Wednesday, October 31, 2001

Today is the 2nd anniversary of my big move to the Emerald City. Man, time does fly...

Oh yeah, happy Hallowe'en!

Tuesday, October 30, 2001

Just found the most entertaining anti-Roger Clemens site. It's kinda funny how much time and effort this guy has put in to create a site for someone he allegedly hates so much. ;)

Monday, October 29, 2001

Mom left with Hannah last night and I spent 4+ hours cleaning and rearranging my apartment afterwards. It always amazes me how women can shed so much hair and still not go bald. Eek. ;)

Just got some pictures from the summer BBQ on the rooftop of Hong's ultra posh Belltown condo back in September.

Thursday, October 25, 2001

A little (ok, *extremely*) juvenile and gross, but this is by far the funniest thing I've seen in a while. Some other equally juvenile and gross yet hilarious stuff can be found here.

Tuesday, October 23, 2001

My amazing New York Yankees beat the evil M's last night! Say whatever you want about the payroll, etc., but the bottom line is that the Yanks are simply better when it really counts. Next up: the Arizona Diamondbacks. Bring it on!

Monday, October 22, 2001

Ok, so the Banff plan did go kaput, but it was an awesome vacation nonetheless. Our last minute plan B was Whistler and while it's not quite ski season yet, it was still absolutely gorgeous there and we had a blast.

Some of the highlights from my week off:

• Mom *forcing* me to play the piano in the hotel lobby at 1 o'clock in the morning!
• Christian getting a new job.
• Stopping by the Furry Creek where Hannah and Christian got married 15 months ago.
• My NY Yankees are up 3-1 vs. the evil Seattle M's! It was definitely worth getting hassled at the border for wearing my Roger Clemens shirt! :)

Tuesday, October 16, 2001

You know who else never ceases to amaze me? Why, my New York Yankees, of course. It was amazing enough that they somehow managed to beat the upstart A's last year. It was amazing enough that they somehow found a way to beat Barry Zito a couple of days ago when he only allowed 2 hits. But, how they managed to come from a 0-2 deficit to take the series? That's too amazing, even for them.

Which brings me to my next topic: Derek Jeter. You see, I've always thought he was overrated. People always talk about how he has 4 World Series rings at age 27, but the truth of the fact is that his stats don't put him in the same league as other young AL shortstops like A-Rod, Nomar, or even Tejada. Besides, since when is the number of World Series rings a barometer of one's greatness? Shane Spencer has 3 rings. Barry Bonds has none. I don't see anybody making an argument that Spencer is a better LF because he's a "proven winner" or something idiotic like that. But, I must say I was really impressed with Mr. Jeter during this ALDS. He is the definition of clutch. That crucial heads-up play in game 3 when he intercepted that horrible throw home (which missed 2 cut-off men) and allowed Posada to barely tag Jeremy Giambi at home was definitely *the* turning point of the series. Zito was brilliant that day, and I doubt that he was going to make more than 1 mistake he had already made (homerun by Posada, which proved to be the only (and the winning) run of the game).

Oh, my vacation (first in 15 months) starts today! I think the Banff plan is no more, but it should still be fun.

Monday, October 15, 2001

American people never cease to amaze me -- you gotta check this out. Frito's got some more of what he calls "campy shit" on his blog.

Sunday, October 14, 2001

Some random thoughts after watching the ALDS game 3 between the A's and my NY Yankees:

• Watching baseball on FOX is really REALLY painful -- Steve Lyons is the worst baseball color commentator, ever.
• Even though he got saddled up with the loss, Barry Zito is fucking amazing. He's got the best curve on this side of Kerry Wood. This kid is 23? Yikes.
• It pains me to say this, but I think we just delayed the inevitable by one day. Still, go Yanks go! :)

Saturday, October 13, 2001

I was walking by the magazine section of the Fred Meyer last night and saw Shane Meier on the cover of the Out magazine. Apparently he will be playing the role of Matthew Shepard in the upcoming TV movie The Matthew Shepard Story. Who is this Shane guy? Why do I care? Well, I don't, really. It's just that he used to sit right in front of me in my grade 8 French class.

Wednesday, October 10, 2001

Just got pictures from the weekend. Yeah, some of them got over/under-exposed, but Hannah says she'll fixed 'em up with PhotoShop.

