Happy New Year!

Yes, this is what New Years has come to for us.... so :P.

New Years

Hope everybody is having a good post Xmas week. Just want to see if any of the FL locals have plans yet. Chances are me and Irene will be staying up here and try to do something (aka maybe going out, so if anybody is up for that let me know). Or if a party gets thrown together or something is going on in Btown we could come down. Chime in with any helpful info so basically Rory keep you damn mouth shut.

Merry Christmas from the Sammy's

What do you want for Christmas little boy?

I want an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred Shot Range Model Air Rifle!

You'll shoot your eye out, kid

Merry Christmas everyone!

Merry Christmas

Patric Young is a beast!!!

http://gif.mocksession.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/PATRIC-YOUNG-WAT.gif

Check out the link. I think you Noles might not like it though!

Sanka, you dead maaan (Jamaican accent)

Just want to make sure people are still alive???

Jolly old Saint Nicholas.....

College Bowl mania {L}

Hey guys it is that time of the year were we get to pick College Football games. I created a league on ESPN so feel free to join up. This to me is much more challenging than the NCAA basketball tournament. Anyway let's match up some whits here.

Group: Elf Bowling
Password: bowl

Charlie Weis

HAHA Nooooooo....I don't know about you guys, but I am sad that blob will not be coaching UF anymore. Now I need somebody knew to make fun of. He really kicked some ass for you guys and showed what he is made of. As UF fans tell me your opinion. Happy, pissed or waiting to see who the hire to see how you feel then??

One thing I do know is that the cooler on the UF sideline is breathing a huge sigh of relief.

Decent BCS article {L}

Not trying to get everybody riled up or in a discussion of who "deserves" a title shot, but this is a decent article. It is funny by limiting the computers that nobody trusts we brough human more elements into the poll, which by all accounts are much much worse. I knew terminator scared a lot of people away from machines and computers, but sheesh.

Also, if I was Nick Saban I would have voted OK State low as a I possibly could without suffering extreme backlash, which he more or less did.

Nick D > Rory (even though he now owns a house...just saying.)

Bowl Games

So what are everyone's thoughts about this years bowl games? UF v OSU should be interesting. FSU v Notre Dame could also be a fun match up, especially because I think the Noles D-line might kill a ND QB. Auburn v UVA, no thoughts on this one because I cannot fathom UVA being in a bowl game. I am completely disgusted by the Sugar Bowl's decision to select VA Tech and Michigan. 2 undeserving teams but they will sell a bunch of tickets and hotel rooms. This game might become the rallying cry for a change in the BCS, the at-large system is completely FUBAR.

The title is linked to ESPN's page on all the games.

Saturday Events

We're going to be doing the Tampa Gun Show and Cigar City on Saturday starting at 9 at the gun show. We'll be coming back to Bradenton, though, before Josh's. Let me know if you're interested in joining us for one or both stops.

FSU v Auburn??? Possibly

Rumors are swirling for a possible bowl game match up between these two teams, which would be fantastically fun. Reports say right now Chick-fil-a bowl is favoring taking Auburn and if they do it would mean one of two teams probably. If Clemson losses this weekend to Va Tech in the ACC Championship game the Chick bowl can chose who they want next. Now since Aubrn and Clemson have faced off once this year, last year and they open the season together at a chick-fil-a sponsored event most people think they would take FSU. Now obviously if Clemson losses Va Tech will get picked for this spot or the Chick bowl can take somebody other than Auburn, which might open the door for Clemson again. So here is to rooting against Clemson this weekend.

Nick D (Eat more chiken)

[L] Well It's Official

Happy Turkey Day!

Props to the other Turkey Trotters who were out early this morning to earn their extra piece of pumpkin pie. Jen and I have a lot to be thankful for this year, but as always I'm thankful for having such great friends. Happy Thanksgiving!

The NOT so big games

Well it is rivarly week in college football which means the annual showdown between FSU v uf and AU v bama. While we all clearly want to win these games this season as been dissapointing for all 3 teams.

Let's start with the game that most of us care about, FSU v uf. I figure this game is going to be ugly offensively with many of punts sure to come. FSU has just a dreadful O-Line which makes running the ball near impossible. Also, our QB is not a pure pocket passer even though Jimbo thinks he is so when we can't scare teams with the run EJ struggles. Defensively FSU is very strong in nearly all phases of the game, especially our D-Line. FSU also has great special teams so I expect that to help a bunch. While I have not watched a ton of UF games it is pretty clear the offense is lacking and they also have a bad O-line. UF offense looks almost as bad as last year and they have Charlie Weis, which is just fun for everybody. UF seems to have a very young defense that certainly has some talent on it. If this was at FSU I would go with a slam dunk FSU win, but since this is on the road and FSU has not won a close game all year it will be closer. Personally I still think FSU has the better team and it would be great to send UF to a 6-6 season and ALSO start a 2 game winning streak against them Gators. FSU wins 17-13.

Other predictions.

1) It is mentioned at least 5 times that Jimbo and Muschamp or friends and own a beach house
2) There is over 20 penalties in this game
3) There is at 8 sacks in this game
4) Charlie Weis either breaks a chair or dents a cooler

In terms of the Auburn game since the game is at Auburn it might be a little closer. Still Auburn losses 21-10.

