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Tuesday, December 18, 2007

San Diego: Day 4

Travel day, nothing eventful. Just the long drive back to Tucson. Sounds like we left San Diego just in time. The weather forecast for today said it was ACTUALLY supposed to cloud up a little and MAYBE sprinkle. That's some pretty severe weather by San Diego standards.

Monday, December 17, 2007

San Diego: Day 3

Today we went to the San Diego Zoo. Very cool. And the weather was gorgeous... but of course we didn't expect anything less from San Diego! But since a picture is worth a thousand words, you can check out my pictures.

Sunday, December 16, 2007

San Diego: Day 2

Today was a relaxing day. About the only thing we did was visit a large outlet mall right down near the Mexican border. Tomorrow, I think we're either going to the San Diego Zoo or SeaWorld.

Saturday, December 15, 2007

San Diego: Day 1

Any day that begins with IHOP is a good day, I always say... um, starting now. And after grabbing some delicious grub with my older brother Ryan and his wife Kate, Denise and I hit the road with my parents from Tucson to San Diego.

Because of our leisurely pace (and almost running out of gas in the mountains... in the middle of nowhere... in the dark) we didn't get to our hotel until about 8:30pm local time. We already got a great rate at the Pacific Terrace Hotel, but due to availability we were upgraded to junior suites with ocean views (although we can't really see much of it in the moonlight).

The room is really plush. And considering the last hotel room I stayed in a couple months ago was in Manhattan, it's downright gigantic in comparison... and at a fraction of the cost. In addition to the ocean view, large wood beds, marble bathrooms, and a flat-panel TV that I estimate at about 42", we get free wine! And as if all that wasn't enough, they actually managed to dig up a charger for my near-dead cell phone since, like an idiot, I left my charger in Tucson.

I have no idea what the plan is for tomorrow but after spending all of Friday afternoon traveling to Tucson and most of today trekking to San Diego, sleeping in and taking it easy are definitely top priorities!

Saturday, September 8, 2007

10th Ave Bridge Update

After a full week of having the 10th Avenue Bridge back, it ended up not being so positive. The reason?? The single lanes each direction are constantly clogged pretty much 24/7. My personal belief is that people are using it as a 35W detour. Not only is that exactly what MnDOT told everyone NOT to do, but it continues to make life difficult for the people who live here and actually need the bridge for our daily lives. Grrr...

Monday, August 27, 2007

Awesome news for me!

I can't really remember if I voted for Cam Gordon or not, but he just made my day...

Update: Looks like it was just confirmed today by the Strib!

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Indefinitely Frustrating

Although I'm a lifelong lover of storms, for once it's not a welcome site.

Despite moving the police tape way back a couple weeks ago, thus giving us back our visitor parking lot, this week the powers that be closed it again "indefinitely". In addition, the whole street right outside my building has been littered with "no parking - police order" signs... also "indefinitely". So essentially, having any visitors over to my building is next to impossible.

Also this week, there was a small bright spot when they reopened my end of the pedestrian bridge just downriver... for about an hour... and then subsequently closed it with no explanation... once again "indefinitely". But without question the most frustrating part is the fact that the 10th Avenue bridge remains closed, making it extremely inconvenient to get to 35W north and any shopping I need to do. And this weekend, they closed the stretch of 94 from downtown to highway 280, making it equally inconvenient to get anywhere east (i.e. St. Paul).

One theory I've heard is that there is a team of Navy SEAL divers down there and they want to protect their identities. Another possible explanation I heard for why the 10th Avenue bridge is still closed is that, given its close proximity to the 35W bridge site, they don't want the public possibly dropping things into it while it remains a crime scene. Either way, things probably won't get any better until all of the bodies are recovered (as of today, the number of missing is two) and cleanup can really kick into full swing.

Which brings me back to the weather forecast which for today and the next few days includes rain and storms, delaying the recovery efforts. I'm not trying to be insensitive to the tragedy that happened here. I just wish the powers that be were a little more sensitive to the fact that people live here and at the very least be a little more forthcoming with information.

Monday, August 6, 2007

Thank God for Small Favors

A couple small tidbits in this morning's news should help me immensely (from this article):

  • Motorists on southbound I-35W will be able to reach the 4th Street/University Avenue exit via a single lane. Previously, southbound drivers could go no farther than Stinson Boulevard.

