Felone Blog :: Well-refined uselessness since 2004

Long Time No See

2008-04-09T08:57:00.003-05:00

Like so many others, I've found no time for the individual blogging for the last year or so.

So, here's a quick rundown of what's happened in the last year+ since I put this blog on hiatus:

Got Engaged
Got Married
Sold my house (moved into Jen's house)
Went to St. Lucia for a honeymoon (awesome)
My wife became pregnant
Quit my job and started a new business
Had a baby (Gabriel Stephen, cutest thing ever) - 1/31/08
Jen's staying home with Gabe, so she resigned from her job

Soooo... needless to say things have been very busy at our house. After deciding to cram as many life changing events as possible into two years, I'm taking breaks where possible and enjoying fatherhood.

Hope any of the former readers of this blog who happen to see this are doing well. Most people I actually talk to anyway.

I may pop in occassionally on this, not sure yet, but I guess it's possible.

Weird Spam About 'Design Patterns'?

2006-09-25T10:09:00.000-05:00

I got this spam in an email, which is no surprise, I get a lot of spam, the majority of which is caught by my email software. Anyway, I was looking through my spam folder this AM to make sure I didn't miss an email I expected to receive and saw this email... As a former programmer, there is some real technology stuff in here... But the language is really choppy.... The weird thing is this email doesn't link anywhere, doesn't contain any attachments, and doesn't seem to do anything. Maybe they are trying to determine if this is a real email address.... But it's really odd...

Head First book, you know Java's built-in pattern With Design Patterns, how patterns are design problems, and better you want to learn the up a creek without In a way that lets you put advantage Java's built-in pattern your time on...something In their native

be wrong (and what your brain works. Using his stunningly clever use of Command, put you to sleep! We think "secret language" advantage your brain works. Using

the "Trading Spaces" show. applications. You Head First Design Patterns or on the real relationship matter--why to use them,

about inheritance might that you can hold your and Adapter. With Head First Design Patterns, you'll avoid and experience of others, your boss told you

of patterns with others the embarrassment of thinking at speaking the language brain in a way that sticks.
is so often misunderstood, of Design Patterns so with

real OO design principles

"secret language" science, and learning theory, own with your co-worker alone. At any given moment, used in the Java API more complex.
about inheritance might

put you to sleep! We think

so that you can spend so you look to Design and experience of others, format designed for the way who've faced the better at solving software applications. You

same problems.

a design paddle pattern. look "in the wild". also want to learn Facade, Proxy, and Factory used in the Java API about inheritance might of the best practices In a way that makes you else. Something more with

between Decorator, Facade to do instead). You want Facade, Proxy, and Factory texts. If you've read a neurobiology, cognitive design problems, and better when he casually mentions Something more fun.
used in the Java API Java's built-in pattern Design Patterns, you'll avoid Best of all, in a way that won't , and how to exploit to do instead). You want

the latest research in to do instead). You want you don't want to look "in the wild". to use them (and when somewhere in the world his stunningly clever use of Command, so you look to Design you want to learn the sounds, how the Factory Patterns--the lessons Design Patterns, you'll avoid Best of all, in a way that won't challenging. Something real OO design principles Most importantly, better at solving software the patterns that a design paddle pattern. Design Patterns, you'll avoid the next time you're

them to work immediately. used in the Java API better at solving software

Singleton isn't as simple as it principles will help

(and impress cocktail party guests) the latest research in to know how they Most importantly, up a creek without between Decorator, Facade the same software

words, in real world

9/11

2006-09-11T17:17:00.000-05:00

Scott at Transformatum asks the question, where were you five years ago today? Earlier today I thought about those poor people who lost their lives, and the change that had on our country, but until I saw Scott's post I hadn't thought much about were I was five years ago today. Here is my response on Scott's Blog:

I was at work, I thought it was going to be a big day (personally), I had recently been named as project manager to a very, very large account (at 25) and my new clients were on their way in town from LA and New York.

I was in the car about the time the first plane had hit (I assume) although I didn’t know this at the time, after parking I got on the shuttle from the parking lot to head to my building when another passenger mentioned something about it. I assumed, like everbody that it was a small plane. By the time I got to my desk, somebody said another plane had hit the WTC. I was a little shocked and huddle with one of my colleagues to watch on the internet.

My clients from LA arrived a few minutes later and we headed to the conference room. Even though we were all in shock, we talked a little bit about what had happened and then to my surprise they said they wanted to get started with the meetings. We found out a little while later that our client heading in from NY flight was re-routed and grounded. I also didn’t really learn about flight 93 and the pentagon until a short time later.

Unfortunately, we worked most of that day (and the three that followed) and other than watching news when I returned home each evening (pretty much late in the evening I should add), I never really had a chance to absorb what happened.

My clients are all very nice people who I usually got along with very well… But it always bothered me that we spent the better part of 10 - 12 hours on 9/11 - 9/13 working and paying no attention to the travesty going on in the world around us. They barely ever mentioned the attacks during breaks, barely regonized the change these attacks had on the world. The most often thing we discussed is how they would be able to return to LA (renting a car, etc…) because of the complications with travel.

Looking back on that day the thing that bothers me because I wasn’t able to reflect and mourn like the rest of the country did at that time.

Where were you on 9/11/01?

Don't Worry Mark, I'm Sure Your Arm Slot's Fine

2006-08-30T12:23:00.000-05:00

And your shoulder should be okay too.... Can you start this Sunday?

(by the way, I know this is a crappy use of the rubber stamp tool, I didn't want to spend a lot of time on it).

Mo' Money, Mo' Problems for China

2006-08-30T12:08:00.000-05:00

China is realizing that what Biggie said is true: "Mo Money, Mo Problems". They are about to hit 1 Trillion dollars in US Cash (or equivalents) on hand... and they are having a hard time figuring out what to do without causing problems in their economy...

Without being an economist (only took 15 hrs in college, prolly close to a minor), and not really studying this situation, my comment is: "Gee maybe if you did want a free economy, instead of trying to finance ours, everyone would be better off". Something's gotta give, I sure they don't dump our cash and TBills on the world market, or were screwed.

Update

2006-06-22T16:00:00.000-05:00

Sorry that this blog's been on hiatus for a while. I've been really busy and the last thing I've wanted to do lately was type anymore on a computer.

Recent News:

I got engaged!!! Which is awesome. I think the day couldn't have gone more perfect. We had a picnic planned at Forest Park near the Grand Basin (pictured on the right). Where we had wine and cheese and sandwhiches. After a while we walked over to the water and down the stairs where I got on one knee and asked Jen to marry me. She said yes (thank God). About a half hour later we went to the boathouse at Forest Park where a bunch of our family and friends met us. Perfect Day!!!
We've set a date, it's next April 14th!!!
I've been extra swamped at work as our business continues to grow. (Which is really a good thing)
My house is for sale, but hasn't sold yet. If you know anyone who needs a house in O'Fallon, MO drop me a comment and I'll give you the address.

That's about it. All of which is big news. Eventually I will get back to posting on this site.

Oh yeah, one thing I saw that bothered me. I got an email from GOPUSA that mentioned something I thought was important. The US has found 500 WMDs in Iraq and no-one seems to care or mention it in the mainstream media. All of these have been chemical weapons, but still after all the complaints, you'd think they would pick it up.

God's Winning (of course)

2006-05-12T13:48:00.000-05:00

Just thought this was funny.

Also, notice that St. Louis is the city to search for God the 3rd most often in the states. Good job StL.

Music Update

2006-05-10T12:56:00.000-05:00

I've been really busy lately, which means unfortunately I haven't had time to update the design of this blog...

Anyway, I've been busy buying a lot of 'tunes to work out to' off of itunes over the last week. I'm really impressed with two albums I've bought in the last few days:

Wolfmother's debut is like a cross between Zeppelin, Jethro Tull and Black Sabbath. Other than the weirdness of the lyrics (kinda similar to some Zeppelin tunes) it's pretty sweet 'modern' classic rock.
The new RHCP Stadium Arcadium is pretty awesome. This has always been one of my favorite bands and this is a great double disk.

Site Template & Cindy Sheehan

2006-05-03T18:11:00.000-05:00

I ended up losing my site template by accident so all links are currently off. As soon as I have the free time I'll update the template and add some outbound links back up. As you probably have noticed I also haven't posted in a while. Nothing major going on lately. I've been to 4 Cardinals games and have some good pics (especially from the home opener at new busch) I'll have to post them soon.

Random Rant:
I came across something about Cindy Sheehan that upset me. Apparently she hasn't even bothered to put a tombstone or grave marker up on Casey's grave yet. This is true and rather annoying. While's she's off exploiting the memory of her deceased son and criticizing our country with Marxists, she can't even add a friggin grave marker on his grave. I'm glad I haven't caught any coverage of her in a while, I can't stand her.

Another thing that upsets me is Joey Buttafucco and Amy Fischer. I was at my mom's last night for dinner and Entertainment Tonight (or one of the other similar shows, access hollywood, etc.) was on and they had a 5 minute special with Amy and Joey meeting up and promised more coverage tomorrow. DOES ANYONE REALLY CARE???? Why do these freaking dirtbags rate as entertainment news? I've never understood why the entertainment media suddenly makes 'average' citizens lives /problems / deaths news stories worthy of several 'news' cycles.

Two other random citizens whose stories became front page / acess hollywood news from off the top of my head, Lacey Peterson and Natalee Holloway. I don't know them, they are not celebrities, I'm upset about what happened to them, but unfortunately murders happen pretty often in this country. Why were their tragic deaths the most talked about news during the time it happened? I don't know...

Media coverage in general is so annoying. Do I care what crazy Tom Cruise is doing these days? I'm probably in the minority when it comes to this stuff, but I could care less what any of these celebrities do with their personal time. Do I care how Nick or Jessica are getting along or how their divorce is going?

(my rant is winding down now)
Speaking of Hollywood, one more point... Why can't Hollywood make a good original screenplay? (Please don't suggest Brokeback Mountain). Everything is a remake and in a lot of cases these days, the remakes are of crappy originals... The only movies that I have really enjoyed lately are movies that are made from comic books (x-men, spiderman, etc...) or from books (narnia, bourne identity & supremacy). Good Will Hunting was a good screenplay, Rounders was a great screenplay, A Bronx Tale, Platoon, Godfather, etc... Where have these movies gone? If you have seen one great movie please let me know what is was and why you liked it.
I'll start it off, the last movie I saw and loved was Walk the Line.

Cya,
Felone

Why I like Ben Stein

2006-03-24T11:29:00.000-06:00

Ben Stein wrote this article almost a year ago, but it's just as relevant today:

Lately, there has been much gnashing of teeth in the media and on liberal talk radio about Protestant preachers urging their megaflocks to get involved in the fight against abortion on demand. There has also been a good amount of muttering about Republicans using churches to promote the vote--up or down--on a few of President Bush's nominees to the federal bench. And of course, there is ever more screaming about what secret plans the new Pope might have for controlling American Catholics in their views on abortion and homosexuality.

All of this, it is darkly hinted, is a violation of the Constitutional bans on the Establishment of a religion, a new and sinister development in political life, and a threat to the Republic.

What foolishness. Who was was leading the marchers heading towards the Pettus Bridge in ( or near ) Selma, Alabama forty years ago during the heyday of the Civil Rights movement? Ministers and nuns in clerical garb. Who was there in Birmingham? Again, men and women of the cloth. What was the greatest political/moral figure of the twentieth century in America? A Protestant minister, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Who was leading us from the pulpit, sounding out fury at the seemingly endless Vietnam war? The Reverend William Sloan Coffin, a minister of the Gospel. Who was at all of the anti-war marches? Ministers and priests and rabbis. No one was complaining about that, for some reason.

Who thundered against slavery and urged on the Civil War? Henry Ward Beecher and other men of faith in the north.

This is what has always been going on in political life in America. The political is the moral. And the moral is the political.

Men and women of faith have always been involved in political/moral issues as long as there has been politics and as long as there has been religion. (Think of Moses urging the politically explosive issue of freeing the children of Israel from bondage, or of Jesus telling followers it was fine to pay taxes to Caesar.)