Can't wait to see everybody this weekend and for some fun and trash talking.

NICK D

Wednesday Night

There was talk of hanging out Wednesday night. My uncle is in town and looking to get a poker tourney going. We thought Wednesday night might be a good time to do it. Who is interested?

New Ride...

Picked this guy up on Friday. 2011 Subaru WRX Pearl White...

Happy Belated B-day...

...to Eric and Josh. Happy 30th! I still remember going to Alligator Rocks one year to celebrate...good times! :)

Sausage Making

Alright folks I am trying to see if anybody would be interested in doing some sausage making this holiday season. I have three different dates that I am going to propose just to gauge interest. Obvioulsy us folks who live in the area can more or less do it whenever, but just want to gauge to see if anybody who is flying in would be interested in these below dates. Even you local yocals throw in your opinion.

Nov 25th (Friday afternoon/evening)
Nov 26th (Before the FSU/UF game, now that we know the game time I can list this as a option)
Dec 22nd (Thursday evening)

PS FSU v UF is set for 7PM on Saturday...oh I can't wait.

Nick >------> D

[L] An interesting read

Drew, I completely expect you to hook a brotha up if you get any intel...

Calling out Rory

Rory, I hear whispers of some news that was posted on FB. Time to make it blog official.

[L] Came across this little gem today...

This kind of shit boggles the mind. Mr. President, in the words of the great Mr. Johnson, "Know your role!"

Maybe we'll buy fake this year...

Bunch of &$%!# Litterbugs

[L] Mizzou Joins SEC

Thoughts?

Preparing for MW3

Is anyone planning on getting the hardened edition? All future updates are included along with some other perks. It's worth it if we're not going to abandon map packs again like we did with black ops.

Juggalo Gangs?? {L}

This just cracks me up. Drew weren't you going to be a Juggalo for Halloween? Did you mean one of these guys or a male bimbo?? I still have a good 6-7 of their CD's and could still probably listen to a song or two of them heck we all listened to them in highschool. Can't believe this guys are still around, very impressive.

"What is a Juggalo, I don't know, but I am down with clown and down with Faego (sp)"

"A Juggalo might eat Monopoly and shit out Connect Four"

Rory is definitely a Juggalo

Sean Parker's first Halloween

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween

Richt Rumor

Thought I would throw this nugget out there for you Gator fans. Also, Alex this quote is true to your point about what type of moral lowground Richt stands on. Apparently Georgia just suspended three of it's running backs...read the below quote, this would really get me amped up....

"a source told DawgNation that the three players were disciplined for failing a drug test that was administered Thursday, two days before Georgia's 24-20 victory over archrival Florida in Jacksonville."

Who knows if it is true or how quickly they receive the results...either way some good message board material....

New template

I switched out templates for the blog in order for the main thread to be wide enough to post Youtube videos at their default width. Let me know if you have any rendering problems with this template.

Some Halloween Pics

Adam and Ali's house (at least it should be)

Halloween Awesomeness

This is for the peeps that don't have facebook. Last year's pumpkin.

Ashley

Peter Schiff Visits OWS

Dressing up at work

So Raymond James is pretty big into Halloween so I decided to join the company spirit and dress up for work. This costume won me a $50 gift card...believe that. Also, in a slightly Modern Family episode I am the only person in my department who dressed up haha...





Anybody else do anything fun??

Oh yea...Rory is a little beotch.....

Avoiding the 4th Loss

Well the exciting college football season keeps rolling with all three teams playing this weekend in different televised time slots. This weekend we shall see if our teams can avoid the 4th loss of the season. FSU looks to continue to rebound from its bad start with its third straight victory in a row against a decent opponent. NC State are not world beaters, but feature a very good QB and some skilled players. UF is looking to end its three game slide against what appears to be a solid Georgia team. While this game has been DOMINATED by UF the last two decades UGA appears to be the better team this year. Auburn is hoping to rebound from a trip to LSU by hopefully pounding on the worst team in the SEC. Both AU and UF really need to find some offense this week if they hope to win. Let's see what we predict below.

UF v UGA - Honestly I have no idea what to pick. UGA should win this game, but UF seems to pull a rabbit out of the hat consistently in this series. UGA 17-13

AU v Ole Miss - Home game for Aubie, Ole Miss is 0-4 in the SEC spells a victory for Auburn. 24-10

FSU v NC State - FSU will continue to light it up offensively and the defense goes sack city all over this statue of a QB NC State has. However, NC State will force a pick six to keep themselves in the game. FSU 38 - 17

Movember

http://us.movember.com/

I just heard about this.  We should all participate, then when we come to FL for Thanksgiving we can throw a Movember party...

Who's on board?