  • Northbound I-35W will continue past the I-94 east exit to the 3rd Street and University of Minnesota exits


That first one would mean a lot more if the 10th Ave. bridge was open since that's the way I usually come home from that direction.

Another bright spot is hearing this morning that removal of cars and debris begins today. And that the stone arch bridge reopened yesterday giving people a place to look at the bridge site from. What that hopefully means is a drop in the ridiculous number of gawkers around my building.

Sunday, August 5, 2007

Bush Visit

Bush came to visit yesterday which was an extreme hassle for everyone on my block. Our entire block was basically on lockdown considering his motorcade drove right past my building.

What seems a little ridiculous to me is this. Everyone is curious to see the site. As frustrating as it is at times having all of these gawkers right on my street, I understand that it's natural to want to see it. I can say at least for myself that seeing it in person is so much different than seeing it on the news.

And yet the authorities are trying to keep people from getting anywhere near it. But any politician who's remotely curious about it is immediately granted permission to go right down to it and see it for themselves.

Heck, it would make my life much easier if they would just set aside a safe area where people can see it. As is evidenced by the news of 2 people arrested for tresspassing after scaling a 10-foot fence and crossing 3 police tape lines just to see it, people obviously want to see it and will try to find a way. Besides, It would mean less gawkers on my street!

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

35W Bridge Collapse

Holy $@#!

Tonight on my way home I was very puzzled when I was forced to stop and turn around. Not sure what to do, I headed another way. Traffic was stopped. All the sudden there were emergency vehicles literally everywhere. Confused, I was starting to wonder if this was related somehow. Turning on the radio, I heard one of the more amazing things I'd ever heard: the 35W bridge over the Mississippi right outside my building had collapsed... during rush hour.

Near as I can tell, it happened not even 5 minutes before I would've been driving right underneath it. Freaky.


After a number of detours, I finally made it home. When I first grabbed my camera and headed out, it was absolute chaos. There were people running confused everywhere... including firefighters and police. When I first walked out, I was literally standing right next to one piece of the collapsed bridge. There was a car on fire not 100 feet from me. But as time passed, police kept shooing us away.

Easily one of the most insane things I've ever seen.

Check out my pictures here.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Las Vegas: Day 3

Go home day. Boo. We finished up some last minute things we had to take care of on the strip: Denise had a $15 voucher she forgot to cash out at MGM, we tried to get a slice of pizza at NY NY (the upstairs part where Nathan's is was closed for renovations), and Denise finally got to see the fountain at Bellagio. She was quite impressed!

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Las Vegas: Day 2

Today was spent with more blackjack and bumming around Vegas. In the evening, we all went and saw Monty Python's Spamalot, which I've been dying to see since it opened on Broadway and now also has a permanent show at the Wynn. We all thought it was awesome!

Afterwards, we headed back downtown where our evening consisted of more blackjack and drinking booze from accurately-sized plastic footballs.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Las Vegas: Day 1

Driving from Bishop, CA, we arrived in Vegas right in the hot part of the afternoon. The thermometer on the car read 111 degrees! After heading downtown and getting checked in at the Four Queens, we got in a little bit of blackjack before heading to the airport to pick up my other brother, Ryan, and his wife.

Later on, Denise and I entered a small, 3-table poker tournament at the Golden Nugget. I was doing pretty well despite mediocre cards but I finally got taken out with pocket 8s.

Friday, July 13, 2007

San Francisco: Day 4

Today we spent most of the day in the car for part 1 of our Las Vegas road trip. A lot of that time was spent going through the Sierra Nevada mountains and Yosemite, which provided some spectacular scenery.

We stopped for the night in Bishop, CA.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

San Francisco: Day 3

Yesterday, Denise and I drove down to Monterey to go whale watching. Despite a couple small setbacks (me waiting until we got to the rental car place to realize that I forgot my wallet, missing our boat by like 5 minutes, etc.), we finally got out on the bay.


The weather was great and the views were amazing. We essentially followed a mother and calf humpback whale around the bay for a couple hours. I was just mentioning to Denise how you don't really get to see the whale's front end (their face?) when they come up to the surface. Just a few minutes after saying that, the mother popped up on Denise and my side of the boat so close that it actually startled us! I only managed to snap the picture on the right. It was absolutely incredible!

