How could I have forgotten this?

How could I have forgotten this?
I really can’t explain why I forgot to mention in the Mental Debris posting about my Sunday afternoon and early evening experiences. I must have spent too much time on the balcony this morning with the sudoku and crossword puzzles.

There was a combination Boy Scout activity, lots of small boys running around and yelling, and drum band concert in the park next to my building yesterday. Having served in the military, I enjoy drum music as much as the next veteran but drum music can last only so long before it grates on one’s nerves. The drum concert lasted an hour or maybe a bit more. It all sounded the same.

But, it was loud enough to hear through the closed window.

Then, with yesterday being the start of Yom Kippur, traffic around my building was bordering on the ugly side. My building is across the street from a temple. Parking is limited in the area. I had thought about going out to grab some dinner but decided I ought to stay home.

I expect that traffic will be on the not so good side tonight with the sundown end of Yom Kippur.


Be well and stay happy.

Mental Debris

Mental Debris
This is one of those posting that is about stuff that missed getting into the last post be for the weekend.

That, plus Utah football.

Utah Football
Our Utes recovered from the misfortune in Eugene, Oregon a week ago this past Saturday. The Utes performance, based on a scan of the box score, looked like a workmanlike performance. The Utes improved this week. But, I wonder if they are improving fast enough to be ready for Texas Christian and Brigham Young games which will, in all likelihood, determine the season for the team and the fans.

This week’s game story is from the Associated Press.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP)--Terrance Cain threw for two touchdowns and Eddie Wide ran for 129 yards to help Utah cruise to a 30-14 win over Louisville on Saturday night.

Cain completed his first eight passes and the Utes scored two touchdowns 18 seconds apart to take control early and help get going again after a 31-24 loss at Oregon last week that ended the nation's longest active winning streak.

Wide replaced Matt Asiata, who left after a knee injury on the game's first touchdown, and made many of his 19 carries on direct snaps with Cain often lined up in the slot position.

After Louisville closed to 23-14 in the fourth quarter, Cain capped an 80-yard drive with a wide receiver screen to Jereme Brooks, who outran the Cardinals for a 34-yard touchdown.

Cain completed 17 of 22 passes for 202 yards.

The most anxious moment for the Utes came when Cameron Graham grabbed a tipped ball off receiver Scott Long's hands and scored a touchdown with 8:51 remaining in the final quarter to cut Utah's lead to 23-14.

Utah is now 4-0 against Louisville. The teams' only prior meeting in Salt Lake City was the first game played in Rice-Eccles Stadium on Sept. 12, 1998. Utah has won 12 straight in the stadium.

Since the Bowl Championship Series began in 1998, Utah has won 18 games against teams from automatic qualifying conferences, more than any other non-BCS school. The Utes are 7-0 against current members of the Big East Conference.

On a drive fueled by Wide's 25-yard scamper, Joe Phillips hit his third field goal with 12:34 left in the game to put the Utes ahead 23-7 in front of a homecoming crowd that numbered 45,588, sixth-largest in team history.

The Utes seemed to make all the big plays right from the start. R.J. Stanford blocked Ryan Payne's field goal attempt to thwart Louisville's quick-striking first drive that had the Cardinals first-and-goal at the Utah 8-yard line.

Asiata took a pitch to the left side midway through the first quarter and broke four tackles on his way to a 24-yard touchdown run that opened the scoring. After the score, Asiata, who led the Mountain West Conference with a 101-yard rushing average, went straight to the locker room.

Utah's highly touted offensive tackle, Zane Beadles, also left the game with a cut leg in the third quarter.

After two thrilling plays, Utah was in the end zone again. Koa Misi chased Louisville's Trent Guy on a reverse and forced a fumble from the back side that Robert Johnson threw back into the field of play as he fell out of bounds. Stanford recovered the ball for Utah.

On the next snap, Cain lofted a 42-yard pass that was caught in stride by David Reed for a touchdown--and the longest play from scrimmage against the Louisville defense this season.

Late in the second quarter, Joe Phillips added field goals from 30 yards and 48 yards to give Utah a 20-0 lead at the half.

Chaz Thompson intercepted Cain on the Utes' first possession of the second half, which led to Justin Burke's 8-yard touchdown scramble with 7:47 left in the third quarter to get Louisville on the scoreboard. Burke was 15 of 33 passing and was sacked six times.

Pathfinder
The Pathfinder, in addition to possibly blowing out a rear tire last week, also reached a milestone of sorts. The odometer rolled over to 90,000 miles / 144,800 kilometers on my way home from school on Friday night just before I got off of Doug’s hated 405 Freeway.