Google+ is dead

So I received the following email in my inbox today:

Hello,
After reviewing your profile, it appears that the name you entered does not comply with the Google+ Names Policy. Please log in to Google+ and visit your profile to learn more and take action.
The Names Policy requires that you use the name you are commonly referred to in real life in your profile. Nicknames, previous names, and so on should be entered in the Other Names section of the profile. Profiles are currently limited to individuals; we will be launching profiles for businesses and other entities later this year.
If you do not edit your name to comply with our Names policy or appeal with additional information within four days of receiving this message, your profile will be suspended. While suspended, you will not be able to make full use of Google services that require an active profile, such as Google+, Buzz, Reader and Picasa. This will not prevent you from using other Google services, like Gmail.
The Google+ team.

I don't use my full name specifically because I don't want a public online presence.  So fuck off Google.  Google+ is dead to me.

-J S

PS: I doubt I am alone in this, if you read their name policy the last paragraph is in there for a reason

To get eveyone in the Halloween spirit...

We'll be carving our pumpkins this week...

hope you all share your jack o'lantern photos too!

OWS is full of idiots except for this lady

Cheap Rents in AZ ??{L}

Jae according to this article you should carefully consider should you ever try to buy some property and rent it out as a investment in the near future. If we all ever wanted to take a vacation and rent a house near the Sammy's I am sure we can swindle some property owner into a great 1 week rate.

Anybody else find it interesting that Toledo, Ohio is one of the 75 biggest cities in America?? Perhaps just me because that is where my dad went to college.

Nick >------------> D

UF v Auburn

It is great to see you guys playing each other again, seems like it has been a while. Hopefully there can be some good shit talking for this game. With this being a road game for UF and there QB play downright awful I think Auburn will take this. Auburn has not exactly been lightin it up either so who knows what to expect. What I do hope for us a competive fun game.

In terms of FSU well if we don't beat Duke all hell is going to break lose. Honestly as pathetic as it is it may be a decent game to watch, they have a good QB and receivers. Amazing we can go with being tied with Oklahoma in the 4th Qtr to hoping to beat Duke. I don't even want to think about if we don't, let's just hope we do so FSU can salvage some type of season.

Full name alert

Hey Jae, I noticed my full name is listed in the contributers list...anyway to get this changed? Nothing bad is linked to my name yet, but I'd like to keep it that way! I don't want another Rory escapade ;)

Also, Eric, Fitocracy won't let me sign in. I tried through facebook and it only errors. Is there an invite code?

Ashley

Road Test Weekend

Well this weekend we shall see if UF and AU can stave off the dreaded second lost that FSU gained two weeks ago. Also, we shall see if FSU season will officially be over with a loss to Wake. Personally I see AU pulling this one out I think Aubie is turning the corner on the season and will take down Arkansas. In terms of UF well lets just say I have zero confidence and in them winning this game. Maybe they will surprise everybody and play a close game, but with the way the offense looked against Bama I just don't see it. That is why they play the games though right?? You never know. Instead of the score I will post how many yds I think UF will gain. For FSU well who the hell knows what to expect sure we have lost to 2 top 10 teams, but Wake always gives us trouble and FSU can't run the ball. Hopefully our defense will make the Clemson game look like the exception and not the norm.

AU wins - +70 points scored
UF losses by at least 17 and gains under 200 yds of offense
FSU wins by 10, but does not look good doing it.

Fire Tablet

Just curious of what you guys have thought about the new tablet Amazon is releasing in November. Seems pretty decent to me mainly because the price tag is sitting at a nice $199. Guess we probably will not know much until people actually get their hands on them.

I figured Alex would like these in the spirit of the UF- Bama game.

http://gatorsfirst.spreadshirt.com/alabama-game-C97378

Happy Birthday Rory

And thank you Florida GNN Birthday reminder :).

Hope you have a happy birthday man.

Gears 3

For those of you who are cool and play video games you should be aware that Gears 3 is out. I found out that Newegg is running a promotion where you get a $20 gift card with purchase [L]. If you ever buy anything through Newegg this is a hard deal to beat.

Netflix site/business split

If you haven't already heard, Netflix is dividing its company into two different sites, Netflix and Qwikster. Netflix will now be a streaming only service with Qwikster handling the DVD by mail. Current customers of both services will have an account created at Qwikster and will be billed separately at the current rates. Qwikster will also add video games to the library. Extreme downsides include separate sites, separate queues, separate ratings and separate bills. This just screams "Let's disassociate ourselves with the DVD business that's taking a nosedive." With this new information, which side are you choosing? Anyone staying with both services? As it stands right now, I'd be a customer of both services, but I'm going to have to reassess how much I use each service.

Italy Trip

Those of you that have been.... If you could go for a week, would you spend the week in Rome or half a week in Milan and half a week in Florence?

Wknd Predictions

Well since we finally all have a decent game (AU had one last weekend) let's have some fun and make a couple of predictions. There is finally a full Saturday of decent games to watch!

