Flammable, With Legs

Saturday I ran in a 5k. Several of my friends do road races fairly frequently and this time I decided to join them.

I did about two weeks worth of training. Needless to say, standing at the starting line of a 3.1 mile race is a little unsettling when you train like I trained (not much). But the race went surprisingly well. I accomplished my two major goals. 1) to finish. 2) to finish without walking.

I ran a time somewhere around 27 minutes. That's by no means a great 5k time. But it was my first time, so I'm giving myself a break.

Oh, and just after I got to the finish line, I barfed in a bush. So that was great.

I got some new clubs recently. It was a lot of fun peeling off all the wrappers and tape and what not. I got a new bag and even a really nice fairway wood at a used club sale. Throw in a used Ping driver for $40 and I'm calling it good. But these irons, though they're technically no longer new. I've had them out at the range a couple of times and even played a few holes. In a word the clubs are, well, huge. But that's good. They are Hippo's. Apparently that is a British clubmaker. These probably are not top of the line clubs, considering that I got them on eBay for a deeply discounted rate. But they're doing the job.

In other news, I'm in the middle of planning a wedding. Rephrase, I'm in the middle of watching Angie plan a wedding and I'm in the middle of planning a Honeymoon. One question posed to me was "how much are you hoping to spend." How am I supposed to answer that? "Umm, zero, because I want someone to step up and offer to pay for everything." Or how about, "Somewhere around $10,000. I'll put it on my Vise and pay it off later. Or can I borrow your Visa?" I see now why people set up payPal accounts for weddings. But don't worry, I'm not stooping that low.

One other thing: we have scheduled a meeting of the parents. Angie's folks and mine have never met each other. So in late April, Dad his flying his lil plane to Indiana for the conference. Angie and I will be flying up (commercial) to moderate. I think it will be a great time.

Anything else? Probably. This is what I get for updating so infrequently. But don't feel bad. I do this on purpose--if you knew everything about me we'd both feel like we should be outdoors more.

Just when you think life can be no more humbling, Thursday lunch happens.

The last couple of weeks have been what I am calling "a little rough." After working hard for a couple of months at saving up a nice chunk of bling/change, some car troubles depleted said bling pile. I was and am still in no way impoverished--luckily my foodstamp application impressed the right people.

In all seriousness, it was a sizeable set-back. But money is money. You make it, you spend it--that's the way it goes. On Monday, part of that money equation took a hit (read: you make it). Due to some downsizing I lost my cush job at a software development company.

Again, a set-back. But it's ok. Actually, in a case of providential coincidence a couple of job offers fell in my lap. One that is a sure thing and one that I'm waiting to hear about. So all is well or at least has some serious potential to be well in the job market.

But today at lunch I hit rock bottom. Actually, I hit rock bottom and then got up off of the rock, lifted it out of the way, laid myself prostrate where the rock once had been and dug my way a good mantle-and-a-crust below "rock bottom."

It was about 2:30 and I finally tore away from editing video (I'm finishing out the week at the softare development place) and headed off to get some lunch. I sat in my truck (read: for sale so I can buy food) and pondered my options. I wanted something cheap and fast. I was hungry but not for anything specific. Then the best and also the worst idea came to me. I went to Cici's.

There are few things in life more humbling both to the soul and to the gastro-intestinal fortidude than a meal at Cici's. But my humility was increased ten-fold--I went alone.

The nice girl behind the counter looked at me with a snicker--"Just one?" she asked. Indeed. Just one. Just me.

By then it was 2:50. With the lunch rush long past the pizza remaining on the buffet reminded me of something I saw at the museum of natural history. So I sat down to a piping tepid plate of Paleolithic Pizza with a red plastic goblet of unsweet iced tea (the Cadillac of teas). I tapped my toes to the beat of poorly chosen 80's music while watching a muted version of "All My Young and Restless Bold and Beautiful Children with Various Passions Concerning the World Turning to General Hospital with Only One Life to Live." Plus, I was just a smidge past chilly.

