Verizon drops DSL surcharge
After being threatened by the FCC and seeing BellSouth drop their surcharge, Verizon quickly did an about-face and dropped their "it's-no-longer-USF, but-we're-still-charging-it-anyway" surcharge on DSL service. Hooray for sanity!
Get In Line
Here's what I would do if I was Brian Cashman, and I just found out about Carl Pavano's rib-breaking car accident two weeks ago:
"OK, everyone who wants to kick Carl Pavano in the nuts, get in line. One shot per player. Carl, take it like a man!"
Moron.
Paulaner Oktoberfest-Bier
As promised, a very special review. It's a tad on the early side for Oktoberfest beers, as it doesn't start till September, but I couldn't resist the temptation of the mini-keg. So here's my review from BeerAdvocate.
Picked up a mini-keg from Norm's in Vienna for Ellie's birthday party (no reason to leave all the fun for the kids!). Interesting little contraption. It worked reasonably well, but it seemed like there was a lot of carbonation at times, leading to very thick heads.
Definitely a switch from the summer beers I've been drinking, but a good transition. Malty amber color, with the aforementioned thick head, but it dissipated pretty quickly.
Fairly sweet maltiness in the flavor. A bit of hoppiness too, just enough to make a clean crisp drink going down. It's going to be an autumn favorite of mine, I can tell.
Good stuff, but don't get the 5L mini-keg unless you plan on finishing it in one sitting, as mine went flat the next day (could have been user error though).
Overall rating: 4.3 (out of 5)
Protecting Little Arms
The Little League has just announced a new program to help keep the young uns' arms healthy. Instead of a straight inning limitation, they are instituting a pitch count limit.
Pitchers league ages 7 through 16 must adhere to the following rest requirements:
• If a player pitches 61 or more pitches in a day, three (3) calendar days of rest must be observed.
• If a player pitches 41 - 60 pitches in a day, two (2) calendar days of rest must be observed.
• If a player pitches 21 - 40 pitches in a day, one (1) calendar day of rest must beobserved.
• If a player pitches 1-20 pitches in a day, no calendar day of rest is required before pitching again.
I think this is a great rule, as it tries to ensure that the kids don't hurt themselves. They're also looking into another good idea, a ban on breaking pitches. Nothing messes up a kid's arm more than trying to throw a curve ball before their development allows them to. Besides, l watched the International final between Mexico and Japan. Japan brought in a reliever to close out the game after Mexico loaded the bases, and the kid threw nothing but fastballs. He struck out two of the three batters he faced, throwing 77-78 mph heat (major league equivalent of 100mph fastballs). He threw all 9 pitches for strikes. When I was in Little League, I was always taught to lay off the junk. Almost all of the kids trying to throw that stuff can't do it well, and not for strikes most of the time. They just see it on TV and think it's cool. But at that level, you don't need a curveball, just learn to throw your fastball right and you'll be good.
By the way, they moved up the start time of the delayed World Series final between Japan and Georgia to 5pm Eastern today. So hurry home to watch!
For the dads out there, one of the guys on my baseball team had an interesting idea. When you start teaching your kids to play catch, buy a left-handed glove (or right-handed, if you're normally a leftie). When you throw with the opposite hand than you're used to, it'll be a nice slow speed for them (plus, you'll be as wild with your throws as they are). After a few years of that, the kids will eventually make it up to the level where they need you to throw batting practice, and you'll be able to throw it to them left-handed, thus saving your other arm the wear and tear. It also has the added bonus of letting the kids see pitches as they would come from a lefty, which they might not otherwise see. Ellie's still not really coordinated enough to play catch, but I'm definitely going to give it a try.
Bad Times for my Tech Stuff
This is getting so ridiculous that I had to post something about it.
First, about a month ago, the hard drive in my Tivo fails. I got that fixed, but the new one seems to be freezing every once in a while, not coincidentally when I need to record something. Annoying.
Then, our DSL connection seems to be flaky. I have yet to pin down the cause, but for once it doesn't seem to be anything on the company's end, and it's likely either our DSL modem going bad, or the router behind it going wonky. The router was intermittently dropping connections a couple of weeks ago, so my money's on that.
