All Hallows' Eve

I know many of you might have wondered who I was for Halloween. Well the answer is finally here. I would have tried to describe my costume, but I thought a visual would be more effective. As a pirate I have sailed the high seas, pillaging and plundering every village and town that possessed gold and silver. I encountered many strange things tonight, things a pirate such as me has never been witness to. I was greeted by a talking fairy, talked to a bunny, saw a man riding an ostrich, and a man with a burnt face asked me directions to Elm Street. What a crazy night.

Number 5

I have temporarily stabilized my computer and am able to get some work done. A few days ago, Wednesday night to be exact I was eating a quick meal at Burger King. Hanging in a frame was a basketball jersey belonging to Earvin 'Magic' Johnson. The numbers on the back of the jersey stood out to me 3 2. At this point the little gears in my head started to spin. Eventually the larger gears were also spinning at full speed. The result of my thoughts were interesting to say the least. The first thing that came to mind was the fact that Michael Jordan's basketball number was 23. What a crazy world we live in, both of these men are considered to be legends of basketball, and their jerseys each add up to the number 5 (3+2=5; 2+3=5). I thought that there must be something special about the number 5. Now here is where everything gets a little more interesting. Michael Jordan retired from the sport of basketball, only to return again. His original number had been retired at the time of his return, and wore the number 45 instead. Here is a man who in his basketball career wore 23 and 45 and the number 5 does not go away (2+3+4+5=14; 1+4=5). A man possessing such talent and ability as Jordan does not receive any random number, he chooses it. The reasons why he chose his career to add up to 5 is uncertain. Perhaps a look into numerology might offer some help. Within the Wiki for the numerology of five it states the following "Five is about pushing life to its limits." If there is anyone who pushed basketball to its limits, Michael Jordan is at the top of many people's list.

Down For Repairs

Once again I must re-direct my free time and resources to get my pc working correctly. This afternoon I went to a computer show, and picked up a new video card. The card of choice was the ATI Radeon X700 Pro. My old card came with my current pc and was a bit outdated for the kinds of apps that I needed to run. It was only a matter of time that I got a new one. Since the Market Pro show was in town at a nearby college I decided that now was the time to get one. Everything was fine, until it was time to restart. The infamous Blue Screen of Death and I became re-introduced after many years. Being that I only use Windows systems, going a few years without the Blue Screen of Death would be considered quite miraculous. The ironic thing is that in the latest episode of hak.5 they demonstrated how to crash a Windows system to the Blue Screen of Death with a few simple keystrokes and a slight modification of the registry. Well I'm of to fight the video card demons, may Gates be with me.

The Return of the E

UPDATE:
I left Atlanta last night after waiting for about two hours for a delayed train. The Amtrak ride back to NYC was comfortable, and I was able to get a lot of reading done. I hope I was not missed too much. A little is ok. By tomorrow I will be back to work, busily writing for your procrastination needs.

Quickie Post:
The word mostly used during my trip to Atlanta was 'vouch'.

Most comedic line used while driving or being lost:
E - "turn right here"
J - "are you sure"
E - "not at all, but that's what the sign says"

Away

There is nothing wrong with my blog, I am still out of town. Once I get back home I will continue to entertain all my readers.

Buckhead

Tonight it was off to Buckhead with J and A. Buckhead is a popular part of Atlanta, there are restaurants, clubs, lounges, and bars. During the weekends at night there are people walking everywhere. Cars drive along slowly, not only due to traffic, but to profile and to observe the eye candy. I came to one realization , I cannot listen to southern hip-hop for more than one song per hour. No such luck. My ears were hurting. I was with my friends, so I managed to have a good time and make the best of my situation. A few drinks didn't hurt either. After the clubs, there is only one way to properly close off the night, a visit to the Waffle House. If you ever go to the South, you must eat at the Waffle House after a night of fun and drinks.

In the A

After a long drive J and myself have arrived to Atlanta Friday night. After dropping off the truck, it was off to shower and change into some clean clothes. Once all cleaned up, it is time to go grab some food and drinks. It is Friday night and no amount of tiredness will prevent us from hitting up a spot for more drinks and fun.

Road Trip

My road trip to Atlanta starts tonight. Wish me luck.


