start. The Red Sox ended up postponing the game till this afternoon and will play a doubleheader. The Yankees waited out the rain and went on to an 11-3 win over the Orioles, and stay on their normal schedule and rotation tonight.
I don't want to jinx anything, but I think this has to be an advantage for the Yankees. Not having to play two games in one day is huge. Plus, they keep their rotation's rest intact, and since they won the game, technically moved 0.5 games ahead of the Red Sox, and into a tie with the Indians for the wild card. I guess we'll see how it turns out. The race is getting very exciting.
Books
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GSI Outdoors JavaGrindLifestream
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Brian is back from the last day at the pool, having barely gotten wet.
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Brian is pretty sure the first day of school wake up call will be filled with grumpy.
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Brian Bitches Brew, Live Free or Die, Old Chub.
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Brian is coming to the realization that I am not a size XL. Or even a L. Time to donate some ill-fitting clothes.
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Shared The Thousand .
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Nordstrom's also has a free personal stylist, might trust them more than Banana Republic. (Can you tell I'm bored with my clothes lately?) [BrianDau]
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Who knew that Banana Republic had complimentary "personal styling appointments"? You know, if you go for that kind of style. [BrianDau]
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