The NBA Finals Required Post

I watched most of the NBA finals.  My favorite part was that the Mavs beat the Heat and won the title for the first time in franchise history!  I'll also admit to saying last night that I would watch no basketball on Tuesday.  The Mavs had one chance to do it (for me) and they did.

My second favorite part was the little girl, Julia Dale, singing the national anthem.  In case you missed it:



Not necessarily a favorite, but a part of the finals that reminded me of something else, were the Indestructible Volkswagen commercials. This is the one that aired:



This is the one I was reminded of:



It just cracks me up every time I watch it. But, I've got a wickedly odd sense of humor. I'm not particularly proud of it, but I do spend a lot of time giggling.

I Am A (non) Sky Diving Cheap Pig

This little ditty went to market.  I'm kidding.  This little ditty will be somewhat rated R.  I encourage you to not read this particular post if you are easily offended or are related to me.

I was recently invited to go skydiving by my buxom girlfriend.  Back when I was a youngster, the idea of jumping out of an airplane sounded kind of reckless and adventuresome.

Now that I've become decrepit, all I can really think about is how painful it would be to blow chunks through my nose at 9.8 meters per second squared.

But, it is not my nature to say no.  So, I put on my best man pig attitude and I said, "Okay, I'll do it if you'll perform a lewd act involving nudity and breasts with your equally buxom friend."

She checked with her friend and, much to my surprise and alarm, all was agreed upon.  It was official.  I was to be the next skydiving pig.

Then there came the price.  Apparently this act of projectile vomiting while plummeting towards earth at 9.8 meters per second squared was going to cost me $320.  "Wow!" says the cheap pig, "this is way more than I intended to spend."

I'd probably still be picking chunks out of my nose while the lewd act started and I'd miss it.  It was just not worth the risk.  Okay, I'm justifying.  I know.  But still.

Then, the price came down to $220, but for an extra $100 they would video tape the event.  I didn't bother to ask whether the $100 was for video taping the chunk hurling or the lewdness.  I probably should have.  I might have been able to sell the latter.

Anyway, while researching my cheap piggedness, I found this video.  It made me smile.  Google may restrict my site for this.  Oh well.  It's a risk I'm willing to take.  Avert your gaze if you are offended.  I won't tell anyone.

Repairing American With The Internet

I've been in Canyon, TX since Saturday so I've had a grandiose helping of Fox News.  It's encouraged me to write about my most recent epiphany.

Not too long ago I wrote about how lazy people propel the human race.

I've been watching all the Republican candidates who are already lining up for President.  They all have one thing in common.  They all complain about the current President.  The odd thing is they are mostly senators and they all blame the President for our current woes.  I didn't make A's in Political Science, but isn't the President's power controlled by the House and the Senate?  Did I miss something?

Anyway, all these candidates do a lot of fiery speaking and complaining.  They sound like a Southern Baptist Preacher with a bad case of hemorrhoids.  They don't seem to offer a lot of solutions.  They're just trying to convince their voters that Obama is the devil and they are the everlasting salvation.  You don't need any proof.  Just have faith.  And I look good on TV.

The reason people like this get elected as senators, representatives, governors, and god forbid, presidents, is because people are lazy.  No one votes because it is too difficult.  It's not going to get any better because we are getting lazier.  We aren't even bothered to go to the store because we can shop online and have stuff delivered directly to our front door.

I spend an extra $2.50 "convenience fee" to register my vehicle every year because I don't want to go stand in line at the tax office.  With everything I need to do I have options.  I usually choose the easiest option.  I tell people I'm like an electron because I take the path of least resistance.  The way to solve America's current woes is to create Internet voting.  When you register to vote, you write in a username and are assigned a password.  You use the password to login to your voting account and are given all the elections that are currently up for vote.

With each ballot option, you are given multiple choice answers (area for "write ins" where required) and an "end date" or when the vote will be counted.  You can login whenever you want, as often as you want, to change your vote or check your votes (to make sure they weren't changed without your knowledge).  You'd be able to login and check your entire voting history.  You'd be able to vote for anyone, anything you wanted from the comfort of your favorite chair in front of you computer.  It'd be easy as pie.  

I'd be willing to bet that voter participation would go up exponentially and maybe, just maybe, America would finally wake up and vote for someone who may not be propped up by the media. 

I Am a Sloth (and proud of it)

I've been kind of thinking about getting one of those new Android readers (like Motorola's Xoom).  I've got a Kindle, and it reads well, but it doesn't have the touch screen or the ability to play many games.  With an Android based reader, I'd have games galore and the ability to load the reader of my choice (including Kindle for Android so I don't lose my current library).

In part of my ongoing research I decided to go to Best Buy last Sunday and get a hands on review of the little devices.  I decided to get an Acer Iconia because they were a lot cheaper and I was rather unsure.  The reason I did it was because Best Buy agreed to give me 3 years no interest on all my purchases.