And this is how I will be getting down there:

Run

I know I talked about running before, but I must bring it up again. I am again determined to loose a few extra pounds that have snuck up on me over the last ten months or so. I only need to dispose of about ten pounds, but a few more than that would not be a bad deal either. I feel healthy overall, but I need to control my weight before it becomes a problem again. Most people tell me I look fine the way I am, but I am doing this for myself and no one else. If I become a fat lazy slob, I will die not them, so I need to look out for number one. Right now I have started with a 2 mile run. When I say run I mean a little running, jogging, and walking. I walk the last half mile or so to cool down. Im starting slow in order to get used to the workout, then I will increase the distance and time.

Angels

Being that I was talking about baseball yesterday, I think I will continue with the same general topic. Just in case you are wondering I have not placed any new bets on any baseball game. There is one thing that has been bothering me about these Angels, and it is the official name of the team. Why do they need to constantly change the location? Years ago they were simply called the California Angels. I didn't think there was anything wrong with that name. Perhaps someone thought it was too long of a name and wanted to save money on ink, so they made it shorter. The new name was to be the Anaheim Angels. Possibly they might have went with the city of Anaheim since the Mighty Ducks made it a popular place for a sports team to be. The changes did not stop there, apparently their ink budget got bumped up and they decided to have the longest possible name imaginable. The new name, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Try to say that three times fast. It seems to me someone discovered alliteration and thought to show of their new found skill. Los Angeles has the Dodgers already, they do not need another team in the same city. California is a big state, there are enough cities to choose from and not be repetitive. Who do these Angels think they are to use two cities in their official names? Angeles is Spanish for angel, so in translation they are the 'The Angels Angels of Anaheim'. That sounds pretty horrible to me, it makes my ears hurt. Thankfully I am not of the West Coast and do not have to deal with the constant name changes.

White SOX

The American League Championship Series (ALCS) is finally over. The series between the Chicago White Sox and the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim was decided in five games with the Sox winning four games and the Angels just winning one.

Lets go back in time about a week or so. The Sox had won their Divisional Series and were resting until the time they would have to confront their future opponents. Eventually the Angles overcame the pinstriped Yankees and advanced to the ALCS. The Angels were not distracted by the pinstripes, which is why the Yankees have won so many rings, their opponents become distracted by the uniform. The winner would advance to the 2005 World Series. That is not something we will need to worry about today, so lets move on.

Game 1 was played and the Angels were victorious. The following afternoon I am chatting online with a good friend and the topic of baseball arises. He then proposes a bet to me saying that the Angels will win the series. At first I protest, who in their right mind would take a bet on a baseball series when one team already has a win. I must not be in my right mind, because I accepted the bet. The bet was more of a friendly wager just for fun. To make up for the win which the Angels had, if the White Sox win I get $20 and if the Angels win, I only pay $15. It seemed fair enough to me so I went along with the deal and a bet was made. After the bet was made my friend tell me 'by the way, statistically the Angles should win the series, so make sure you have my money ready.'

The ALCS is now over and I am now $20 richer than I was about a week ago. At this rate I will become a millionaire in only 50,000 years. I think a few more poker nights and trips to the casino will speed things up for me and my million dollar goal. Wish me luck.

Rocket FM

Confused? You probably are. If you read my post from yesterday, you are expecting to read the conclusion to the story; my 'loss'. Looking at the title of my current post, you might be wondering what the connection is. The answer, my readers, is that the loss I suffered was the loss of my pc speakers. Everything I said was true. At first volume would suddenly drop then resume. After time the speakers became so low in volume that I would have to turn up the sound output to max and the physical volume of the speakers all the way up in order to get some kind of sound. I knew they would not last very long, and one day functionality was completely lost. I was not left without sound options, I was fortunate to have a decent pair of headphones with a very long cord allowing me to plug into my pc and still move around in my black leather office chair.