UT @ UF - Gators take this one by a close margin, if it were on the road I would go with UT, but since it is in the swamp. Gators win. 21-17

Auburn @ Clemson - Seems pretty clear to me that Auburn has a productive offense and unproductive defense. While Clemsons D has looked bad and their offense unspectacular. If this were at home I think Auburn takes it to them by a good margin, but since it is a road game Auburn wins by a closer margin. 34-24

OU @ FSU - With what happened last year many people think it will be a repeat performance. However, that was only the second game under a new defense coach and we got smoked by a good team. This year I expect our defense to fair much, much better. Offensively it is hard for me to tell. If we play like we did the first two games I will not be happy then again we played the most basic offensive sets you could possibly play. Personally I think this game will be decided by 7 pts or less. With FSU and the home crowd and NICK D in attendance I am predicting a FSU win 27-24!!!!!!!

Yea I am drinking the kool-aide, but can you blame me. By the way we are setting up our tailgate at 7AM going to be cooking all three meals out there. I have Bloody Marys ready to roll with a couple of mandatory water chug/alcohol breaks scheduled for the afternoon.

GO NOLES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

NICK D

FSU/OU Sleepover!

Okay not really a sleepover (unless you want to), but I am thinking of having a game watch party on Saturday night. Figure it'll be madness to try and go to a bar but I would definitely prefer to watch it with a group. Anyone free & interested? Nobody's seen my place yet... understood that it's a bit of a trek up to Clearwater, BUT we just got a new couch! Let me know your thoughts.

Random Thoughts

I'm feeling super lethargic and gross after a gluttonous weekend and am not particularly motivated to finish my work, so here are a few things I thought I'd share while killing time:

1. Happy Anniversary (yesterday) Eric & Christina! Three years of just livin' the life :)

2. Happy (two month) B-Day Avery! Time is flying...

3. I won an award at work a few months ago and got a free round-trip ticket for Southwest. I booked my flight today to Denver - so excited as I've never been west of the Mississippi (except Iowa). If anyone's been and has tips I'm all ears!

4. I'm very unhappy about Cougartown not being on the fall TV schedule. When the heck is it coming back?

5. Also regarding television, I'm pumped about James Spader joining the cast of The Office. He's the new CEO (aka replacing Kathy Bates), but no word on who the new manager will be. I did read that no one else was hired on this season though...

Happy Hump Day kids - have a great day!

Another one bites the dust

Happy Bday Logan hope you enjoyed your 20's.

Tigers and House

Opening Weekend

Hope everybody enjoys opening weekend to College Football season. While most of the games will not be very close or entertaining at least you can watch for a half or so. Would say good luck to all of our teams, but to be honest they probably do not need it. I will be in Tallahassee for opening weekend basking in tailgate glory. Let's hope our teams get off to a injury free successful bashing building our confidence for tougher games in the coming weeks.

PS Rory and Alex enjoy the beer.

GO NOLES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nick to the D

HGTV Is FOS

Cristina and I have successfully navigated the oft times precarious activity of buying a short sale. The task was accomplished in no small part with the patience enhancing effects of Tequila. I have watched all the homebuying shows and as far as I can tell our experience is unique in its trials and tribulations. It is a story too lengthy for the blog, but it does come with a happy ending. The end result is that we now own a 2,000 sq. ft. 3/2.5 home in the seminole heights area of Tampa. The shows never mention the last minute changes of heart the seller experiences, or the fact that the bank doesn't actually do any work on your loan until exactly 30 minutes prior to the scheduled closing time. I look forward to having everyone come by and see the new place once the new furniture arrives and we have painted our walls some such shade of greenish blue, and yes punch and pie will be served. The house also came with 4 kittens who have laid claim to the backyard and will only agree to leave if I find them suitable lodging in a home with a magic Turkey Box(refrigerator containing turkey). I can't post pictures from my iPhone so it will have to wait till I get home.

FYI

If you haven’t heard, apparently there was an SSL certificate falsely issue for all of Google’s domains last Month, possibly to an Iranian source:

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/239112/google_says_gmail_attack_focused_on_iranian_targets.html

They’ve since revoked the certificate but not before it was successfully used to perform several man-in-the-middle attacks. Given the seriousness of the breach, removing the offending certificate authority (DigiNotar) from your browser’s list of trusted authorities (both at home and at work) is probably reasonable.

Some instructions to help:

* *

*Firefox:*

http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/deleting-diginotar-ca-cert

Chrome:

go under options -> under the hood -> manage certificates -> trusted root certificates -> edit DigiNotar and disable all the trust settings.

Internet Explorer:

http://www.gainesvillecomputer.com/blog/fake-ssl-certificate.html

Nick the job man

Well folks I am on the move again and have accepted another job, but this time I will at least be in the same city. Reason I was looking for a job was because the company I was working for is not financially healthy. I knew it was a risk when I accepted a job at a start-up, but it was a great learning opportunity for me. My new position is with Raymond James and I will be doing some accounting for them. I am very excited for this for multiple reasons, but mainly being I will be finally moving out of the insurance industry which is something I have been wanting to do for a while. Obviously they are secure and respected company and it should provide me with a wealth of opportunity going forward. I will be starting my new job in two weeks so prepare to be work neighbors soon Amanda!

PS Football starts in one week let the trash talking begin. We can probably find plenty of trash in Charlie Weiss's garbage can as he consumes as much food in a day as a family of 5 eats in a week.....