I have gotten used to seeing five digit odometer rollovers in the Pathfinder and the Prelude.

I think I will have a chance to see another six digit odometer rollover when the Pathfinder hits 100,000 miles. I doubt that I will see the Prelude rollover to 400,000 since I am only at 359,000 miles in it now.

Events I won’t be going to
When I drive home from school on Friday nights, the traffic is not too heavy so I can take more than a passing glance at the billboards along the 91 Freeway. I discovered there are two upcoming events in early October that I will not be attending.

I will be missing the Tattoo Expo and Adultcon. I think sleeping on the balcony on the weekend days of these events is a much better use of my time. Even exercising would be better but let’s not get too overboard on exercising.

Tattoo Expo is all about body art. I guess calling a tattoo body art makes it sound a little nicer. Besides, I know I can skip the event because I have a number of students, male and female in my class, who have body art. Besides, my class has free parking.

Adultcon is an adult entertainment convention. I think most of the attendees are male and are interested in meeting adult film stars in person. I suppose I should go and support one of our local industries.

Did you know that the San Fernando Valley is the capital of the filmed or DVD adult entertainment world?

I don’t think the City of Los Angeles likes to brag about that part of its history. The San Fernando Valley is mostly a large section of Los Angeles. I don think Mayor Antonio Villaragosa will be there.

I guess the adult entertainment industry for Los Angeles is sort of like every family’s weird uncle or aunt. We acknowledge them but wish they would stay out of sight.


Be well and stay happy.

Graduation at School and Other Events

Graduation at School and Other Events
I went the school’s Summer Quarter graduation on Wednesday night. Two of my former students asked me to come to the ceremony so I did. As you might expect, graduation is a big family event. In many cases, the student is the first one in the family to have completed high school and college, either an Associate’s or a Bachelor’s degree.

I wasn’t very lucky in picking my seat location; I ended up sitting near a lot of infants who had much better ideas of how they should have spent Wednesday night. This was to be expected since the majority of the students are in their early twenties and many are married with small children.

The two former students were surprised to see me at graduation. I said that they asked me to be there so I was. I received an incredibly fast introduction to their families. Being a good instructor, I told their families that the students were some of my favorite students and that they did very well in my classes.

About half of the students who graduated had been in one or more of my classes. They were surprised to see me at their graduation. One of my students introduced me to his fiancé. She wanted to know if he had been a good student in my classes. I said that he had but she looked as if she didn’t believe me. I told her to read the letter of recommendation it wrote for him.

The student said, “Thanks again Mr. R.; that was a killer letter you wrote for me and Justin.”

I smiled.

Pathfinder
I got the Pathfinder’s tire fixed. Actually, I had to buy a new tire because the old one had suffered a catastrophic tread failure that could not be repaired. I must have driven over something on the sharp or pointed side because there was a cut about four inches long that extended into the side wall about an inch.

The tire technician said that my tire was ten years old and that it would have failed soon regardless. He suggested that I replace the other three tires so that I would have a safe set of tires on the car.

I thought about the replacement idea but held off on the decision for the time being. The old tires were driven for 40,000 miles. The tread wear is still good. I don’t drive the Pathfinder all that much.

Visitors
We had another slow week for visitors. The log had 146 visitors who stopped by to look at 173 unique pages. I do appreciate all of you who stop by and visit the blog.


Be well and stay happy.

Residue

Residue
There are always some left over thoughts and ideas from when I write the Weekend Update blog entry. I had a few leftover thoughts that didn’t make it into the regular blog.

9
I went to see the film 9 last week. It is an animation film that takes place in a post-apocalyptic world ruled and populated only by machines and nine rag dolls or sock puppets. I wish I had a copy of the film because it would be a good film to show in my Group Dynamics course.

I enjoyed the film and think it presents a great deal to think about after wards. The characters are all voiced by very good actors. I found it surprising that the warrior character was a female role.

I would recommend seeing it if you have time and want something without the mindless explosions and car chases at the cinema.

Doug is not much of an animation fan so he has not seen the film. I think he would enjoy 9 if he saw it.

Pathfinder and Fatburger
I went to Fatburger on Friday night after my evening class. I picked up a large fatburger with cheese and an order of fat fries. It was a perfect ending to a long day and an extremely satisfying comfort food meal at the end of the day.

Either at Fatburger or on my way home, the Pathfinder’s left rear tire picked up a puncture of some sort. I discovered the problem on Sunday when I went out to Giuliano’s for my evening meal.