This was a temporary fix. In time I would need to be free from my headphones. I had two options; A: buy new pc speakers or fix old ones, B: find a way to connect my pc sounds to my stereo. Being that my video card connects to my tv for use as a second monitor, I went with option B. This was to be my attempt of having an affordable Home Theater Personal Computer (HTPC). I again was faced with more options; A: wired or B: wireless. This was the toughest choice to make. The internet was my first resource, followed by asking amongst my trusted peers which option might be in my best needs. Everything at first was pointing to go with a wired option. It seemed simple enough, plug a wire into my pc and connect to my receiver. I would probably need way over 6 feet of wires in order to reach and keep them out of view. That would have been a huge pain, but the main benefit of having a direct connection is quality of signal. My living room is by no means a professional sound or recording studio, so i thought a slight degradation of signal would be neither too important nor noticeable. When it comes to a wireless option I was told that the main downside is the quality and clarity of signal. In my mind going wireless was thinking outside the box. Through the use of some kind of FM transmitter I could tune into my pc's music in my living room and bedroom, and depending on the range the signal might even be picked up in different parts of the house. I could even wake up to the artist or song of choice by simply looping the tracks I wanted to have playing on my winamp and then set the alarm clock radio to wake up to a radio station. I knew there were FM transmitter devices available for the iPod, now I just needed to know if the technology was also available for pcs as well. Thanks to a few Google searches, I found exactly what I was looking for.

The choice I went with, as the title suggests, was the RocketFM made by Griffin Technology. Just so you know this product can be found new at Amazon.com for less including free delivery. The device is aesthetically appealing and nice a nice blue glow which I like. The installation is simple, plug it into an available USB port and start using. Then came the fun part, testing it out. I set my sound options to output to the RocketFM device, and then start up my winamp and load up a few tracks. I turn on my stereo and tune in to 88.10 FM, turn on the volume and it works. I can clearly hear the music that my pc is playing through my stereo. Knowing that it works fine, I needed to test the range of the device. I got to my bedroom, where the only electronic device besides the lights is my alarm clock radio. I tune it to the same frequency and I also have great sound. Round one of testing now complete, moving on to round two. From the basement I go on upstairs to the living room of the house and decide to test out the stereo there. Again I have similar results, and can hear the music from my pc with no problem. I must be honest and mention that there was slight static on the line, but almost every radio station on that stereo gets some static. I was feeling lucky and decided to go for the hat-trick. I yelled up to my sister who lives on the second floor to turn on her radio and tune into 88.10 FM and tell me what she hears. She told me what song was playing and I was happy. Then I asked her how is sounds. She replied 'It sounds normal, why you askin' me all these questions for?' Then I explained that it was not a real radio station that she was listening to, they were the sounds being broadcast by my computer. I eventually ran up there myself to listen, and it sounded perfect.

My vision of having the ability to listen to audio from my pc throughout the entire house is now a reality. I am very happy with my new toy, and felt it was my duty to post this small chapter of my life. Hope you enjoyed your visit. Good Night.

My Loss

I recently suffered a loss in my life. Was it sad? Yes. But it was more unfortunate than anything else. Nothing will last forever, and that is a fact we must all deal with. The loss was not something that occurred overnight, it was a gradual decline. This being the case I had ample time to prepare and plan out how I would deal with the situation. In a time like this basing decisions on emotional thought is not wise. The best approach when confronting a loss is to make a well thought out logical choices. Listening to advice from trusted friends who either have insight or prior experience with a similar situation can prove very helpful. I was fortunate to have both a rational mind and a wide base of trusted friends to deal with my loss. A few internet searches also provided much needed guidance.

I hope that thus far no tears have been shed over my loss. For one thing I have not even mentioned what exactly my loss was. I have done this with the purpose of invoking your imaginations to get a work out. I know it is fun at times to read my blogs, I try my best to make them worth our time. Tomorrow I will conclude the story of my loss. Feel free to take a guess as to what I am speaking of.

Vacation

I have not traveled a lot, but I have gone to strange and far away places. Part of me is always restless and at times needs to be on the move. I grew up in Queens,NY; studied and lived in Buffalo,NY; lived and worked in Atlanta, GA; and back to living in Queens,NY. Besides my long term stays in various cities, I have also taken shorter trips to places along the east coast including CT, NH, NJ, VA, PA, DC, SC, FL, MD, DE. Just north of the border I have been to Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, and Niagara Falls. When talking about the western part of the continent I have been in AZ and CA. I was recently in AZ visiting my brother and cousin, but the first time that I went was almost 15 years ago. My brother and I went to AZ to visit our grandparents and a few other family members. It was more than just a visit, it was a road trip, on a Greyhound bus. The voyage lasted for two and a half days, taking us through many states and a wide variety of terrain: mountains, rivers, plains, and desert. I think this sums up my continental travels.

The list of my overseas travels is a lot shorter. Just around this time of year in 2002 I spent seven weeks in Chile. In December of 2004 I spent three weeks in Thailand. In May of 2005 I spent close to two weeks in Hawaii.