The only new thing is that now it's conservatives marching for life and preaching for life, not ministers marching for civil rights or disarmament. But surely men and women of the cloth are not just allowed but commanded to assert their moral beliefs on issues of supreme importance. Men and women who wear the cloth do not check their first amendment rights and their moral duties when they take their vows. They never have, and they never will. And we are far better for it.

Windows Rot and Memory Leaks

2006-03-16T18:29:00.000-06:00

There is a term out there called 'Windows Rot'. What this term means is that over an extended period of time, Windows will keep slowing down as you use it. Essentially this means that after a year or two, Windows is slower than it was when you bought it. Now some slowdown is expected as you use more software, but the problem of Windows Rot has more to do with your registry and file system than your usage. They get full and out of index (or corrupt, or both).

In my time as a developer, the shelf life of Windows for me was about six months. Because of the amount of compiling I would do.

I would expect it to be longer now that I've switched my primary role to sales / marketing (anyone from my work reading this knows I abuse computers and probably laughs at that statement).

Anyway, I have a 3.0 Ghz, Pentium 4 with 512MB of RAM (which is not enough, but I'm working on more). Above is a screen shot of my Windows Task Manager with nothing running (literally nothing, no background apps, no foreground apps, nothing). Explain to me how if I have nothing running my computer is using 369 MB of RAM? I'll tell you how, Windows Rot and Memory Leaks. This PC is maybe 1 year old (probably not even that) and that 369Mb of RAM was probably 10 minutes after I've closed everything down (because I was getting mad at how long everything is taking too run). I've mentioned it before on this blog... Windows Sucks!!!! If it wasn't for the fact that I still dable in development (in Microsoft's .Net) I would be using a Mac. I'm fed up.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it Billy Packer

2006-03-16T15:11:00.000-06:00

Update: Shockers make the sweet sixteen
Wichita State: 80
Tennessee: 73

Bradley: 77
Kansas: 73

Wichita State: 86
Seton Hall: 66

Sorry for the lack of posting lately, I've been busy with work and it's tourney time. Anyway, I can't stand Big East and ACC blowhard Billy Packer. Here's a quote from Packer talking about the MVC getting four bids in the NCAA tournet (courtesy stltoday.com):

"I'm really not an expert on the Missouri Valley, but . . . it doesn't make any sense to me," he said. "You put Florida State and Maryland into their league, I'd like to know where they'd end up (in the MVC standings). Do you see any of those four teams taking Duke to overtime, at Duke (as Florida State did this year) and beating them on their home court?"

I hope the rest the three other MVC teams get a win, to help put Packer, Phelps and Nantz in their place. In the same article on stltoday.com Packer talked about how he thought the MVC and Colonial teams would do:

"What's going to be great about this first week is what those six bids actually do in the first round," he said. "I don't know how many they'll be favored in."

Nice job Captain Obvious... I wondered how they could be favored considering the screw job they got from the commitee. Only one of the four (Wichita State) is the higher ranked seed in the 1st round. I'm thrilled the MVC got four bids, but their pairings pretty well stink.

Good luck MVC. I hope you shut these east-coast biased announcers up.

MHCC

2006-03-10T14:00:00.000-06:00

Just a post to help MHCC in the search rankings. MHCC is the home of Maryland Heights Chamber of Commerce.

KB892130 Update

2006-03-01T14:57:00.000-06:00

I've made two previous posts (here and here) about the 'Windows Genuine Advantage Program'. After somebody posted a comment that the page was still not found on Microsoft's website. I sent an email to Microsoft support. They actually emailed me back quickly and fixed the dead link. The page now appears here.

Here is Microsoft's verbiage of what the 'Windows Genuine Advantage Program' is:

If you access downloads on the Microsoft Download Center or on the Microsoft Windows Update Web site, you may be prompted to complete the Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) validation check process. On the Download Center Web site, you may be prompted to install an ActiveX control when you select a download that is marked with the WGA icon. On the Windows Update Web site, the ActiveX control is a mandatory update. This update is required to access downloads that are specific to Windows.

On both the Microsoft Download Center and the Windows Update Web site, an ActiveX control that is known as the Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool performs a validation check to verify that your copy of Windows is genuine. If your copy of Windows is genuine, you may continue to access the download. If the copy of Windows does not pass the validation check, you receive a message that states why Windows did not pass the check. Additionally, you receive information about other steps to try and about how to obtain a genuine copy of Windows. If you are using the Windows Update Web site, you are returned to that Web site, where you can obtain non-Windows downloads.

I guess the mystery is solved. As we all assumed, you can only download Windows Updates if you have a genuine licensed copy of Windows.

If I had a million dollars

2006-02-27T13:52:00.000-06:00

Recent lotteries (including the $360 million dollar powerball) have caused me to ponder how my life would change if I won. You hear the stories, that people are unhappy or broke after winning the lottery (which I question, here's some research that doesn't necessarily prove this, it's probably a toss up).

I imagine I would be just as happy as I am now, although I wouldn't worry about money as often. Things I would do (in no particular order):

Pay off my house
Pay off my car
Pay off my mom's and sibling's houses
Take a vacation somewhere that I haven't been before like Italy, Germany, Sweden or Switzerland.
Invest most of my money in safe investments like bonds and invest a smaller percentage in high-growth sector like small caps or foreign caps.
Give a decent amount of money to charity
Hire a personal trainer

Things I wouldn't do:

Quit my job
Change my personality
Let people take advantage of my newfound wealth
Buy any huge extravagant item... mansion, exotic car, etc

If I ever won the lottery (which, by the way is extermely doubtful because I rarely play, and even if I did play every week, the odds are stacked against me, you and everbody else -- they don't call it idiot insurance for nothing), I think I would try to keep my life as similar to it is now as possible. What would you do?

New Look

2006-02-17T15:09:00.000-06:00

Until I have some time to redo the look, I'm going back to a template. I was getting sick of the over-designed technical look thing I had going on. I find elegance in simplicity. I delight in nothingness. (I am full of crap.)

I like Scott's idea of using a template and incorporating your own pictures and tweaking it. Until then, template it is.

Weird Cause of Traffic

2006-02-17T14:32:00.000-06:00

For some reason I am getting a lot of traffic to my website for a post I made about how Windows occassionally sucks. The reason I made the post was I received some weird message after an update that said: "Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool (KB892130)"

Apparently this is some update to windows that ensures you are using a real licensed version of the software. Extremely annoying. I'm sorry, but I don't know what it does if your copy isn't licensed, mine is, so I didn't have any problems.

To you, the poor souls who found my site looking to find some info on this 'tool', I wanted to help you out (I'm a nice guy and all), so I searched Microsoft Developers Network (MSDN) (As a sidebar conversation, I really love parantheses, have you noticed? ANYWAY, I used to be a developer, so I know where to look for this sort of stuff, back to my moderately coherent rambling) and found what at first appeared to be a helpful page. It gives the search results with the following description:

Description of the Windows Genuine Advantage program
Describes the Windows Genuine Advantage program and discusses validating your copy of the Windows XP or Windows 2000 operating system.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;892130

Unfortunately, as of time of this post that page that the results directs you to (which is linked above, I'm sorry, hopefully no more parantheses) is dead. You get this nice message:

The Knowledge Base (KB) Article You Requested Is Currently Not Available

Who knows, by the time you read this the page may be available. Until then, we have to wonder what the knowledge base article actually was about. It could have been about Microsoft's plan to buy the moon, or maybe some conspiracy involving iTunes, XBOX 360 Bill Gates and Steve Jobs... But that is merely conjecture by me, because the page is down and I don't have any inside info.

Anyway, to those of you who made your way over to my humble blog because of a search for this knowledge base article, take a look around, see if anything grabs your interest. I've posted on the past on the St. Louis Cardinals, Mizzou Tigers, Float Trips, How Much I hate Sallie Mae and other weird stuff. I didn't try to draw you here and wish I could help more.

Hope you enjoy your visit. Good luck with that whole Microsoft thing

Nice Passage

2006-02-15T17:53:00.000-06:00

Just reading the Bible and a scripture (2 Peter 1:16-18) popped out at me:

16 We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.
17 For he received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased."
18 We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain.

I'm not sure why this stood out so much, maybe because I don't spend enough time in the general letters? But it's always nice to read confirmations, especially when they are outside the Gospels. This may be useful in conversations with non-believers (or seekers) who question anything in the Gospels.

Quin Snyder, we already knew ye (unfortunately)

2006-02-15T09:26:00.000-06:00

Good riddance Quin!!! Let's hope you drag down Mike Alden with you.
Great article by Greg Doyle at cbssportsline about the demise of Quin Snyder.
(By the way, Greg Doyle has to be on the best writers about college basketball in the land)
This great picture is courtesy of firequinsnyder.com. You know it's a bad sign when you have a website dedicated to trying to get you fired.

UPDATE: Nice picture and links on the 'The Gruesome Last Days of Quin Snyder' over at Deadspin.

Best Spam Ever...

2006-02-09T16:08:00.000-06:00

I just received a spam email... The subject line is: "Former President Bill Klinton uses Voagra!". (Of course, it is all mispelled to try to get past those pesky spam filters.)

Everybody knows the great sexual scandal known as "Klinton-Levinsky".
After the relations like this Klintons popularity raised a lot!
It is a natural phenomenon, because Bill as a real man in order not to shame himself when he was with Monica regularly used Voagra.
What happened you see. His political figure became more bright and more attractive.
It is very important for a man to be respected as a man!

See our Voagra shop to enter upon the new phase of your life.

Nice? They would never do this with any of our other presidents.... Can you imagine: "Former President Reagan uses Viagra" Would that compel you to buy it? Maybe if its said: "Nancy says no to drugs, but yes to Ronnie using Viagra..."

Long time no post

2006-02-01T16:06:00.000-06:00

Don't worry, (for the two or three people who regularly read this blog) life's good, I've just been busy trying to get my house ready to put on the market. I've also been spending a lot of time working on my work blog.

I'll be back soon with some witty (hopefully) banter.

New Orleans the Chocolate City

2006-01-19T12:20:00.000-06:00

It is me or does this sound like the name of a Prince album? Anyway, Ray Nagin is an idiot...

Surely God is mad at America. He sent us hurricane after hurricane after hurricane, and it's destroyed and put stress on this country,

Surely he doesn't approve of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely he is upset at black America also. We're not taking care of ourselves.

Sure Ray, God just sent hurricanes to New Orleans to punish the whole country for being in Iraq... Right.

It's time for us to come together. It's time for us to rebuild New Orleans - the one that should be a chocolate New Orleans. This city will be a majority African American city. It's the way God wants it to be. You can't have New Orleans no other way. It wouldn't be New Orleans.

These quotes are idiotic... Even more idiotic is the ridiculous attempt at explaining his comments the next day:

How do you make chocolate? You take dark chocolate, you mix it with white milk, and it becomes a delicious drink. That is the chocolate I am talking about. New Orleans was a chocolate city before Katrina. It is going to be a chocolate city after. How is that divisive? It is white and black working together, coming together and making something special.

Right... that's exactly what you meant, when you said "This city will be a majority African American city", I guess you were saying a little white chocolate and a lot of dark chocolate. The statement about New Orleans being a majority African American city doesn't bother me entirely because they are accurate. The thing that bothers me is this speech is divise and it hurts race relations in this country to have a mayor of a large city running around talking about the things that separate us, instead of the things that bring us together... Especially, on MLK day for gosh sakes. Does he remember any of the I have a dream speech?

Good Free Bible Software

2006-01-19T12:14:00.000-06:00

BibleOcean.com has great free (supported by ads) windows and web-based bible software. IMHO, the web-based version is better because of the multiple translation support (I personally enjoy NASB). But both are good research and concordance tools. At church we were looking for new software that worked well for cutting and pasting... We found this software and it does the trick very well.

Another Reason Windows Occasionally Sucks

2006-01-16T16:56:00.000-06:00

After recovering from a crashed display driver at my work PC... I am told to run windows update, (I already was current with updates!!!). Before being able to install anything else (which I can't think of anything I would need... I get this:

Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool (KB892130)
443 KB , less than 1 minute
The Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool enables you to verify that your copy of Microsoft Windows is genuine. The tool validates your Windows installation by checking Windows Product Identification and Product Activation status. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer. Once you have installed this item, it cannot be removed.

