It is Done

That's it. Finito Lance Ito. It's done. Vacation over and done with. It was nice while it lasted, but now I'm back to the grind stone. Like Sugar Ray Leonard, here are the quick hits:

• Turducken is mighty tasty. The white meat on the turkey turned out dryer than a fried turkey (which is still my favorite), but the sheer fact that you can eat 3 animals at once and not have it be all ground up (a la hot dogs/sausage/etc) is definitely nice. We will be partaking in the Christmas Turducken. If only they had a way to fit Goose in there. Turgoosen is what it would be called. I don't really like eating Geese. I just don't like the animal.
• Congrats to Daisha and JR on being pregnant. After June I guess I'll never get to see JR at basketball again. Just as well really... I'm tired of him blocking my shots.
• Some people are having problems getting the WhoAmI program. If you are one of those and you still want it, send me an email and I'll email it to you. It's really big..like 100K. As an aside, I remember when I had this program on diskette. The thought of having anything on diskette now is absurd. I have word documents that eat 100k as a light snack. Those word documents aern't nearly as fun as that program though. Heck, this blog post is probably going to border 100k.
• Shout out to my brother in-law as well as my brother for getting cell phones within the past week. Welcome to the late 90s boys.
• Shout out to our Beta for still being alive. Although I kind of wish he would just kick the bucket. He's very sick. He got pop-eye and the eye popped out. It's just a socket now. He's gasping for air even though the water has plenty. He's been this way for weeks. I don't see how he survives. Those fighting fish sure are fighters.
• Played Madden 06 on the xbox 360 the other night. I still don't like Madden, but I have to admit that it looks nice. When is that first price drop again?
• Shout out to Brad Johnson. You've played very average ball but let your team, the Minnesota Vikings, to a 4 game winning streak and are back in playoff contention. I really couldn't care less about the Vikings or Brad Johnson. The only reason I give a shoutout is to irritate Jeff.
• Shoutout to Jeff for stealing my profile picture. That made me laugh.

Alrighty, that's it for now.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm thankful for so many things. My wife, my job, my apartment, my family, my savior, short basketball courts (really thankful after being sore from football), the list goes on and on.

Have a good Thanksgiving!

[edit at 10pm] I'm also very thankful for Ron Dayne and that 55 yard scamper in OT. You made my turkey digest so much easier.

Who am I

So a long time ago I found this program called Who Am I. It was a character analysis program that worked shockingly well by having you create a picture. Thanks to the wonders of the internet I found the program and have decided to share my results. If you would like to try the program, you can. The hosting place will only have it for a month or so.

* WHOAMI analysis *

{C}opyright : Maurice Smith MOLCOL SOFTWARE (UK) 1992

Character Analysis of: CARL

You can be a bit of a dreamer sometimes, cherishing quiet and reflective moments alone: long baths, and good books are your happiest indulgences. When you do socialise, it will be with one of your few close friends (normally at their place) rather than with a crowd of acquaintances out on the town. (This is actually pretty true. I like quiet/cave time and I have a core group that a hang out with.)

The word 'Teaser' may well sum up your relationship with other people because you tend to lead them on, creating an image to control and influence how others see you. You like to be liked and can be very sensitive to criticism. Before letting anyone get really close, you must know them for a long time and trust completely that they would like the 'real' you. (Again, surprisingly true)

Although you recognise that spiritual happiness is as important as financial or material security, you may often find it hard to balance the two. This can lead to going full speed in one direction -(material goals) - and then a sudden change to the opposite -(spiritual goals) - when happiness is not achieved. (This would explain the big screen HDTV that suddenly appeared in my living room. THAT's how it happened..)

In general, others find you easy to approach. However, you can be shy of new people in unfamiliar situations. This trait can lead to people that don't know you well mis-understanding your attitude, and seeing you as unfriendly. As you are affected strongly by people you're with, you tend to try and project an image of yourself which best suits their expectations of you. (Shayna thought I was a jerk the first year she knew me...she was right the first time)

Much of what we become is formed in the early years of our life by our parents and family. When you were young your mother was loving and helpful. You don't feel she failed you in any way. Surprisingly, this has not been a major factor in shaping your character and the person you are today. Other major factors in your childhood or adult life have been more influential on you!
(No comment)
You do/did not know your father deeply, but perceive him as an uncomplicated person. He was (or still is?) a lovable, jolly dad. He was normally there when you needed him most. This has had some affect in the past on forming your character. Parental traits, affecting how you like to deal with life, come from your father (a little) but more from other factors.
Your mother and father were often close to each other, although they may not have always demonstrated this fact. (Ok, the program is a little off here. My parents divorced when I was 13. They were never really "lovey dovey" kind of people. The only time I saw affection was then dad came home from work and they had a kiss hello. I do percieve my dad as uncomplicated and lovable. He was there while I was a child, but after the divorce I definitely feel that he wasn't there)

You can be deep-thinking about subjects that arouse your curiosity. People with your high degree of reflective ability enjoy games, and puzzles in their spare time. (I bet you enjoy doing crosswords) and are attracted to tales of mystery. (I hate crosswords. I like the wording though. I can be deep thinking. I'm typically not except in few inspired instances.)

