Stuff I forgot to say

Stuff I forgot to say
I think I forgot to mention a number of things in my last blog posting. This will be the first time in a while that I have made two blog posts in a week. Having three new classes requires more preparation time especially when they are all small classes.

Teaching
I had an email from my department chair this week. He was congratulating me for having great engagement [class attendance] numbers. That was on Tuesday night before one of my two students called me and said she wouldn’t be in class. Then, last night, my only student in my class called in and said she wouldn’t be in class.

My engagement numbers went right into the toilet.

I ran into one of my former students a week or so ago. I hadn’t seen her in over a year; she takes morning classes and I have been teaching at night. She had dyed her hair or rather let it return to its natural color, dark brown.

I felt embarrassed because I didn’t recognize her. On the plus side, she did look absolutely stunning with dark hair.

The school gave me an unexpected surprise today. I earned a bonus from last quarter. The bonus was more than I had expected. I will use it to buy myself an early Christmas gift, to me from me. I’m going to get a Kindle DX reader from Amazon. I had thought about buying a Kindle 3 but the bonus money will about cover the reader. The extra three inches of reading space was a deal clincher for me.

Theater
I went to see “The Allergist’s Wife” at the La Mirada Theater on opening weekend. I read the Los Angeles Times’ critic’s review of the play.

The critic thought it was only so-so. That was probably because she left at intermission. The play got better in the second half. I thought the play was good. I gave some vouchers for tickets to the play to a friend of mine. She went with one of her girl friends; they liked the play.

So much for professional reviewers.

Weather
I was going to get the MINI washed today. It was looking a little sad from last week’s drizzles. I woke to the sound of “Here Comes the Sun” on the radio and rainwater in the building gutters and downspouts.

So much for a car wash trip.

Rain on a convertible roof sounds so much different than rain on a steel car roof. I like that softer sound. Of course, I haven’t been in a heavy downpour yet so I may change my mind.

I was listening to a local weather newsreader the other day. He said this past Summer was one of the coolest Summers on record.

Perfect timing to get a convertible.


Be well and stay happy.

End of September, end of the Summer

End of September, end of the Summer
Yes, I do know that it is now almost the middle of October. I have had some distractions in my life lately. It is 10/10/10 today.

Distractions happen.

The Month in Numbers
The MINI ended the month with 4,773 miles on the odometer.

The blog had 801 visitors, the most since July 2009.

The MINI had 23.5 hours on the openometer and 64.50 total hours on the openometer.

University of Utah Football
Our Utes are doing well in football, improving to a 5 – 0 record so far after crushing Iowa State University at Ames, Iowa 68 – 27. Utah now has 21 wins over BCS teams; the most wins by a team from a non-automatic qualifying conference.

It certainly looks like Utah is ready for the big leagues now.

Next week, our Utes play Wyoming. Wyoming has a 2 – 4 record now.

The Mountain West Conference now has three teams ranked in the Top 25 in the nation. Texas Christian University and the Air Force Academy join Utah in that grouping.

Sweet.

The Princess’ South Carolina Gamecocks knocked the nation’s number one ranked college football team in a game at Columbia. That moved South Carolina to the Number Ten spot in one poll, dropping our Utes to Number Eleven.

No. 10 Utah makes statement, stomps out Iowa State

AMES, Iowa -- (AP)After watching two early turnovers turn into quick Iowa State touchdowns, No. 10 Utah knew it was time to find its trademark rhythm.

It didn't take long for the Utes to turn things around.

Jordan Wynn threw for 325 yards and two touchdowns, Shaky Smithson threw a TD pass and caught another one and No. 10 Utah blew past host Iowa State 68-27 Saturday night, scoring its most points since beating Wyoming 69-14 in 1983.

Eddie Wide added three touchdowns for the Utes (5-0, 2-0 MWC), who overcame an early 14-10 hole with 31 unanswered points in the second quarter.

"I just kind of got into a groove and rolled with it," Wynn said. "As a whole offense, we just started clicking."

Once the Utes got going, they didn't stop.

Smithson, a wide receiver, gave the Utes a 17-14 lead with a 32-yard touchdown pass early in the second quarter. Matt Asiata and Wide followed with short TD runs, and Wynn found Smithson for a 61-yard touchdown to make it 38-14 late in the first half.
Reggie Dunn's 100-yard kickoff return for a touchdown pushed Utah's lead to 51-20 midway through the third quarter.

Austen Arnaud had 178 yards passing for Iowa State (3-3, 1-1 Big 12), which has surrendered 106 points in the last two games.

Utah had seemingly gotten lost in the BCS-buster shuffle as Boise State and TCU rolled out to unbeaten starts. Utah's lone big win came against scuffling Pittsburgh, 27-24, in its opener, and the Utes had feasted on UNLV, New Mexico and San Jose State in subsequent weeks.

The Cyclones certainly aren't a Big 12 powerhouse, but the ease with which the Utes handled them was impressive.

Utah racked up 593 yards of offense, topped 50 points for the third week in a row and held Iowa State -- which beat Texas Tech 52-38 just a week ago -- to 0-for-11 on third downs.

"Everyone was underestimating us. I mean, that's kind of been the story of this whole season," Utah linebacker Chad Manis said. "We're going to go out every game and make a statement. We earned our ranking."

On a night when seemingly every Ute shined, none stood out quite like Smithson.

