Retro NES game player at Buy.com

Got an email today from Buy.com for this little gem: Retro NES TopLoader Video Game System. Yes, it is a gem. Those of us that remember the 8-bit graphics of the NES can appreciate this "machine."

One reviewer remembers the quick fix to get a game cartridge to if it wasn't working properly by "blowing in games and console." It's funny how this more often than not worked like a charm.

Oh the days of old. If I had any of my cartridges left, I would consider this for $25 or a black one for $18 but alas, the cartridges have been sold, given away, damage or forgotten.

How many fist bumps is too many?

This was shown during a men's tennis match at the U.S. Open between Sam Querrey and Stanislas Wawrinka. Wawrinka just broke Querrey's serve after losing his own and Wawrinka's posse reacts.

Frying wingettes for buffalo wings

I've never "deep" fried anything before. I am trying to make homemade buffalo wings.

I was told to deep fry then put them in a container with the buffalo sauce to marinate.

We'll see how it goes.

UPDATE: I don't think they turned out too bad.

The kids, my kids and a couple of neighbor kids, taste tested and said it was very good. The buffalo sauce I used wasn't really spicy but probably more of what I'd call tangy. Next time I'll try a little more of a spicy flavor.

Overall, I thought I did a good job if I may say so myself. 1^st time frying and 2^nd time making hot wings. Good times.


Sent on the Super Jay Network from Super Jay's BlackBerry®

How could you not love this face?

She looks for me in the crowd.

She finally sees me.

She shows this kind of excitement every time she hears from or sees me.

In the news 09/06/2010

I think this was one of the best headlines I read in a story line this evening.

From Yahoo News:

Wozniacki downs 2006 champ Sharapova at US Open

Click here for article while it lasts.

Both players are pretty attractive. Both players are very skilled. One screams while she plays while the other relies strictly on her abilities. One isn't enjoyable at all to watch because of her screaming.

Can you guess which one I can't stand?

Email humor 09/06/2010

Law Officers Said It!

These are actual comments made by 16 Police Officers. The comments were taken off actual police car videos around the country:

1. "You know, stop lights don't come any redder than the one you just went through."

2. "Relax, the handcuffs are tight because they're new. They'll stretch after you wear them a while."

3. "If you take your hands off the car, I'll make your birth certificate a worthless document."

4. "If you run, you'll only go to jail tired."

5. "Can you run faster than 1200 feet per second? Because that's the speed of the bullet that'll be chasing you."

6. "You don't know how fast you were going? I guess that means I can write anything I want to on the ticket, huh."

7. "Yes, sir, you can talk to the shift supervisor, but I don't think it will help. Oh, did I mention that I'm the shift supervisor?"

8. "Warning! You want a warning? O.K, I'm warning you not to do that again or I'll give you another ticket."

9. "The answer to this last question will determine whether you are drunk or not. Was Mickey Mouse a cat or a dog?"

10. "Fair? You want me to be fair? Listen, fair is a place where you go to ride on rides, eat cotton candy and corn dogs and step in monkey poop."

11. "Yeah, we have a quota. Two more tickets and my wife gets a toaster oven."

12. "In God we trust; all others we run through NCIC." (National Crime Information Center)

13. "Just how big were those 'two beers' you say you had?"

14. "No sir, we don't have quotas anymore. We used to, but now we're allowed to write as many tickets as we can."

15. "I'm glad to hear that the Chief (of Police) is a personal friend of yours. So you know someone who can post your bail."

AND THE WINNER IS....

16. "You didn't think we give pretty women tickets? You're right, we don't.. Sign here."

Racists, racists everywhere

I just got a chance to write about this but there was an incident at my roller hockey game a couple of weeks ago.

No, it didn't involve me.

It could have easily been avoided but there's this uncanny knack that men cannot take the high road (I'm guilty of this once in a while as well). It bears no weight that most are at least in their late 20s and above on whether they act like a jackass or not!

This though was completely ignorant and 95% one guy's fault.

So, picture my teammate: about 6'2", Caucasian, biker mustache/goatee, definitely seems to have anger issues. He's on the bench with me and my brother when a team member of the opposing team seemingly (more than likely) takes a dive to draw a penalty. One is called on our team but for slashing instead of tripping. Weird but we move on.