From my long distance travels you can almost see a pattern of visiting warm places. Even though December is winter in Thailand, the average daily temperatures that time of year is in the 80's. (During the summer it is easily over 100 degrees) I now feel that it is time I experienced the opposite. I want to go somewhere a lot colder and less tropical. As if living in Buffalo's long winters is not enough punishment I now want to travel to Alaska. Some people think I am a little nuts or crazy or just a weirdo, I take the 5th. Just so you know it was not 'Northern Exposure' that made me want to visit this far and cold place. I hear the scenery is amazing and I believe it. Blue oceans, blue skies, white glaciers, whales, sea lions, polar bears are a few of the things that my imagination believes I will encounter. What I think will make a trip to Alaska worth every cent is to see the aurora borealis first hand.

Rain

For the last few days it has been raining. Today it is raining. For the next few days it will continue to rain. Although the rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain, here in New York and any other city in the United States it is mainly just a pain. Someone recently asked me 'Why do we even need rain? What good does it do?' The question was of course facetious, but the answer is simply to live. If raining would cease, we would all eventually die. The opposite however is not true, continuous rain would not make us live any longer than is naturally possible. One example that comes to mind when thinking of rain causing death is the city of Seattle. Seattle gets an average of three feet of rain per year, which I must point out is actually less than New York. The reason why Seattle is known for its rain is probably that it falls at a much slower pace, more like drizzle that never ends. Along with the rain come clouds and cold gloomy weather, causing people to be depressed and eventually commit suicide. That is one place I do not care to live in, visit once, maybe, but nothing long term. Rain cause all sorts of other problems, the main ones being flooding and mudslides. We all witnessed the effects of flooding on a major city. Mudslides or landslides caused by the rain can be so massive to the extent of burying an entire village. Rain is something most of us have to experience and deal with at some point in our lives. Some even like to sing in it. But what ever you do when it rains, do not run. Just walk. A person running in the rain to avoid getting wet will actually end up less dry than the person who simply walks. Water will not make me sick and my skin is basically waterproof, so I have nothing to fear. As a child I looked forward to rain. My brother and I would grab a few sheets of paper and start folding away, creating a small armada. Once the fleet was complete and the rain had ran its course we would head outside and race out little handmade paper boats down the streams of rainwater. Those were fun days indeed. Now, when I start to feel bothered by the non-stop rain we have been getting, I travel back in time to I time when I enjoyed a good rain. When I return from my mental voyages through time I bring back with me a part of the happy little kid I used to be.

Truth

I find it very interesting that people would rather believe a lie than the truth. Is it that the truth is too complicated for people's gray matter to process. Lies are usually very simple and straightforward. I would say that the more simple a lie is, the more effective it is. It is common knowledge that you can tell when someone is telling a lie by the complexity of it and use of too many needless details. That fact is what makes telling the truth a problem. Life in general is not simple, and in fact is very complicated. When describing something in words that is true and relates to anything real by default is complicated. So lets say some one is being asked about an action they have taken, and we will assume the person is telling the truth. When responding, they do not just give a quick answer, but instead give a full explanation of said action. To the listener, a few things run through their minds. The first one is that the situation being described sounds a bit too far fetched. The second thought is 'this is too complicated and too detailed... it must be a lie.' It is easy to see that this situation will not turn out positive. One person becomes frustrated that by telling the full truth he is not believed. The second person becomes frustrated because they feel they are being lied to. There is an overall lack of trust in people. If someone does not trust themselves, the less likely they will be to trust in others. It is a serious malfunction that I have witnessed in various people, and I can only pity their ignorance. The truthful persons in this world must continue to tell the truth, regardless if they are believed in or not. I myself have made a conscious effort to employ truth in all I do. Whatever the consequences may be, I know that I can sleep in peace at night.

Turkey Day

I am not aware of having any Canadian readers, but just in case. Happy Thanksgiving Day!

My 'Shining' Moment

All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy. All work and no play, makes Enzo a dull boy.

Email Me

UPDATE:
As you all know you can post a comemnt on here for all to see. I am sure there are tiems you mihgt want to let me know somtehing, but do not necsesarily want the wolrd to read what you write. To slove that prolbem, at the very bottom of this page there is a button you can clcik on to sned me an email diretcly. Hope this hleps out.