Some August Pics

Braden & Ava watching TV:

New Security Door:




Farmer Braden & Mom:

Monsoon double-rainbow:

Divorce Agreement for the US by Law Student

Matt found this - I thought you guys would appreciate it :)


Dear American leftists, social progressive, socialists, Marxists, et al:

We have stuck together since the late 1950's, but the whole of this latest election process has made me realize that I want a divorce. I know we tolerated each other for many years for the sake of future generations, but sadly, this relationship has run its course. Our two ideological sides of America cannot and will not ever agree on what is right so let's just end it on friendly terms. We can smile and chalk it up to irreconcilable differences and go our own way.

Here is a model separation agreement:

Our two groups can equitably divide up the country by landmass each taking a portion. That will be the difficult part, but I am sure our two sides can come to a friendly agreement. After that, it should be relatively easy! Our respective representatives can effortlessly divide other assets since both sides have such distinct and disparate tastes.

We don't like redistributive taxes so you can keep them. You are welcome to the liberal judges and the ACLU. Since you hate guns and war, we'll take our firearms, the cops, the NRA and the military. You can keep Oprah, Michael Moore and Rosie O'Donnell (You are, however, responsible for finding a bio-diesel vehicle big enough to move all three of them).

We'll keep the capitalism, greedy corporations, pharmaceutical companies, Wal-Mart and Wall Street. You can have your beloved homeless, homeboys, hippies and illegal aliens. We'll keep The hot Alaskan hockey moms, greedy CEO's and rednecks. We'll keep the Bibles and give you NBC and Hollywood.

You can make nice with Iran and Palestine and we'll retain the right to invade and hammer places that threaten us. You can have the peaceniks and war protesters. When our allies or our way of life are under assault, we'll help provide them security.

We'll keep our Judeo-Christian values. You are welcome to Islam, Scientology, Humanism and Shirley McClain. You can also have the U.N. - but we will no longer be paying the bill.

We'll keep the SUVs, pickup trucks and oversized luxury cars. You can take every Subaru station wagon you can find.

You can give everyone healthcare if you can find any practicing doctors. We'll continue to believe healthcare is a luxury and not a right. We'll keep The Battle Hymn of the Republic and the National Anthem. I'm sure you'll be happy to substitute Imagine, I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing, Kum Ba Ya, or We Are the World.

We'll practice trickledown economics and you can give trickle up poverty your best shot. Since it so often offends you, we'll keep our history, our name and our flag.

Would you agree to this? If so, please pass it along to other like-minded liberal and conservative patriots and if you do not agree, just hit delete. In the spirit of friendly parting, I'll bet you ANWAR which one of us will need whose help in 15 years.


Sincerely,

John J. Wall
Law Student and an American


P.S. Also, please take Barbara Streisand & Jane Fonda with you.

The Mindset List

Came across a reference to the MindSet list that Beloit College comes out with each year. It lists some facts about the incoming class as information for the faculty.

It makes for some interesting observations:

• Ours (2004)


• Most Recent (2015)

HP Touchpad Firesale

Anyone get (or looking for) an HP Touchpad this past weekend? HP is discontinuing them and the price has been dropped from $499 to $99. I bought one from amazon but I'm still waiting for the shipping notification. If you're interested, click here for a listing of places with them currently in stock.

[L] WWJD

Sure says something about the Japanese when you compare this to Katrina...

Verizon 4G coverage in Sarasota/Bradenton

It was reported that Verizon would be expanding their 4G LTE coverage today to include the Sarasota/Bradenton area. I've tested my connection as far northeast as my house and as far southwest as Blake Hospital and I can confirm that the new network is indeed up and running. Bad news is if you don't already have an unlimited data plan from Verizon you're stuck with their new tiered plans. Thankfully my plan was grandfathered in!

[L] This is beyond sad

There is nothing they could possibly do to this man to make up for what he has done.

[L] Noles could grow a pair

The football season could become a much more heated battle... talks of the Noles joining the SEC get serious.

Happy Birthday Part Duex

Happy Birthday Alex.....30!!!!!! We now all can hold something over his head for a little while, until we turn 30 anyway.

Happy Birthday

J

Team iLuminate, America's Got Talent

Anyone see this last night? It's a pretty cool performance and I can't help but wonder what kind of programming went into this. It's like Fighting Gravity from last year's America's Got Talent plus lights and computers.

[L] Could've seen this coming...

Just another reason I so desperately want to reach kids BEFORE they turn into zombies.

Blog > Google+

Now that Adam and Jae are all over Google+ and have previously boycotted most social media outlets I hope the blog does not get neglected. Personally I still love being able to say things on here that only this group would appreciate. Long live the blog.

Nick to the D

Nick>Rory

Spotify

I signed up for Spotify as soon as it became available in the US, but my friends list is looking awfully sparse. For those that don't know what I'm talking about, Spotify is essentially an iTunes type app with free, on demand access to any music you want (with the occasional ad). It also pulls your facebook contacts that are also using the service allowing you to see their top artists, tracks, playlists, etc. Request an invite at spotify.com.

