long drive contest

headed up to LI yesterday for a round of golf- 6 1/2 hr round trip for a 5 hour round. the outing was planned a month ago, when we figured the conditions would be more spring-like. turned out to be cold (high- 42 degrees) and windy (gusts to 25+ mph), but thankfully clear and dry.

despite the less-than-optimal playing conditions, was well worth the long trip. great catching up with old friends, one of whom i've been playing with for about 20 years. and no matter what the weather is or how i play (was another round of flashes of brilliance scattered amongst a baseline of inconsistency), when playing with 3 other great friends, golf is the greatest sport in the world.

word up!

(no, not that cameo from the 80's)

thanks for the overwhelming response to the my 3 songs question. the answer, which eluded all of you, was that each of those songs featured a cameo from a prominent artist. all 3 of those songs make my list of "top 5 cameos from the 80's"...

5. glass tiger, "don't forget me when i'm gone", featuring bryan adams- canadian superstar adams helped to make his fellow countrymen a flash in the 80's pan with this hit.
4. howard jones, "no one is to blame", featuring phil collins- collins produced the album too, and i believe played drums on this track as well.
3. rockwell, "somebody's watching me", featuring michael jackson- i can't think of another song in which michael does backing vocals for someone else (besides those awful duets with paul mccartney). according to wikipedia, jermaine appears on this song too.
2. michael jackson, "beat it", featuring eddie van halen- the legend goes that when eddie did his guitar solo for this song, the only compensation he asked for was dance lessons from MJ.
1. dire straits, "money for nothing", featuring sting- the quintessential 80's cameo, sting's only line in the song is probably the motto for 80's music in general.

any other nominations?

yeah! more songs!

hopefully more guesses for this one- it's a lead-in to a top 5 post for friday...

• rockwell, "somebody's watchin' me"
• dire straits, "money for nothing"
• glass tiger, "don't forget me when i'm gone"

and no, the answer is not "80's songs"...while that might be true, there's another more unique common thread to these three.

5 days of eating over the sink and leaving the toilet seat up

kids are off from school this week and vacationing at camp ironwood (aka my parents' house) while erin works a few days in a row. that leaves me here to feed the fish, water the plants, and empty the fridge of leftovers. lots of time to update the ol' blog, so i'll try to get some fresh entries this week.

no takers on the "my 3 songs" post from last week- goes back in the vault to be pulled out again someday.

as if i needed further confirmation that i married the right woman...

very disappointed (but not terribly surprised) when i hit mcdonald's yesterday prior to my hoops-a-thon and found that they were no longer serving shamrock shakes.

very excited when i returned home to find a post-it note on my tournament edition sports illustrated that read "we bought you a shamrock shake on monday in case you couldn't get one today- it's thawing in the fridge. enjoy the games! love, us".

i love us.

my 3 songs- holy week edition!

might have been better later in april, but it works now too- here's your newest installment...

hooters, "all you zombies"
talking heads, "nothing but flowers"
burning sensations, "belly of the whale" (not on iTunes, but a great lost classic of the 80's- found it on one of the "living in oblivion" discs- you can listen to a bit of it here)

good luck!

what rocks?!

while my heart is always with the stags come march, it's nice to have another alma mater with a little more of a basketball pedigree.

fairfield made some noise in the closing weeks of their regular season, but lost in the first round of their conference tournament. georgetown, however, seems to be getting stronger as the big east tourney moves on. a nice win against villanova today, coupled with the loss by their nemesis uconn, gives them a clear path to another big east tournament championship and possibly a #2 seed in the NCAA tournament.

maybe last year wasn't a fluke, and the hoyas will go far in the NCAA tourney again. that'll make the shamrock shakes taste even better.

extreme makeover- plumbing edition

looking for some advice on home repairs? you've come to the right place! here the first in what may be yet another recurring series: a little how-to based on some real-life experience. this one's fresh- just from last night!

how to repair your leaky outdoor faucet (also called a sillcock- *snicker*):

1. when playing outside with your kids, if you notice the sillcock is leaking, check to see if the knob just needs tightening. when the knob begins to turn freely in all directions and the water begins to run faster, you've confirmed a leaky sillcock.
2. shut off the water to the house. be aware that once this is done, all children in the home will immediately crave water as if they had been travelling in the sahara for 3 weeks.
3. remove the knob from the sillcock, exposing the pipe and the long rod within it that connects to the thingy inside that turns the water on and off. remove this rod.
   