"Angry man" responds to the call with something like "What was that?" "Are you seriously going to call that?" "That was a Dora-like performance!"

Where that last comment came from is beyond me other than the fact that the "diving guy" was seemingly (more than likely) Hispanic or Mexican. The Dora comment was pretty ignorant but I guess if one dug deep enough the correlation could be made...maybe. The point is there was really no need to bring ethnicity into it.

So, the immature bantering goes on between my teammate and the "Diver" and a couple of others on the opposing team. There is about 20 seconds left in the game and what players just happen to be left on the rink: White guy, the Diver and a few other Hispanics (presumably), and my brother (who looks Mexican like I do).

All of a sudden we see White guy get tackled by Diver. Which is just plain stupid to begin with because we are all "adults" but I do understand the Diver's reaction to the ignorant Dora comment. White guy gets out from under Diver but is in a kind of sitting position and then Diver's brother bum rushes White guy, knocking him to his back and sucker punches the White guy on the left side of his face.

It's not my altercation so I remain on the bench as to not bend/break any of the "rules" as I really don't know what the facility's rules are to begin with. I just know it's not my issue and I'm not friends with White guy or Diver.

My brother sees it another way. He's three years older than me and a little shorter and scrawnier. But he has the same temper - we get that from our dad. Anyway, my brother sees the sucker punch and goes in to pull Diver's brother off White guy. I yell from the bench for him to stay out of it. His wife and son are in the stands watching and I hear her voice the same sentiment. I keep a close eye on my brother because if someone did involve him, I would have jumped off that bench and leaped over the wall to bust some knees! Fortunately, the facility workers were able to separate and settle things if not temporarily. They went ahead and ran the remaining 20 seconds off the clock and the game was called. Our team was victorious.

We are removing our equipment in the locker room (basically the back side of the stands without doors or really a room) when I told my brother that I'm glad he stayed out of it. His wife and son again shared the sentiment. My brother said he wasn't getting involved until he saw Diver's brother sucker punch White guy. He just wanted to make sure it didn't happen again.

After a few minutes or so, when we were done de-equipping and getting ready to leave, my brother walks down to White guy and says something. My brother starts to walk back towards me and I hear White guy say, "No disrespect," and my brother says, "That's alright. I'm not Mexican."

My brother sits back next to me and says that White guy skated by Diver and said, "Chico." This apparently is what set off Diver. This is also some portion of what White guy probably said and "apologized" to my brother because White guy thought my brother was Mexican.

So, other than the obvious immaturities, I was a little bothered by the situation. Granted, I'm not Mexican but as I've stated time and again, I look Mexican, especially to the ignorant gringos of the U.S of A. especially in the border states!

Should I feel offended by White guy's comments even though it wasn't me and I'm NOT Mexican? Yes, because that very well could have been me he asininely called, "Dora" or "Chico." Would it have pissed me off like it obviously did Diver? Fuck yeah it would have!

Should I feel awkward by my brother's oblivious statement of "It's okay, I'm Hawaiian?" Because fucking White guy thought he was Mexican to begin with. And as such, his Dora and Chico comments could have indirectly affected us. Just because we aren't Mexican, doesn't mean we haven't had to deal with the outright ignorance, stupidity, racism and dickheadedness of White guy in some form or fashion.

White guy is obviously a pigheaded dip shit that doesn't know any better. Diver is probably an asshole too but it has nothing to do with him being Mexican. My brother is just a dumb ass for encouraging White guy and thinking that whatever White guy said was funny or intelligent sounding.

So, it bothered me a bit. I'm over it but I wanted to write what I was feeling/thinking at the time. I'm just as racist as the next White guy but I've written before about how I don't think it's racism by me when I hate and make fun of every race. :-) Most of the time I'll make fun of your intelligence, your overall life skills and your wife or family in general (even though I don't know her/them). Sometimes, deep down in my mind I may have some damn good racial slurs waiting to creep out of my vocal chords but the odds are I won't bring them to the plate unless the other person brings it first. Even then, I really try to keep my arguments precise and to the point and if your race had nothing to do with it, why even bother mentioning it? It's a waste of time and effort for the argument and it just shows the ignorance of the person who flung the race card because they can't hold their own without turning it to race.