Tomorrow morning I will call the Automobile Club and have them come out to change the tire for me. I could change it myself except for the fact that I do not have a wrench that will handle the locking lug nut.

Life is so much fun sometimes.


Be well and stay happy.

At least BYU lost

At Least BYU Lost
Our Utes did not prevail in a closer game than the score would otherwise indicate. I watched the game from the comfort of my flat in Southern California. I think the Utes could have won with more inspired play calling and with a quarterback who can through the football in the rain or mist in Oregon.

After all, Utah plays most of its games in adverse weather, well adverse when compared to Southern California, so it seems only logical to recruit a player who is used to playing in rain and snow. The current Utah quarterback comes from Houston where they do not have much in the way of snow.

In any event, the Princess and I can take comfort in the fact that Brigham Young University lost badly in a home game in Provo. Of course, the losses will take both schools out of the BCS big post season bowl games unless there is an incredible melt-down everywhere else which is a possibility given USC’s stumble in Seattle.

Rather than write my own game summary, I choose this one as a better one. It is by Kurt Kragethorpe of the Salt Lake Tribune.

Eugene, Ore.
Late in the fourth quarter, when Utah quarterback Terrance Cain's pass was floating toward receiver Jereme Brooks, it all still seemed so possible.
After everything the Utes did wrong Saturday afternoon at Autzen Stadium, from Cain's firing 11 straight incompletions in the first half to the Utah defense's allowing a 152-yard rusher, you just figured that somehow, they would overcome all of that and keep winning.

Brian Johnson and the '08 Utes always did, right?

Cain and the '09 Utes did not. Utah was driving toward a tying touchdown in the last two minutes, when Oregon safety John Boyett intercepted Cain's underthrown pass. The result for the Utes was a 31-24 defeat that ended their nation-leading 16-game winning streak, left them with what offensive lineman Zane Beadles described as “a foreign feeling” and tossed the rest of their season into the “to be determined” file.

When it was all over, the sun broke through, casting a glow over the Oregon campus. During the game, the atmosphere was gray and rainy, eerily forecasting a Duck kind of day. The Utes had grown used to the sun shining on their sideline alone over the last couple seasons.

"We all wish that could have gone on for infinity," said coach Kyle Whittingham, alluding to the streak that stretched over parts of three seasons. Forgive him for maybe wishing some of his dependable players could have stuck around longer, to deliver more of the resourceful performances that characterized the perfect '08 campaign. Or perhaps that team's clever escapes just used up Utah's quota.

Whittingham credited his current players with "guts and toughness," after they could have crumbled when trailing 28-10 in the third quarter, but whatever else it took for Johnson and his teammates to produce those fourth-quarter finishes was missing.

So another streak ended, and for anyone looking for a parallel occurrence, it is easy to find. In the third game of the '05 season, after the Utes' run stretched to 18 wins, offensive failings cost them in an overtime loss at Texas Christian.

Cain produced a touchdown run in the first quarter and a creative touchdown pass to Brooks in the third quarter that made it 28-24. In between, and afterward, he struggled. During a seven-series stretch when the Utes failed to gain a first down and netted only 6 yards, Cain went 0-for-10 against Oregon's varied defensive schemes and tight coverage.

The junior college transfer recovered nicely in the second half, only to throw two fourth-quarter interceptions.

The first came after Ute safety Robert Johnson's end zone interception kept the score 28-24, following Johnson's fumble-return touchdown. Oregon linebacker Eddie Pleasant "came out of nowhere," Cain said, with an interception that led to a field goal.

The clincher came after Utah had moved to the Oregon 38. Brooks appeared open, deep on the right sideline, but Boyett made sure the ball never reached its target. "I should have put it a little bit more out there, so [Brooks] would have a chance," Cain said.

The Utes were left to express those sorts of regrets for the first time since November 2007, when BYU's famed "fourth-and-18" play helped beat them.
"I don't expect to lose," said linebacker Stevenson Sylvester. "In fact, it does happen, so we're going to have to learn how to cope with that."

Whittingham walked away saying, "We're still trying to figure out who we are, in a lot of ways."

Who they're not, apparently, is the '08 Utes, which only underscores how remarkable those guys were.

Dr. Karen Got Married
I didn’t see Dr. Karen on Friday for my regular appointment with her. She had just gotten married so I am guessing that she was on her honeymoon.

Congratulations and best wishes Dr. Karen.

Dr. Michelle Wang filled in on Friday. Dr. Wang had filled in four or five times before over the last twenty months or so. Doug and I both like Dr. Wang.