Disclaimer:
There is a theory that states that when reading, our brains see words as a whole and not as individual letters. The important thing when reading familiar words is that the first and last letters must not change. I am sure that sometime within the last few years, your inbox has been spammed with an email stating this theory. This is my attempt at creating a similar effect.

Pool

After a few weeks off, my Thursday night pool sessions are back in effect. In the past my dad and uncle would go shoot pool regularly, but I was always too young to join them. They used to go regularly, then stop, and eventually start again throughout the years. This off and on again pattern has gone on for many many years and will continue to go on in the future. Within the last year there has been a slight modification to the established pattern. I now am old enough to play with the grown ups, some might even say that I am myself a grown up. The jury is still undecided about that. In addition to being of age to play, I am now living locally and not hours away. So sometime last year I joined my dad and uncle in weekly visits to the pool hall. Needless to say, they were a lot better than me at first. Slowly my skills began to improve. Like previous patterns of shooting pool, this one ended as well. Earlier this year weekly pool nights started again, but this time it would be my dad and myself playing. We have only missed a few weeks overall, with the exception to the month when my dad was in Chile. Currently we are tied. Neither of us has proved to be superior to the other. Only time will tell who will emerge as the better player. Although we do play for bragging rights, it is a bonding event that we both enjoy.

Can't Sleep

The time shown for this blog says its one minute until midnight. In actuality it is about three hours later, yes 3AM. A while back I talked about how I stay up too late at night too often. I even mentioned how I intended to change that bad habit and go to bed at a decent time. I always procrastinate, even when it come to sleeping, so I end up doing something else and miss my bedtime. This week I decided that the time to stop or at least control my procrastination was now. Sunday through Tuesday night I was true to my plan and in fact did go to bed at decent hours. This new sleep schedule caused me to wake up earlier than usual. It felt good to be awake early and enjoy a few extra hours of sunlight. With winter coming soon and the days getting shorter, it is to my advantage to enjoy the sunshine while it lasts. Everything was going good up until now. For some reason I stayed up and did not go to bed. I know if I were to go under the covers, REM sleep would kick in almost instantly. But no such luck. I am awake. I think I will try to watch a DVD and hope to knock out. Being that my couch is very inductive at causing its user to fall asleep, I should be able to get some rest.

It Works

Just a few days ago I decided to include a link to a site explaining various techniques on how to tie a tie. This morning I needed to wear a tie, and decided to try out a new method. I buttoned up my custom made shirt, stood in front of the mirror, took the tie in my hands, took a deep breath and went for it. I forgot to take a pic, but after two tries the results were impressive. I only had to make a few attempts because I had the length all wrong, but the actual knot and even the dimple were correct. I must say that I am proud of myself. This is something that I knew I would one day learn, and that day is today. Will I write it down on my calender? No. Will I remember this day years from now? No. The important thing is that I remember it now and am able to share with my readers one of my small achievements in life. If I was ever to take over the world, at least I will be properly dressed.

Good Night.

New Pics

Just to let everyone know, besides the pic of Shea Stadium that was displayed in yesterday's blog, there are a few more on my flickr.com site for your viewing enjoyment. I took over 30 pics at the game yesterday, but I only uploaded my top six pics to flickr. The link is located on the sidebar in case you might not know.

Search

I just want to mention a slight change in the way my page looks. I added the Google Search box to the top of the sidebar for ease of use. Having it at the very bottom of the page has proved to be quite ineffective. Hope this helps.

Last Game

It is over. The regular season for baseball this year is no more. Today was my last visit to Shea Stadium for the year. Besides today being my last visit to Shea, it most probably will also be Mike Piazza's last game as a NY Met. Today the Mets came out with a loss. That is ok. The overall energy inside every fan was positive. During the seventh inning stretch, there was a tribute on the giant screen for everyone's favorite catcher since Gary Carter, Piazza. The entire place was on its feet, cheering and applauding. It was a site that can not easily be expressed in words. Someone with far superior writing skills than myself can even begin to describe the energy and emotion in the air. Today was the kind of day you tend to remember for the rest of your life. I can picture myself as an aged and grayed old man taking my grandson to his first baseball game, telling him how I saw one of the greats play his last game for the Amazing Mets. To be honest I hope I am wrong and that next season Mike returns and eventually retires with the Mets. The one place I know where he will end up in is Cooperstown.