I made three trips for pizza, the last time racing a woman who was getting food for her grandchild and a 60-year-old man wearing an unbuttoned FUBU baseball jersey.

And you thought you knew me.

It's cold in Florida. For the three people who read this that aren't in Florida, this is big news. And if you already knew that it was cold in Florida, isn't that just ridiculous?

I came home yesterday to my genius of a roomate doing homework bundled up with the AC blasting. It got much cooler when the AC went off and windows went up. This morning's temperature without the aid of electricity was a brisk *65 f. That's downright chilly. I mean, I was considerably more comfortable in long sleeves than short. For this region, that's saying something.

In sports . . .

Chiefs move to 4-2. That makes me happy.

And to my boy, Brad Smith (pronounced "Smiff"), he had another outstanding game against Nebraska.

Passing, he was 21 of 36 for 234 yards and a touchdown. No biggie, right? I mean lots of quqarterbacks can do that. Here's what they cannot do, 28 carries for 267 yards and 3 touchdowns. He had 480 total yards, leading the NCAA in week 8.

This guy is leading the Big 12 in RUSHING YARDS by a good 200 yards. Someone try and stop him, I dare you.

I saw this posted somewhere and thought it was funny.

10 TRUTHS BLACK AND HISPANIC PEOPLE KNOW, BUT WHITE PEOPLE WON'T ADMIT:

1. Elvis is dead.
2. Jesus was not White.
3. Rap music is here to stay
4. Kissing your pet is not cute or clean.
5. Skinny does not equal sexy.
6. Thomas Jefferson had black children.
7. A 5 year child is too big for a stroller.
8. N' SYNC will never hold a candle to the Jackson 5
9. An occasional BUTT whooping helps a child stay in line.
10. Having your children curse you out in public is not normal.

10 TRUTHS WHITE AND BLACK PEOPLE KNOW, BUT HISPANIC PEOPLE WON'T ADMIT:

1. Hickey's are not attractive.
2. Chicken is food, not a roommate.
3. Jesus is not a name for your son.
4. Your country's flag is not a car decoration.
5. Maria is a name but not for every other daughter.
6. "Jump out and run" is not in any insurance policies.
7. 10 people to a car is considered too many.
8. Buttoning just the top button of your shirt is a bad fashion statement.
9. Mami and Papi can't possibly be the nickname of every person in your family
10.Letting your children run wildly through the store is not normal.

10 TRUTHS WHITE AND HISPANIC PEOPLE KNOW, BUT BLACK PEOPLE WON'T ADMIT:

1. O. J. did it.
2. Tupac is dead.
3. Teeth should not be decorated.
4. Weddings should start on time.
5. Your pastor doesn't know everything.
6. Jesse Jackson will never be President.
7. RED is not a kool-aid flavor, it's a color.
8. Church does not require expensive clothes.
9. Crown Royal bags are meant to be thrown away.
10.Your rims and sound system should not be worth more than your car.

My schedule has been pretty packed lately. Work and school is a 5-day-a-week gig. And every evening has something--usually. The only time i seem to have free is Friday and Saturday night. This is the first time (i think in my life) that that's the case. Usually my weekends were packed and my week was total boredom--mere precursor to the weekend. Now I sit at home on Friday night "because I just need some time to relax." Thanks for the lesson Mom and Dad. I'm finally learning it.

So the last month and a half or so has been fairly busy.

Lately I've been occupied with catching up with my girlfriend, Angie. She was gone for most of the summer for her work. I was glad she got to go, but SO glad she's back. A trip like that shows you how you really feel. I'll admit that at first I was glad to have some space, and the chance to do whatever the junk I wanted. But that wore off after about 2 weeks. By the end of her trip I was pining. I moaped, i sulked, i whined . . . i yearned. But she's back, so it's cool.

Recently I have acquired two new toys:

1. Road bike.
A la Lance, my road bike is complete with curvy handlebars and skinny tires. I've been riding so far at the parking garage to the office building right by our apartment, and at a great local park. It's a park in the New Tampa Area called Flatwoods Park. The highlight of the park is a 7-mile paved loop that is great for bikes, joggers, and bladers. I just got a sweet road bike and I tried the trail out today for the first time. My bike performed well today--my firt time on that trail.