Since Dr. Karen wasn’t there, the appointment went much faster because I had fewer questions to ask since Dr. Wang doesn’t know as much about me and my cancer as Dr. Karen. That is not her fault. She said my regular lab tests were normal and that she was happy my immune system was functioning normally.

My next appointment will be October 9th and Dr. Karen should be back in town. I hope to see her then.

Nurse Vhrunda and Nurse Wendy and the calorie cluster bomb
I dropped off my calorie cluster bomb to Vhrunda and Wendy on Friday. They were like children on Christmas Day, excited about getting a gift.

I told them the five pounds of Hershey’s miniatures was an early Halloween gift. I also said that I would not be responsible for any ill-fitting scrubs after they finish off the candy. Vhrunda said that I was responsible since there would be no ill-fitting if hadn’t given them the candy.

I suppose that I could have said they didn’t have to eat the candy. That would have fallen on deaf ears I think.

Wendy said, with a big smile after taking hold of my hand, that I could give them some more candy in late October.

Thoughtful of her now.

Sending and forwarding emails
I will freely admit that I forward emails. I think almost everyone I know forwards emails. Friday was no exception for me.

My friend Lizzie sent me, I think, 18 or 19 emails with over 20 or 25 MB of data. That was the most I have ever received in one day from one sender. Well, I think it was the most. I guess Lizzie had saved up a bunch of material and had a lot of free time on Friday to send them out.

When I forward an email, I always clean up and delete all of the prior addresses. That just seems like the proper way to handle a forwarded email to me. I don’t understand why some people will forward an email with a hundred or more email addresses on it.

Random Thought
I use Microsoft Office 2007 like a lot of people. I suppose that most of the blog readers use Office 2007 too.

Have you ever noticed the icon of the Save function is an old 3.5 inch floppy disk?

How many of you still use that size floppy disk drive?

For some strange reason, I have an external 3.5 inch floppy disk drive that I use regularly. Mostly, I save my personal correspondence on it. I don’t feel like using a rewritable CD since that would take close to a lifetime or more to fill up.

High Definition Television
I am very happy that Doug convinced me to purchase my big screen, high definition television set last year. California is proposing some new energy regulations about electricity use that will require large screen televisions to be much more power efficient beginning in 2011. This new regulation will likely result in higher costs to meet the new technology requirements.

I am glad to avoid the likely higher cost. I am also glad to be able to watch our beloved Utes play on the big screen, even when they play poorly.

Visitors
Last week, we saw a drop off in visitors. We had 110 visitors who viewed 124 unique pages. I guess that I need to reconsider my decision to end the Woman of the Moment feature. That brought the traffic to the blog. I do appreciate all of you who take time out of your otherwise busy day to visit the blog.


Be well and stay happy.

50,000th Blog Visitor, Crows, and Utah Football

50,000th Blog Visitor
The blog had its 50,000th visitor on Sunday afternoon. He was from New Haven, Connecticut and visited the archives and in particular January 1, 2007. It has taken just over four and a half years to reach this level.

On a lesser note, the blog traffic was off last week. We had 123 visitors who looked at 174 unique pages.

I do appreciate all of you who stopped to visit the blog.

Crows
I think many of the regular readers of the blog know I live next to a park. Usually, this is an advantage in my mind because the park is dark and quite at night and on the weekends. Not having a neighbor directly opposite you on the other side of the fence is rather peaceful.

Ever since I moved in, crows, a large flock of crows, fly into the park in early May and seem to stay around until the end of June. Crows are loud, raucous birds that like nothing more than to make a great deal of noise in the early morning as the sun comes up.

This year, May was a quite month for me and I enjoyed the ability to sleep in on the weekends.

Sunday, the crows were back in the park; loud and noisy as ever. My plans for a nice long sleep evaporated. They weren’t out this morning so maybe this was a one-time aberrant visit to ruin my sleep.

Utah Football
Our Utes, our being the Princess and me, struggled to win a game against San Jose State University in San Jose, California. I stayed up to watch the game. I only saw the second half but that was enough for me. Our Utes managed to maintain their unbeaten string at 16 games, the longest of any major football playing school

Rather than write my own rant about my frustrations, I’ll post in two columns from the Salt Lake Tribune sports writers.

Utes need a lot of work
By Gordon Monson
Tribune Columnist

San Jose, Calif.
The biggest opponent and the stiffest challenge facing the Utah Utes on Saturday night was neither San Jose State, nor beating the Spartans.