In astrology one of the most passionate star-sign types is the Scorpion. You possess many of the Scorpion traits: passionate, hot and exciting in love and sensual pursuits. In life you willpursue anything which fires your imagination for as long as it captures you. This type of dynamic obsession can overcome unbelievable odds and obstacles and enables you to achieve great things. But this same power can lead to great pain and and extensive self-damage especially in matters of the heart. (Passionate? Nope. I'm very loyal and don't pursue things for as long as it captures me. Great pain..like the dark side?? Noooooooooooooooo)

This has happened to you: your picture is showing repression of all these things - the fire is not burning as bright as it once did.

Summary of other traits and personal tastes:-
----------------------------------------------
Decision making : Plays safe - avoids taking chances.
Day-dreams most of : Travel or escapism.
Worst Nightmares of: Various - rarely has recurrent nightmares.
General Outlook : Balanced - between pessimism & optimism.
(highly accurate actually. )

** REPORT ENDS **

If you are going to post results, please do so on your own blog. It actually took me a while to format the text. Posting results in the comment field would be very difficult I would think.

So what do you guys think?

No time

Not a whole lot of time at the moment but I saw this and had to pay it forward.

 

Be sure your speakers are turned up.

 

A)This is how Christmas lights should be

B)This rocks my face off

 

http://pihb.movezig.com/source/1095759873/lights.wmv

Quick Hits..with turkey, stuffing, and gravy mmmmm...gravy

• The Broncos beat the Jets 27-0. That's bad. In the 2nd quarter, the Jets ran 2 plays. That's it. 2 plays. The Broncos had the ball for 14:05 out of 15:00. That's humilliation.
• Played football for the first time in I can't remember yesterday. The team I was on came out victorious by a huge 48-28 margain. Shoutouts to Sammie for leading us to victory, Andy for doing his best Peyton Manning impression, and Laurie for icing the win. She had 1 TD pass as well as another TD reception.
• I am so sore but not as bad as it could be. Shout out to my lovely and beautiful wife for rubbing me down with Aspercreme last night. It really helped.
• This was our last "official" week at Fairfax. Starting in December (next Sunday we'll be in Pitt) we'll be attending The Church at Clarendon. Shayna and I are going to be working on the outreach ministry for the church there. Helping those less fortunate and spreading the word. We're looking forward to getting our hands dirty in the Lord's work.
• XBox 360 launches tomorrow. I was thinking about waiting in line at walmart and try to get one and then immediately sell it on Ebay afterwards for a tidy profit. The money isn't worth the effort to me though...unless it's like $1000 for the xbox. It won't be because it will definitly have to be sold as used.. ;-)
• Thanksgiving is this week. I'm really looking forward to spending time with my family (including in-laws which I don't even really think of them that way...well most of them). This year we are doing Turducken up in Pittsburgh. boneless chicken (stuffed with stuffing) put inside of a boneless duck put inside of a boneless turkey. never had one before, but how can you go wrong??
• Tivo announces today that they are going to be offering Tivo2Go to video Ipod as well as PSP. Will have to be connected to your computer and go through a conversion process (2 hours conversion to 1 hour of video). So now you can pay Steve Jobs $2 for that episode of Lost or you can just do it yourself. Still doesn't make me want to buy an Ipod.

Sorry, no links this time. Nothing good on the internet at the moment.

Dynamic Duo

One of the great things about staying home from work sick is that you get to do nothing but look at blogs all day.

I tried looking for some good links to post, but I think the well that is known as the internet is drying up. That reminds me of a tagline I saw on some persons AIM profile: I beat the internet, the end guy is hard. How true..how true.

Without further adieu, Sam's 2 list:
Two Names You Go By: Carl, Crazy
Two Parts of Your Heritage: Willis, Smith
Two Things That Scare You: spiders, Sneaky
Two of Your Everyday Essentials: email, kiss goodnight
Two Things You Are Wearing Right Now: basketball shorts, underoos (Thundercats if you must know)
Two of Your Favorite Bands or Musical Artists: Weird Al, Billy Joel
Two Things You Want in a Relationship: laughter, smiles
Two Truths: Some days your the dog, some days your the hydrant; For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief. (Eccl 1:18)
Two Things You Hate (or rather dislike with a passion): Carl (I HATE that guy), dairy products
Two Physical Things that Appeal to You: breasts, smile
Two of Your Favorite Hobbies: Video games, sleeping
Two Things You Want Really Badly: Peach Pie, To not be sick.
Two Places You Want to go on Vacation: Colorado, Hawaii
Two Things You Want to Do Before You Die: go to Colorado, make Shayna happy
Two Ways that you are stereotypically a Chick/Guy: I like video games and sports.
Two Things You Normally Wouldn't Admit: my feelings, how much I like sneaky
Two people I would like to see take this quiz: Gordon, Jesus

Mike "Odgie" Miller

So the web blog of love continues on. Taking a nice little rest here and moving on to the man known as Odgie. This is actually going to be difficult because I have a self imposed limit of 300 words per post and I've already wasted a good 30 just explaining that. I'll make up for it later though.

