I am on the Washington coast right now (near Ocean Shores) for a work event. Kite flying is big here so we used yesterday afternoon to give it a try. Skeptical about how fun it would be, we picked up a ’stunt’ kite and headed to the beach. There is a whole story there about how I was continuously up sold in the kite store by a shifty saleswoman, but more on that another time.
Way more fun than I was expecting. The kite was strong enough to pull us along the beach. We could flip it around in any direction we wanted. We has some nice epic collisions with the ground. The kite was worth every cent I spent on it. We even broke the thing once, but the store we purchased it at was kind enough to repair it for free. When we returned to the house, several of my coworkers were looking online for their own kites.
Most of you have already seen this, but I must write about it.
Microsoft recently announced they have partnered with Netflix to provide streaming movies and television over Xbox Live. The service is free for anyone with a gold account and a Netflix membership.
This is really big for me. Our family does not have cable. We use the Blockbuster version of Netflix. We will definitely be doing this. I have been putting shows onto my home machine and watching them over the network on the Xbox for several months.
My only issue is the Netflix streaming library does not offer many new releases. They have a wide range of older movies and TV shows, but nothing really new. Of course, that nine dollar a month membership means you always have one in the mail. I wager they will have massive additions to the library over the next few months as well.
Last night I registered for the free Netflix trial and watched a few episodes of Heroes. I was going to wait until the Xbox version was in and the bugs were worked out, but I think that Blockbuster account is getting cancelled very soon.
My son has been in a wresting camp at Boston University for three weeks. I have spent no small amount of money on this trip for him. Today he sent me a picture showing me what he has been working on.
He literally shaved the top of his head and left the horseshoe hairdo on purpose. I am not sure where he got the mustache.
At least I know what he will look like in 30 years.
I remember warming up in the same room as David. I knew I was fighting him, but he was not sure who I was. I was working the Thai pads with some hard kicking combos (I am a fairly strong kicker). In between rounds he said, ‘Man, I am glad I am not fighting you, those kicks are wicked.”
Ahh, it was glorious when he discovered the facts. Don’t get me wrong, Dave is a good guy, I just loved knowing I was in his head before the fight started. You will notice he comes in fast to avoid those ‘wicked kicks’.
It is hard to tell, but I finished the fight with an ankle lock.
The worst part about fighting (at least for me) was how tired you can get. I have barely been able to walk after fights from expending so much energy. Even if you do not take any damage it can be grueling. That was the glory of this fight, I worked up a bigger sweat warming up than I did in the fight.
Ages have passed since the last time I paid any attention to new Xbox Live Arcade games. Lack of time, interest, and the plethora of stupid games keep me away. Despite the fact I have my Xbox automatically download them.
Geometry Wars 2 is a different story. Version one was awesome. It was easily the best released game on Xbox Live. Heck, I was even playing it a few days ago. August 6th is the release day and I will definitely be getting this bad boy. There is something about the simplicity of play combined blowing things up into a rainbow of colors that just makes this game incredible.
I spent almost three months working like a dog, cutting from 185 pounds to 155. Feeling pretty good I decided to take a couple days off then start again. Partly because I had hurt my knee from running everyday and partly because I was dying to eat some tasty treats.
Well, that was a mistake. A couple days has turned into a month. This morning I weighed in at a whopping 175 again. At least I have not gained it that back. So back on the program I must go. Nothing like a long run and an omelet for breakfast.
Having participated in both (more boxing then chess actually), I am allowed to say this may be one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard of.
How do you come up with this? Are you sitting at home one day, playing a game of chess with a friend and a dispute breaks out over a move? In order to decide who is right and who is wrong you put on the gloves and wack it out? Huzzah, a new sport is born! Well, maybe not a new sport, as people have clearly been fighting over games since the beginning of… well… games.
Yesterday I played around with SimpleViewer, today I am playing around with TiltViewer. Again, very easy to set up. Using Picasa and the TiltViewer template, I had this page up and running in seconds.
SimpleViewer is a smooth bit of flash used to create image galleries for web pages. I have been meaning to get it set up on my site for a while. The whole process took about 30 minutes from downloading, to installing, to beginning to upload images. Very easy. I love it.
Here is a gallery from my daughters tournament last weekend.
Spore is amazing. Allowing any possible combination of bodies, arms, legs and mouths to walk, run, and dance around properly is an incredible achievement by itself. Not only that, but it is crazy easy to create them. Here is an insect beast I made in just a few minutes.
Everyone already knows this, but this game is going to be nuts.
July 25, 2008 
Eric showing us all up
Blue skies and lots of wind
Joe is going for the crash
Perfect Day
Eric retrieving the downed kite
Jesse getting pulled down the beach
JT on the strings
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