Back, Bad, and Sad!!!

Welcome Shami fans...

So its been a while, a long while, a real long while, but there has been a reason.

Allow me to enplane, no that will take to long, allow me to sum up:

1) New job
2) Promotion at new job
3) I'm now "In charge" of people
4) New job happens at three offices
5) I need to drive back and forth from each
6) No riding for the time being
7) The seventh reason....

So while the seventh reason is being address, I will not be ridding until spring, maybe. I need to figure out a route that allows for simple park and ride as well as extending my route after I get back in the saddle. SOOOOOO Hopefully this fall/winter there will be more riding to work boy, but for a little while at least I am bound to the car.

So back to the posts.

New Tech...

Three new tech items have come into my life, They are:

Verizon BlackBerry Tour 9600...

Or as I like to refer to her, "My Precious"

Oh how I love thee, let me count the ways:
1) All four email accounts in one place
2) SMS and MMS via the same interface
4) One calendar to rule them all
5) Password Keeper!
6) Mobile Facebook
7) Its not touch screen

Very much love this device, keeps me happy in touch with those I need to stay in touch with, while at the same time keeping me organized.

The Microsoft Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000...

So wrap your head around this, its a full sized keyboard with separate 10 key num pad that connects to your laptop via bluetooth. It thinner then my blackberry, about the thickness of a pencil and its slightly ergonomic.

Pros:
1) Love typing on it, large keys, nice home row indicator, good key replay, satisfying key click
2) Ergo is a nice touch
3) Supper thin, its only a bit thicker the the AAA's that run it (two each)
4) Easy to link
5) Nice power, sync and battery lock switches
6) Good over all feel
7) Fits into my laptop bag with ease
8) Num pad works independently from keyboard, so you can take your 10 pad with you when traveling if you are so inclined, and I am always so inclined.

Con:
1) Hard on batteries if you forget to turn the keyboard off at the end of the day, the num pad gets around this with a auto sleep function that after a certain time of non-use will put it to sleep. It wakes up very nicely in about 5 seconds after typing a number.
2) Good thing that its easy to sync up, until bluetooth get a bit more bullet prof, you will be doing it about once day for the keyboard.

With all of that said, I like it a lot, work well, nice to use and easy on the wrist, truly portable.

Microsoft Arc Mouse...

Ok, i have made it clear in the past that I have no love for the big blue MS, or really any software they have developed short of a few very, very select game titles. But, I cant beat their peripherals with a stick, well I'm sure you could but then they would not work would they? Now I'm sure that one of the reasons I like them so much is that the non-OS developers make sure their stuff at least works with the swill the OS developers put out. This brings us to the ARC mouse.

Pros:
1) Sexy design
2) Receiver is attached to the bottom of the mouse by a rare earth magnet when not in use
3) Closing the "Flipper" turns off the mouse
4) battery life 1 year +

Cons:
1) Its just a touch small
2) Side button is to far forward
3) Receiver sticks out just a BIT to far. Logitech still has the winner when it comes to this.

Again, I would buy it again, I have gotten used to it and it sit beside my track ball all the time for wrist relief and any time I need accurate point and click that the trackball cant provide.

Oregon Scientific's Solar Weather Station...

While growing up, if I wanted to know what the weather was, I stuck my arm out the window, now there are lots of things that can do it for you, but until now they all sucked up power. Well not any more, for about one hundred bucks you can have a weather, humidity, inside, outside temp, clock, and more display that runs all on solar power.

Read More>>>Click Here<<<




Pet of the day...

I'm somewhat sure I know what happened here, and since this is turning into a day of lists:
1) Own the following
Pool, Cat, Beer
2) Combine

While I am not 100% sure, but I would be willing to bet a donuts, and I love, LOVE donuts, that this cat is going to FU%$ someone up, when its gets out of the pool.


Why Helmets done suck...

"Ring Announcer" - "And in this corner weighing in a 155lbs, BMX boy, and not entering the ring, our raining champing of gravity, the big blue her self, weighing in at over 6 septiliion kilograms, the EARTH!!!!!!!!."

"Intergalactic Crowd" - Goes wild!!!!!

"Intergalactic Fight Announcer Neal" (aka -The iFAN) - "Well Bob this is going to be one hell of a match up today."

"Intergalactic Color Man Bob" - "Yea Neal, BMX boy has a real fighting chance of being the one to finally take down the Earth, I mean with a mass to speed ration just under that of a flea's butt hair compaired to the Earth, this should feel just like a fly hitting a dodge dart on the free way. All that will be left to take care of in the end is the mess."