It's about as wide as a 2-lane highway. And since traffic is one way, even if it's crowded, it doesn't seem so conjested. They have shelters every now and then with water jugs and bathrooms. And the best part, its out in the middle of the Florida wilderness, which has its moments.

2. iPod Shuffle
A friend of mine has a job at a bank that has several branches here in Tampa. They were opening a new branch and if you opened up a checking account they gave you an iPod. They were unspecific as to what kind of iPod. I was hoping for a mini--6 gig maybe. Turned out to be a 512 Shuffle. I almost backed out but decided to do it. That was a good decision.

The shuffle doesn't boast all the nifty features of the bigger brothers like gigabytes of storage or a screen, but for my purposes, it's about right. It holds about 8 hours of music. And after combing my iTunes library, I couldn't find enough stuff to fill it. I have over 5 gigs of music, but most of it isn't stuff I need to carry around with me all the time. Plus switching out a new playlist is really easy. And I can't think of any situations where I listen to 8 hours of music at a time.

So that's the latest. Shuffles and biking. I plan on mixing those two very soon.

music

Way Less Hairy v2.1

Enjoy

If you haven't seen Batman Begins, you probably should. It's really a great movie. It's not really anything like the original Michael Keaton Batman movie, and no where near the other ones. Keaton, George Clooney, Val Kilmer all must bow in the dark Batmanish splendor that is Christian Bale. That guy is stinkin awesome.

And the Batmobile is just lame after this movie. Sad, isn't it.

This movie really was a lot of fun. It does a good job of filling in all the back story. And it was done well, too. The explanations weren't all that far fetched. It all worked together well.

Anyone who reads The Internet Movie Database is usually good for a little trivia on their favorite movies. So here is my fav. piece of IMDB trivia for Batman Begins: (this is a cut and paster)

# This Batsuit has no nipples, unlike the one George Clooney wore in Batman & Robin (1997).

That should explain about 2/1000's of the reasons why this movie is the difinitive of the Batman series.

Here's to hoping that it's the beginning of the NEW batman series.

Come on in and check out the newest podcast in the whole freaking world!

Way.Less.Hairy

Today I had my first experience with Thai food. Being my father's son, I have a deep love of the hot and spicy, so I felt I was up to the challenge of some nice Thai. Greg and I hit a local spot during lunch. The following is a synapsis of my own personal Thai-Cycle.

Smelling food on way back to office--antsy
First bite--Surprised, but pleasantly
Finishing with "sticky" jasmine rice to quench flames--relieved
Moments after meal--quite satisfied
One hour after meal--suspicious of lingering nature of the thai
Two hours after meal--going to break room for tums

I must say, though the food gave me a little trouble, I'd gladly have some more.

Thai food . . . do it

This last week was pretty busy.

I started my internship at Striedpoint. Check us out on the web at Stridepoint.com.

Tropical storm Elise or Elaine or something is coming through. Looks like the beginning to another busy hurricane season.

Now to something really important that I learned this week. During lunch on Friday I realized something that maybe I hadn't before. I was eating a sandwich from the famous Olde Worlde Cheese Shopp that was really delicious. And it hit me: Sandwiches that make a squishing sound are generally better than those that don't. The noise was a testament to the quality of meats and cheeses and breads used on this sandwich. It was really, really good.

Another great thing that happened this week: I got to ride a brand new roller-coaster at Busch Gardens. It's a drop-coaster. Shiekra is the coolest.

Oh, another great thing. As of today, Angie and I have been dating for 9 months.

Podcast coming soon. Might as well

I added a few photos. They are of a new plant and a new table.

The table is a poker table that I helped my friend Derek build. We play a lot of poker round these parts and we thought we needed a decent playing surface. It took Derek a few hours to do most of the cutting and sanding and Derek, me and Trev the better part of a Saturday to put all of the materials on. The table has padded rails, a padded velveteen playing surface, and some sweet lights around the inner edge.