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

San Francisco: Day 2

Today, with Matt and Maria working, Denise and I spent the day just bumming around the city, mainly Fisherman's Wharf. For dinner, we ate at a delicious little pizza place called Tommaso's.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Denise Quote of the Day

While walking around San Francisco: "I'm telling you, these streets were laid out by Dr. Seuss."

Monday, July 9, 2007

San Francisco: Day 1

Denise and I arrived at SFO at about 8:30pm local time. We hopped the BART to downtown SF and took a cab to Matt and Maria's place. We grabbed a quick bite to eat and hit the sack. Tomorrow should be more eventful.

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Engaged!

7/7/07. I asked. She said yes. So it begins.


Sunday, July 1, 2007

Valleyfair

Denise and I spent a gorgeous Sunday afternoon at Valleyfair today. The weather says it only got up to 83 degrees but it felt warmer walking around in the sun. So it felt pretty good to ride on a couple water rides.

I thought the new Renegade coaster was really fun but Denise thought it was a little too--as she put it--"rickety". In my opinion, that's pretty much what can be expected from a wooden roller coaster.

I'm not typically one to fall prey to carny games, but the ginormous stuffed Stewie doll just called to me and I felt compelled to win it... for Denise, of course. On the 5th try, I was victorious.

Saturday, June 30, 2007

Old-fashioned date night

Like really old-fashioned. Like right out of the 70s. First up was a trip to the Taste of Minnesota where we dined on corn-on-the-cob, a corn dog for Denise and a foot-long hot dog for me. Oh yeah, and we rocked out to the Village People (see über-lame cell phone video number one or number two).

We decided we didn't want to wait around for the couple hours after the Village People (mercifully) ended until the fireworks started so we headed out. Continuing 70s night, we stopped by the A&W drive-in. I, of course, had a root beer freeze. But for some unknown reason (I think she was dropped on her head as a child), Denise doesn't like root beer.

Not quite wanting to go home yet, we played a little late-night bingo. Despite coming close a few times, we won exactly $0.

Oh, and I almost forgot, after A&W we stopped to get the car washed. Check out video below of Denise being entertained by it. She's so easily amused!



The fun continues tomorrow when we head to Valleyfair!

Saturday, May 26, 2007

New car

It's the end of an era: I traded in the BMW 330CI on a '07 Audi A3. I never saw myself driving a hatchback (although Audi calls it a "compact wagon"... even though "wagon" also has a fairly negative connotation in my book), but it sure is a cute little bugger! And even though it's a hatchback, it only loses 3 cubic feet vs. the A4 sedan.

It has the same 2.0T engine as in the Volkswagen Jetta. Although I wasn't necessarily looking for it, I ended up getting one with the S Line Package (i.e. sporty). Another feature I wasn't looking for but am sure glad I got, Audi's "open sky" feature. It actually gives it TWO sunroofs, although only the front one moves. Pretty cool having a sunroof over the back seat too!

Yet another feature I didn't really need, a navigation system. But I haven't even had the opportunity to play with it yet. Because it was pre-owned, the dealer didn't have the navigation DVD or even my manuals, which took away my favorite part about buying a new car: reading the manual!

Monday, May 21, 2007

Quick Update

Cabinets are done, appliances are in, the trim is done... About the only thing that remains now is countertops and sink. And (fortunately) I don't have to do anything for that. It's all just a matter of waiting for Home Valu to call and come and install everything. Yay!

Monday, April 30, 2007

Home improvement continues...

Even though I haven't posted in week and a half, I've been far from idle. The carpet's all finished and looking (and feeling) awesome. Next up came the kitchen. That little project got a much-needed shot in the arm when Denise and I were at Ikea a week and a half ago.

It turns out Ikea sells kitchen cabinets that are pretty nice and very reasonably priced. So I got to work ripping my old cabinets out and installing the new ones (pictures here). Throughout the process, I have to say I've been very impressed with Ikea's attention to detail. They really thought of everything and all of the mounting hardware seems ingenious and, for the most part, foolproof.

I should be finishing up the cabinets tonight. I did have one minor mishap this morning. I was trying to finish up the cabinets while I waited for the granite guy to come and measure for the countertops. Anyway, I was opening cabinets door boxes with a scissors and at one point it got stuck momentarily and managed to clamp down on my right, middle finger, practically slicing the tip off. It took me close to a half hour just to get the bleeding to stop.