The air conditioning in our Dodge Intrepid has been flaky too. Not particularly tech-related, but just another expensive thing to go wrong.
And now the bitterest pill of all. Last night, I went to sync my iPod up with the latest podcasts I downloaded, and it didn't work. The drive inside sounded like it was constantly clicking, spinning up, then clicking again. This royally sucks. I've got a few things to try, including formatting the drive and restoring it, but I'm not sure if anything will work. Excuse me while I go cry for a while now.
Can’t Stand Ya
It's days like today that I wish I had a cubbie hole to sleep in under my desk, like George had on Seinfeld.
Yesterday was a loooong day. I woke up at 6:30am for my baseball game at 8am. We ended up playing 8 on 8, loaning the other team a player for right field. I mostly played shortstop and third base. I made one bad play on a throw to second, but it didn't end up costing us anything. I had a triple that I drilled over the centerfielder's head, and a single that drove in two runs as well. I also stole a base off their lefty pitcher. It's true what they say, it's easy to steal off a lefty once you see his move (Andy Pettitte notwithstanding). This guy didn't have a good move at all, his motion throwing to first was slower than his delivery home, and I stole it easily. Oh, and running with batting gloves in my hand kept me from jamming my thumb again.
After I got home, I had to run around getting balloons and ice, then there was a lot of stuff left to set up before the party. We were just putting the finishing touches on everything when people started showing up. Luckily, Ellie actually did take a short nap before the excitement, but it was not easy. She had a lot of fun playing with her friends on her new mini-moon bounce/trampoline. It has room for three kids, and they were bouncing around like crazy in that thing. Good times for her, but tiring times for us parents. I'm glad to be at work today, if only because it's quieter here.
Magic Hat Circus Boy
And what better way to start the week than with another beer review, as posted on BeerAdvocate:
The most interesting beer from my Summer Variety Pack.
Poured a very murky golden color. In spite of swirling a bit before pouring to mix the yeast, it still settled in clumps to the bottom.
Faint yeast aroma, not much to it.
Complex taste to it, I'll see if I can pin down what's in there. Yeast is obvious, it lingers a bit afterward too. A bit of a slight peppery taste. Mild banana and citrusy fruitiness to go along with the obvious wheat.
Very nicely blended together, and right up there with my favorite summer wheat beers.
And lo and behold, my 13th beer review of the year! Not bad for a project just started on June 5th. At this rate, it's more like 48 beers! Not like that's a bad thing. I've got two more bottles waiting for me to try, plus a very special mini-keg fresh from Norm's that I tapped this weekend for Ellie's birthday, so there's lots more to come.
Magic Hat Hocus Pocus
No better way to end the week than with a new beer review, as posted on BeerAdvocate:
Another one from the Summer Variety Pack.
Hocus Pocus had a fairly thick white head, that disappeared quickly. A decent amount of bubbles apparent in the pale yellow beer.
Somewhat of a wheaty smell to it, maybe slight hop aroma.
Tasted very light, decent wheat flavor with just a tinge of hops and maybe a little something else.
A crisp summer beer, you could drink a couple of these on a hot day, but I like a bit more flavor in mine.
I Only Wish It Was a Joke
Armor of God pajamas "will help your children to depend on God to protect them from their fears, doubts, and uncertainties at night so their sleep can be restful and peaceful." I pity the child whose parents force them to wear these. Click through for the picture, it's priceless.
Fee Fi Fo Fum
Now this is ridiculous. The big telco companies lobbied the FCC for a long time, saying that they shouldn't have to pay to the Universal Service Fund for DSL connections. The logic was that DSL was a data service, not voice, so they shouldn't have to pay. They ended up winning this argument, similar to the FCC's earlier ruling that DSL lines did not have to be opened to competition. So what are they doing? They're taking the USF fee off your DSL bill, and adding it right back in the form of "supplier surcharges," or worse yet, "regulatory recovery fee." To recover a fee that they aren't charged any more?!?!? You must be joking.
My phone company, Cavalier, as near as I can tell from my bill, only charges USF for the voice portion of the bill and always has. That's not to say they don't have their share of high fees, but at least they seem to have good reasons behind them.
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