Google+ = Penis enlargment

J not sure if you put me on some email list or something, but I get at least 1 email a day to both of my email accounts (work and home) saying from J S. Either way not important I unsubscribed, which is not really important, but I will not be joining after this belligerent email attack I keep receiving from this fucking heinous company. Not sure why they think I will want to join because I keep receiving emails like I want a damn penis enlargement or want viagra or something. Only way I will ever join unless everybody on here joins and it is so great I have to overcome my stubbornness. F GOOGLE!!!!!

Nick D over and out.....

August Recess

I will be back in Bradenton for a few days in August, specifically the 16th through the 21st. Mandy will also be around, she is leaving on Saturday to go to New Orleans (it is Harper's first day of pre-k). But if any one is around and wants to hang out, let me know.

Google+

I got my foot in the door of Google+ (thanks Brian). Let me know if you want an invite.

Netflix Price Change

I'm sure everyone else got the email about Netflix splitting up their DVDs vs Streaming. What is everyone's take on this? We cancelled the streaming portion and went DVD only until their streaming selection grows. I know Netflix is trying to push everyone towards the streaming since that's where they make their money, but I think this move is going to backfire as more people like us ditch the streaming since the selection just isn't worth $8 a month.

Sean Parker Bailey born July 10th 9 lbs 2 oz 20.5 inches

Avery Marie - 7/7/11

6 lbs 11 oz, 19 in, born @ 2:05 AM after approximately 12 hours of labor. We'll be posting a ton of pictures on the Mousseau family blog in the near future.

Rory, I found something to do with your Kinect...

4th of July storm

Mystery solved

So we figured out what was wreaking havoc on our garden. At least he was nice enough to also eat our weeds. Time for the dog to prove her worth and get rid of this thing.

God does not want me to eat sausage

Forces conspired against us today culminating in us eating casing-less pseudo-sausage sandwiches in defeat tonight.

It all started on Hulu where we were watching the latest Master Chef competition with two teams competing to cook sausage sandwiches for 101 hungry bikers. It only took one shot of a grill full of plump spicy italian sausages to get my cravings going. It also just so turned out that we had a frozen pork loin and a meat grinder attachment that hadn't met each other yet.

I spent this afternoon looking up recipes and since it turned out we had all the ingredients in house, I got to work grinding my little heart out. I finished up the filling and we headed out to do some errands. One of these was to pick up the sausage stuffer attachment for our mixer.

Our first stop was Bed Bath & Beyond. My understanding was that this store was only in business because it sold random kitchen stuff (in the Beyond category). Apparently our sausage stuffer wasn't random enough because they don't carry that in stock. They could special order it for us though (no shit, it's called the internet I can special order it too). We left there defeated but confident that somewhere in this town of 1 million people a store would sell the key to my sausage making destiny...

Not so. The exhaustive list of stores we either visited or called is Target, Walmart, K-Mart, Kohls, Sears, Dillards, Macy's, J.C. Penny, and Home Depot.

For another shot in the pills we stopped by Chick-fila since our local store was giving out free milk-shakes today. That is except for me who could only walk away with a rain check because they were cleaning the milk-shake machine (of course they were *shakes fist towards the sky*).

So now we are left coming up with other ways to use our 4 lbs of spicy sausage filling. In the mean time, we wait for our $7 sausage stuffer to come via Amazon Prime. We probably spent over that in gas today.

[L] Google+

Has everyone seen the lastest offering from Google in the social arena? Third time's a charm? I could definitely see myself using the Hangout and Huddle (group video chat and group texting/chat respectively). Circles seems like what I've already done w/ the blog (maybe Google stole it from me!). Anyway if you haven't heard about it check out the link in the title and take the tour. Like all of Google's services this is by invite only right now but will eventually get rolled out.

4th of July (Bradenton Ppl mostly)

You guys have any plans? If not maybe we should try to throw something together for Sunday/Monday. Also, if the non Bradenton people have any plans that might make us jealous please feel free to share.

Eric hope things are going well for you and Christina...I am crossing my fingers for a 4th of July baby for you!

Nick to the D aka (Grammer King :)

UF v FSU

I don't usually post this stuff ahead of time but this is a pretty special occasion and I want to give everyone plenty of heads up. For our 5 year anniversary (I know, that sounds crazy) Jen and I want to go to the UF v FSU game. We would love company for the tailgating, game, or after partying. Things are in the preliminary planning period, so let me know if you think you can make it...

Team Fortress 2, now free on Steam

Don't know if anyone is interested, but Team Fortress 2 is now free to download and play on PC and Mac. It's 4 years old, but still a fun game.

[L] No Idea How This Works But Looks Awesome

Why do I find this hilarious!?

[L] Reverse Definition

We live in a great time where someone with a terrible memory like myself can still be productive. Today I was having one of those "on the tip of my tongue" moments trying to remember the word homogeneous. I found this great site where you can do a reverse definition lookup. I put in "everything is in the same type" and the first hit was my good old friend homogeneous. It asked me for feedback if that was what I was looking for (which they use to train their algorithm). I plan on bookmarking this guy since I have been having more and more of these memory problems. Probably due to too much Call of Duty.

Ultrasound Pics

Christina had an ultrasound done yesterday to take a peek at Avery. The rest of the pictures can be seen on our blog or my flickr account.