"Intergalactic Fight Announcer Neal" - "Ok Bob, well here we go, BMX boy is ready, and hes off, down the ramp he is going, Wow Bob, It looks like he is really trying hard today. He building up quite the head of steam coming down that hill for his first jump. On this first one he will be attempting to comlete four rotations in the air, before Earth can do something about it. What do you think is going through his head right now Bob."

"Intergalactic Color Man Bob" - "Well Neal, I don't know whats going through his head right now, but I know what will be going throw his head in a few moments."

"Intergalactic Fight Announcer Neal" - "There he goes Bob, hes off the ramp, 1, 2, 3 rotations, going for number 4.... He... Could... Go... All... The...."

"Intergalactic Color Man Bob" - "NOPE! Earths got him, she has latched on to him tighter then a hungry new born to Dolly Parton, and the best part, she is grabbing him by his face by one of her biggest and baddest laws.. Gravity!"

"Intergalactic Crowd" - Goes, ohhhhhhhhhhh

In the fight ring there is a tumultuous CRASH..........

"Intergalactic Fight Announcer Neal" - "Oh man, Bob, I wonder if BMX boy is going to be OK, that was a nasty fall, Earth grabbed him right out the air, pulled him down at 9.8 meters per second squared and landed him right on his FACE!"

"Intergalactic Color Man Bob" - "Well Neal, i guess that's why there are so many power wheal chair manufactures out there, Hehe, I would not worrier to much about BMX boy, and hey look on the bright side, at least he did not get a dent in that nice helmet that he thought would make him look like a dork, wonder how hes going to feel in the Hover Round Chair"


Sgt. Pezzers Epic FAIL!!!

I don't know how or even why, but I am willing to bet that somewhere on that truck there is written the max weight it can carry. This guy did not read that sign, I like that he is sitting there on a brick, nice touch.

Come on weekend...

What a week...

Well the week is almost over. Whewwww!

My legs are tired, and my butt is sore in about the saddle regions but over all it was a good week.

Number for today:

GPS.
Moving Time: 35:40
Moving Avg: 13.2
Stopped: 4:27
Max speed: 30.5
Trip: 7.83
Total Ascent: 136 Feet
Total Descent: 248 Feet

Cycle Comp.
Time: 35:17
Avg: 13.2
Max: 31.0
Trip: 7.8

By the end of today I will have ridden 66.98 miles this week. I can definitely feel that I'm putting in more miles as well as much more elevation change.

New Tires...

My new tires arrived last night, god I love my Amazon Prime account. All the fun of shopping online, no shipping costs and 2 day shipping.

After I got back to the house last night I enjoyed a very nice Troegs, Nugget Nector and sat out on my front porch and put the new tires on.


The tires I went with are the Avenir Streetster Tires 26 x 2.0. They are smooth with a extremely low rolling resistance. They were a monumental pain in the but to get on. But from what I have learned by reading online reviews the side walls are slow to cut from "hefty" riders. Seeing that has been a problem in the past I'm hoping that this will help to elevate the problem. They also have a Kevlar belt running under the tread to help elevate flats. All this for $19.00 each.

www.mtbr.com has no review for the product yet, guess I'm a trend setter.

Green Geek item of the day...

Allow me to start off by saying I want one of these. It is the NatureMill in Home Composter. I know what your thinking "Ewwww but the smell" well forget that, this thing is smell free. They range in price from $250 to $400. They also have a pet waist version.





Pet of the Day...

Now this is a problem I fully understand. Its amazing how little bed space you can end up with when you have pets in the house.





Why Helmets Don't Suck...

Kudo points on not only landing on his butt, but also getting the hand up for the "I'm OK wave" which is different from the "I need medical assistance" and the "That heart so much I don't know my own name" waves.






Sgt. Pezzer's Epic Fail...

Today's Sgt. Pezzer's Epic fail is a link to this video.

Click here to watch-Safe for work.

Please not that he receives extra points for falling on his skate board at the end. Classic.

A hole new sore...

Wonderful web...

So the web has given us some data over the past 20 years. But one web page has come to my attention as being almost indispensable to the commuting cyclist. If your like me and tend to find out what the ride home is going to be like by sticking your head out your office window, this site may help your and your co-workers comfort levels. Just plug in your zip code.

www.weatherbike.com

New Ride...

Wow, that was harder then I thought it was going to be.

Over the past two weeks I have been riding fairly short rides 8 to 10 miles round trip per day. I was feeling good, really good, fast, agile all things not fat.

This has been my ride for the past two weeks.

This ride is safe, easy and best of all, I can sleep in a bit and still make it to work just fine.

This is the new ride.Still very safe, not easy, and about twice the time on the way into to work.

The Green path is what I drive to my parking area (Giant Parking lot). So the questions may be, why do I drive, and not ride that short distance. Well, I hate a hill between my house and the parking area. I really hate it on the way into work, but it sucks HUDGE on the way home.