4. take rod to lowe's and ask for replacement. when advised that among the 5 bazillion things they sell there, sillcock parts are not any of them and only entire sillcock mechanisms are available, head to home depot.
   
5. show rod to attendant at home depot and learn that rod you removed is not supposed to come out of the pipe, and that entire pipe/rod/spigot mechanism will need to be replaced. unfortunately, said part is not available at home depot.
   
6. head back to lowe's and purchase part. return home.
   
7. find spot inside basement where sillcock pipe comes in and fastens to copper piping. attempt to loosen nut on sillcock pipe, then inspect closely and realize that copper pipe is soldered into sillcock pipe and nut is really just there for show.
   
8. cut copper pipe with broken hacksaw blade, freeing old sillcock pipe. remove old sillcock from outside home, breaking as little of surrounding stucco as possible. (save large chunks of stucco which can be crazy glued back on later.)
   
9. go back to lowe's to purchase fitting for end of exposed copper pipe that will allow sillcock pipe to be screwed in.
10. head to home depot after finding out that lowe's does not sell said fitting. purchase fitting, and return home.
    
11. slide new sillcock in from outside, then screw copper fitting onto end that is now inside the house. be sure to tighten as much as possible, despite the fact that the space you're working in could barely fit a moon pie much less two pipe wrenches and your hands.
12. affix other end of fitting to exposed copper pipe.
13. turn on main water line to house. watch as water drips from screwed in portion of fitting.
14. disregard bloodied knuckles and further tighten fitting with pipe wrenches.
15. dry fitting with towel and watch closely for length of time that it takes to finish one beer (at this point, 4 minutes).
16. no water? congratulations- you're done! (in case of continued dripping, repeat steps 14-15, including beer.)

let the madness begin!

one of my favorite times of year- march madness. conference tournaments start this week, meaning i'll be watching semifinal matchups of conferences i've never heard of between schools i've never heard of, all to see who ultimately will draw the coveted #16 seeds in the ncaa bracket.

while the conference tourneys are fun, if nothing else for the sheer excitement of the players and the sparse crowds they play in front of, my absolute favorite day of the year is the first thursday of the ncaa tournament- this year on 3/20. as thursdays are my early day around here, my usual routine for the past few years has been to leave here at noon, hit the mcdonalds drive-thru for a burger and a shamrock shake, and park myself in front of the TV hopefully just in time for the usual 12:20 tipoffs for the first games. at sometime around midnight, i get up and go to bed.

maybe this year, i'll bring the laptop home and post updates as the day goes on. i'm sure you'd love that.

my three songs

a new feature here on finkipedia, based on a contest run on many radio stations and named after the one that was a regular feature on the WHFS afternoon show years ago.

very simple- i give you 3 songs, you give me the common link between them. a little difficult to do because of the lack of sound, but i think i can come up with some that are common enough that you'd know them and can figure out the link.

sometimes the link may be related to the lyrics, or sometimes it may be related to more of a generality about the songs themselves.

here then is your first installment- a relatively easy one, i think:

1. bangles, "manic monday"
2. prince, "little red corvette"
3. sheena easton, "sugar walls"

good luck.

even leonardo was 6 years old once

brendan's taking to sketching things lately- he got a sketch book for christmas, and likes to sit in bed before going to sleep sometimes drawing things he sees in his room. the other day, he must have been thinking about something he saw in a puzzle book or a worksheet at school, because he came up with this:


hard to see unless you've got a 21" monitor, but my favorite part is the answer key, written upside down on the lower left.

also of note: the pepsi can, because i don't believe we've ever had a can of pepsi in this coke-loyal house. he must be sneaking it on the side.

a stitch in time

walked into work this AM a few minutes before 9, and our receptionist said to me "rough one already". not too unusual a comment for a thursday, because it's my half day and therefore usually busy. the story unfolded further when our office manager took me aside in the hall, coat still on and coffee still in hand, and said "a patient of yours walked in a few minutes ago- he's on coumadin and fell yesterday morning, and his arm hasn't stopped bleeding since. and that's not the bad news."

uh oh.

put down the coffee, hung up the coat, rolled up the sleeves and fixed mr. jones up quick with a single well-placed stitch and a pressure dressing. the other stuff, more business than medical, will take quite a bit more to resolve.

i always knew fixing people would wind up being the easiest part of this job.

great work, if you can get it

kids went back to school today after a 4 day weekend (off friday and monday). erin was talking to them yesterday about how nice it is to have 4 day weeks- goes by so fast, weekend here before you know it, etc.