Braden's Stepping Reflex

This reflex is supposed to go away at 6 weeks, I guess nobody told Braden that :).

[L] - Nintendo's new console announced

Nintendo announced their new console, the Wii U, at E3 today. It will be released in 2012. Check out the link for specs and a video demo.

Damn You Autocorrect

This seriously made me laugh so hard I cried. Alex will tell you it doesn't take much to make me laugh hard...but this seriously is hysterical.

Saturday Evening

Pool party / BBQ at the Sammy's starting at 5. Meet the little one and eat some grub. There will be normal person beer available, byomb (byo-micro brew).

Jae

What are your plans for Saturday evening/Sunday. Me and Irene will be in town and want to try and meet up with your brood. Let us know. Thanks.

Nick is >

Survey

So I have an odd survey. I am sitting around listening to the new Lonely Island album and there are a lot of really good hip hop/rap songs that remind me of the ridiculous rap songs of the past. I was trying to think of good rap songs from when we were in high school/college. All I can think of right now is the Big Tymers, a la Get Your Roll On. I had this huge playlist that somehow got lost in a hard drive reformat years ago and I am still trying to recover. Can anyone think of some classic rap songs from that era?

P.S. Everyone should get the new Lonely Island album, it is awesome! I am currently wearing a turtleneck and chain, sippin' on a light beer.

Socialnomics

Very cool presentation on the impact of social media...

Liquorville

For those of you that missed it...

JT on SNL again last week

Justin Timberlake needs to host SNL every week... there are a few other videos that I could easily post that made me laugh out loud (especially Liquorville). But, I know how much we all love digital shorts, so... Enjoy!

Memorial Day Weekend

Alright guys this weekend the Cleveland Indians are headed down to Tampa with their slightly offensive logo and the best record in the MLB. They will be taking on the Rays Friday night at 7PM and Saturday at 4PM. As of now me and my family are definitely going to the Saturday game and I would like to go to the Friday game as well. Even if it is slightly crowded tickets will not be hard to come by. Let me know if you are interested.....

Nick D over and out with tons of Tribe Pride

"Hey bartender Jobu needs a refill!"

Cutting Cable

After a bunch of tinkering we're finally ready to cut cable tv. The antenna has been mounted in the attic and supplies every room in the house with live tv. The HTPC is acting as a completely automated (some maintenance required) DVR using XBMC, ted:torrent episode downloader, Event Ghost and The Renamer. The 360 provides ESPN and Netflix (and Hulu Plus if I sign up). The final task was to run some network cable to keep Christina's work PC on the wired network and I finished that up last night. We're mid billing cycle so we'll keep the cable boxes for a bit to make sure we can live without them, but I'm just really excited to cut the Verizon bill by 67%.

Lessons

J think you can put together a tutorial for Amanda on how to start threads instead of creating drafts??

Shake Weight Class

_

As "Thejae" asked for...

So I traded in the Chevrolet Colorado that Jae had originally owned and I inherited. So to upgrade the whip mode, I purchased a 2004 BMW 745i w/ V8 and 80,000 miles. Got a Great 5 year warranty and I am loving having a massager in my reclining driving seat.

New Whip

This post is to call Jared out to post some pics/vid on his sweet new ride...

Friday the 13th

So this coming up Friday is Irenes Bday (yea Friday the 13th) anyway we plan on going out to Ybor to a restaurant called Columbia than out for a few drinks after. This restaurant is Cuban/Spanish and has got great reviews, entrees generally $15-25. If anybody is interested in coming up and wants to join in let me know. If you can't no worries just wanted to throw it out there.

Be well fellow citizens....

Nick D

Osama is dead!

By now, I'm sure all you folks have heard the wonderful news. I got a text from my sister late last night stating, and I quote, "Obama is dead!" Sensing that tragedy has stuck our nation again, I quickly turned on the TV and my sister's typo was corrected by the good fellas at FoxNews.

Anyways here is a little song that I feel is appropriate for the situation. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-LYH2Gg8yM

(Just click the link, I don't know how to post videos)

=== EDIT ====
Here you go Rory...

Email Addresses

Hey guys can you send me a email to the below email address from the email which you would check the most regularly. If I talk to you on a regular basis through email do not worry about, but if not please do. I tried to pull most of yours off of facebook, but I don't know if that is up to date or not. Apparently my contacts list is not up to date on my email.

Thanks,

Nick to the D

njd4877@hotmail.com

(Hint: This is in regards to debauchery)

[L] Portal 2 DLC announced... best part?

... it's free :).

I need to get my butt in gear and pick it up.

Acer Aspire Timeline X 4820T-6645 + Arch Linux

Our old laptop (Dell 600M) is showing it's age (for example the backspace key barely works). So I picked up an Acer Aspire Timeline X on Amazon for a little over $600. I am amazed at what you can get in a laptop nowadays. From a single-core 1.6 GHz processor to an i3? Pinch me.

Well it came in today and the first order of business is to wipe Windows 7 Home off the hard-drive and put Linux on it.