While I was there checking out tablets I spied behind my left shoulder a laptop.  Now, I've been playing Rift.  It's a rather entertaining game, but I'm not ready to blog about it yet.  My kids were over and my youngest daughter was on my speedy desktop computer (so no Rift for me).  And, I've been wanting a laptop for a while now.  It just seems like a natural progression.  I had already been doing research, but I just wasn't ready to spend the money yet.  Since Best Buy was offering me 36 months, no interest, I said to myself, "No time like the present".  So I bought a laptop.

I didn't buy the one pictured to the left.  I bought a stripped down version from Best Buy.  Reviewers are fond of calling it, "The 'watered down for Best Buy' version."  But at 36 months no interest, that gives me 3 years to pay it off at $34 per month!

While at Best Buy I bought a little laptop desk so I could sit on my couch or in my recliner and play on my computer.  It's similar to the one pictured here (without the light and with a mouse pad that slides out on the side).

Finally, I went home.  Once home I started putting everything together.  First thing I had was a big happy helping of buyer's remorse.  So I packed up the Acer Iconia and took it back to Best Buy for a refund.  This made me feel enormously better.

I got everything installed on my new laptop.  Incidentally, if you do buy an Asus G73SW laptop and the keyboard lights aren't working, you must go to the Asus website and download the ATK drivers (I think ATK stands for Asus Technical Keypad or something like that).  The lights are controlled by the keypad and if the drivers aren't installed, the keypad doesn't work.  I accidentally disabled mine whilst trying to uninstall unnecessary software.  You might have to uninstall the existing ATK drivers and install the new ones.

On Tuesday evening, I sat in my recliner, in front of my TV, with a beer in my cup holder, playing Rift and watching the Mavs lose valiantly to the Heat.  I had brief moments of guilt because of all the things I "should" be doing, but it was masked by the shear satisfaction of being a sloth.

Cabo Conclusion

My laziness really knows no bounds.

Monday, day 5 was to be mostly about packing and heading to the airport and flying home.  We got up early and at about 9 AM, both of our phones rang, one right after the other.  They were both unknown numbers and since it costs $1/minute roaming charges to talk internationally neither of us answered.  But, I did question the oddity of one phone ringing immediately after the other.

We had breakfast, lunch and then went to the lobby to wait for our ride to the airport.  We were to meet our ride at 1 PM.  The ride to the airport was long and somber.  It wasn't nearly as much fun as the ride from the airport.

When we finally arrived at the airport there was foreboding commotion.  People were whining about cancelled flights and, "You might as well go back to the hotel."  kinds of things.  Sure enough, American Airlines had cancelled all flights to Dallas because of severe weather.  Apparently a line of thunderstorms were heading east and were scheduled to imminently cross the DFW zone.

I got in line and flirted with the nice ticket counter lady and she recommended a hotel that was offering "deals" to the American Airlines passengers who were stranded in Cabo.  For $90/person, you could stay at the all inclusive resort called Barceló.  She also informed me that I had already been re-booked on tomorrow's flight.  Upon checking my voice mail messages, my 9 AM call was American Airlines letting me know that they had cancelled my flight and booked me on the same flight tomorrow.  No need to go to the airport.  I would have rescued an entire day had I just answered my phone.  It will go down in history as the worst $5 I ever saved.

The Barceló was quite a bit different from the Riu Santa Fe.  People were more mature and sedate.  I sat with a group of guys who were talking about their fishing expeditions rather than their drunken escapades on Squid Roe.  I didn't much like it.  The people were snootier and the wait staff was not nearly as good.  It was kind of odd.

On the 6th day, we decided to have lunch Barceló's steak grill which sat on the beach.  This little restaurant had me changing my mind about the Barceló experience.  They had good beer on tap.  The food was good and it was tranquil; eating steak, sipping on a beer and listening to the surf crash onto the beach.  I could have stayed there all day.  As it was, I had to leave at 1 to go catch a flight.

I'm sure I'm leaving out some sordid details of my trip.  Feel free to ask questions.

Economic Capitalistic Rapture

So the gal on Wordpress who drew up the little flowchart here has gone viral.  Last I looked, almost 7000 hits in one day all for a silly little flowchart.  How do people find these things?

It got me to thinking how I can profit from this?  It seems kind of odd thinking about profiteering on the day before the end, but nevertheless, it's what I do.

My first thought was to setup a care service.  When those without sin are sucked up into heaven, I'll remain behind, complete with my sin, and take care of any loved ones (including pets) that might also get left behind.  I figure you won't be needing your money anyway, so I'll charge $1000 per.  I've got a paypal account setup and everything.

Then I discovered this.  They are a group of animal loving atheists who will care for your pets.  $135 for the first pet then it gets discounted.  Once again, I am late on coming up with the multi-billion dollar idea.