It was letting loose their own wandering focus and betraying themselves.
The Utes surely suspected they were the better team long before the opening kickoff here, seeing that San Jose had been crushed the week before by USC ... what was it, 7 billion to nothing?

They had studied the film, they had seen the Trojans treat the Spartan defense like a drag strip, they had watched San Jose State take a 3-zip lead, and then give 56 points back.

That game was all Spartans ... for a quarter.

Thereafter, well ... the poor possum family crossed the road in front of a Peterbilt.

The Utes knew which end of that business they should be on. But should and would sometimes don't line up all nice and tidy.

They did not come together so well this time, Utah struggling to defeat San Jose, 24-14.

In the first half alone, the Utes fumbled twice, the second of which led to a Spartan touchdown. They suffered stalled drives, including one that gagged at the San Jose State 1-yard line. And they missed two long field goals.

More mistakes followed.

The greater opportunity for the Utes stood up like this: They were heading for the second bag of their preseason sked, having already rounded first by beating Utah State.

Along the way, Terrance Cain had to show what he could do in his first road game as a big-time college quarterback. It was part of the growing and training process that was leading him smack-dab toward a date with Oregon at Autzen Stadium next Saturday, when the preseason would slam into a brick wall and the play suddenly would have to be more polished, the offensive attack filled out.

Unlike Saturday night, when it coughed and sputtered.

The best way, naturally, to prepare for what comes next against a Pac-10 team was dialing in on the here and now against a listing bunch from the WAC.

That's exactly what Kyle Whittingham expected his team to do.

Still, the fact that the Utes had lost three of their four road openers under Whittingham, and now were moving ahead with an inexperienced quarterback, had to dance on the edges of his mind.

Early against the Spartans, Utah seemed to be arguing with itself as to how best to mix the run with the pass, and the result was less than impressive: the Utes scored just seven points.

Over that span, Cain threw for 139 yards, and ran for 39, but the offense's consistency blew.

Cain needed to throw the ball around enough to expand on his rudimentary showing against Utah State, when the JC transfer made the same read, throwing the same pass to the same receiver, over and over, again. He opened up a bit more against the Spartans.

His ongoing development is a major priority for the Utes, a point that must be addressed and stressed for this team to ever fill its measure.

The defense will be OK, although it was imperfect here. The rush attack is solid. The receivers are play-makers.

That leaves Cain to become what he can -- right away. If he is being fed milk and rice cereal, first, he'll have to step up to a full Hungry Man now. And, overall, it leaves Utah having to reduce its errors.

That's what these first two games were supposedly for: Preparing a team and a QB to find focus -- and themselves _ in the present, preparing themselves concurrently for oncoming better competition.

A full-course meal awaits.

GORDON MONSON hosts the "Monson and Graham Show" weekdays from 2-6 p.m. on 1280 AM The Zone. He can be reached at gmonson@sltrib.com

Utes hold off stubborn Spartans
By Lya Wodraska
The Salt Lake Tribune

San Jose, Calif.
Utah's game against San Jose State Saturday should have been nothing more than a formality. Take a short plane flight, pick up a road win and move on to the bigger, badder teams looming on the schedule starting with the visit to Oregon next week.

San Jose State should have been like Utah State, another nice relatively easy win against a WAC opponent in which the 17th-ranked Utes' new quarterback had a chance to become more familiar with the offense in live situations, the defense could iron out those missed assignments and the first-year coordinators could become more comfortable in their roles.

Only the Spartans (0-2) didn't play along with that expected storyline Saturday, showing that while the WAC may have fallen behind the MWC in prestige and national awareness, its teams can still cause fits for BCS contenders including the Utes.

"Give credit to San Jose," Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said. "They played hard. They had a great game plan going in."

The Utes (2-0) did indeed survive, beating the Spartans 24-14, but the game wasn't nearly as decisive as the final score indicated.

Sure, Oregon is next on the schedule as is a home date with Louisville and the conference schedule, but first the Utes must go home and figure out what went wrong Saturday before they can look ahead to those matchups.

'Suspect,' was the best way to describe the Utes' Saturday. Suspect in the way they played and suspect in regards to the outcome of the game for much of the night.

The same team that was whipped by USC 56-3 last week held the Utes scoreless for two quarters, a drought that wasn't broken until receiver Jereme Brooks scored on a 51-yard pass play with 13:44 remaining that finally gave the Utes a 14-7 lead.

In between that play and an impressive opening drive in which Terrance Cain led the Utes on a 77-yard scoring drive, the Utes virtually did everything wrong they possibly could. Cain, who found his receivers with strong, accurate passes and wisely tucked the ball and ran when necessary in that drive, got shakier and shakier as the game continued.