Odgie is many things to me. A friend who helped me come out of my shell. A person to laugh with. A spiritual guru. A person that can go toe to toe with Shayna..and that says a lot.

Odgie spends his life helping people. He started as a minister and now he does social work. He enjoys spending 40 hours a week helping people who are less fortunate, either economically or mentally.

He is able to speak his mind and pose very good discussion/debate with almost anyone he meets. He's smart, intuitive, and loves God.

Odgie is also a big reason why I'm married. He was able to answer questions that I wasn't able to for Shayna. He also showed her that being a Christian doesn't mean not having fun. He stood at my wedding as I got married. Even though he had to drive through a snowstorm in the mountains of PA to do it.

If you have to choose a person to have your back, you should make sure it's Odgie.

And now, a Haiku:
Mike Miller is the man
O D to the G I E
thanks for everything

Your turn Odgie.

It has arrived

I was wondering if it would ever get to me. I had a feeling it would when it started with Shayna. But after long last it has finally been passed to me.

I am sick.

I hate being sick. It's totally the worst feeling of all time. At the moment it's not to bad. It's just a sore throat. But it will get worse. I'm going to be on a strict liquid diet until it's gone. I just hope that it doesn't take to long...

I'll get to the web log of love sometime. Thanks Leann for passing it to me!

another puzzle game

http://www.funflashgames.com/resources/games/swfs/33338.swf


click, drag, type, and listen your way past the puzzles.

This morning

Some people ask what the best thing about marraige is. There are a lot of things. Not having to drive home, inside jokes (BABE!!), constant sounding board, the list goes on.

I think I have a new favorite though. Last night Shayna and I left a fan on and the window open in our bedroom as we went to bed. It sure got cold last night. When her alarm went off at to(o) early o'clock we snuggled up together until it was actually time for her to get up.

Sure, it's not very manly. But it sure does feel good.

something that is worth it

http://www.google.com/sms/

Never use 411 again. If you have text messaging already on your cell phone plan this is definitely the way to go.

Was it worth it?

nope, not really.

Good day so far

So far it's been a good day. I haven't thrown up. Eonline is reporting that Scrubs will be back on the air soon. Arrested Development returns on Monday. Powerhouse starts tonight. I'm going to upgrade my cell phone (going with the LG 6100. Shayna and I will evaluate. Then she will have the option of having the new phone or my current phone) The grandfather clock is assembled and not next to my head (although if it were I wouldn't notice. It's not really that loud), my wife told me that she loved me today.

Last but certainly not least, Al has completed the first 6 songs of his next album.

Can't wait to see what God brings tonight at powerhouse. I think it might rock my face off.

oo-ra

I like the quick hits type posts. Let me know if you like them as well or if you prefer the slightly deeper but longer 1 topic type of posts..

Shayna and I received our 1st Christmas present of 2k5 yesterday. It's from my mom in law. She calls to tell us that she is sending our Christmas gift. We say it's not even Halloween yet. Wait until we get up there for thanksgiving. She says that won't work, it won't fit in our car. We say what the heck are you giving us?!!? She says it weighs 91 lbs.

So it arrives. It's a grandfather clock. Very cool, very nice of her to give it to us. Shayna suggested we put it in the bedroom..right next to my head. I think I'm going to suggest it go right next to her head. It will sound like her alarm clock anyway. I would hate to be sleeping and then have my alarm clock on my chest because she got confused during the night. :-)

In other news, our cell phone plan expires this month. 2 years with Verizon. They are giving us a $100 credit towards 1 phone if we reup with them. I'm torn on this. I could have sworn that when we initially signed up that we would get $100 per phone. We could go to Cingular and get free phones, but I don't know how well the reception would work in our apartment. Our current phones don't work very well. Decisions decisions.

Last night I took Shayna out to dinner at Chipotle. It was nice to go out and laugh and have fun (not that we don't do that anyway, but it was just nice in general). One of Shayna's coworkers has been married for 3 months and says it's "Hard". Don't know if I would catagorize marraige as hard. There are difficult times, yes. On the whole though, marraige is fun. Maybe that's just who I'm married to.

Ben Roethlisburger is out this week. Had surgery on his knee today. Charlie Batch replaces him this week. Cower doesn't trust Maddox to hold a clipboard much less a football. I've been telling my brother-in-law (shout out to Matt) for years that Maddox wasn't any good. Maddox finally came through for me earlier this season when he individually lost the game (which is hard to do in a team atmosphere)

To make up to my wife for the bad steeler news, here is panda bounce.