Review Tuesday? What was I thinking?

I don't know how to write a review. I should have put more thought into this whole schedule thing. When I don't know how to do something I turn to my good friend Google. In the handy search box I typed, How to write a review. Google never lets me down. First link took me here.

So for my first review, I'm going to review....this article!!! I'm so clever.

Step 1: Start with a category.

That's easy, this is a self-help article on how to write reviews. That I found on the Internet. Not much more to say about that.

Step 2: Develop clear criteria.

Not really sure what that means. Let me look at the examples. Hm, no examples. Wait, yes there is. "What makes it good?" What makes this article good? It was easy to find. It's short. Probably not what the author intended as good points but who knows.

Step 3: Make a judgement.

Another easy one. This article sucks. What kind of helpful hints are these? It's like saying, if you want to know what the weather is like, look outside. Thanks. Very helpful.

Step 4: Gather evidence.

The article is 5 paragraphs long and most of the page is taken up by ads or links to related articles like "How to write a thesis." If the thesis article is anything like this one, I feel sorry for the poor sap that follows its advice.

Step 5: Sum it up.

While looking for an article on writing reviews, I found this uninspiring article at Suite101.com. The author put forward some pretty vanilla thoughts. They could have made more of an impact though if presented with a couple of helpful examples. The website was hard to look at with the myriad of ads for flat bellies and work at home opportunities and I felt it took away from the legitimacy of the article. I should have searched a little harder for a more helpful article. Maybe my review would've been better.

Maybe.

Money money money money

Money is always at the front of my mind. It affects darn near every decision I make and surely affects my mood. Money and I have a strange relationship. When I was younger I spent everything I got my hands on. Heck, I worked for it, why not spend it. Even through my late 20's, I got married, bought a house and just spent and spent and spent.

I don't spend so much anymore. Not that I don't want to. Don't get me wrong. I'm a techie and love new gadgets. I love to give my wife and kids things. Heck, I would love to be able to give money to charities that call the house every night. But I can't. It's like waking up on New Years Day with a killer hangover. All those years of bad behavior eventually catch up to you.

While my wife and I currently make a great income there never seems to be enough to take that great vacation or heck even do something like home repairs. But before you start feeling sorry for us, please stop. We live in a nice house, drive two nice cars and eat plenty. (Check out my waistline.) We don't really NEED anything. We still have plenty of wants though.

That's where the difference between being a grownup and being a kid (in grown up clothes) lies. We can delay this pleasure for now. It's hard. Really hard. But when we look back at the last year and see that we paid off over $18,000 in debt it makes you realize it's worth it.

Debt is forefront on our fight with money. I won't let it beat us. It had a good hold on us but I can see that light at the end of the tunnel. A couple of years ago I was looking for a book to listen to on my commute to and from DC. I stumbled upon Dave Ramsey's, "The Total Money Makeover". And it made me mad. I remember hitting my steering wheel with my hand when I realized how foolish I had been with all the money that I've come into contact with in my lifetime. So I changed.

We got on a budget and we laid out a roadmap of where we are headed. We are half way down that road now. There is no turning back. Well that's a lie, we could get new car payments, more credit cards and it would feel good for about a month or so. But then we'd have to start writing those checks again. That never feels good.

Sunday - It's playoff day!

The Ravens are getting ready to kick off their playoff game against Kansas City. I thought about holding off this entry until later but if they lose, I'm not going to be in a happy mood and then there would'vebeen no blog. And, I have a schedule to keep.

I mentioned that my loyalty mainly lies with 3 teams. Two hometown, one not so much.

I'll concentrate on the Orioles today. The fact that I go to them first should tell you what I feel about them. I can't remember a moment in my life that I wasn't a fan. I love baseball. I'm a big nerd and I love all the numbers. But this recent run has hardened my heart against the black and orange. They made a lot of moves this year and my heart is jumping up and down going, "Hey, nice job!" My head is going, "Shut up." Head wins for now. I have witnessed some great events in my lifetime. I was at Memorial Stadium for the last game in 1982 when Earl retired and the O's had won three straight to force what was essentially a one game playoff with the Brewers. When the game was over, this happened.

And I'll never forget it.

Oh speaking of never forgetting, I was here too....

I tried to find some video but all I could get my hands on were people taking video of their television. Not the best quality there.

When Cal did the lap around the field, this grown man cried. A little. Hey, it's allowed.

I watched this on TV and it still hurts. Deep deep hurt. That little bastard stole an out and helped the O's lose a playoff game against theYankees that they might have won. That was 1996 and I don't think they've been the same ever since.

I'll never stop following them. I'll never give up on them. But why does it have to be this hard to root for a sports team?

Everything is running on schedule

Or it will be at least. I think that if I want to continue this blog and have people read it, I need to come up with a schedule for myself. I know every Thursday at 9, "The Office" will be on NBC. Or that football games on Sunday start at 1 & 4. So I'm going to lay out a schedule and hopefully keep to it. Mark it on your calendar and come back for your favorite days. Better yet, just come back every day. See, I'm here to make your life easier.

• Sports Sunday - I'm a big sports fan. The Ravens and the Orioles are my favorite major league teams and I'm a big time Duke Blue Devil basketball fan. 2 out of 3 isn't bad right? I do follow other sports but I don't have a vested interest in any other teams. So on Sunday you'll get a whole bunch of sports goodness.
  