As he went, so too did the rest of the Utah team. Running back Matt Asiata's runs were dominant at first then diminished, Utah lost two fumbles and Utah's defenders committed several costly penalties. As a team, the Utes were penalized 11 times for 69 yards. Even the kicking game suffered as Ben Vroman, who made his first collegiate field goal against Utah State, failed on three attempts Saturday.

Trick plays backfired too as a pass play from Asiata and Cain on 4th-and-goal at the one-yard line failed with the ball soaring past Cain's outstretched fingers as he ran wide open in the right corner of the end zone.

"We did a lot of things not very effectively," Whittingham said. "Namely, we didn't play the deep ball very well. We turned the ball over twice in the first half. Our special teams was a big dropoff from last week. You name it, we have to work on it this week."

The Utes have two injuries to deal with now too. Asiata's night ended early with a shoulder injury and offensive lineman Caleb Schlauderaff started then was held out for precautionary reasons because of a knee injury. Both will be evaluated Sunday.

The only other thing that remained for the Utes to mess up was the ending. Luckily for them they didn't.

Cain settled down, finishing 18-of-31 for 248 yards, and the Utes made it 21-7 with a 15-yard run by Eddie Wide with 9:03 remaining, then held on to escape with their perfect record still intact. The question is, how intact is their confidence?

Certainly it has to be a little shaky after struggling against a team that hasn't beaten a ranked opponent since upsetting No. 9 TCU 27-24 in 2000.

Whittingham insisted earlier this week the game wouldn't be a 'trap' game because the Utes wouldn't allow it to be one. They'd be ready to play and give their best effort, he indicated.

If that indeed was the case and Saturday was a best effort, next week's game at Oregon suddenly looks much more challenging than it did last week when the Ducks were losing to Boise State and Utah was manhandling Utah State.

Maybe the Utes will get back to Salt Lake City, dissect the film and decide Saturday was just one of those weird nights when bizarre things happen.

Or maybe they'll get home and decide trap game or not, the Utes escaped and for a young team finding its identity, that is good enough regardless of what occurred, at least for this night.

"We could have played better, but we can't get frustrated," Cain said. "We need to stay poised."

Fatburger
Doug and I were talking over the long holiday weekend about a bunch of things like if there were any good films to see [Doug didn’t think there were any] or if Doug and the Movie Club had any thoughts the cartoon 9 [not his type of cartoon].

I said that we ought to get together for a run to the Original Tommy’s Hamburgers sometime soon, at least before year end. Doug wasn’t interested in Tommy’s because he said the meal tended to stay with him all day long and into the night.

I always thought was one of the benefits and joys of eating a Tommy’s hamburger with cheese and chili on it.

Our conversation drifted off to other hamburger venues and we could both agree on Fatburger as place where we could both go and enjoy a meal there.

I decided to go to Fatburger last Tuesday for an early dinner. It was temporarily closed because of a transformer failure. They staff gave me a couple of discount coupons for future visits. I gave the crew from Southern California Edison time to fix the transformer and went back for a large Fatburger with cheese and everything else and Fat Fries for dinner. My receipt had a coupon for a free order of fries on my next trip there.

Perfectomundo.


Be well and stay happy.

Utah Football and other things of interest or not as the case may be

Utah Football
I am going to use a part of an email from my old Utah roommate Dave who went to the game that Utah won. Utah’s consecutive game win streak is now at 15.

Just a quick report on the game from my perspective. First, the most important thing was that Utah won the game, but it was no walkover. Utah controlled the game, but they did not dominate. Utah State came out strong and actually took the lead 3-0. Asiata fumbled on his first carry of the season.

Utah then awoke, so to speak, and scored twice on good drives. But after they took a 14 to 3 lead, I told my friend Dave Hosick that Utah had better not get complacent. Utah had Utah State deep in its own territory, on is 3.5 yard line with a potential safety a distinct possibility, and then the Utah State running back went right through the Utah middle all the way for a TD. Ugh! It was the longest play in Utah State history, or so said the Salt Lake Tribune this morning.

Utah State was running a true spread offense, which is difficult to defend in my view. Gary Andersen and his troops have nothing to be ashamed of, as they played well and hard for the entire game.

The good news for Utah fans is that Terrance Cain is the real deal in my opinion. He was cool under fire and had very, very few plays that he didn't do well. The one question mark about him remaining is whether or not he can throw accurately the long pass. Utah did not try to take advantage of his running ability. That was too bad, because the Utes ran the same play with Asiata time and time again, and if he had faked the handoff and taken off he could have made big yardage.