So today was the first time this spring I made the longer ride. My back side is sore, and my legs felts like they were going to fall off by the time I got to the car. But as they say, pain is weakness leaving the body. I must be very week, it was a lot of fun to be able to be on the bike for a much longer time, I'm sure there will be time in the upcoming weeks when I will want to slash my tires, but this is for the betterment of me and I'm excited about it.

Numbers of the Day:

According to my Cycle Computer.
Time: 40:25
Avg: 11.4
Max: 37.7
Trp: 7.7

According to my GPS.
Moving time: 40.30
Stopped: 2.22
Over all Avg: 10.6
Odo 7.59 miles


Geeky item of the Day...

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the ThinkGeek Annoy-a-tron.

This comes to us from one of my favorite sites, ThinkGeek.com where you can get such wonderful thinks like the One up mushroom t-shirt and the R2 fish training school kit. Today I would like to talk about the Annoy-a-Tron. This wonderful little device has crumbled the mind of two of my coworkers, go to the above link and read the letter ThinkGeek received.

So what does it do, it emits a random tone, at a random interval... All day...... They also have a new version that emits a buzzing sound. You know something like a cell phone on silent.

Pet of the Day...


I try to stay away from all the pet pictures with intentionally incorrect English, but this was funny.








Why Helmets don't suck...


I have three words, CRAP!!!! all of them.






Sgt. Pezzer's Epic Fail...

I would like to point out a where these two "men" went wrong.

A) WTF are they wearing?
B) SNOW! No pants, SNOW!
C) Crazy Person 1 (CP1) is standing on ICE, Crazy Person 2 (CP2) is diving into what they believe is water. CP2 really should have looked at CP1 prior to attempting to dive into a sheet of ICE.
D) What is CP2 wearing under their "toto" is it?
E) I'm not sure how much alcohol it took to get these "men" out here but for CP2 is about to not be enough.

There is a part of me that would really like to see how this turned out.

Till the cows come home...

Ride to work...

OUCH!!!

Ok, it was fun, but wow did the wind on river front suck today. I was peddling for all I was worth and could get up to a whopping 8mph.

Squirrel racing...

Squirrel can run at about 13.5 mph for some time. On the ride home Friday after work I was racing a Squirrel. Now I'm not really sure why the little guy ran by 5 trees before going up one. My only guess is that the one he/she went up was home. But for the 50 or so yards of river front park that we were side by side on he was going at about 13.5mph. I'm not so sure I would call it run or I would call it flying, they don't touch the ground very much when the run.

Pet of the Day...





I would have loved to seen how this played out.




Why Helmets don't Suck...





Remember boys and girls, always, always verify the depth of a water crossing PRIOR to making your entry.




Sgt. Pezzers Epic Fail...




HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!!! I'm not sure how the hell they pulled this off, but I'm sure it was really, really hard to do.

Stage 4...

The Next Step...

Well my frame is not back yet, but when it gets here it has to spend a few days at the shop for a few coats of frame saver.

I will admit that I am really, really, missing my bike, I want to ride.

While we have a little down time...

We are taking some time to make me a bit safer.

www.roadid.com

This ankle strap will have all of my contact information, who I am, who to call if something happens to me and most of all, on the bottom of the strap.

NEVER GIVE UP!!!!!!

Grain, any fool can make bread...

But the devout can craft BEER!!!


Your car smells...

It smells like a moco save-ay... wow the jokes around here, read on soon it will make sence to you too.

Experts say that 5-7kg of used coffee grounds can produce one liter of biofuel at a production cost of about $1 dollar a gallon. If Starbucks figures out that they can make the world smell like their coffee two they are going to be biger then Costco.

What kid would not want to try this...

Hell what adult for that matter.

One letter at a time...

Wow, you know things are bad when you can't even keep you sign on any more. (would have been a nice hack)

Pet of the Day...

I try to stay away from all pictures of pets with captions. Especially all captions that are written in that cute "pet" language that always ends in SSSSSS. I have news for you, my cat does not understand English, if it did, it would not get on the table. While I do not think that poor sentance structure makes this picture cute, there is something about cat in a PC case that I just cant seem to pull my self away from.




Why Helmets don't suck...


Wall riding 101.

Pass!








Fail!

Tomarrow its suposed to get up to 4!!!!!

OK, that's a dramatization but it was damm cold out their today.

Funny story from my friend Joe H.

