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Archive for September, 2009

KSDK — An Imperial man is dead after accidentally shooting himself in the head while teaching his girlfriend firearms safety.

Sheriff Glenn Boyer said that on Friday, deputies responded to 4307 Rock Valley Court in Imperial for a shooting. Investigators found 40-year-old James Looney with a gunshot wound to the head.

According to witnesses, Looney was demonstrating how to use the different safety mechanisms on several guns to his girlfriend. The witnesses said Looney would put the guns to his head, and before pulling the trigger, would ask her if she thought the gun would go off. With the first two guns, the safety mechanisms worked. The third gun fired.

Full KSDK Article

For some reason I always look forward to the “In Memoriam” parts of award shows, especially the Oscars and the Emmys.  I always like to see what clips are used of a performance of the deceased and what order they are presented, and sometimes I’m surprised that someone died and I had no idea that they were gone, or just reminded of a great that has passed. And it’s cool that I get to see people I had no idea were behind a film or show that really impacted my life. Oh, and it’s really interesting to see how the audience reacts to each person.

I didn’t get to watch the Emmys this year because I was too busy not watching a Cowboys game at the new stadium.  So for those of you that missed it, here it is.

• I noticed that Troy Aikman tweeted about Michael Irving on Dancing With The Stars.  He was trying to solicit some votes for his old teammate.  I thought that nice.
• I’m about to declare jihad on my closet.  Since we got the new carpet, this is going to give me an opportunity to get rid of some clothes that I will never fit into again, and some clothes that are totally out of style.
• It’s amazing what maturity can do to a person.  For the longest time, I always thought Eagles/Giants/Redskins fans were nothing but jerks.  But over time, many of them have shown me that they can be really good friends.  I’m humbled, and feel stupid for taking rivalries too seriously.
• But I still question their mental health from time to time.
• Anyone in Massachusetts missing a Netflix DVD?
• I pray that I’m never stuck at a stoplight next to this guy.
• I don’t know how anyone can listen to 105.3 The Fan.  I tried to listen to it for five minutes on the way home.  In that five minutes, I think I discovered that because they are the official Cowboys station, they won’t even remotely come close to criticizing the Cowboys.  Here’s what I heard in that five minutes:
  • If the Cowboys lose to Carolina their entire season is over with – even with a one win and two losses with 13 games left in the regular season.  They didn’t even consider that in those three games, the Cowboys have only played one team in their division.
  • A great comparison for the Party Pass tickets is the Subway $5 footlong subs.  The same people that are upset that a footlong sub from Subway costs more $5 when you add chips and a drink are the same kind of people that bought a Party Pass and expected to see the game.
• Women are becoming more beautiful
• An actual lawn chair
• Average size models cause drama in London fashion show
• Glenn Beck not a fan of McCain or Theodore Roosevelt
• For fans of fonts: Arial vs Helvetica
• “Numbers are for baseball, there’s only one thing that matters in the NFL — championships.”  Jimmy Johnson on Fox NFL Sunday.
• This will be me at the U2 concert

Fantastic Planet used the power of Google Earth to create an aerial montage of many cities set to some instrumental music.  I thought the chances of Mineral Wells, Texas being a part of this would be slim to none, but I was wrong.

Search for you city on their YouTube page.

Along with Mineral Wells, I included a few more cities you may be interested in, well, for you Texas readers.

Mineral Wells

Waco

Tyler

Weatherford

Someone driving from Austin to Wichita Falls drove through my hometown of Mineral Wells and decided to recorded it. It will probably bore you to tears, but it caught my attention.

Even though it was a part of town that I didn’t frequent much, I almost shed a tear watching the video.  Perhaps one day I can muster enough strength to go back for a visit, but I have a feeling that won’t be for a long, long time.