Utah scored two safeties in the game, one on blocked punt in the end zone and another on a tackle of the USU QB in the end zone. Utah gave up a very late TD in the first half, when a pass bounced off a receiver and was intercepted by USU deep in Utah territory. The Aggies scored a moment later. Utah only scored 9 points in the second half, a TD in the 3rd quarter and then a safety in the 4th quarter. Asiata rushed for 36 times gaining 156 yards.

Another good thing of sorts for the game is that I thought the game was well refereed. There have been so many times in the past when I thought the refs really blew a lot of calls and hosed a team, usually the Utes. Utah didn't have too many penalties, and neither did the Aggies.

Thanks Dave.

I watched part of the Oregon – Boise State game. I was torn about which team to root for. Normally, I would have rooted for Boise States, the underdog. But, since Boise State had a chance to go undefeated with a victory over Oregon, I was inclined to root for Oregon since an undefeated Boise State season might affect Utah’s chances for a top level, post season game in January.

Perfect.

Then I thought about my Brother’s USC Trojans and how an Oregon defeat would benefit them.

In the end, I switched sides as the game went on.

Visitors
We had a modest uptick in visitors in the past week. We had 203 visitors who viewed 269 unique pages. This was the first time in several weeks that the visitor count was over 200. I surprised when I checked on the most popular pages in the blog archive. I found that January 1, 2007 had fallen to 59% of the traffic while the current blog page had risen to second place with almost 20% of the traffic.

I do appreciate all of you who come out to the blog from time to time.

Nokia
I happen to love Nokia cell phones. I currently own two of them. My first hand held cell phone was a Nokia Model 100, a small brick with no texting capability. All I could do with the phone was talking. I got that phone in 1990 and have used Nokia cell phones ever since.

My current Nokia phone is a Model 6126. I use it mostly for talking. I have sent about 60 messages in the three plus years I have owned it. I have so many messages because two of my students liked to send me text messages. I responded in kind with properly spelled words, proper punctuation, and proper sentence structure. I think that may have upset them.

By way of comparison, a month or so ago Doug sent something like 2,300 text messages under his unlimited data plan. He said that he is trying to cut down on his texting now.

So, why am I writing about Nokia in my blog?

I am writing to vent my extreme frustration with the Nokia online store.

It is horrible; it is painful to use; it sucks; it is a failure.

One of my Nokia cell phone’s battery recharging function was failing after three years of use. It is on the AT&T network so I went into the local AT&T store to buy a new phone.

All I wanted to buy was a Nokia cell phone that came in the flip form factor and use it to talk on.

That seemed very simple to me.

The nice young clerk said that the store didn’t carry any Nokia flip phones. She was very helpful in a not very helpful for me sort of way. She did show me a Nokia semi-smart phone that I could use to download videos and surf the Internet.

And, best of all, it was only USD$129 with a two year contract renewal.

Never mind the point that I have been off contract for over a year now and I am very happy being off contract.

She was very helpful when I said all that I wanted to do was and she suggested that I could purchase a Nokia flip phone online at either AT&T or Nokia web sites.

I went to the Nokia web site since I thought I would have more choice by going to the manufacturer. This was my step in the path to endless frustration and anguish.

The Nokia web site has a mandatory selection function that sucks. It asks you what is important to you as a cell phone user. None of the choices included simply talking. It was impossible to go directly to the form factor and navigate from there.

I don’t need GPS. Doug calls me The Navigator. I have maps that work wonderfully and I never have to run the risk of losing power in the device before I arrive.

I finally reached the section that I wanted. I was scrolling through the images of the phones. This went well until I clicked on the second page of photos. Some of the photos were being shown in a thumbnail size and some were being shown in life size. The life size ones overshadowed the other images so I had no idea what they looked like.

Brilliant design and web site management there Nokia.

Nokia has a sales agent chat function that is next to worthless. I was unable to even enter one letter in the conversation box when the agent came online.

So much for guided help Nokia.

After close to 45 minutes, I bailed out and abandoned the search and purchase effort.

I came home and swapped SIMM cards with the two Nokia cell phones that I have. I can now use the cell phone and it can properly charge my battery for my primary cell phone.

The other phone with the crummy or broken recharge function can still be used so long as I chat with the power cable plugged into the phone. This is an adequate work around since I rarely use the other phone; I have just kept it because I like the number and it is a lucky number, lots of 8’s in the phone number.

My long term solution doesn’t seem to have Nokia in much of the future.