The plant is an Aloe Vera plant. I was working a job and we were cutting around the edge of some beds in a guys yard. We had to (sadly) cut out some good healthy plants. I salvaved a scrap of an aloe plant with roots intact. I grabbed a spare put, some very fertile Florida topsoil, some miracle grow plant food and some time release fertilizer. I brought it home and put in in a window. Seeing no immediate results I of course tried to help nature out by putting the tiny plant outside in some strong Florida sun for a couple of consecutive afternoons. This caused it to get just a little brown so I again freaked out and watered it like crazy.

After all this I showed the plant to my brilliant girlfriend. She told me that the plant didn't need that much attention and that I was probably killing it. So I checked some places online and she was right. They don't need to be watered, and lots of sunlight can be bad for them. You can see between the 2nd and 3rd picture that it gets much greener. That's because I stopped watering it put it in a shady place in our house.

The other new pictures are of my freakishly long hair.

This just in. Anakin Skywalker was actually the dude who became Darth Vader. Holy Crap! Who saw that coming? No one? I didn't think so.

I am not and have never claimed to be a Star Wars efficianado, but I think that anyone who knew JACK SQUAT about the original trilogy, saw any part of the episodes one and two, and/or has had their eyes open during the last two months knew that what I sarcastically wrote above would be played out in cinema. It would be hard for someone not to know this stuff.

Example: I got a Slurpee from the local 7-11 that basically spelled out the plot of E3. Picture of Anakin, dark circles under eyes, looking really PO'ed. The there are more blatant examples, like this poster released after E1.

So here's my gripe. If you mention this movie in any sort of conversation or publication, web or print, don't say "I don't want to ruin anything." Everyone who wanted to see it did just that last night around 12:15. And anyone who might be angry at the "spoiler" probably is too far gone to be a Star Wars fan. We clear?

I had plans of going to a friend's wedding that COMPLETELY fell through. Now when I say completely fell through, I mean that the person planning the trip (my roomate) called me at 1am the the night before we're to leave and tells me that he can't go. Wow. Thanks for the heads up.

So weekend plans being shot, I decided to make the most of it. Angie had already planned a girls' night with her friends for Friday so she went ahead with her plans (since her friends aren't deadbeats). So having a rare wide-open Friday, I worked some planning magic and found something to do.

I called up a good buddy of mine and headed to his apartment. I arrived to find him in the middle of a project. He was building a poker table in his garage. Being the fan of poker that I am, and considering that the guy was moving in with us in just a few weeks, I decided to lend a hand.

It seemed like the last time i worked with wood was Mr. Hogan's 8th grade wood-shop. It probably was. But we got it done. I'll post some pictures soon.

It's the standard run-of-the-mill table--black vinyl padded rail, blue velveteen top for optimum card slide-age. Derek even installed track lighting around the inner lip. Someday we'll hook up cameras so people in the other room can see what we have. Maybe I'll do it with a webcam and Matt can give me tips.

Saturday night was the usual--dinner (wings and cheese bread from a local fave) and a movie (National Treasure--not nearly as horrible as I thought it would be) with Angie.

And Sunday after church we played some poker. What a great weekend.

Thanks for stopping by to read this. My brother Danny set me up with this weblog so if you come often and keep reading and maybe commenting there is a good chance that I'll write here lots.

So Danny is my brother, Matt is my former journalism teacher and current friend, and that might be it for Brendoman.com connections. But that's ok. I'm going for quality not quantity. And those two fellas are quality if I know anything at all.

I'm currently at the University of South Florida in sunny Tampa. I'm working my way toward a degree in mass communications with a focus on advertising. I'm taking a class this summer and working part time doing landscaping. I'm also doing a short internship with Shirley Hutchinson National Advertising.

This will all be keeping pretty busy but I will have more free time than usual as my girlfriend, Angie will be gone for 11 weeks doing some recruiting work for Florida College.

So that's what's up.