• The Cowboys record breaking attendance deserves an asterisk.  If 30,000 Party Passes were sold, and only 14,000 were actually let inside the stadium, then 16,000 needs to be subtracted from that total attendance record.  And I’m upset the media is only reporting that “dozens” were left outside.  Trust me, it wasn’t dozens, it was thousands, and I have the pictures to prove it.
• I’m not mad, just really sad that so many tickets were sold in which people would never get inside the stadium.  It was trickery – do the act and apologize later, say their was a communication error.  Jerry wanted to break that attendance record, but he never got to see the faces of the fans stuck immediately outside the stadium who were regulated to watching what was going on inside on a temporary outdoor screen.  Some ticket holders had so much home pride they dressed up and painted their face, some of which had children wishing they would get a peak inside – which never happened.
• The weird part is, I myself don’t feel so bad that I didn’t get the experience I was hoping for.  I tend to approach things preparing for the worst, and hoping for the best.  For me, cost wasn’t a major factor and my commute is about half an hour to the new stadium.  But as I said, it’s all those other people who traveled so far away, many with family, with that look of anticipation in their eye only to be told you can only stand outside the stadium for a once in a lifetime experience even though you have a ticket.
• Those Party Passes were marketed as if you would be able to be inside the stadium watching the game, it was never mentioned that there was a possibility that ticket holders would never get a chance to be inside for this once in a lifetime event.
• Jerry Jones is the modern day Nero.  He’s done nothing but burn the franchise down in terms of play on the field (when was the last time we won a playoff game?) and now he’s got his new stadium.  Just give him a violin to complete the image.
• Or since we are in Texas, a fiddle.
• And yes, I stole the above reference from something I heard on The Ticket.
• And now get this . . . the Cowboys are now going to reduce the number of Party Passes by TWO THIRDS
• It’s wrong to toy with people’s emotions, and their income.  For so many working folks, getting away to a Cowboy game is a small escape from the everyday stresses of the world.
• Jerry, go to hell.
• OK, I didn’t mean that.
• Autobots vs. G.I. Joes
• Real life Flinstones house
• Rate My Fishtank
• Romo mic’d up for the Tampa game – I found this “inside” look interesting
• All through high school my football coaches would never let anyone take their helmet off or unbuckle their chinstrap during a game.  I thought that was the stupidest rule.  Their reasoning was they didn’t want us to be unprepared, but I’m thinking see if you can trust us first and if not, then enforce the rule.
• Monkey roll was a fun football drill.
• Cold weather, come on down.
• I’m humbled by my dog’s loyalty.
• Someone mentioned they were upset at me.  Sometimes it’s hard to try to be myself and state my opinion without upsetting anyone, but I think most of you by now know my heart – that it isn’t my intent to be an ass or jerk.
• Nathan S – It was me.  If that doesn’t make sense now, it will later.
• House was good last night.  SPOILER ALERT – I thought it was interesting how they got the whole psych ward story out of the way.  It was nice to see him confront his troubles, but I kind of like the grumpy House, so I hope there isn’t too much of a change.
• Man, I got a lot to catch up on the DVR.
• Billy Graham’s grandson is a Presbyterian minister

The makers of these 10 tech products – the iPod, BlackBerry, Firefox, Twitter, Windows 7, ThinkPad, Android, Wikipedia, Mac OS X and the “Big Cats,” and Red Hat Linux – all have displayed certain amounts marketing savvy, common sense and fun-loving spirit in settling on their products’ names. Here are the intriguing, surprising and sometimes predictable accounts of their creation.

There are some interesting stories in that article, but I also learned a new word:

Portmanteau – Taking two words and combining them into one, ie Wikipedia.

And the article also mentions that red in Western history is “the symbol of liberation and challenge of authority.”  Considering red is the color of the GOP, and that makes for an interesting concept.

TweetPsych uses two linguistic analysis algorithms (RID and LIWC) to build a psychological profile of a person based on the content of their tweets. The service analyzes your last 1000 tweets and works best on users who have posted more than 1000 updates.

Link

I enjoy reading tweets more than I do posting them, so results probably aren’t that great, but they are below in case you are interested.

I like burgers, so I found this list interesting.

The cheese-stuffed burgers sure do sound interesting enough to try.