Doug has been urging me to get an Apply 3G iPhone because it is an Apple and it is so easy to work. He said it has replaced his MacBook for many applications like emailing and web surfing. He used his first iPhone to take over 900 photos at the Princess’ wedding two years ago.

I’m just not sure if I want to be that connected to the Internet and everyone that I know. Being disconnected has its advantages in my little mind, like avoiding a nagging girl friend.

The other solution that looks very viable to me right now is a Samsung flip phone. My Verizon cell phone is a Samsung and it has performed very nicely for me for over four years now. Then, there is the economics of the cell phone; Samsung’s are much less expensive then the iPhone and buying two devices makes it more significant.

I still have time to make my decisions. When the phones ultimately fail, I will be faced with a decision. I can wait until then.


Be well and stay happy.

Quarter Break

Quarter Break
Half way through my quarter break and I am happy and enjoying life at the beach. Of course, the air is not so good now with all of the wildfires blazing in the area. The biggest one is now over 125,000 or so acres and it only started last Wednesday.


The fire is about 30 miles away from my flat but you can see the enormity of the clouds. The photo was taken from the car park on the second floor. Ok, so the photo isn't very best. It was taken with an old camera and not much of a distance lens.

Dr Karen and Me
I went in for my regular visit with Dr. Karen last Friday.

Dr. Karen was very happy to get an early Labor Day gift from me. I brought in the tissue block of my old tumor she had requested I pick up from Torrance Memorial Hospital. When I see her again in a couple of weeks, I will drop off a mini-calorie cluster bomb. It is a small box with 24 miniature dark Belgian chocolate brownies inside.

Yum, yum, yum.

I will also spot the nurses with their early Halloween calorie bomb, a modest five pound tin of Hershey’s Miniatures. They liked the last one so I know they will enjoy this one.

Of course, I will totally deny any responsibility for or any implications, involvement or culpability in any sudden weight gain from anyone.

Dr. Karen said my tests were all normal, no real changes. She did comment that my blood sugar was on the high side. I told her that the blood test was right after my breakfast with a banana on my cereal and I had forgotten to take my diabetes medicine right after eating.

Dr. Karen frowned as she looked over her glasses at me.

I am in a wait and see what happens next condition now. The big event for me will be the end of September colonoscopy procedure. Doug will be up for the procedure and will probably come to the October 9th meeting with Dr. Karen.

I had expected Dr. Karen to take me off the Xeloda like she did the last time I had a colonoscopy procedure. She said she took me off of the Xeloda the last time because the colorectal surgeons were so anxious to cut me open. This is not the case for this round.

Kindly Doctor Drill N Fill
I went to see my dentist on Saturday for my regular six month visit. I did not plan to have the appointments back to back; it just worked out that way.

Dr. Drill N Fill said my teeth were good. I figured as much since he did very little in the way of scraping. It was just an intense cleaning with a water device. It like the water device since it is much less noisy and irritating.

My dentist did find what he thought was a developing mole on my chin and suggested that I ask my doctor about it. Naturally, I couldn’t see any mole when I got home. I will speak to Dr. Karen and ask her what she can see when I see her in September.

DISTRICT 9
DISTRICT 9 is a new film about apartheid with a science fiction twist. The victims of the apartheid are a sentient species of aliens who are trapped on Earth when their ship’s engine fails over South Africa. The South Africans refer to the aliens as “shrimp” because of their skeletal nature of their bodies. The film was produced by Peter Jackson [LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy].


I went to see DISTRICT 9 last week after my lab tests. I liked the film; it is very entertaining. I think I may have mentioned that Doug and his Movie Club [4 of his movie fan friends] thought DISTRICT 9 was one of the best films of the year. The film is a protest against apartheid. The film has the usual cast of stereotypical characters from the blood thirsty mercenary leader to the severely ethical challenged corporate executive. It is a well made film and one that moves along quickly. There is some violence, mostly in the last twenty minutes or so, but not so much that it seems excessive or out of place within the film’s context. If you enjoy science fiction films, I think that you would enjoy this film.

There will be a sequel to the film because it has been so profitable. I think it will be released in probably 2011 or 2012; the film explains the release date assumption.

Visitors
We had 161 visitors last week who viewed 217 unique pages, still a little slow for the Summer.

August’s total visitor count was only 727, the lowest since November 2007. I had hoped that the blog would reach the 50,000 mark. It would seem fairly certain that I will reach the 50,000 level in September.

I do appreciate all of you who stopped by and visited the blog.


Be well and stay happy.