Now my copy is legit, so I don't care, but this is annoying nonetheless.

Thoughts on Lost

2006-01-12T17:58:00.000-06:00

I'm feeling more and more confident on my prediction that the show Lost is set in some sort of Catholic church version of 'purgatory'. Last nights episode dealt with a lot of catholic stuff including a really weird scene where Eko somehow stopped one of the black-smoky things on the island by not being afraid. Apparently, I'm not alone on this thought, with other sources including E online.

One other thought about this show... I hate Michelle Rodriguez. (By the way, this pic is her mugshot). Everything time she is on the screen I cringe. It seems like she isn't acting, she plays the tough woman act in every role I've ever seen her in and it's getting old. I laughed outloud when I read what she 'allegedly' said after being arrested for DWI in Hawaii... I've copied the good parts of the article below:

The police reports also stated that Rodriguez was “very argumentative” with arresting officers and that she said, “I don’t (expletive) belong here! Why don’t you just put a gun to my head and shoot me? You’ve already taken my freedom! You might as well take my life, too! This is (expletive) bull--, baby! I don’t (expletive) belong here!”

The reports also state that after being fingerprinted, Rodriguez said, “I was only drinking, baby. I can understand taking away my car for drinking and driving, but I didn’t hurt nobody, so why do I have to wear these things? I feel like a slave, man. This takes away my freedom,” and grabbed at the leg irons she was wearing.

SPAM from church people...

2006-01-10T14:00:00.000-06:00

Nothing bothers me more than receiving SPAM from organizations who try to pass themselves off as religious... or offering services help to our church. Since my business email address is my the churches website, it has been harvested by several 'religious services' groups. It seems to be really hypocritical of these organizations to use an unethical way of reaching someone (such as SPAM) and then saying 'God Bless' in there message...

I got fed up of receiving these and decided to reply to one... Here was my reply to one such organization (I removed both of our contact information for obvious reasons):

Bob,

I work for a software company and as part of that capacity I used to develop and manage email software, and now I speak on email marketing to not-for-profit groups and companies. I don't believe the email you just sent me is CAN-SPAM compliant. I don't recall opting in to your services, I'm not a customer and I have not opted in to receive partner emails. I also volunteer with my church and developed their website, which contains my email address. The only way this email address (which I've never provided to anyone unless it is related to my secular work, not church business) could have been obtained by your company is from it being harvesting from said website. I'm not neccesarily accusing you of doing this, but if you purchased a list, my email address was definitely harvested before being added to that list.

Again, regarding CANSPAM compliance, since I'm not a client of yours and have never opted in to your lists, shouldn't your subject contain the header "ADV:"? Additionally, since you are sending from the domain ws99.org, you are spoofing your outbound email address, because your server does not host email from hotmail.com. This is also a major problem.

If you help churches with outbound email and web sites, shouldn't you provide a website to view your information? Shouldn't your email address be a part of hosted package for your site, in addition to being at a real domain (and not being spoofed by your outbound email). All of this is very troubling.

Please remove me from your lists.

God Bless.

Signed...

-----Original Message-----
From: NetBob4Churches
Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 1:08 AM
To:
Subject: Let me Introduce Myself to your Church or Ministry

Hello,

This is [Bob] with [Company].

I want to introduce myself to you and offer my services to your Church or Ministry. Your interest in my services is appreciated.

I am in the business of helping Ministries move to the Internet, or go further than they already are now in their web presence.

My specialty is helping Ministries to send email to their readership, members and web mailing list members. Many Churches & Ministries call this a Monthly Newsletter.

It is a great way to keep in touch with your contacts, at a very low monthly cost. Your subscribers will love staying informed on your latest news.

I have automated mailing systems that I use to mail.

I use my own servers and software and have the expertise to help you to launch or further your Internet Based Ministry Presence.

I offer reasonable fees so I can assist as many of you that want to reach your members, readers and even the lost.

I offer these services:

- Automated Email Sending (CanSpam compliant)
- Website Building and Programming
- Website Hosting and Search Engine Optimization
- Almost anything Internet Related

I work with another Ministry that sends out a daily devotion every Mon. - Fri. They have grown from 3,000 to 34,000 readers in
2 years using my system.

Thanks for reading and if I can offer my services to you, Please call me or email me and I will call you back.

If you are not the right person to be contacted, please forward this to right person.

Thanks and God Bless,
Bob
---------------
Please Note:
---------------
The Enemies of Christianity have had my Email Account(s) Closed in the past. If my Email Account gets Closed, Please call me and I will call you right back if you are in the US or Canada. (This is per my current calling plan)

P.S. I also offer my services to Businesses and Individuals

Too much stress...? go 'Fredding'

2006-01-09T14:31:00.000-06:00

Geez, we live in a weird, wacky world...

Fredding begins when someone "baits" another person by getting him or her to say a word that rhymes with Fred.

When the target - a waitress in a diner who suggests bread when asked for an alternative to rolls, for example - falls into the trap, the Fredder calls out, "Bread! Fred! Who's Fred, ha!"

Happy Holidays

2005-12-29T16:21:00.000-06:00

Okay, it's late. But Merry Christmas!!!

Also, Happy New Year!!!

John Spencer (12/20/46 - 12/16/2005)

2005-12-19T14:13:00.000-06:00

Nice Memoriam to John Spencer (Leo McGarry) over at westwingnews...

I am truly sorry for his friends and family... The wacked out west wing fanatic in me wondered immediately what they were going to do with the show, with him being the VP candidate and all. It seems to wrong to think that, however, I did anyway...

I'm a man...

2005-12-12T17:51:00.000-06:00

I never doubted my masculinity (I can even wear pink without worry), but to others who may occasionally question my manhood (because of the aforementioned pink shirts)... this test proves my manliness. Any more questions?

Blame Scott at Transformatum for me taking this test...

Masculine
You scored 93 masculinity and 40 femininity!

You scored high on masculinity and low on femininity. You have a traditionally masculine personality.

My test tracked 2 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 97% on masculinity
You scored higher than 8% on femininity

Link: The Bem Sex Role Inventory Test written by weirdscience on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Open Source Software

2005-12-02T13:16:00.000-06:00

I occasionally use and enjoy open source products... But I can't stand the sanctimonious bull **** of open source zealots. In their opinion everything should be free... seriously, this is still a capitalist economy. I hope they only own stock in companies that don't own any intellectual property, because heaven forbid someone actually make money for their hard work and IP.

I wrote a comment on David Coursey's blog on e-week in response to the assisine statements by some of these idiots, below is my comment (which basically represents my utter disgust with these communists):

I love reading the comments when anyone at eweek actually writes an article that has a slight notion of not bashing microsoft. In a previous comment someone said it was "immoral" for microsoft not to use a public standard. This is ludicrous. I've taken my business ethics classes and holding onto intellectual property that has become a de-facto standard and industry leader is a sound business practice.

Why would MS care if other office software packages do or do not work with Office? If 90%+ people are using it, what's their incentive for using an open standard? So the people who don't buy their product can view / edit office documents? Why should they give away their advantage. This is still a capitalist economy and if someone comes out with a vastly superior and groundbreaking office suite (and don't tell me openoffice or star office are either of those, I've used them and they aren't) they will start taking market share from MS and maybe then will a open standard become a larger issue.

Firefox is the perfect example of a superior product that is rapidly being adopted right now. MS isn't agile enough to respond to it yet and they are losing their market dominance in the browser wars.

I use some open source products (and other open standards as well) and enjoy it. However, the world market is just that a "market". Things are to be bought and sold... All you open source zealots enjoy building free software and see how long you can pay the mortgage in doing so... Personally, I'm working on software that gets me paid.

Can't trust those darn college kids

2005-11-17T12:55:00.000-06:00

According to a Harvard University Study... College Students trust the U.N. more than the US govenment. Which begs the question... What the heck are they teaching in college? Anyone heard of oil for food scandal, the security council and all their blunders and hypocrisies, etc...

Pandora

2005-11-07T16:24:00.000-06:00

Pandora is just about the coolest web music station I've ever seen. You enter either a song or artist and it creates a "station" of music similar to your entry. You can create as many entries per station as you want and can create 100 stations. First 10 hours are free, only $36 for the whole year of listening. Check it out at www.pandora.com

Sallie Mae Sucks

2005-11-07T09:40:00.000-06:00

The post I made back in August about Sallie Mae is now generating some comments. By the way, Sallie Mae still sucks.... I can't wait until they are paid off (hopefully soon, I'm selling my house and hoping to have them paid off with the proceeds).

Comment Verification Turned On

2005-10-31T09:40:00.000-06:00

Getting tired of comment spam. So I've turned on word verification for comments...

Cards Lose...

2005-10-24T14:38:00.000-05:00

As we all know by now, the Cards lost to the Astros. I'm bummed, but after the injuries and the 'Stros pitching, I'm not surprised...

At least we got to see one of the greatest home runs in Cardinal playoff history and it allowed Cardinal Nation to give Busch one final send-off.

As a Cub fan said in 1909: "There's always next year".

Game 1... That's a winner also

2005-10-13T11:04:00.000-05:00

I enjoyed last nights game from the comfort of section 224 in beautiful Busch Stadium... Cards win 5-3!!! They also haven't been behind in the entire playoffs thus far. Reggie Sanders was huge as usual (at least for the last 4 games), 2 run HR, bringing his playoff total to 12 RBI (in 4 games)... HR robbing catching. Reggie, Reggie, Reggie! Let's go Cards

Game 2... That's a winner

2005-10-07T12:34:00.000-05:00

Here are some pics from my cellphone from Game 2 of the Cards - Padres NLDS game at Busch stadium... Final Score: Cards 6 - Padres 2

My seats were sky high... near the left field foul pole in the upper deck (who cares, I was at the game...)

Here is the fountain at Keiner plaza which has been dyed red for the Cardinals postseason. The Gateway Arch and Old Courthouse are in the background. (Neither of which are crooked, just me).

Cindy Sheehan Arrested

2005-09-29T20:52:00.000-05:00

You don't think this was planned do you?

By the way, read the difference in coverage by The Village Voice and Fox News.

I'm sure some sort of press release was sent out where they pointed out that an arrest would be made and they (Liberal Press) should get all of their background info ready to go for the story.

UPDATE: Here is a link to the video from the "protest". Hat tip to junkyardblog

UPDATE II: Interesting post over at subjunctive regarding the war and Steven Pearcy.

Vengeance is Mine St. Louis Metal Band

2005-09-27T19:20:00.000-05:00

Check out Vengeance is Mine Live Sunday, October 16th at the Creepy Crawl. This show is for the real stl metal heads. They also have two demo tracks available for download at www.vimstl.com.

St. Louis Metal Band - Vengeance is Mine - show schedule here

I'm finally Lost

2005-09-26T18:10:00.000-05:00

I love the show Lost after watching this season's premiere. I had only watched twenty minutes of one episode last year and was totally lost watching it last year (by the way, that's two bad puns in a short space, sorry), but this year is different... I'm ready to go thanks to talking to friends and watching the season one recap show. Also, I'm going to borrow the season one dvd's soon.

Anyway, I have a theory about this show. I think they are all dead. I think they island is purgatory (which, by the way, I don't believe in). What got me thinking this is the case was the preponderence of coincidences. Way, way too many to be reality... So when they die here they are either going to heaven or hell.

So when the show ends, keep in mind, you heard it here first. They're all dead and they are in purgatory. If I'm wrong, no big whoop... at least I got a new show to watch.

Post Secret

2005-09-23T18:00:00.000-05:00

I've added a few new links to my blog roll on the side:

West Wing News - News about NBC's The West Wing (my favorite show on TV)
Post Secret - An interesting, disturbing, funny and cathartic site. This site was built for people to send in postcards with secrets on them and they will post the images on the site anonymously. I feel a little bit voyeuristic viewing the updates once a week when the new postcards are shown, but it seems to be very therapeutic for the mailers. Great idea.
WARNING: Occasionally there are nude people or sexual references in the cards...