I guess that's all I have to say about that.

Amazon book pricing is slightly messed up

There was this book for sale on Amazon that's a part of a series my wife has read. It's the latest of the series in fact. I noticed something funny about the pricing. If you look at the screen cap below, tell me what YOU see.

Yep, that's right. The hardcover price on Amazon is $12.97. The Kindle version is priced at $12.99.

Now, my understanding is typically and usually the Kindle version is much cheaper than the hardcover. That's kind of the whole point of the eBook, right...cheaper and more convenient to carry around?

Is this the way of the eBook? Suck the customer in and then fuck them over...like the Audio CD: buy a whole 15 songs when you only want 1-2 of them?

I guess I'll have to wait and see if this is an error or truly Amazon trying to pull one over.

UPDATE 9:51 p.m: I looked on Amazon just now for the book and the hardcover has been upped to $15.17. Interesting.

In the news 09/02/2010

Headline from the Star-Telegram reads:

Bedford high school student turns in dead woman's purse

Click here for article while it lasts

Just a few questions:

1. Why did the kid(s) take the purse in the first place?
2. After taking the purse, did they immediately say, "Let's turn it in"? or...
3. Did the teens feel guilty and decide to turn the purse in once they found it belonged to a dead lady?
4. Why not just keep the purse? (it probably didn't contain much valuables)

I'm not condemning the kids. I just like to wonder without ever getting answers. I like to frustrate myself like that. Besides, as a teen, I'm sure I did a lot of "questionable" things too. But now that I'm an adult and father, Hell hath no fury like me being pissed off! :-)

It reminds me of a time in junior high when me, my older brother, a guy friend and two girl friends were walking along a walking/running trail in the local park. I found a wallet. Opening it up revealed a driver's license, credit cards, and $500 in cash. Whoa! There was five of us and that meant $100 each. Booyah! The girls were sisters, one was very God-fearing and the other was a tad more wild than her older sister. They both agreed though that returning the wallet would be the "right" thing to do. WTF? What dumb ass goes for a jog/walk with a loaded wallet? Finders Keepers, bitchass! The girls' opinion somehow won (probably because I was the only male - bro is gay, guy friend was in the closet at the time and then the girls) and they returned the wallet to the address on the DL. I can't remember if they mailed it or did it in person but the guy somehow knew their home address. A few days later they came to my house - they lived two houses from me - to show that the guy thanked them by sending them both a dozen red roses. Again, WTF? They didn't find it. I found it!

No, I'm not bitter after all these years. Okay, maybe just a little bit. I mean I could have invested that $100 at age 13 and by now 20+ years later it could have been a million dollars or more! So, why be bitter?

Nah, nah...nah, nah, nah, nah...hey, hey, hey...goodbye, Andy Roddick

Tennis was not so good last night for Brooklyn Decker's husband. Yes, I feel he is no longer "Andy Roddick - tennis player." He has been sucking for so long and his one major (2003 US Open Champion) that he won was from pure determination, a powerful, feared forehand and a dominating serve. What does he have now? Nada!

Headline on Tennis.com reads:

Roddick eliminated by Tipsarevic in second round
Click here for article while it lasts

I watched the match an in my opinion, Tipsarevic dominated Roddick on every aspect of the match. Even though he lost the 1st set, it was a minor hiccup. I think they said Tips was coming back from ankle injuries so I'm sure he wanted to try and ease into seeing how they felt before going harder.

He just played Andy's "wait for them to make a mistake" game plan better and at times changed that plan to the "I'm ripping this bitch past your ass" plan. Mrs. Decker just seemed like he was confused on how to play: should I go for broke when it feels right or wait for the other guy to do that and screw up? It didn't work either way. It was a pity. It is a pity to see someone with such talent waste it, like James Blake. Maybe either or both will have a second wind like Agassi did. Let's hope.