In other news, last Wednesday through Friday, my walls got a much needed painting. Those pictures can be seen here.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Carpet installation: Day 1

Since Huey got to my place around 12:30 but his installers didn't show up until 4pm or so, Huey and I did a large part of it ourselves. Ok, Huey did most of the actual carpet laying, but I helped with the grunt work which included lugging a 1,000lb roll of carpet off the truck so we could make our cuts. Needless to say, I'm a little sore again today. Man I'm getting old.

Once again, I documented the day with pictures.

Monday, April 16, 2007

Busy Weekend

After spending the weekend pulling up and hauling away carpeting, I'm a little sore today. And until I get new carpeting (which should hopefully be this Thursday), my place looks pretty ugly. But hey, on the bright side, I don't have to worry about taking my shoes off.

See pictures here.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

New light fixtures

I finished up what's essentially step 1 in my home improvement project last night, installing new light fixtures. The old ones were really bad. See before and after pics here.

Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Fricken Weather!

I'm very confused. It was over 80 degrees last week (which broke at least one record). Heck, it was 50 degrees yesterday. All the sudden, last night it got snowy and windy. On my way into work this morning, it was still very windy and a bone-chilling 18 degrees out! What the heck?! It's April!!

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

Spring Cleaning

To kind of kick off the "home improvement/get my condo ready to sell" project, Denise and I cleaned the crap out of my living room and dining room last week. That was all well and good, but that still left the unenviable task of cleaning up my den (which was fairly... shall we say... disorganized?) and my bedroom. Well going out with our realtor and looking at some places on Friday must've got me excited because I felt fairly motivated and pretty much cleaned the whole place up last night!

Monday, March 12, 2007

Sunday in Duluth

On Saturday, Denise called me with the sudden, random desire to drive up to Duluth that night. I told her I was in. After waking up and having some breakfast on Sunday, we drove up the North Shore Scenic Drive. And right in downtown Duluth, we visited the somewhat-less-than-impressive Fond-du-Luth Casino. Not only was it pretty dumpy, it literally felt like it was 100 degrees inside.
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I was also obligated to check out a landmark from my youth, the Radisson with the revolving restaurant. Oddly enough, I remember it being MUCH bigger when I was a kid! On the way home that night, we also stopped at the Black Bear Casino.

Check out my pictures here!

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Las Vegas: Day 2

Check out day. Time to go home... again. We checked out of Paris and left our bags with the bellman while we went out and grabbed some food, went shopping and played a few more slots. I was somewhat disappointed to find out today that you can actually go up to the top of the "Eiffel Tower" at the Paris hotel. That would've been really fun for Denise and I to do last night. Oh well... next time.

Our flight was around an hour late taking off due to some sort of accident involving the refueling truck. Supposedly they even called in an ambulance for the guy. Not really sure how something like that happens when those things probably go like 5 mph.

Because I had to dig the Explorer out of several inches of snow at the Park N' Fly and help Denise dig her car out too, I didn't get home until around 1am. Bed time!

Monday, February 26, 2007

Arizona: Day 6 / Las Vegas: Day 1

Woke up early this morning and hit I-93 north to Vegas. A hour or two later, we grabbed some breakfast at a McDonald's on Route 66 in Kingman, AZ. An hour or two after that, we were driving across the Hoover Dam. Then it was on to good ol' Vegas. That's when the real fun began.

I headed towards the airport and drove out to where all of the rental car places are. But after driving through once, I never saw a Fox rental office. Confused, I looped around and drove through again. Still nothing. So I called Fox's number only to be told that Fox rental no longer has a location in Las Vegas, despite what the agent told me. I had even paid the $150 drop off fee to drive to Vegas. Heck, he even gave me directions there.

So I spent several minutes with the Fox rental district manager while he kept repeating fairly obvious and unhelpful things like "How can you be in Vegas? We don't have a counter in Vegas." I kept telling him that wasn't my problem since his own agent told me I could drop off in Vegas. Finally, he agreed to see if he could work out a deal with a rental agency here. After getting the runaround and being sent to a couple different agencies multiple times, we finally managed to ditch the car.


From there, we went straight to the Paris hotel where we were staying. Our room was quite impressive. We spent the rest of the night walking the strip, playing slots and even visiting downtown. I tried to show Denise the fountains at the Bellagio, but much to my disappointment, they were turned off due to "high winds." We finally went back to the room and crashed at around 4am.