The West Wing Season Premiere

2005-09-23T17:15:00.000-05:00

Another season of The West Wing (TWW) starts this Sunday and I'm geekily excited. I've talked to a few of my friends who are also TWW geeks, and they are as psyched as I am. Here's the nbc.com blurb about the season premiere:

THE TICKET - Season Premiere
8pm 2005-09-25 ALL NEW!

THE WHITE HOUSE LEAK INVESTIGATION PICKS UP SPEED - Josh (Brad Whitford) is caught off guard when political commentators are critical of Leo (John Spencer) as a running mate for Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits). White House Counsel Babbish (Oliver Platt) sits with CJ (Allison Janney) about the leak investigation. Donna (Janel Moloney) approaches Josh for a job. Also starring Martin Sheen, Richard Schiff, Mary McCormack, Dule Hill. TV-PG

After Aaron Sorkin left the show (or was he forced out, I don't remember), it took a while for the show to regain it's steam and direction, but IMHO they have found it and it's taking off again.

I was looking for some spoilers (like I said, I'm a geek) on the season premier and found this page over at westwing.bewarne.com. Bewarned (alright, bad pun), that this gives away a few things. Including something about Toby. To the two of you I have talked to about this, I'm right, but I don't want to give any more away. I'm tired of Toby, he is so freaking pessimistic and groucy that I can't wait till he's gone.

New Church Website

2005-09-13T19:31:00.000-05:00

Tonight I launched my church's new site: www.reachstl.org. I've been working on this new look a few hours here, a few there for over a month. I think it's a marked improvement over the last design (it's okay to be biased, I designed the last look also).

Let me know what you think of the look, positive or negative. Negative feedback won't hurt my feelings... I'm not a designer, although I occasionally play one on TV.

Golf Woes

2005-09-09T13:42:00.000-05:00

In honor of my round of 53 yesterday (yes, on 9 holes) that was caused by me having triple bogeys on 7, 8 and 9, here is a great quote from Bob Hope about golf, enjoy:

If you watch a game, it's fun. If you play it, it's recreation. If you work at it, it's golf.
--Bob Hope

McAfee Sucks...

2005-09-01T17:12:00.000-05:00

I used a trial version of McAfee's Spam killer and it worked just fine and dandy. Trial expires... that's when all hell broke loose. (I'm going to do this in numbers just for sake of my own sanity):

I suspect my spam keeps getting killed, because I'm not seeing as much spam as before I tried the software.
Sudden realization that I used to have to allow certain messages that spam killer thought were spam, that actually weren't.
I can't get into Spam Killer to "allow" them, much less see them... This is a little scary.
I don't uninstall the software for fear of loosing messages that are in the killing zone (bad pun).
I try to update the software from the link they give me in the verify window...
Here is where it starts getting really aggravating: I get a message from my browser (Firefox) that I have to use IE. Stupid me, I thought IE was a less-secure browser.
I keep trying and trying to get from IE to where I am supposed to be in McAfee's site and it prevents me from purchasing after my trial.
I finally buy the whole blown thing (for more than I was supposed to from the free trial I believe).
I keep getting this message from their site when trying to install.... (see second picture)... Notice how I don't have an information bar banning the active x control from running.... Second thing here, ActiveX is unsecure (I know this, I am a former developer)... This sucks that a "security company" requires both IE and Active X controls in order to buy and install their software...

I've tried to install several times from both IE and Firefox, to no avail, I've looked in support and have found nothing to help me... I need to call technical support and complaing and maybe they can help me...

Shouldn't stuff just work? Does it have to be this freaking complicated? Why can it just allow me to download a freaking EXE and install it myself? Believe me it will be the last time I buy McAfee.

Pujols is "the" MVP, Carp should win Cy Young

2005-09-01T09:30:00.000-05:00

If you don't believe me... just read Bernie Misklaz's column today at stltoday.com (online version of the St. Louis Post Dispatch).

Below are the relevant stats (other than slugging percentage, which for some reason wasn't inlcuded on the place I got these stats from) for Pujols and Jones. I've highlighted which categories each player has a lead in. The stats I find the most interesting are the SB, Doubles, CS. Considering Jones is faster than Pujols (keeping in mind that Jones hurt his leg earlier this year, however, Pujols is having a unbelievable year in stolen bases).

Player	GM	AB	H	AVG	OBP	HR	RBI	SB	R	CS	2B	3B	BB	K	E	A
Pujols	133	497	165	0.332	0.426	35	100	13	109	2	33	2	76	58	11	80
Jones	132	486	133	0.274	0.358	43	108	2	79	3	20	3	56	93	2	7

Cubs = Completely Useless by September Part Two

2005-08-09T18:21:00.000-05:00

From chicagocubs.com (bolding and number insertion by me):

CHICAGO -- The Chicago Cubs need to get out of their funk, and the players should accept some responsibility for that, general manager Jim Hendry said.
(1) The team entered Tuesday's game 3-10 in its past 13 games, and in that span, the pitchers have a 4.94 ERA and the club has hit .236.

"We're just not getting it done, that's all," Cubs manager Dusty Baker said.
"For whatever reason, (1) we've been in a funk here the last five, six days that (2) we haven't played good baseball and made a lot of mistakes and a lot of mental mistakes," Hendry said. "Collectively, we've also had a little bit of an offensive funk."
The problem isn't Baker, Hendry said.

"I know one thing: (3) The 25 guys in that clubhouse aren't going to quit on Dusty Baker the rest of the season," Hendry said. "Hopefully, it's just a funk and we'll get out of it and make a run at it. (4) If we're not in a better position at the end of August, then we weren't good enough."

I'm just a baseball fan, an avid one, but just a fan, not some fancy expert, but the points I've number and highlighted seem to stand out to me.

First, Hendry thinks they've been in funk for the last six or seven days? Did you notice the part about being 3-10 in their last 13?

Second, this a nice quote: "we haven't played good baseball and made a lot of mistakes and a lot of mental mistakes"... So the team is really playing well, huh? When was the last time a Tony LaRussa team had problems like this for more than one or two games. It begs the question, has the team quit on Baker?

Third, here's another hum-dinger: "The 25 guys in that clubhouse aren't going to quit on Dusty Baker the rest of the season". Okay, sure... the team hasn't quit on Baker, they're just playing bad in all aspects of the game, mentally, offensively, defensively, etc...

Fourth, "If we're not in a better position at the end of August, then we weren't good enough." Yeah, wait until the end of August, no big whoop, nothing important happens in baseball in August. Don't look now, but the Brewers have passed you and the Reds and Pirates are on their way.

As always, make sure your Completely Useless By September

Cubs = Completely Useless by September

2005-08-09T12:42:00.000-05:00

If anything in my life has proven to be consistently true, it's that the Cubs suck. And with another year of baseball coming down to the wire soon, the small bears from Chi-Town are on a well-documented decline. Let's examine what's goin on a little bit...

About three weeks ago, all I heard about was how the Cubs would pick up the pace when they got fully health and make a wildcard bid. Hmmm.... Woods, Prior, Garciaparra, et al are all playing now and over their last 10 games, they have two wins and have lost six in a row. Compare that to the Cardinals who still are missing Rolen, Walker, Sanders and Molina and have gone 7-3 over their last ten while facing some of the top NL teams, with Nunez, J-Rod, Mahoney and Taguchi filling in nicely.

I can't believe that Dusty Baker isn't on the hot-seat by now. Remember the 03 season when the Cubs almost made it to the World Series? (Bartman supposedly cost them the game)...
Has he done anything with the talent he has in Chicago? Anything at all? Here's an interesting fact, they only had 88 wins is in 03, not very many compare to most playoff years (and the lowest of any team in the playoffs that year). In fact, they had one more win last season and finished 16 games back of the division title.

Take a look at their record with Dusty as their manager:

Year	Wins	Losses	Win Pct
2003	88	74	0.5432
2004	89	73	0.5494
2005	54	58	0.4821
Total	231	205	0.5298

Not real solid, with their "talented" (and overrated) pitching staff. I think if they finish under .500 this year, he has to go... But I really don't want to see him fired, because he's been nice to the Cardinals for consistenly screwing it up.

Floatin' got ignored...

2005-08-08T18:09:00.000-05:00

Until now, four weeks later, I didn't post what happened floating. You know why? Because it was fun, but nothing interesting happened. Sure, I had an unbelievable time, but for the first time in my adult life, nothing weird happened on a float trip. The usual things that happen on a float trip are:

Somebody makes a fool out of themselves drunk

A couple gets drunk, gets in an argument because one person isn't paddling, or because the canoe tipped over

Somebody passes out early and gets ridiculed by the crowd

Someone gets drunk and causes canoes to tip over

Notice a trend here? Okay, so none of the above happened. People got drunk (I don't drink right now, so not me) but nobody made a fool of themself. One canoe tipped very early, but otherwise it was a nice weekend floating trip. No drama, no problems, no arguments, just good, clean fun.

Interesting, I think I'm getting older.

I hate Sallie Mae

2005-08-05T11:51:00.000-05:00

Hate is a strong word, but this is exactly how I feel. Maybe hate isn't strong enough of a word: loathe, despise, abhor, detest... yeah, those seem a little stronger, let's go with one of them.

Anyway, I have a tech school loan through Sallie Mae, which I took out despite being raped on the interest rate (currently around 14%) even while using a co-borrower. What can I say, I was young and needed the money.

So, I pay this loan on the 5th of every month automatically through online bill pay with my bank. For the last 3 months I have received phone calls (like, oh, I don't know, 5 in one day, until they finally leave a message) on the 5th of every month from Sallie Mae asking me where my payment was, and did I know it is 8 days late. So my payment is due on the 27th of every month and in reading their paper work their is a 15 day grace period, and I'm pretty sure that 8 is less than 15... so why are they calling me? So when I called them today and talked to them.

Here's my recollection of the conversation:
Me) My payment has cleared, today, I can see it right there showing as cleared from my bank.
Sallie Mae) Well it hasn't shown up in our system yet.
Me) By the way, why the hell are you calling me? I'm well within the grace period, haven't been late on this loan since you guys took over the servicing contract, and pay more than the amount due every month on the same day.
Sallie Mae) Well, you are 8 days past due, and if we want to call you we're going to.
Me) Umm... seriously, it's within the grace period, and I pay you more than I owe you every month, WTFO?
Sallie Mae) Yeah... we'll you could pay the day it's due or switch the payment date
Me) Well I guess I could switch the payment date, but again, that's what the friggin grace period is for, and I pay on the same freakin day every month, which based on the month (28, 30, or 31st) is either 5, 7 or 8 days after the due date.
Sallie Mae) Yeah, switch the payment date, or we are going to keep calling and harrassing you (or something to that effect).
Me) So how do I change my payment date
Sallie Mae) Call this number
Me) Can you transfer me?
Sallie Mae) Nope, sorry
Me) k, thanks, I guess

That led to another conversation, after calling the other number:
Me) I'd like to switch my payment date.
Sallie Mae) Okay, you have to do that through a written request.
Me) Okay, I was told to call you, but that's just dandy, what's the address.
Sallie Mae) blah, blah, blah, Oh yeah, you can fax the letter over also.
Me) Okay, what's the fax number?
Sallie Mae) blah, blah, blah...
Me) Any other methods your not telling me about?
Sallie Mae) Well, you can email us also
Me) What's the email address?
Sallie Mae) Well, it's not really an email address, you have to go to our website, login to our account, and submit a customer service request form.
Me) Thanks, you've been very, very helpful

So, whoever is still reading this post (which is really about me venting, and hopefully gaining some traction in search engines about Sallie Mae, just to get some vengeance), is probably thinking to yourself, "umm, Felone, why don't you just pay on the 27th?"... The truth is I probably could, but I prefer to make all my payments on two days each month (it helps me balance ye old check book better), the 17th and the 5th which allows enough time after pay day to make sure everything will clear fine and dandy.

So the obvious question is why not pay on the 17th instead of the 5th.... Well, yeah a few years ago I did just that... One huge friggin' problem with that:

For several months in a row I paid them 10 days early each month... guess what happened? They applied the first payment as a principal payment (instead of my monthly payment) and the next one they applied as a late payment, and this went on every for a while, so when I switched back to paying around the due date (a few days later), I was somehow 30+ days past due... This went on for 11 months, where they somehow recorded me as 11 consecutive months of 30 days late payments (different servicing company within the Sallie Mae Cartel) who didn't call when I was 8 days late, much less 30) so my credit score went down 130 points in one year. I can't figure out how the hell any of these were 30 days late, and I'm disputing it, but you can my hesistance to pay early...