7.8 mph. Cold weather caused me to be slow this morning. Funny thing happened, I am pedaling along, and realize I'm just not going to be able to keep my glasses free of fog, and my face covered. Choosing the lesser of two evils, I ditched the goggles, and kept pedaling. This however had an interesting effect, the warmth from my exhalations was doing a fine job of keeping my eyes warm! Brilliant! Well, except for one thing, those same exhalations are filled with moisture, while this would normally not be a big deal, at 12 degrees it caused my eyelashes to start to freeze. But wait, it gets better! I didn't realize that this was going on till I decided to do something we all do several times a min, blink. Yes, you guess it, I blinked, and my eyelashes stuck together. Talk about an odd sensation! I was like Whoa! Why can't I open my eyes?

Needless to say, I figured it out and got them open. Just a funny little story to start your day!

And the geek in my likes my hot pocket buying power...

Glass Pool Table...

No jump shots please. Only one question on this one, 98 percent of all the cool stuff I learned in collage is on a pool table. And a very large % of it has to do with friction between the ball and the FELT! See any issue here,,,,,,, NO FELT!!!!!!!! Well at least my cat will be able to sit under it and go completely insane.

OK, I'm a dork...

The wife has told me, I have seen the signs, but I think this clinched it. I would so wear these. $22 for a set of Millennium Falcon Cuff links.








Sam I am...

I want this shirt, it's 20 dollars,
I want the boys to gimme hollers.
It's four bucks more for a woman's fit,
But Sam, I don't really give a shit—
Cause when I wear it I'll be geeky cute,
Oh, Sam, I sure hope the boys will hoot!
I do not want 3 Megs of Ram!
I do not want them, Sam I am!

Potty Training...


I'm speechless.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the Laserpup...


I can see the dog now, you walk in the house and the dog comes running up to you.

I saved the house from invaders!!!! The little red dot did not get anything!!!! TELL me I'm a good dog, plessssssseeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!

http://www.makershed.com/...

A new web site has come to our attention, Makershed.com Full of DIY projects and the materials to do them your self.

Dogs vs cats...

There seems to be some debate as to why you can dress a dog up in a costume, while cats are less supportive in wearing Halloween items.

To help clear this up, I have enlisted two pets on the street to prove my point.

Clancy - "I know, this is adorable, now pet me behind the ear, and give me that hot dog your kid is eating"












Nigel - "I would recommend that you don't fall asleep tonight, case I will KILL YOU!"

Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy...

Happy almost turkey day everyone.

I'm so excited, I sometimes feel like the father from a Christmas story when it comes to a turkey. Its really not about the day of, its about the left overs...... I'm drooling just thinking about it.

Ways to help the Retailers...

http://www.ihavetohavethat.com/ - Stainless Steel Solar Garden Lights - $6.99 Reg $22.99
http://www.handbagchick.com/ - The Sak Signature Leather Zip Top Shoulder Bag -$35 + Free Shipping
http://www.covercutlery.com/ - K.O Chive, Black 410 Stainless, Black Blade, Plan hunting knife - #35.72 Reg $64.95
http://www.secondact.com/ - Samsung LN37a550 37 inch 1080p LCD HDTV - $799.99 Reg $1499.99
http://www.biglots.com/ - Life-Like Chamion Speedway 600 HO scale Electric Slot Racing - $75.00 Reg $159.99 (Ahhhheeeemmm honey,, <--------- ;) http://www.yugster.com/ - Green Laser Pointer - $15.97
http://www.woot.com/ - Areobed Sport Bed in a Minute II - $49.99

Lets talk about geeks baby...

Wonder twins power active form of...

A very nice VGA to USB hack.
http://www.instructables.com/

You might be going to fast...

Honda is adding a color-changing speedometer to their new line of cars. Its more for an indication as to how "green" your driving is, Changing from a green background when you are getting good MPH to a Blue background when the Houses get out to play.

Golden Shellback is not for sale...

If you have not seen this, you really should check it out. 100% waterproofing for any electronics


Golden Shellback Gadget Waterproofing from Gizmodo on Vimeo.

Prices.

Blackberry Pearl $120.00 per unit coated
Apple IPod Shuffle $60.00 per unit coated
Apple IPod Touch $120.00 per unit coated
Lansing IPod Speaker Orbit M $60.00 per unit coated
Garmin GPS etrex $75.00 per unit coated
West Marine Vhf 55 Radio $120.00 per unit coated
Speakers (no enclosures) up to 8 inches in diameter $100 each $180 pair

The only kicker is the company is only backing it with a 30 day warranty. While I'm looking forward to getting my GPS coated, I think I might wait for a while.

Degrade dam you...

Someone, somewhere came up with a bio-degradable soda bottle. Ya know for all those that cant seem to put stuff in the recycling container!!!!!

Pet of the day...

Sometimes I wish I was my pet.

Why Helmets don't suck...

Ouch, over and over and over again.