Tuesday, October 9, 2001

Ok, the lack of cable TV has made my baseball kung-fu rather weak over the course of the 2001 season. In a feeble attempt to get back into it just in time for the playoffs, here is my 2 cents for this year's AL Cy Young race, using ESPN.com's sortable pitching stats as the main guide.

Since ERA is the most important pitching stat, I'm gonna look at pitchers with top 9 ERAs: Freddy Garcia, Mike Mussina, Joe Mays, Mark Buehrle, Tim Hudson, Jamie Moyer, Mark Mulder, Barry Zito and Roger Clemens.

First, we can eliminate Zito, Buehrle, Mays and Mussina. When there are three 20-game winners, 16-17 wins just ain't gonna cut it unless they have some other spectacular, Pedro-esque numbers. These guys don't.

As much as it pains me to say this, Roger Clemens clearly doesn't deserve his 6th Cy Young. Sure, he is my favorite player of all time, and he did start the season 20-1, but he has the highest ERA, RS, Opp OBP/OPS, second highest Opp Avr/Slg of the bunch. He also has no CG. He'll get a lot of votes from some stupid baseball writers, but that's like saying David Wells had a better season than Pedro in 2000. Having said that, I certainly won't complain if Rocket ends up winning the award. :)

Jamie Moyer's next to go. Of the remaining pitchers, he's last in K, QS and IP, with only one complete game. We can also take out Tim Hudson since Freddy Garcia has better or comparable numbers in almost all categories.

So, that leaves us Mark Mulder and Freddy Garcia.

- Mulder: led AL in W, SHO, CG. Fewer walks than Garcia.
- Garcia: #1 in Opp Avr/Slg/OPS, ERA (.40 lower than Mulder). Also more K/QS.

I think the choice is obvious -- Freddy Garcia is da man. Disagree? Flame on!

(Oh, in case you're wondering, NL Cy Young should go to Randy Johnson. If you really need me to explain why, you clearly don't deserve to watch the game of baseball.)

Sunday, October 7, 2001

Bought To Venus and Back and Strange Little Girls -- Tori rocks!

Friday, October 5, 2001

Hannah, Christian and I did the Grouse Grind today. I clocked in at just under an hour, but I'm sure I could've shaved off extra 10-15 minutes if I hadn't wasted so much time waiting around for them to catch up. ;)

Thursday, October 4, 2001

Bad Movie Night at Chez Frito avec Ludercrous and Dickertator. The feature presentation: Incubus (1965) -- black & white, entirely in Esperanto and starring a pre-Trek William Shatner! It doesn't get any better (or worse) than this. Oh, Shatner *is* Canadian, BTW. French Canadien, no less.

Mom's visiting from Japan!

Wednesday, October 3, 2001

I was watching Nightline and they had a story about Bill Maher who recently got into trouble for saying that launching cruise missiles from thousands of miles away is cowardly. What the fuck? Of course it's cowardly. No one has a problem calling it cowardly when a bunch of hijackers use planes as guided missiles to kill *our* innocent people. How is using missiles to kill *their* innocent people any different?

Also, from Jehan's blog:

Why is everyone referring to NYPD as heroes?

These are the same guys who shoved a plunger up Abner Louima's ass, nearly destroying his digestive system, and then clammed up about it.

These are the same guys who pumped 40 rounds into Amadou Diallo as he responded to their demand for identification.

They are not heroes.

They're just a bunch of guys who were too lazy to go to college, too fat for the military, and too stupid to get into any other line of work. And, everybody knows that law enforcement is a magnet profession for psychotic, bigoted, violent, inadequate people who see the uniform as the only way to gain self-worth and recognition.

They are not heroes. So, everybody should just stop saying that.

Monday, October 1, 2001

Yeah, I know I have nothing here yet. In the meantime, these will have to do...

• Mr. Blonde (a.k.a. yours truly. No geek would be complete without a personal homepage that contains absolutely nothing useful.)
  
• Movie Diary (yes, I do watch that many movies; yes, I do have way too much time; yes, I do need to get out more.)
  
• My Private Blog (uh, if I gave you the link, it wouldn't be so private now, would it? It does exist though -- good luck finding it...NOT!)