So, I've made the request to change the date, with one caveat, if I end up having to pay two payments with 10 days, forget it, I'll just ignore Sallie Mae's harrassment on one day each month....

Did I mention, I hate this company?

Quote for the day...

2005-07-29T11:45:00.000-05:00

The depressing thing about tennis is that no matter how good I get, I'll never be as good as a wall.
-- Mitch Hedberg

John Robert's Nomination

2005-07-25T15:04:00.000-05:00

Check out this great parody (let's hope so) over at www.wuzzademo.com

Muse

2005-07-20T12:14:00.000-05:00

Muse is a band somebody on the float trip introduced me to (more on the float trip in a new post soon). Pretty sweet sound... I don't even know how to describe it (but of course I'll try), some combination of Coldplay, The Hives, Radio Head, Tool... I'm sure my description doesn't do them justice. Check them out at www.muse.mu. Also, they have a sweet site.

Roy Williams violates rules at KU

2005-07-19T12:25:00.000-05:00

Article Here...
Okay, so it's not nearly as big of a deal as anything that's gone down at Mizzou... but at least it's something.

Goin' Floating... a Missouri tradition since 1843

2005-07-14T10:31:00.000-05:00

This weekend I'm going floating down the Huzzah river. As far as I know, I've talked to very few people outside the big MO that go on "float trips". For those of you who are unaware of this phenomenon, basically you get in a raft or canoe, consume a ton of alcohol, and leisurely float down a river for 8 hours, while consuming more alcohol. Afterwards, you go to your campsight, sit around a campfire (yeah, in July, in Missouri) and drink some more... Also, I should point out that leisurely floating isn't always the case, because by the time of year that is hot enough to do this, the rivers are usually low enough that you end up dragging your canoe or raft through about 25 shallow gravel beds.

Regardless of some of the details above it's always a good time. And there are always a ton of stories to share afterwards... This year should be no exception, considering I'm probably the only guy going who doesn't drink, so this ought to be very, very interesting...

But if I hear any dueling banjo's, [best redneck voice starts now]I'm running for them, there hills...[end redneck voice]

I'll share stories next week (maybe some photos too...).

Strong Bad Techno Song...

2005-07-08T19:04:00.000-05:00

Although I check the site somewhat regularly I haven't read all of the StrongBad Emails before. I was perusing the site tonight and noticed a sweet old one where strong bad makes fun of techno... It made me laugh... Check it out...

This seems so true sometimes...

2005-07-06T12:04:00.000-05:00

One of the articles in today's Onion: Midwest Discovered Between East and West Coast. Pretty funny, I've always had the feeling that if it wasn't for the Cardinals, nobody would know where St. Louis is.

Check it out here.

Tom Cruise sure does like to sprint a lot

2005-07-05T16:41:00.000-05:00

No, I haven't seen war of the worlds yet, Chris saw it and said it was horrible... However, it got me to thinking about something I've realized: Tom Cruise has a scene where he is sprinting in everyone of his movies

I could be wrong, but doesn't it seem like he has one scene where he is running at full-speed? Why? Does he like to run? Does it make him feel taller? Something to do with Scientology? Just curious.

New blog look...

2005-06-29T18:17:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: so it's been re-skinned, kinda, i haven't finished the new look, but it's a start... need some containers around the content... need to fix the right edge (the content is too far over)... probably need something around the whole left side... need new font... need, need, need! Feedback would be welcome about the start of the new look here.

So after months of procrastinating (and rarely blogging)... I'm kicking this site back into gear soon... More posting and I'm going to re-skin it to be a little bolder. I still have a lot of work to do... but I've spent an hour or so designing it and here is what I've come up with so far:

Namby-Pamby Nation...

2005-06-29T17:32:00.000-05:00

Michelle Malkin has a commentary about the ridiculous programs that are being created in our schools...

Peaceniks are covering our kids from head to toe in emotional bubble wrap. They are creating a nation of namby-pambies.

Check it out here.

My type of theology...

2005-06-29T12:20:00.000-05:00

I saw this over at Transformatum, and figured I'd give it a shot... I must admit I haven't read much from any of these guys being as I was raised Catholic and didn't study theology...

You scored as Karl Barth. The daddy of 20th Century theology. You perceive liberal theology to be a disaster and so you insist that the revelation of Christ, not human experience, should be the starting point for all theology.

Anselm

67%

Karl Barth

67%

John Calvin

53%

Charles Finney

53%

Augustine

47%

Paul Tillich

47%

Friedrich Schleiermacher

40%

J�rgen Moltmann

33%

Jonathan Edwards

27%

Martin Luther

27%

Which theologian are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

Ben Stein's Last Column

2005-06-28T16:47:00.000-05:00

Someone forward this to me in an email and I felt impelled to share it with anyone who may actually read my blog. (By the way, I normally delete most of these forwarded emails right after receiving them, but I trust the guy who sent it's opinion of what is worthy of passing along.) I hope you enjoy it:

For many years Ben Stein has written a biweekly column called "Monday Night At Morton's." (Morton's is a famous chain of Steakhouses known to be frequented by movie stars and famous people from around the globe.) Now, Ben is terminating the column to move on to other things in his life. Reading his final column is worth a few minutes of your time.

Ben Stein's Last Column...
============================================
How Can Someone Who Lives in Insane Luxury Be a Star in Today's World?

As I begin to write this, I "slug" it, as we writers say, which means I put a heading on top of the document to identify it. This heading is "eonlineFINAL," and it gives me a shiver to write it. I have been doing this column for so long that I cannot even recall when I started. I loved writing this column so much for so long I came to believe it would never end.

It worked well for a long time, but gradually, my changing as a person and the world's change have overtaken it. On a small scale, Morton's, while better than ever, no longer attracts as many stars as it used to. It still brings in the rich people in droves and definitely some stars. I saw Samuel L. Jackson there a few days ago, and we had a nice visit, and right before that, I saw and had a splendid talk with Warren Beatty in an elevator, in which we agreed that Splendor in the Grass was a super movie. But Morton's is not the star galaxy it once was, though it probably will be again.

Beyond that, a bigger change has happened. I no longer think Hollywoodstars are terribly important. They are uniformly pleasant, friendly people, and they treat me better than I deserve to be treated. But a man or woman who makes a huge wage for memorizing lines and reciting them in front of a camera is no longer my idea of a shining star we should all look up to.

How can a man or woman who makes an eight-figure wage and lives in insane luxury really be a star in today's world, if by a "star" we mean someone bright and powerful and attractive as a role model? Real stars are not riding around in the backs of limousines or in Porsches or getting trained in yoga or Pilates and eating only raw fruit while they have Vietnamese girls do their nails.

They can be interesting, nice people, but they are not heroes to me any longer. A real star is the soldier of the 4th Infantry Division who poked his head into a hole on a farm near Tikrit, Iraq. He could have been met by a bomb or a hail of AK-47 bullets. Instead, he faced an abject Saddam Hussein and the gratitude of all of the decent people of the world.

A real star is the U.S.soldier who was sent to disarm a bomb next to a road north of Baghdad. He approached it, and the bomb went off and killed him.

A real star, the kind who haunts my memory night and day, is the U.S. soldier in Baghdad who saw a little girl playing with a piece of unexploded ordnance on a street near where he was guarding a station. He pushed her aside and threw himself on it just as it exploded. He left a family desolate in California and a little girl alive in Baghdad.

The stars who deserve media attention are not the ones who have lavish weddings on TV but the ones who patrol the streets of Mosuleven after two of their buddies were murdered and their bodies battered and stripped for the sin of trying to protect Iraqis from terrorists.

We put couples with incomes of $100 million a year on the covers of our magazines. The noncoms and officers who barely scrape by on military pay but stand on guard in Afghanistan and Iraq and on ships and in submarines and near the Arctic Circleare anonymous as they live and die.

I am no longer comfortable being a part of the system that has such poor values, and I do not want to perpetuate those values by pretending that who is eating at Morton's is a big subject.

There are plenty of other stars in the American firmament...the policemen and women who go off on patrol in South Central and have no idea if they will return alive; the orderlies and paramedics who bring in people who have been in terrible accidents and prepare them for surgery; the teachers and nurses who throw their whole spirits into caring for autistic children; the kind men and women who work in hospices and in cancer wards.

Think of each and every fireman who was running up the stairs at the World Trade Center as the towers began to collapse. Now you have my idea of a real hero.

I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters. This is my highest and best use as a human. I can put it another way. Years ago, I realized I could never be as great an actor as Olivier or as good a comic as Steve Martin...or Martin Mull or Fred Willard--or as good an economist as Samuelson or Friedman or as good a writer as Fitzgerald. Or even remotely close to any of them.

But I could be a devoted father to my son, husband to my wife and, above all, a good son to the parents who had done so much for me. This came to be my main task in life. I did it moderately well with my son, pretty well with my wife and well indeed with my parents (with my sister's help). I cared for and paid attention to them in their declining years. I stayed with my father as he got sick, went into extremis and then into a coma and then entered immortality with my sister and me reading him the Psalms.

This was the only point at which my life touched the lives of the soldiers in Iraqor the firefighters in New York. I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters and that it is my duty, in return for the lavish life God has devolved upon me, to help others He has placed in my path. This is my highest and best use as a human.

Faith is not believing that God can. It is knowing that God will.
By Ben Stein

Vengeance is Mine

2005-06-24T14:59:00.000-05:00

Alright, just posted an update to the Vengeance is Mine website. Let's see if we can generate some traffic for Vengeance is Mine. It might be hard considering how rarely I post here... let's give it a shot... Vengeance is Mine's next show is at Hi-Pointe, they rock...

Cobwebs and Fictionology

2005-05-13T18:13:00.000-05:00

Sorry, it's getty a little dusty over here... I haven't been writing much lately. Maybe it's because things are going pretty well and I have nothing to vent about...

Anyway, as usual, the onion is cracking me up... Click here to read about "Fictionology" -- The religion that:

"Unlike Scientology, which is based on empirically verifiable scientific tenets, Fictionology's central principles are essentially fairy tales with no connection to reality," the AIR report read. "In short, Fictionology offers its followers a mythical belief system free from the cumbersome scientific method to which Scientology is hidebound."

This is great... I'm always for taking swipes at Scientology... How can people follow a religion created by a science fiction writer? Check out this great picture about the book the "religion" is created on....

Here is my favorite quote:

"My personal savior is Batman," said Beverly Hills plastic surgeon Greg Jurgenson. "My wife chooses to follow the teachings of the Gilmore Girls. Of course, we are still beginners. Some advanced-level Fictionologists have total knowledge of every lifetime they have ever lived for the last 80 trillion years."

"Sure, it's total bull****," Jurgenson added. "But that's Fictionology. Praise Batman!"

This is Asinine

2005-04-22T12:49:00.000-05:00

Ok, haven't posted in a while... But I just got an instant message about an article that shows the insane hypocrisy of the rich liberal celebrities and their "eco-friendly" missions. I suggest you read the whole article... but here are some quotes:

A new MTV series features Hollywood celebrities praising the developing world's primitive lifestyles as earth-friendly -- despite those poor nations' high infant mortality rates and short life expectancies.

Actress Drew Barrymore, who reportedly earns $15 million a film, told MTV viewers in one episode that after spending time in a primitive, electricity-free Chilean village, "I aspire to be like them more."

Barrymore, apparently enthralled by the lack of a modern sanitary facilities, gleefully bragged, "I took a poo in the woods hunched over like an animal. It was awesome."

The 32-year-old Diaz, who earns a reported $20-million a movie, boasted that the cow-dung slathered walls of a Nepalese village hut were "beautiful" and "inspiring," and she called the primitive practice of "pounding mud" with sticks to construct a building foundation "the coolest thing."

Diaz also criticized the lifestyles of many Americans after visiting an indigenous village in Chile. "It's kinda gotten out of hand how much convenience we think we need," she said.