I've got no other ideas.  I've read where some naysayers are going to find the addresses of all the sinless and put clothes in their yards.  This is making the assumption that when the sinless are sucked up into heaven, their clothes will be left behind.  So, the optimistic sinless will come out after the supposed "rapture" and see their lawn littered with the clothing of those that made it (and hopefully be devastated).  Actually, now that I think about that, I should have lived a better life.  I bet some of them might look pretty good naked.  But, then, if they are holy enough to get sucked into heaven, I'm betting they wouldn't be much fun anyway.

Of course, all this means that the earth will fall apart on October 21.  The apocalypse takes 5 months?  Is that written somewhere?  I'm too lazy to go and look it up.  $135 per pet is not nearly going to cover 5 months worth of pet care.  Just the other day a college kid put a note on my door offering to care for my pets while I vacation.  His cost was about $10 per day.  Let's just say 5 months is 150 days.  That's $1500.  I should easily be able to charge $1500 per pet.  Damn atheists are working on the cheap to put me out of business!

Cabo Four or So

Sunday or day four in Cabo started out with me giving myself my 2nd injection in four years.  We decided that we wanted to walk back to San Lucas, but this time we intended to swim in the ocean for a bit.  The walking and the beach was not much different than Friday's walk.  There was a Disney cruise ship anchored outside the bay so I kind of thought I might be able to run small children off the pier, but no such luck.

The highlight of San Lucas on Sunday was me haggling with a guy about his shirt prices.  I don't know if I can describe it in a way to give it justice.  It started out with a $20 shirt and me ending up with a shirt and a jacket for $35.  I feel like I won because I received at least $10 worth of entertainment from the exchange.  When I was younger I didn't like haggling.  I hated it with a passion.  We'd have our yearly garage sale and people would always want to haggle with me about the cost of my Matchbox Cars.

It occurs to me suddenly that the haggling may have happened on Friday.  I knew I took too long to write this!

As I've gotten elderly, I have learned to appreciate the friendly art of haggling.  It's downright entertaining to argue about prices.  Next time you go to a flee market and you see something you really want at a good price.  Argue anyway.  Argue for the hell of it.  See that $10 solid gold Rolex?  I'll give you $5.  How about $7.  Soon you may spend the $10 anyway, but you'll have gotten some free haggling practice and entertainment.

On the way back to the hotel.  My goal was to swim in the Pacific.  Small oversight here.  It has come to my attention that I haven't told anyone where it is I stayed.  It was the Hotel Riu Santa Fe.  A party place.

Compared to the Caribbean, the water off the Baja Peninsula is cold.  The tide was fairly rough even in the "swim zones".  Of course, this could have been part of my neurosis.  I had to find the swim zone with the least amount of people which, coincidentally enough, is also the one with the largest swells.  Anyway, I just threw caution to the wind and dove over the next big wave and into the water.  That first taste of salt water down your nose and the strength of the water pulling you off the beach causes a moment of panic that is hard to describe.  It's both exhilarating and terrifying.  Once I got beyond the swells, I just treaded water for a bit, decided it was too cold and went back up on the beach.  Mission accomplished.

Sunday was to be our last full day at the hotel so, naturally, I was in rare form.  First stop was the swim up bar near our room.  I asked the bartender for his "specialty".  I did it jokingly, but later found out that all the bartenders make a "special".  I guess the game being to go around to all the bars and ask each bartender to make you one of their specials.  This particular bartender made something he called a "Mike Tyson" because it will knock you out.  Watching him make it almost sent me running, but it was surprisingly tasty.  And it made me talkative.

I have a problem when I go to bars.  I'm normally quiet and reserved.  After one or two drinks I become talkative and entertaining.  This causes people around me to pressure me into drinking more.  The logic being that if he's that funny with two beers imagine how funny he'll be with a shot of tequila.


We went back to the hotel, changed and decided to head out to the "evening bar".  Again, since this was our last night at the hotel, we wanted to say, "Bye, eh" to all our Canadian buddies.  I left out part of my story.  The guy who made the Mike Tyson told us which bar he'd be working at that evening.  Another reason to plan for a late night.

We saw Kevin and Steve (I mean Chuck and Larry) again.  We saw Neil (I mean Syndrome) again.  We saw Syndrome's wife again.  Syndrome's wife had somehow found a group of friends to hang out with.  I encouraged Syndrome to go get them all drunk in an effort to have group sex.  Really, I was just trying to get him distracted by something else.  He could be quite annoying sometimes.  I think he may have been a quasi-functioning alcoholic.

Larry decided I wasn't an egotistical asshole as he originally thought and told me as much.  He was very friendly and a bit too fond of hugs.  He talked lovingly of Chuck and Chuck tried to feign disinterest.  We told them we'd be leaving tomorrow.  They told us they had their last dive tomorrow so we probably wouldn't see them again.  I ordered a round of Mike Tysons.  They saw how funny I was and they ordered two more rounds.  If memory serves, I got sick Sunday night.  Yuk.