• The Fake Jerry and the Fake Wade Phillips from sports radio KTCK 1310 The Ticket were on the Fox NFL Sunday.  It’s nice to see the local guys get a little national attention.  Actually, the host of Fox NFL Sunday use to work on The Ticket.
• I found out that “basic carpet installation” does not cover the cost of new floor tacks.  Blerg.  However, I was able to talk the guys into stretching the living room carpet for a couple of beers.
• You’re right, I don’t drink, but they were leftovers from when someone else brought them over.
• One of my friends met Justin Leonard at church.
• I just realized that my cell phone number has three 7’s and four 3’s in it.
• I actually enjoyed myself at the air hanger wedding on Saturday night.  Even though I really wanted to watch the Texas and Texas Tech game, sometimes you just have to put football aside and attend a family function.  You can believe that, or that WifeGeeding forced me to go.
• It was a very casual and relaxed wedding held right outside a hanger as the sun set, and I loved it.  The reception was inside the hanger.
• When the bride is introduced, I rarely look at her, my attention is focused on the groom.  I like to see his first reaction to seeing his bride for the first time in her wedding dress.  And besides, I’ll get to see the bride a lot after she walks down the isle, but I only get one chance to see the expression on the groom’s face.
• The bride’s entrance was actually superb.  As the music played, we all looked to our backs at another hanger, and the gigantic doors slowly slided to the right into one another until eventually the bride appear.  Talk about a grand entrance.
• The father of the bride wore a dress shirt that had an “NRA Member for Life” patch sewn on the sleeve.
• The food at the wedding was Turkish.  That was interesting.
• We actually got to tour this B24 and listen to some old war stories from a veteran.  It was absolutely fascinating.  There were of four of us, all the same age, listening to this vet talk when we were inside this cramped plane, and afterwards it was great to hear how much respect everyone had for the man and how we all wished we could spend more time with him to hear his stories.  Usually you hear young folks do nothing but complain about old people tell stories, so I thought this was cool that all of use really enjoyed the moment.
• Regarding the B24, at one time the U.S. was able to produce one per hour.
• Rides in the plane start at $450, which I think isn’t all that unreasonable.
• One of my father’s first jobs in the military was to time the machine gun and propeller so that the bullets would never hit the propeller.  That’s what I thought about when I took this picture.
• 
• A pretty accurate list:  15 Things That Suck About The Internet
• Maybe the birthers and teabaggers are onto something after all
• Arguing over translations without reconstructing the full context of scripture is like arguing over which note-pluck sounds better without putting the strings on an actual instrument.  Link
• Our weekend ended by going to the Cowboy game.  I always wanted to attend a grand opening event, and as a Cowboy fan I thought this would be a great opportunity, but I ended up being a bit disappointed.  We ended up leaving after the first four possessions and made it home to watch the second half.
• WifeGeeding and I decided to take advantage of the Lincoln Square parking promo since it was only 0.7 miles from the stadium.  Basically all you had to do was purchase a total amount of $40 from their stores, put the receipts on your dash, and your parking is paid for.  So we just ate at Jason’s Deli for a late lunch and bought a gift card and off we went walking to the stadium about three hours before the kickoff.  Since we plan on eating again at Jason’s and using the gift card, it’s almost as if parking was free.
• I still can’t believe a Super Wal-Mart is across from the stadium, and I had no idea how they control parking.
• Speaking of parking, one place was selling parking spots for $80.  I have a picture of it below.
• They wouldn’t allow us into the stadium until two hours before kickoff, but we did get to see the grand opening of the end zone doors complete with fireworks, and you could totally feel all the cold air come out and hit you. As one guy behind me said, “I love that new stadium smell.”
• While waiting there, we saw George Riba of WFAA and I thought it was odd that his camera man was fellow WFAA sports reporter Ted Madden.
• In case I didn’t mention it earlier, we had those Party Pass tickets, which means you get access to standing room only areas.  I knew it was going to be crowded, but what I didn’t know until I talked to a stadium representative that was manning the Ring of Honor suites that  30,000 Party Pass tickets were sold, but they were only going to allow 14,000 inside.  Many people had to watch the game from outside the stadium on temporary viewing screens.  We were “lucky” enough to get inside, but it was so packed we never got a chance to see what the entire field or inside of the stadium looked like.  I tried to get some pictures to give you an idea just how packed it was in those Party Pass areas. And I think in most areas they would only allow a certain amount of people, like four deep, and then you were asked to keep on walking.
• I feel kinda sorry for that guy I sold two Party Passes to who was flying in from Philadelphia.  I hope he got a decent spot.
• Basically we found a spot that was inside, but we could look outside at the temporary screens, just outside the Ring of Honor suites.   Here’s our view.
• I kept hearing how much extra space there is in the concourse area, I never found this extra space.
• I also heard that there were so many restrooms that you would never have to wait in line.  I felt that my wait in line was just about the same as Texas Stadium.
• Poor Texas Stadium, I bet it felt lonely last night.  Kinda like an ex-girlfriend that sees her ex-boyfriend with his new bride.
• Speaking of Texas Stadium, there was some cheesy animation on the screen we were watching, which was the same stuff that was being shown on the big screen inside.  You had the star from Texas Stadium taking off into space going back in time like one of the Superman movies and then landing in the new stadium.
• Speaking of the star, it looked smaller than the one in Texas Stadium.  Maybe it got smaller because it burned up during re-entry.
• I can’t believe they didn’t upgrade the music, and I wish Jerry didn’t have those guys waving the Cowboy flag  who are dressed up like “real” cowboys.
• When George W. Bush was introduced I heard a majority of boos, but I’m not sure how it sounded on TV.  Heck, I thought it was a good idea for Jerry to ask him to do the coin toss.  A lot of areas don’t a have a former president in their backyard who happens to be a fan of the team.
• Seeing Madden and Summerall sit together was cool.
• I’ll never understand why people will go to a game wearing the jersey of a team that isn’t even playing.
• I was right that the first points were going to be a field goal, but then again a guess like that isn’t all that hard to predict.
• The only thing I bought at the stadium was an inaugural program in the gigantic Pro Shop for ten bucks.
• The Cowboys didn’t deserve to win with that amount of turnovers.
• Pictures from last night are below, or you can click here to see the high-def versions.  I tried to take pictures of things you wouldn’t be able to see on TV.

Watch CBS Videos Online

What I took away from this piece is that there may be a difference between Conservatives and Republicans, with Conservatives being Birthers, Teabaggers, Palin and Joe Wilson supporters, and what you will, and the Republicans being the ones that my actually ahve some common sense.

Not many people claim a notable alligator kill on their first hunting trip, but Arianne Prevost of Satellite Beach can.

Prevost, 23, guided by Capt. Peter Deeks, 23, of Merritt Island, and Prevost’s boyfriend, Robert Rohmann, 23, of Indian Harbour Beach — who comprise Native Sons Outfitters — claimed the 11-foot gator at about 9 p.m. Tuesday in marshland between Lake Washington and Lake Winder.

“It was a total archery kill,” Deeks said, adding Prevost shot the gator several times with a crossbow and finished it with a broadhead. Prevost is having the meat harvested and the gator half-mounted.

Full FloridaToday.com Article