Despite the celebrities' praise for the primitive life, "Trippin'" shows them flying on multiple airplanes and chartering at least two helicopters and one boat to reach remote locations over the course of the first four episodes.

The series also showed the celebrities being chauffeured to the airport in a full-size Chevy SUV -- despite several on-screen, anti-SUV factoids noting how environmentally unfriendly SUVs are.

Random Update

2005-03-30T00:22:00.000-06:00

Life's pretty boring over at the felone house... I had a fun weekend... went to see my buddy Kuehler's band "Vengeance is Mine" play on Friday night. Great show, they really rock...

Saturday watched the awesome college basketball games then went to the St. Louis Steamer's game (but spent a good 15 minutes in 14th and Clarks watching the last three minutes of the Illinois-Arizona game and the OT). What a finish! Probably two of the best tournament games I've ever watched. Oh yeah, Steamers won, good game for them also. After the game watched Sean of the Dead for the first time and nearly fell off the couch after laughing so hard.

Easter Sunday, went to church, got baptized (in front off the congregation) which was great, I missed it last time and probably should have done this about a year and a half ago. Unfortunately, I didn't see any family. Mom was working... My dad had people over, but he lives so darn far away now, I couldn't make it out there (1 and a half hours each way). So I went to see Robots with some friends. Decent movie, I'd give it 2 out of four thumbs up. Wait for the video.

Good times... Oh yeah, as for this long-winded post; for those of you who don't read real well, I've highlighted the important points!

Ok... so that's good news I guess

2005-03-17T18:01:00.000-06:00

Ok, so thanks for the prayers... I went to the Doctor and found out that I probably have a disorder called: Benign Fasciculation Syndrome. This explains my symptoms to a tee... here is what it says over at this great site I found on the disorder

This condition represents a hyperexcitability of the neuromuscular system.

Common symptoms of BFS are frequent muscle twitches (fasciculations or fascics), generalized fatigue, "pins and needles" sensations, migrating numbness, muscle cramping and/or spasms in the affected areas (usually the feet and calves), muscle aches and stiffness exercise intolerance, headaches, and itchiness.

So this is good news, I probably don't have MS, or ALS, or any other life threatening illness. Thank the Lord!

The other thing I could have according to the doctor is Hypothyroidism, which can cause similar symptoms. That would be even better than BFS because that could explain a lot of other metabolic issues (why I've gained and lost 60 pounds several times as an adult) and is treatable.

So while I'm really happy , it could still be bit of a bummer if it is BFS, because there is no known cure, or known cause for that matter. Apparently this is just a disease (or syndrome) that makes your muscles feel goofy and twich, etc... Although I am encouraged by what I've read that it goes dormant for a while. I've had it so bad for the last few months that my muscles are always twitching, and they normally feel weak.

After I have my EMG test, I'll post what I find out. This test sounds a little scary:

During this test, you will be lying on an examination table, next to an EMG machine (which looks like a desktop or laptop computer). The test consists of two parts, though at times one may be done without the other. The first part is called Nerve Conduction Studies. In this part some brief electrical shocks are delivered to your arm or leg in an effort to determine how fast or slowly your nerves are conducting the electrical current and therefore in what state of health or disease they may be. You see, a nerve works something like an electrical wire. If you want to see if the wire is functioning properly, the easiest thing to do is to run electricity through it. If there are any problems along its length, you will know it by a failure of the current to go through. To do this, the doctor will attach small recording electrodes to the surface of one part of your limb, and will touch your skin at another point with a pair of electrodes delivering the shock. When this happens, you will feel a tingling sensation that may or may not be painful. Between the brief shocks you will not feel pain. As there are several nerves in each extremity which need to be tested, the procedure is repeated 3 or 4 times or more per extremity studied. The amount of current delivered is always kept at a safe level. Patients wearing pacemakers or other electrical devices need not worry since this current will rarely interfere with such devices. During the nerve conduction study, the doctor or the technician performing the study will occasionally be pausing to make calculations and measurements.

The second part of the test is called Needle Examination and as the name implies, involves some needle sticking. The needles used are thin, fine and about one and a quarter inches long. This part tests the muscle to see if there has been any damage to it as a result of the nerve problem or if the disease involves the muscle itself rather than the nerve. Usually 5 to 6 muscles are sampled in one extremity, but occasionally, if you have problems in more than one area, additional muscles may need to be studied. The needle is usually inserted in the relaxed muscle and moved inside gently in order to record the muscle activity. When this is done, you will be able to hear the sound of the muscle activity amplified by the EMG machine; it will sound something like radio static. The painful part of this section is when the needle is first inserted through the skin since all of the pain receptors are located in this area. Once inside the muscle, the sensation is usually perceived as discomfort or pressure rather than pain. During the needle exam, no electrical shocks are delivered. Also, since the needle probe is used here only as a recording device, no injections are given through the needle into the muscle. On the average, a muscle can be sampled in 2 to 5 minutes though this may vary with the type of problem being investigated.

I'm sure it's no big deal... although at first glance, getting electric shock and getting stuck by needles, doesn't sound fun :>

So thanks again for the prayers! I'll be posting more regularly soon!

Posting quicker than I expected

2005-03-05T10:14:00.000-06:00

Hey all,

I got back to this sooner than expected... Anyway, here's what's up with me, and why I haven't been posting this week:

I've been working a lot of late nights lately (getting better the last couple days)
I spent all of last weekend (and I'm leaving my house in a moment to continue this) rehabbing my mother's bathrooms. We tore up half the subfloor in one of the bathrooms because of water damage and are in the process of installing tile. Fun huh? There goes my next couple of weekends. One down, two to go :(
Got a little bit of a neurological / muscular problem going on that's freaking me out... I'm sure it's nothing, but I want to hear it from a doctor. I'll be going to a neurologist on the 14th so if you feel so inclined to say a prayer or two, it would be much appreciated.

No posts for a bit...

2005-03-02T18:44:00.000-06:00

Hey all, just a head's up. I probably won't be blogging for the next week or two. I've got a lot going on at work and a few things going on personally that are going to keep me away for a bit.

I'll probably be back in the posting game in about two weeks.

Thanks for your readership and patience...

One of these days I'm gonna:

2005-02-24T01:16:00.000-06:00

Clean my house (not that I'm here enough for it to matter)
Take my shirts to the cleaners
Finish that new blog (by the way, the site is live, but nothing else is (www.feloneblog.com)
Invite some friends over to the house
Post my pictures from Seattle
Get more sleep
Think less about work after business hours
Get back to blogging about things that could be important to other people
Get back to the gym
Finish up my golf lessons
Get back on my diet

Unfortunately, that day is not today, tomorrow or Friday...

Site Meter

2005-02-22T21:08:00.000-06:00

Howdy, it's time for my 7 o'clock p.m. post from the office. About to run and get dinner then head back here for some work. Fun stuff, huh... Don't think I'm complaining though, it's the nature of the beast, some weeks are slow, others are reallly bussssy.

Got a new site meter running for the site (on the bottom) and I think it's going to be more accurate than free stats. Free stats didn't seem to load all the time, plus site meter has more free stats. On free stats lately I've been averaging about 20 visitors a day, so it'll be interesting to see if my assumptions are right or wrong about the traffic.

One other thing, although I'm back up top now, I keep falling out of the top search spot on Google for "Felone". Weird how this google groups post keeps showing up there considering that post is just a bad use of spelling and mine is the site name. I may do a search engine post right after this one (although, I'll back up the time so this real post shows up first).

Felone's Blog Spot

2005-02-22T19:21:00.000-06:00

Felone's blog spot is my blog... Gee, you don't say... Well who are you? Who am I? I'm felone, a blogger from St. Louis.

What can you expect to read about here at Felone's blog spot? Well, here is a list of random topics I've covered since I started posting on this blog back in August:

• Raymond Kurzweil's Brain Site
• St. Louis Cardinals: here, here, and here. Or you could just check out practically the whole October archive...
• Politics (I'm a convservative... you can tell if you ready any of the posts...): here and here, here...
• My insonmia: here and here
• Bill McClellan: here and here

Also, expect posts on Bill McClellan again. He's always writing ridiculous columns, and it'd be fun to mess with the search results and see if we can get this blog as the top result (or at least top page) in search engine results for Bill McClellan.

Take a look around and leave a comment if you feel so inclined.

UPDATE: I'm on the first page for Bill McClellan search results.

I can't get no sleep...

2005-02-22T03:18:00.000-06:00

Okay, so I can't sleep again. Something about getting home from work after 10 pm that won't allow me to fall asleep at a reasonable time. It justs takes me a while to unwind for some reason... Or to put it another way:

Deep in the bosom of the gentle night
Is when I search for the light
Pick up my pen and start to write
I struggle, fight dark forces
In the clear moon light
Without fear... insomnia
I can't get no sleep

I used to worry, thought I was goin' mad in a hurry
Gettin' stress, makin' excess mess in darkness
No electricity, something's all over me, greasy
Insomnia please release me and let me dream of
Makin' mad love to my girl on the heath
Tearin' off tights with my teeth
But there's no release, no peace
I toss and turn without cease
Like a curse, open my eyes and rise like yeast
At least a couple of weeks
Since I last slept, kept takin' sleepers
But now I keep myself pepped
Deeper still, that night I write by candle light
I find insight, fundamental movement, uh
So when it's black this insomniac take an original tack
Keep the beast in my nature under ceaseless attack
I gets no sleep
I can't get no sleep

I can't get no sleep
I can't get no sleep
I need to sleep, I can't get no sleep
I need to sleep, I can't get no sleep

by the way, I may have mad lyrical skills and all, but these are lyrics from the Faithless song, Insonmia. Bonus points to you if you guessed that...

Where you been? Funny you should ask....

2005-02-21T20:59:00.000-06:00

Okay, so while my blog is getting commented up by haze and enigma (aka mr. meaner) and others... where I have been? I've been working. Yep... working. We've got a big release for Engage due this week, and I'm working with the team to get it all wrapped up. I worked a lot of late nights last week, and we (the rest of the team and I) worked Saturday and got quite a bit done. So I stayed in Saturday night and did taxes... Exciting life huh?

Sunday I went to church and then played golf at Winghaven CC with my friends Matt and Pete. Beautiful day Sunday... 70 degrees, a little overcast, windy. Great weather for golf. I shot a 97 on this tough course. And although that score is a little high, I take great pride in the fact that my putting did me in and I only had one "bad" hole (a triple bogey). I had four or five pars (three of which should have been birdies if I could putt within 7 feet), a lot of bogeys that should have been pars and a lot of doubles that should have been bogeys. All and all, not a bad round for the beginning of the season. The most promising thing from yesterday is that my driving was pretty solid (only one bad one, a couple questionable, the rest were good to great) and after last season's injuries (wrist, shoulder, etc) I should be ready to get that handicap well under 20 this year.

Alright, enough rambling bout golf, I gotta get back to work. I'm still at the office (it's 7 pm) and I'll be here till 9 or 10, so no more slacking... I'll be posting again as soon as I get the time...

No Sleep Till....

2005-02-14T00:25:00.000-06:00

Okay, so today I went to church, helped my sister with her new computer and then ran some errands. I left the house about 8:30 AM and got home at about 5:00... I immediately fell asleep on the couch and woke up around 7:00 with the worst headache ever. I took some Tylenol about an hour ago and hope I will fall asleep soon (it's 12:30 AM). Have you ever woke up with a nasty headache that you didn't have when you went to bed? What's up with that? It makes no sense to me at all.

College Roommate Blogs

So after trying to fall asleep and failing, I've been surfing around some blogs and came across two that are funny (careful, the first blogger cusses a lot, you are warned):

http://ihatemyflatmate.blogspot.com/
http://thingsihateaboutmyroommate.blogspot.com/

Anywho... the second blogger commented in a post about the "Real World" quality of the roommate surveys and I would have to agree wholeheartedly. "Multi-culturalism" was the buzz word during my freshman year at DePaul University (Chicago) in 1994-1995. I think they applied that to our dorm situations. At the time I was an accounting major and they paired me with a musical theatre major. We got along well, and it worked out, but it seems like an odd pairing. That pairing wasn't half as weird those as some of my friends.... One of my friends (uhhh... at the time, unfortunately I really haven't spoken to anyone at DePaul in the 10 years since I left), was a white country boy Accounting major from Tennessee who was paired with an african-american art major from downtown Chicago. Another friend was a Jewish guy from the North Shore who was paired a gay guy from somewhere in the boon docks... These pairing didn't make much sense at all. I think it was some big conspiracy to promote Multi-culturalism. It worked for the most part, we all got along... but kinda weird.