I like Tipsarevic. He's a very decent player. I've seen him playing at his best and not-so best. He's a likable guy and he was very respectful in his on-court post match comments. What's no to like about a guy like that?

Here is another article on the official U.S. Open website about the match while it lasts.

Dinner at Central Market on Lower Greenville

The wife and I have decided on a weekly date night for us to get away for an hour or so, by ourselves, while the kids are at home. We've only done it a few times now but it's been pretty enjoyable just to get out for a bit, especially for the wife.

So, tonight I decided that we'd try Central Market. I'm not a fan of Central Market. In fact, I think they are overpriced for their groceries and although their "fixed" food looks good and tasty (and so far has been), I think it's slightly overpriced as well. I'm not a "fancy food" expert so I could be way off but I just don't like to pay too much for "basic food."

Anyway, we live and learn on what is good, tasty and worth the money and that which is not. The wife went with her standard visit to the salad bar where as I wanted to venture out a little bit. I ordered 1/2 lb of the shrimp salad and 1/2 lb of grilled flank steak with honey garlic. Her salad was rated at $7.49/lb and each of my items were priced at $17.99/lb. The price of mine is why I went with a 1/2 lb because there was no way I was paying $35 just for my shit. Total bill cost with tax was $24.31.

The shrimp salad was passable, very passable. The salad consisted basically of shrimp, diced celery and some dressing. That's it. The counter attendant did give me a decent amount of shrimp but I think for $8.64 I could have just bought a shrimp ring at Kroger for $9.99 and it is currently a BOGO. So, I'd get 60-80 decently priced and tasting shrimp for roughly $11. The celery was like needless filler.

The grilled flank steak with honey garlic was pretty tasty. It wasn't oo, ah awesome. It wasn't fork-cutting tender. It was however well grilled and marinated nicely. I could see a pound for $9 worth it but $17.99? That's just ridiculous.

On the way out, we picked up some dinner for the kids. We saw the "dinner for two" meals in a bag. They had a meatloaf dinner that had a good-sized portion of meatloaf, two rolls, a side of garlic mashed potatoes (probably like a 1/2 lb) and a side of amandine green beans for $13.99 plus tax. Once we got home, we opened the dinner-for-two bag and found that it contained way more food than we got with the individual orders combined! We got jacked. If we'd known any better, we would have gotten 1 or 2 dinners. I think we could have easily split one dinner between the four of us with the amount of food that was included.

Staples has some of the dumbest coupons

I'm on a newsletter listserv for Staples. Yes, I'm on a bunch of e-newsletters that may or may not benefit me at some point in time.

Anyway, I got this email today with the header reading, "Hurry! This coupon ends Saturday." Of course, I open up the email to see how awesome this coupon is and this is what I see: $5 off my purchase of $50 or more. Are you shitting me!?

What is with the store advertisements and pricing "deals" these days? This is nothing special and it isn't that devastating for it to not be used before Saturday. Granted, $5 is 5$ but to have to spend $50 is not a good or decent return on an investment. What if I go to Staples to get something I really need and the total only reaches $40 but I was lead to Staples because I wanted to get $5 off? Should I purchase something not necessary to reach the $50 mark just to get the $5 off or not? It's always, "Hell no!" with me but others may be different. Now if it was something that I was having to pay $45 for in the first place then making an additional $5 purchase to get $5 off is sort of okay because it's close to getting something for nothing but then you add tax and we're back to "Hell no!"

Oh well. I think I posted something similar in regards to a Sports Authority coupon scam. Yes, it's a scam no matter what they may say.

Vanilla Ice T-shirt

Saw this in an email newsletter from Thrillist. Link to actual page is here. I'd get it but they don't have my size. I'm not a youth nor have I been a medium since junior high or high school.

I really don't know why I'm on the Thrillist newsletter. I know I signed up for it but it doesn't contain anything (yet) that I find of real interest. It provides occasional things to post about but nothing that I can really say, "Wow! I want to get that," or "I want to do that!" I guess I stay on it because I have hopes that one day they will provide me with something of worth to me.

Until then, I'll just enjoy the sporadic humor they provide me now and then.




"Word to your mother!"