A couple guys at work really talked up Arch Linux as a stripped down DIY distro. (This is what I am running on my MythTV backend already but not a full-desktop install).

I am currently elbow deep in installation, updates to follow...

EDIT1 ======

So definitely more hands-on than an ubuntu install. My first cut left me rebooting into a system without wireless. Mulligan

EDIT2 ======

Downloaded broadcom driver from manufacturer website, transfer by usb drive to laptop, built and installed. Can now ping google (you're welcome google).

EDIT3 ======

Just upgraded to the bleeding edge `pacman -Syu`... rolling release model sure beats ubuntu

EDIT4 ======

Time to choose a desktop environment. i don't know what it is but the more processing power i get, the less software bloat i want to run. leaning towards xfce...

[L] Depressing.

You political minds on the blog have an opinion on this?

Adlib

Well since Amanda did not finish her draft I think she meant to make it like a adlib for all of us to take a guess. So here it is continuing upon Amanda's previous message...

"I have decided to move to LA and attempt to be a celebrity trainer or be a trainer on biggest loser"....

Happy Easter

Hope your baskets were as enjoyable as mine.

Happy Easter everyone.

Skype rox

I had the bright idea this afternoon to try and dust off my xbox 360 vision camera and get it working in Ubuntu (so the little one can skype his grandparents).

Well it took probably half an hour of googling and another half an hour of updating drivers but i have been able to skype my mom on her laptop and my brother on his iphone.

Anyone else on skype? if so send me your username...

Windfalls

As I was driving in to work today I had a weird thought... I wondered what I would do if somehow or another I came into a windfall of $100,000. What would I do with it? It's a great chunk of change (of course), but it's not (F-you, F-you, F-you, You're cool, F-you I'm out kind of change). I still haven't determined what my coarse course of action would be, but I thought I would open it up to the blog since we have a good mix of professions and personalities on here...

So what say ye, what to do with a $100,000 windfall?

Congrats Logan!

Heard the good news yesterday. Congratulations! Also, I moved to Clearwater this weekend - expect a housewarming (apartmentwarming?) party invite whenever it is that we get situated... so, maybe Christmas. :)

Nick in real life...

You HAVE to get one!

Greg Biffle is Gay

J do you think you can remove that thread or whatever it is, for some reason when you search some of our names that and only that pops up. Not sure if deleting that will cause another instance to appear or not.

Nick to the abc

[L] Yet another reason to hate France

I brought this up when this law was first passed. It blows my mind that the French think this is okay. Can you imagine a $200 fine just because of what you're wearing? Maybe if I was wearing a T-Shirt of a woman doing a donkey show while walking through an elementary school. The French make me sick.

Fasoli Day

Happy Birthday Adam and Drew. Today I am trying to recognize you each individually instead of lumping you under one name Fasoli Brothers since you are both special in our hearts. Have a good day gents.

Happy Birthday Nick D

NJD >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> everyone else (for today, anyway)

BAS

How is BAS (Braden Alexander Sammy) doing? Are you guys able to get some sleep or have you started downing 5 hr energy shots??

NJD > BAS > RJZ

Little Mexicans that Live in Pyramids

<a href="http://msn.foxsports.com/video?vid=fbe212ba-d8fd-42ee-ab8c-b6d3379b0ab4" target="_new" title="">College Experiment: 'MegaSkeet420'</a>

60 mins

just got around to watching the 60 minutes episode on the new tax havens.

it's remarkably frustrating to listen to leslie stahl in the same breath say that the us has the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world and blame cisco's ceo for moving profits overseas to lower tax-rate countries like ireland and switzerland.

the houston dem that was blaming companies in his district for having shell offices in switzerland is infuriating. he can't see that the end-game of his attempts are not lucrative companies paying a large percentage of their profits to the government. the end-game is lucrative companies moving out of the country for good.

drew, i want you to find repr. lloyd doggett and pass along that he is an idiot. thanks.

edit: my point exactly

Zoolander

Blue Steel:

First Week With Tunderbolt

Last week I upgraded phones and got an HTC Thunderbolt on launch day. Everything has been great except for battery life. After some playing around trying to figure it out I found that simply being connected to the 4G network killed the battery (100% to 0%) in about 5 hours. Of course there is no official way to turn off 4G service, so I had to turn to the internet for answers. As you can see in the screenshot, I've created a shortcut that allows me to toggle between 3G and 4G on demand. This completely solved the problem, and I'm still able to connect to the 4G network when I need the speed (for those that care, currently getting 17Mbps down). If anyone is up for a phone upgrade, I would highly reccommend this phone provided you perform this little hack.

Chavez Quote {L}

Nothing really needs to be said, but I can't believe these words were actually said in a serious fashion. Wonder if those celebrity morons who visit this guy harbor the same belief. I can't believe this guy "leads" a nation and has other countries who support him, kind of scary.

Meet Braden

Braden Alexander Sammy born 3/21/11 @ 6:35 pm

7 lb 8.4 oz, 20"

Mom and baby are recuperating after a long day and a half.

Uploading pics/vids from the hospital is proving to be a royal pain, so any more updates will be sparse until we get home on Thursday evening.