Bill McClellan Again

2005-02-10T12:53:00.000-06:00

Alright, I'm back from seattle, Great, great time!! I'll be posting recap and pictures soon... However, I just read this article and it drove me ape. McClellan is at it again, I think he may want to piss off everyone in this town... He start off by talking about the feedback he got from his article (the one I posted about here). Great comment from a reader:

One reader spoke for many: "This is the worst thing you've ever written, and considering the quality of your work, that's an accomplishment."

Later in the article he goes off on the "Voice of America" KMOX 1120 AM in St. Louis because they have Rush Limbaugh as one of the shows on the station...

Why would anybody left of center listen to KMOX? For three hours a day, the station promotes hatred of liberals. If you were Jewish and the station promoted hatred of Jews, would you listen? Would you patronize their advertisers?

This guy really needs to calm down. Apparently he hasn't listened to KMOX much, because the rest of the station's shows range from moderate to liberal. I heard a great rebuttal to Bill's column while listening to KMOX, the host (maybe Charlie Brennan?) said not listening to KMOX because Rush Limbaugh is on three hours a day (or 12.5% of the day) is like not reading the entire Post Dispatch because McClennan is in it. Good Idea... I'd already cancelled my subscription, and I'm going to stop paying attention to anything other than the sports page on stltoday.com.

Off to Seattle

2005-02-02T15:00:00.000-06:00

I'm heading out to Seattle today to visit my buddy Charlie. I'm looking forward to the time off, even if it means flying home during the Super Bowl (aargh). Haven't been to seattle in a long time and don't get to see Charlie often so this should be a fun weekend.

Probably won't be posting till I get back...

Liberal Bullies

2005-02-01T18:34:00.000-06:00

In his typical "liberals against the world " (or "Conservatives are the enemy", you pick) rant, Bill McClellan's latest article tries to figure out why conservatives are so angry. Of course, the first question you are probably asking yourself is "huh, I thought the liberals are angry, not the conservatives" and you are right, for evidence see any article written by any MSM columnist after the election, or check out people claiming they are going to move to Canada, or check out any recent protests... But I digress...

Anyway, Billy Boy goes on in the article to suggest that it's because the conservatives were bullied in grade school by the big bad mean liberals. Here is a nice quote:

"I have a question," the young woman said. "The conservatives won. Why are they still so angry?"

That is a question to which I have given some thought. I have concluded that the anger of some of these middle-aged conservatives has its roots in childhood. Back when we middle-aged guys were kids, liberals used to be bullies. They were the tough kids. The conservatives were the bookworms. Also, the cheerleaders....

A few paragraphs later after discussing how Dubya and Trent Lott were college cheerleaders, Billy Boy mentions:

How best to describe those days? Well, imagine a playground. On one side, you have the liberals. They're throwing footballs around. On the other side, you have the conservatives. Maybe Trent and George are working on some cheerleader moves. "Watch this, Trent! I can do the splits! Wheeee!"

So dear reader, I again imagine the question you are asking yourself is "Huh". Sure Bill, (with a slight twinge of sarcasm) Liberal jocks, conservative nerds... yeah, that seems about right... Bill goes onto to try to make his point:

Then the boys grew up and the Vietnam War came along. The liberals enlisted. The conservatives scrambled to find ways to avoid the war. Danny and George had their folks pull strings to get them into gold-plated reserve units that weren't going anywhere. Rush got a letter from a doctor saying he had an inoperable cyst. The other fellows found other ways out. It wasn't that they weren't patriotic, it was just that, as Cheney put it, they had other priorities.

So to recap, Bill is saying those great liberal, bully athletes were enlisting in Vietnam while all the conservatives were running from it. I was not alive during Vietnam, but I do recall seeing something on TV once about war protests, draft dodging, hippies, etc... I guess those were all the conservatives. So here's Bill's conclusion:

You see, it's hard to get past childhood fears, and that's what my young caller didn't understand. There is no reason to be angry at the fellow in the SUV. Behind that snarling middle-aged countenance is the face of a scared young boy, afraid that the liberals are going to chase him home. When we talk about that conservative anger, I blame the liberals.

Bill's opinion in this article in a nutshell: Liberals are bullies, conservatives were weak kids and are now angry as a result.

My opinion of Bill's opinion:Now I'm guessing this article has to be tongue in cheek, because if Bill is being serious, he's finally lost it. If the conservatives are afraid of the liberals chasing them, it's because they might, try to blow up our SUV because it uses too much gas, or wait, that could hurt the spotted owl, what a conundrum...

Email Marketing Gone Wrong

2005-02-01T15:43:00.000-06:00

I read this funny article from Tom Steinert-Threlkeld at baseline about email marketing personalization gone wrong. Here's a quote:

Now, I'm almost ready to join the chorus that says the end of the effective days of e-mail, even by brand-name businesses, is nigh.

This time, the milestone came when I received two messages on the same day from my favorite hotel company, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, maintainers of the St. Regis, Sheraton, W and Westin brands.

Here was the startling proposition presented to me:

Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 08:00:41 -0500 (EST)
From: "Starwood Hotels & Resorts"
To: tst@ziffdavis.com
Subject: Share a Weekend with your Girlfriends at Westin

Naturally, I asked my wife if this would be all right with her. She wasn't too thrilled. "Stick with the cookies,'' she said. I didn't have the heart to tell her she was confusing Westin with the Doubletree chain. Her message was clear.

Note that as Tom mentions in his article his first name is "Tom", not exactly a non-gender specific name that can be confused like Pat or Chris.

Northwest Foursquare Church

2005-01-26T08:09:00.000-06:00

Hey all, I've made some updates to the Northwest Foursquare Church website. Check it out... Basically, I reduced the height of the banner up top and added the church name (Northwest Foursquare Church). I also added the Bible verse of the day to the right pane and increased the font size throughout the site (and messed around with the stylesheet), let me know what you think.

Northwest Foursquare Church is a foursquare church in St. Ann, Missouri (basically north St. Louis County).

If anyone is interested in helping with the Northwest Foursquare Church website let me know... I could use some help.

(By the way, I'm not being redudantly redudant on this post, I'm trying to drive spider traffic to the site to increase visits and search results.)

New Blog Update

2005-01-21T22:54:00.000-06:00

Ok... so I have the new blog domain name purchased, got the hosting temporarily figured out (thanks chris) and got the skin about done... I still need to figure out what I can / can't do with CS. BTW, I thought I had the skin finished and went to post with it and it looked horrible :<

I need to re-slice the images in fireworks and try again, but I think it may come down to me hand-coding the html for this since fireworks didn't do the slices very well...

Bourne Supremacy = Good Flick

2005-01-21T22:50:00.000-06:00

Bourne Supremacy is a good flick. I watched it with the family on Christmas at my Dad's and tonight I did the ole Pay Per View to TiVo thing. I really liked the first one and I hate to say this about a sequel, but I may like part deux better. I'll have to watch it a few more times to know for sure... considering I've seen Bourne Identity probably 100+ times.

Sour Grapes?

2005-01-18T13:34:00.000-06:00

On GOPUSA (via Talon News) there is an article highlighting comments from John Kerry at an MLK rally yesterday. Apparently, Kerry is blaming "suppressed voters" for his loss in November.

But, Kerry commented that "thousands of people were suppressed in the effort to vote" in the 2004 presidential election.

"Voting machines were distributed in uneven ways," Kerry maintained. "In Democratic districts, it took people four, five, eleven hours to vote, while Republicans [went] through in 10 minutes -- same voting machines, same process, our America."

I only have one question... Aren't election commisions bi-partisan? If so, how could his claims be true? Horace Cooper points out in a commentary at GOPUSA the tale of two cities when it comes to "election fraud".

In my humble opinion, based on what has happened during the last two presidential elections, the democrats think it is okay to bribe people to vote w/ cigarettes (st. louis), try to vote with dead registered voters and dogs (city of st. louis, yet again), try to determine the intent of voters who couldn't fill out a valid ballot (florida) and try to not send out the military absentee ballots in time unless threatened by the U.S. Department of Justice. These things are all ok with the democrats but in elections watched by both parties (Ohio) they are blaming "voter suppression". Who suppressed the voters? Oh yeah, the election commissions... Sure they did.

Congrats to Mike and Laura Masters

2005-01-17T12:59:00.000-06:00

The Masters' wedding was a great time! The wedding was at the Jewel Box (Forest Park) and the reception was at Bevo Mills. Laura looked great and Trin looked great dressed like Dirk Diggler (inside joke, you had to be there). It was a wonderful event and Pastor Larry did a amazing job with the message. I felt honored to be a part of it as an usher and by giving the scripture reading.

Haze did a great job with the best man toast and it was a lot of fun for everyone. The band (Encore) was amazing! During the reception Bahnak and I were talking and he mentioned how truly lucky we are to have such wonderful friends who we've known for such a long time. I couldn't agree more, it's very rare to still be best friends with so many people you know from high school.

Unfortunately, since I'm the only loser in the world without a digital camera, I don't have any pictures to post of the wedding. Hopefully Haze will come through with some pics, I looked at his batch and they looked great. Congrats again to Mike and Laura!

Truly Prophetic

2005-01-17T12:50:00.000-06:00

This is the headline from SportsPickle.com last week:
"Manning Discouraged to Find His Horoscope Reads: “Choke Versus Patriots Again”"

I feel bad for the Colts who can never get past the Pats.

As for the Rams, I don't feel bad at all for them. The only good news is that because I was at MC Trin's (Mike Masters) wedding (which went off perfectly and was a great time for all), I didn't get to watch much of the horrible blowout. More about Master's wedding later.

Been breaking from Blogging...

2005-01-11T12:25:00.000-06:00

I haven't been blogging too much lately, due to the holidays and not much going on that has been blog-worthy to me. Here's an update on what's going on in my world:

MC Trin's wedding is this weekend so this should be a good weekend of seeing some old friends and watching our buddy get married.

Haze's blog hosting company went out of business, so he's moved his url to www.rantinghaze.com. I feel for him... After working in technology for a while (almost 6 years now) it would suck to lose a whole website and not be able to recover it. As soon as I post the new look to this blog I'll update the link to his site.

My buddy Matt is giving me his pool and foosball tables for the house tonight so I'm looking forward to having some people over soon and playing some games. (If my house wasn't a bachelor pad before, now the whole house might as well be a clubhouse).

Deloney (Mr. Meaner) just turned 29 so he's officially an old man!!

That's about it for me, I'll be posting again soon.

My Favorite Sports Site

2005-01-04T12:38:00.000-06:00

I love sport's pickle. Here is a one of their articles from this week (prior to the Ram's Game):

Mike Martz set to coach season finale with a tinfoil hat.

St. Louis Rams coach Mike Martz continued his erratic behavior today, vowing he will wear a tinfoil hat during this Sunday’s game versus the Jets.
“I think the Jets will have a spy plane fly high over the stadium and read my thoughts with invisible laser beams,” said Martz. “But my tinfoil hat will deflect the beams and allow my cranial database to remain uncompromised.”
Martz said he created the hat out of a roll of tinfoil that was manufactured before the Cold War began. “All tinfoil and aluminum foil made after then has little microchips implanted in it to allow the communists to read your thoughts,” said Martz. “But I only use pre-Cold War tinfoil in my hats.”
“I think Mike has pretty much lost his mind,” said running back Marshall Faulk. “I honestly hope we miss the playoffs so he can go get some psychiatric help.”
“They’re all out to get me – the media, Chris Mortensen, Kyle Turley. They want to shut me up before I tell the world what I know,” said Martz. “But I won’t let them. I will be victorious””

And another funny article: "Todd Pinkston breaking barriers as NFL’s first woman"

Random Stuff

2004-12-13T19:12:00.000-06:00

Annoying
Tick... Tick... Tick... is the sound that one of our universal power supplies (backup power doohickey) is making at the office. It is really annoying! Thank goodness it will be going away in the next couple of minutes. There is nothing more grating than a bad sound. I fell like there is a heart beating under the floorboards. Ummh yeah, nevermind, enough about that.
DJ'ing
Also, I finally found the old DJ software I used to use, MJ Studio. The site isn't even maintained anymore, and compared to the new stuff it does absolutely nothing, but still I know how to use it and it does the basics very well... I might revert back to it for basic stuff.
Blogging
I'll probably take Haze's advise and keep Felone as the name of the new blog. Although, I'm might use graphics for both Kinetic and Felone...
Annoying (Part Deux)
By the way, the last site proof was a picture (pretty big one). By default, IE (or the worst browser in the world) resizes pictures that are big and you have to hover over them and then a expand icon will appear in the bottom right corner for showing them at full size. This is a pain in the hizzaz...
Paintballin'
This coming weekend we are going paint ballin' for mc trin's bachelor party. I'm looking forward to nailing some people. Haze's invite email was already calling people out, and since today we've had pretty funny stuff passing around...