  
• Money Monday - Don't roll your eyes. Everyone needs to think about money. This probably won't be the biggest of my weekly entries but I do think about money. A LOT. Not in a get rich sort of way but in a how can I pay off my debt and still take my family on a cool vacation way.
  
  
• Tuesday's Review - Tuesday is when new DVDs and games come out. It's the perfect day for a review segment. It won't always be the newest stuff. I may review a TV show that I watched in the last week or a even a book I'm reading. Could be a movie I saw with Brigid or a PS3 game that I can't stop playing. I'm out of control. I've never really reviewed anything before and I hope I'll be able to muster something other than, "True Blood is awesome, you should watch it."
  
  
• Wildcard Wednesday - Wednesdays suck. It is the middle of the week. Last weekend seems so far away, next weekend is equally as far. On Wednesday, for no good reason, I'm going to open up Yahoo and comment on whatever is the top trend at the time. Yeah, how's that for a wildcard?
  
  
• Interview Thursday - I'm a husband, father, son and brother. I have a great core group of friends and I have a job that I do quite well. But what's going on deep inside? Got me. I'm one of the least introspective people you'll ever meet. So I'll think up a question and ask myself. And then I'll answer. See how that works? Like an interview. Clever.
  
  
• Computer Friday - I restarted the blog on a Friday with a small rant about something that happened in my job as a Desktop Engineer. (Fancy title, right?) So I think I will keep computer Fridays. It won't alway be about my job. It may be about....yeah it's probably going to be about my job.
  
  
• Stupid Saturday - No, I don't think Saturdays are stupid. Quite the opposite, I love Saturdays. It's the one day of the week that I feel is the least filled with stress. (For the most part.) I'm going to browse the web and find the something that makes me laugh or makes me shake my head in disgust. It's going to be hard work, surfing the web in search of funny or disturbing things. But I'm up for the challenge.

And to prove it, here you go.

What I love about this is that he really tries the first two hurdles and knocks them both down. Then he just starts Hulk smashing his way through the rest of them. Near the end when one of the hurdles gets wrapped around his head and knocks him off track into the next lane, he destroys those hurdles too. The poor guy that was running next to him has no idea what to do so he just sort of fake half jumps over the broken hurdles. And at the very end of the clip he actually trips on the little ledge that surrounds the track. I'm thinking the hurdles are not his strongest event.

Computer Friday - Patches didn't break your stuff..

I hear it all the time. "IT installed patches and now my computer is broken."

Yeah, right. First of all, I install patches. Well I have a big server that does it for real but I push buttons like no one's business. So, I know what the patches are capable of. And on a side note, when a person out there in cube land says "IT" do they know what the heck they are talking about? My experience is no. Anyway, I digress. About these patches. See everything needs to be patched. The operating system, your programs and even hardware. So it's a necessary evil. Like staff meetings. A long long time ago, in a galaxy far away, (ok IT folks are a little nerdy) patches could and did break stuff. But that day is long gone. I still test my patches because I like to be safe but haven't had patching break anything as long as I can remember.

So, patching is necessary. It fixes and enhances and protects your computer. It's going to happen so just relax and let it happen.

Here is what patching won't do.

• Cause your voicemail not to work. Adobe acrobat has nothing to do with your phone.
• Cause your laptop to change your password. Um, I don't patch your laptop. Especially not your personal one.
• Cause your emails to disappear. Maybe if you didn't click on the sort button and sort your emails from oldest to newest, then you'd see your new emails. Just saying.
• Cause vision problems. Stay with me on this one, it's like a little play.

"IT installed patches and now I can't see anything on my monitor."

"Is the computer on?"

"Yes, well I can see something but there is a glare coming in through my window from the sun."

"Wait, you can't see your screen because of sun glare?"

"Yeah, this just started happening after IT installed a patch or something this weekend."

Or it's just that the time changed and the sun is in a different position now when you come to work. And you just need to lower the blinds in your office. I really am a computer genius.

Back from the dead

My blog is now a zombie. It's been dead for over 2 years now while I was off doing so much exciting stuff that I couldn't possibly put all my adventures into words. All right, I'm lying. I just got bored with it after a few posts and left it to rot.

Does this mean I'm going to be a posting machine like my beautiful wife, Brigid Kemmerer? Yeah, probably not. But who knows, maybe I will. Maybe I will become famous for my witty posts. I will have hundreds, no THOUSANDS, of followers hanging on my every word.

What's probably going to happen though is this. I will blog about crap that is going on for about 2 months. Then the zombie blog will die again.

Only to see daylight in 2013. ggrrrrrrrrrr. (that's the sound zombies make in case you didn't know.)

Um. Facebook is Stupid

So I naturally have a page. I didn't mean too. Honest. But I was bored in a training class last week and one thing lead to another and well there you go. I'm not proud. So instead of admitting my mistakes, did I just let the page wither and die? No I added a whole bunch of stuff to it and check it 3 or 4 times a day. What in the hell is wrong with me?

My friend r0n would say that I'm gay. But that's pretty much his answer whenever I ask that question.

I have 11 friends now on Facebook. Mostly made up of people that I know from work and a few relatives. And my wife. It's not the most happening page on the intertubes by far (nor is this one for that matter) but it kills a couple of minutes at a time. And really, isn't that something that we all need more of?