In the first half alone, Smithson set up a touchdown with a spectacular 78-yard punt return, threw his TD pass off a reverse and snagged a long touchdown pass to help put the Utes ahead 41-14.

On his punt return, Smithson fought his way through traffic near the right sideline, cut left and then back inside before running out of gas at the 2-yard line. Wynn followed with a short TD pass to Wide to give Utah a 10-7 lead.

Smithson then pulled up on a reverse and chucked the ball into the end zone. It was a risky toss between two Iowa State defenders, but the ball plopped in DeVonte Christopher's lap to put the Utes back ahead 17-14.

Smithson later pulled up on a fly pattern to grab Wynn's pass, shook off his defender and sprinted 61 yards for the score.

"Whenever I got the ball in my hands, I was just really tried to make a big play and just get the momentum for my team," Smithson said.
Iowa State knew it would need some breaks to hang with the Utes, and the Cyclones took advantage of two early takeaways to jump ahead 14-10.

A Utah fumble deep in its own territory led to a 2-yard TD run by Alexander Robinson, and Arnaud followed a Wynn pick with a 20-yard touchdown toss in the back of the end zone to Jake Williams.

The lead didn't last though, because Iowa State couldn't control the line of scrimmage or even slow the high-flying Utes.

"Some days you get up and you get the unexpected. That was a heck of a football team. There was clearly a big difference in team speed out there tonight," Iowa State coach Paul Rhoads said. "That showed in all phases, special teams in particular. We were soundly beat in all three phases."

Even when the Cyclones scored, Utah quickly topped them. Arnaud threw a 36-yard TD pass to Collin Franklin in the third quarter. But Utah blocked the extra point, and Dunn took the kickoff 100 yards for a score.

The Utes had 109 yards on a pair of interception returns and 156 yards on six punt returns.

"Once we got the two turnovers behind us in the first quarter, we got into a rhythm and did a nice job," Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said. "We were very productive."

Road tripping with the Princess
The Princess phoned me on Thursday to ask me if I could drive her to Santa Barbara in the MINI on Friday and then pick her up on Saturday and drop her off at Los Angeles International Airport. I tentatively said yes because I wasn’t sure if I could get all of her stuff in the car. The Princess was coming to town for a campus recruiting trip.


The Princess emailed me the dimensions of her easel that she was going to use for her presentation. It fit in the back of the MINI if I put the back seats down with three inches to spare. I was going to put the seats down regardless since it would be easier to carry her suitcase there.

Friday was a perfect day for road tripping in the MINI with the top down. It was warm and sunny and 76F / 25C when we left LAX and turned north on the 405. The 405 was a crawl through the Westside until we passed the 10. Then, speeds improved.

On the plus side, the slow speeds gave us time to talk. Driving at 65 miles an hour is too noisy for a conversation.

The MINI handled very well and drove like a dream as we reached Santa Barbara. On the return trip to Redondo Beach, I opted for the scenic route along Pacific Coast Highway. This was an excellent opportunity to see how the MINI handled in S curves at a moderate speed.

It handled perfectly.

This was my best time to try this since S curves are not popular with the Princess.

The Saturday drive was much better because there was no traffic to speak of as I drove to pick her up. As the Princess had planned, she did pick up some sun on the ride to Santa Barbara. We made excellent time on the return trip.

This was particularly good because I was able to drop her off directly in front of the curbside baggage check-in spot. She only had to walk three feet to check her bags and, best of all, she was the only one checking in at the time.

By checking in a hour and forty five minutes early, the Princess had time to relax and find something to eat before her flight.


We compared tans after the drive to Santa Barbara and back.

Perfectomundo.

This was my first time driving for an extended time. Each trip was four to five hours behind the wheel. Overall, I felt very well after the two trips.

The MINI ended the weekend with 5,735 miles on the odometer.

I did find one minor disappointment with the MINI. It has a smaller engine than the Prelude and so has less power climbing hills like the grade on 101 coming south out of Oxnard and the Sepulveda Pass. The MINI did automatically down shift into the lower gears and I was able to maintain my speed.

More power would have been nicer but this would result in lower fuel efficiency.

I can live with lower power.

Doctor D and Me
I went to see Doctor D this past Tuesday. Doug came with me because he hadn’t met her yet.

My lab tests were all in the normal for me range and that made Doctor D happy. This was the first time that she has worn scrubs for an appointment. Doctor Karen rarely wore scrubs.

Most of the appointment was spent in discussing whether I should take a referral to the City of Hope, a major national cancer hospital, for a second opinion on my treatment plans. Doctor D wanted me to do that and said the City of Hope was more aggressive in its approach to treating cancer than the Harbor UCLA Medical Center.

After talking about the second opinion option for about ten minutes, I agreed to do that. Doctor D will send me a referral form in the mail.

Doug also agreed with Doctor D. He also said the Tuesday appointments were great because there are fewer patients in the appointment cycle. Doug did have a point there.

I also ordered the Halloween candy from Hershey’s for the Oncology Clinic nurses. They love chocolate.

Lunch with Doug
Doug and I had lunch after the appointment with Doctor D. We went to BJ’s Brew Pub in Torrance since it is on the way to my house.

We talked about writing and the cinema, our usual subjects lately. I said that I figured that I needed to add perhaps as much as one hundred more pages to the first book to provide some foreshadowing and deeper narrative based explanations.

Doug recommended that I go see SOCIAL NETWORK. I would have done that this weekend but I was out on the roads instead.


Be well and stay happy.