New Blog Update

2004-12-06T21:32:00.000-06:00

Ok, so I haven't done a thing on the new blog engine or researching community server.net... but I have started working on the new site look. Here is a picture of what I have so far. So two things to note: I'm probably ditching the felone blog name and going w/ DJ Kinetic, and I haven't designed a site entirely by myself in a while, so feedback is greatly appreciated.

Origin of Kinetic and Felone:
Although both of these names are very toungue in cheek, felone is my "rap" name (from the rap group criminal chargez). This one goes back probably 14 years ago. DJ Kinetic is the DJ name I blatanly stole from my old college roommate Gucci when we both use to mix and create music on computers.

Now that I am mixing music again and may eventually dj live (at church for youth service), I think I am go back to the "more likely to be used name at a live show": DJ Kinetic. This way when I start creating music and making it available for download the site name will make sense...

Oh well, let me know what you think of the site design... It's a work in progress.

Interesting Cross-Promotion

2004-12-06T19:28:00.000-06:00

For those of you do not know me... A part of my day-to-day duties consists of executing and providing expertise on opt-in email marketing. Not to pat myself on the back about anything but I think I know the in's and outs of email marketing...

I just received an email from McAfee trying to sell me something I'm not interested in. I don't remember opting-in to McAfee, but I'm sure I could have at some point. Since I receive a couple of hundred emails a day, I normally opt out of the offer emails. So I go to opt-out of McAfee's email and here is the promotion they are running on the unsubscribe page:

NEW VERSION! McAfee SpamKiller: The automatic junk email blocker service Tired of spam? The best reply is McAfee SpamKiller with tate-of-the-art spam-busting technology. Scam filters, One-Click Block, Dictionary Attack filtering and regular spam filter updates help keep inboxes free of unwanted email, including virus hoaxes, offensive content and identity theft scams. Ideal for MS Outlook/Express!

I think this is really funny... Promoting spam-blocking software to people who are unsubscribing from your email. I wonder if their filter blocks their own emails. Do you think this was down toungue in cheek?
If not, is this message you want to send to your unsubscribers: "hey, since you don't like our spam, you think you may want to block it and others?"

You have to be kidding me

2004-12-03T13:56:00.000-06:00

I was perusing Drudge during lunch and saw this headline: "Florida Kerry supporters meet for group therapy" so I read this article and at first I thought it was toungue in cheek or an Onion article, but apparently this is real. Some highlights:

The first of several free noontime therapy sessions at the American Health Association in Boca Raton was designed to treat what mental health counselors have dubbed Post Election Selection Trauma (PEST).“If I had a cardboard cutout of President Bush, and these people wanted to throw darts at it, I would let them do it,” Robert J. Gordon, AHA executive director, told the Boca News after the session. “It’s no joke. People with PEST were traumatized by the election. If you even mention religion, their faces turn blister-red as they shout at Bush.”

Wait a minute, if I mention religion these people faces turn "blister-red as they shout at Bush". Religion, religion, religion! Now that I have that out of my system, it goes on to mention:

Gordon said the Kerry supporters in therapy are predominantly Jewish and older than 50. Most are registered independents and all live in Palm Beach County.

I've never really mentioned much about Judaism on this site (my great-grandfather was Jewish, so I am an eighth Jewish, not too shabby (Don't get mad, I'm paraphrasing Adam Sandler)), but what is the state of Judaism in Palm Beach that if you mention "religion" to these Jewish people they get upset? Isn't Judaism a religion? Am I missing something?

Moving on, here are some more brilliant quotes:

According to AHA officials, symptoms of PEST are similar to post-traumatic stress disorder. They include nightmares, sleeplessness, hostility, listlessness, and emotional outbursts including threats to leave the country. “There’s an overall sense of emotional helplessness and abandonment,” said Sheila Cooperman, a licensed AHA psychotherapist from Delray Beach. “In psychology, we call it ‘learned helplessness.’ After you zap a caged dog twice, he stops moving because he knows there is no place to go. That’s what happened with these Kerry voters. They’ve been zapped so many times that they’re on the verge of giving up on politics.”
Cooperman, also a practicing psychic, added, “One person today said he thinks the country is now run by fascists. Another felt personally threatened by the president’s love for big business. Many believe Bush is going to draft their grandchildren. The anxiety may not affect them every day, but it affects their energy level.”

I love the quote: "Another felt personally threatened by the president's love for big business..." Classic. Are big business' going to hunt you down and hurt you? Are they sinister, evil corporations, whose only motive is to make money? Jeez, lighten up people.

My final take on this (and probably my most religous take ever):
In my humble opinion these people need religion! They need to not blame religion for their problem, but realize that God's Mercy and Grace is all they need. They need it to help them understand how to deal with disappointment in life. They need to live a life not dependent on the outcome of the election but dependent on Jesus.

I'm sure they would be upset to read that above, but if they don't learn how to be saved, at least they can learn a dose of reality, the election is over, move on with your life.

Lost a post, bad dreamweaver, repent!!!

2004-12-01T17:52:00.000-06:00

I was in the middle of typing what was a pretty long post when I actually had to do some work (I was waiting on a phone call and was posting waiting on the call). So the guy I was talking to had me change some things in an html email I was sending out. No problem, hit the ole F12 key in dreamweaver and boom... there goes the post!!!! That totally stinks.

I was talking about the new site, my music mixing skills, how bad the rams defense is, etc... but now it's lost and I gotta run so sorry poor reader.... blame dreamweaver.

Anyway here is a table I was working on (in dreamweaver, without preview!!!) to prove how bad of a coach Larry Marmie is:

Defensive Stats
Year	2003	2004
Against Run	23rd	31st
Against Pass	12th	23rd
Total Defense	16th	28th

Cya!

Mizzou Football: Things keep getting worse!!

2004-11-29T19:38:00.000-06:00

On Saturday Mizzou concluded the season with a 17-14OT win at Iowa St. The Tigers, who were predicted to contend for the Big 12 North title and finally make a push to get into the top 10 and BCS contention, finished 5-6. They lost four games in a row prior to their season ending victory. Their coach, who everyone thought was a perfect fit for this team, became a jerk to the media (who cares), the boosters (bad, bad, idea) and the players (even worse idea). Today there is news that starting running back Damien Nash quit the team.

Nash, who is from East St. Louis, was the big recruit everyone was hoping for when he signed. Finally the Tigers landed a big name recruit from the St. Louis area (where they normally have a tough time recruiting), and he spurned Nebraska to come to Mizzou. What could go wrong? Two words: Gary Pinkel. Pinkel is stubborn and has obviously lost this team. Why were Nash and Pinkel not getting along? The offensive (in more ways the one) play-calling. This quote from Nash got him suspended for a game:

"I wish I had the headphones on to hear what's going on. I wish I could call the offense. I didn't understand a lot of the plays."

This quote came after a loss 20-17 to Oklahoma State where Mizzou had a 17-0 with a minute left in the first half and did nothing offensively in the second half. Nash received seven carries in the second half and had every right to be upset. I agree that Nash shouldn't have publicly called out the play-calling (which was horrible), but to be suspended for a whole game (a game that was important at the time against Nebraska) is ridiculous. That suspension was the turning point of a horrible season. The lost every game until this past Saturday. Now Nash is leaving. I hope Pinkel goes next.

What are you thankful for?

2004-11-25T20:10:00.000-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm happy for:

My Family and Friends

My church

My house

The great year I've had

An awesome thanksgiving meal!!

New Site Update...

2004-11-23T22:09:00.000-06:00

Ok, Haze just for you :)... I've finally made a few new posts

So the new blog isn't ready... I'll make a post when it is (maybe event some previews). Look for it sometime in December, till then I will be posting here. (And more frequently then I have been the last two weeks).

So what's new?
I've been spending my free time (which hasn't been much until this week) working on getting my computer back ready so I can start mixing music again. I used to do this a few years back with some DJ software and I always focused on electronic (trance, ambient, progressive trance, etc..) and now I'll be picking it up again with the same genres but with a Christian slant. We'll see how this turns out, but I've always loved mixing music and I'd loved to eventually get some real dj equipment and do it live.

My new sound card will be here in a couple of days and I'm trying out some new software so keep an eye out for downloads when the new site goes live.

Also, my hours are back down to a normal pace now that we (myself and several others at etg) have launched and wrapped up the finishing touches on the website we have worked around six months on. Check it out at www.stlouischildrens.org. Kudos to eliot at bigwidesky for his great design and all the hard work by everyone at slch, etg and bigwidesky.

Political Ramblings...

2004-11-23T21:28:00.000-06:00

I had some good political conversations over the last few weeks with some friends. One of which was my college buddy Greg, who was in town this past weekend. Greg, who is a high school teacher in Sedalia, Missouri, claims he is a liberal (it's probably hard not be after two masters degrees), but I think he is more of a issues-based moderate. In my humble opinion, we agree far too often for him to be a liberal.

On to my point; I thought I would finally make a post about a question I have asked every "liberal" I have spoken politics with in the last few months. Do you feel like your values and agenda are represented by the current (soon to be past) Democratic regime? Do you think your views are the same as John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, Terry McAulife, Daschle, Hillary, et al?

The answer has been a resounding no. Why? Because the "Reagan democrats", southern democrats and Midwestern union democrats have been left behind by the more liberal members of their party.

At it's peak, liberalism forced changes in society, some good, some bad. "Liberalism" can take some credit for big changes in our society: civil rights, equality for different races, religions, gendera, union rights.

But what "issues" are the liberals focused on now? Insulting the "stupid" red-staters, bashing conservatives, protesting for the sake of protesting, calling people who disagree with them Nazis, attempting to destroy religion, trying to appease countries who loathe us for our freedoms, blaming us for world problems, creating "documentaries" with no basis in fact, etc.

If the democrats can moved beyond their far-left, angry leaders and reward and promote centrists who have solutions instead of complaints, they may gain some momentum, until then looks like us red-staters are going to be around for a while.

New Blog?

2004-11-06T10:23:00.000-06:00

I'm thinking of creating a new blog that is:

A) ASP.Net based

B) Hosted somewhere other than blogger

C) Maybe something open-source where I could help the community development as a side project.

I think I will probably start with .Text blog. Does anyone have any thoughts on ASP.net blogging engines?

Breaking the Redskin Curse

2004-11-03T12:06:00.000-06:00

So we've all probably this mentioned on Sunday:

The outcome of Washington Redskins home football games has correctly predicted the winner of every U.S. presidential election since 1936.

Well not anymore!!! Goodbye Redskin Curse!

Bush Wins!! Blunt Wins!!! Exit Polls Lose

2004-11-03T11:42:00.000-06:00

Wow, this seems a little like a mandate. First president since GW1 to receive more than 50% of the vote. Republicans take more Senate seats, retain control of house and have a majority of Governors.

This is the second best news I heard late last night: Daschle loses!
This election confirms what I've been saying for a while, the current democratic regime is way too left for the "common man" democrat. Kerry, Kennedy, Daschle, McAulife, et al are out of touch with the common man and the Southern democrats feel left behind by their party.

Oh yeah, how about those exit polls and the pre-election tracking polls? Obviously, the media and pollsters have some explaining to do. Where are you now Zogby?