despite the holiday, my office was open yesterday. this led to another discussion about how great it is to be a kid, because when you grow up, long weekends are few and far between, and every week seems like a full 5 day week.

brendan's comment: "that's ok. i only plan on working 2 days a week."

not sure if that means he's got his career path set on 1) corporate tycoon or 2) priest.

doubt the latter.

lose the extra "o"

rant time again...

straight from a communication to parents from the principal's office at our school (slightly paraphrased): "...it seems that they loose their mittens and hats very easily".

while not as prevalent as some of the other grammatical missteps i've soapboxed on before, this one has annoyed me for years: the misspelling of "lose" as "loose".

this isn't one i've seen (thank god) in any print media, but i've seen it quite often in personal communication. i didn't realize the word "lose" was that confusing, but unless i really am sending my kids to school with gloves that are too tight, it must be.

open season

flu season here in DE- swamped in the office, and feeling the effects at home too. brendan started it the other day, erin started with some symptoms last night, and molly woke today with a temp of 104. owen and i have dodged it so far- we'll see how the week goes.

patients always ask me how i'm able to stay relatively healthy. i use the same line on all of them: "you never see a farmer with a sunburn, do you? constant exposure builds my tolerance". whether it's true or not, so far, i've been lucky.

our lenten journey

i usually eschew the traditional catholic behavior of giving up something for lent- for several years now, i've spent the time focusing more on prayer than on not doing something i probably shouldn't be anyway.

this year, the kids have for the first time chosen to give something up. owen, on his own, decided to give up the wii. he's been enthralled with it the past few weeks, so this is a big deal. so far he's doing very well.

owen's explanation for giving up the wii was that he knew he should be giving up "something i really like to do". on those grounds, when brendan was asked what he would be giving up, he offered "i'm giving up waking up grumpy."

and you thought jesus had it hard for 40 days in the desert. 3 days down so far, and i must say, they've all been great. if this kid gets to easter waking up happy every morning, i'm lobbying the vatican to make lent a year-round season.

CCCLXII days until finkbowl XIII

the guests are gone, the house is mostly clean, and there's still one gladware container of gumbo left over. another successful finkbowl has come and gone. thanks to all who made the trip, from near and far. we always have a great time, but this year's game made the day that much better. couldn't have scripted it better.

things i learned this weekend:

1. i am most definitely allergic to mangoes
2. don't continue to bet a seemingly unbeatable hand when your opponent asks "what's the ranking of hands again?"
3. cheering for "eli" and "plaxico" and "osi" is way more fun than cheering for "tom" and "randy" and "teddy"
4. super bowl commercials just ain't what they used to be. bring back the budweiser lizards!

kitchen confidential

cooking marathon starts in about 1/2 hour. over 4 gallons worth of soup to pump out today- gumbo and chowder. because i only make the gumbo once a year, i learned years ago to make enough to enjoy afterwards too. (only took one year without leftovers to convince me to make plenty extra.)

got news earlier in the week that superdad lead guitarist mikey will be unavailable for this weekend, which means that "middletown's favorite three-car garage band" may need to change their name to "plan B". we'll see if the show goes on...

joy in mudville

hold the football! baseball news from the hot stove too hot to let go...

after last year's historic collapse, the faithful were screaming for something to be done this offseason. and while endy's extension was nice, and dumping paulie bag o'donuts cleared some space for the HGH cap, this is the news we've been waiting for.

hopefully, sir johan will inspire pedro to get off his rocker and actually train for this year. then we may finally have a rotation that will get us through until october.

now, if only someone could teach delgado (aka cerrano) to hit a curveball, we may have a shot.

one week to go!

preparations are well underway for sunday's big event- finkbowl XII in just 6 days!

did some menu planning last night, will be making the circuit of the local groceries sometime this week. keeping with the tradition of the last few years of making a regional dish representing each of the teams, current plans are for some NE chowder and reuben sandwiches. of course, the gumbo will make its annual appearance as well, along with a few other things.

the celebrity death pool that we tried out last year was good but not great, but i still wanted to have some kind of contest that would last the year between finkbowls. i put together a year-long sports championship pool with wagers on different sporting events throughout the year. we'll see how that goes over. usual finkbowl wagering rules specificially prohibit off-site involvement in any competition. however, to increase interest in this year's special event, i'm opening it to anyone interested. the only caveat is that while you need not be present to participate, you must be present to collect. if you win but don't show at finkbowl XIII, your earnings roll over to next year. interested? let me know.