Sunday, February 25, 2007

Tucson: Day 5

Woke up to some rather unpleasant news this morning. Denise and I were supposed to be flying out of Phoenix this evening at around 8pm. But due to what sounds like some pretty heavy snowfall back in the Twin Cities, our flight was cancelled. After spending a good 20 minutes or so on hold with Northwest Airlines, I was told that we wouldn't be able to get another flight until Tuesday. So it looks like we'll be staying two more days.

But there's a bright side. Since it was the same cost, we decided to get a flight out of Las Vegas (since Denise has never been) on Tuesday evening. So after some last minute preparations, we said goodbye to the family and headed north. We just pulled into a Best Western in a little town called Wickenburg, AZ, which is about halfway between my parent's house and Las Vegas.

So tomorrow we'll be getting up bright and early and heading to sin city where we should have most of the day tomorrow and a good share of Tuesday to bum around! Sweet!

Tucson: Day 4

After another lazy morning, the whole family had some lunch at a great little seafood chain up in Tucson called Rockin' Baja Lobster. Afterwards, we all went to visit my grandma, who lives in a retirement home in Tucson.

Then Denise and I took a very scenic drive up Mt. Lemmon, an incredibly picturesque mountain north of Tucson. There's a little village up on top called Summerhaven but unfortunately the gift shop (and more importantly the Cookie Cabin where you can get freshly baked chocolate chip cookies) was closed by the time we got up there. But we weren't disappointed for long since we managed to time our drive down just as the sun was setting.

The rest of the day was spent back down in Green Valley relaxing with the family and playing a little Phase 10.

Friday, February 23, 2007

Tucson: Day 3

Today was mostly spent in the car. The original plan was to get an early start and head north to Phoenix and then on to Sedona, but we took a few detours along the way. For lunch we dined on some delicious Magpies Pizza. Then we took the long way through the mountains to Prescott, AZ. We then managed to miss our turn for Sedona and ended up on a pretty cool gravel road that took us through the mountains where it began to snow. By the time we decided to turn around and finally got to Sedona, it was dark so we didn't really get to see much of it.



After that, we headed back to Phoenix to pick up my oldest brother Matt and his wife Maria from the airport. After a tasty In-N-Out Burger, we headed back down to Green Valley.

Tucson: Day 2

Another gorgeous day in AZ. I believe the temps were up around 75 and not a cloud in the sky all day long. It was a little slow going in the morning for Denise and I since we were both still fairly tuckered out from traveling the day before. When we finally got ambitious enough, we headed to my parents house for a delicious breakfast of french toast and bacon, which my mom buys right from the butcher shop. Mmmm... bacon...

Then we made a run for the border. Even though I forgot to bring my birth certificate, we talked to some locals here and heard that you can park on the US side and walk over to Nogales, Mexico, and all you need to get back in is a driver's license. So we hit I-19 and went about 40 miles south to the border.

This might sound odd, but Nogales actually reminded me a little bit of New York City. Certainly not in size, but it's essentially filled with dirty little storefronts and persistent street vendors that relentlessly hassle you to check out their knickknacks as you walk past. Oh yeah, and farmacias. Muchos de farmacias! But we did have a lot of fun exploring and buying some souvenirs. We also made friends with one store owner nicknamed "Fish"--he never explained the nickname, only telling us it was "a long story" (see picture at right).

On the way back, we stopped at a pretty famous little spice shop, the Santa Cruz Chili & Spice Co, in Tumacacori. Then we continued north through a little "city" called Tubac. It's called an "artist colony" down here but it's basically a bunch of hippies selling arts and crafts stuff. But it was good enough for us to look around and grab a quick bite to tide us over until dinner.

We spent the next few hours beating up the rental car driving through Madera Canyon and Box Canyon where we witnessed a typical (i.e. awesome) Arizona sunset. Afterwards, we picked up my dad (since mom was a little under the weather) for some dinner at an awesome local Mexican place right in Green Valley called Manuel's. (Every time I come down here, I absolutely have to go to Manuel's at least once!)

Even though I was tired by this point, Denise somehow talked me into going a few miles up the road to the Desert Diamond Casino where we played some slots for a couple hours. Then it was back to the hotel for some much-needed sleep.

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Tucson: Day 1

As always, day 1 is typically just known as "traveling day". When you get up at 4am and don't really stop moving until like two in the afternoon, it tends to wear you out. And it doesn't help when yours truly isn't exactly a huge fan of traveling; my 5-second attention span tends to hinder such things. However, this time wasn't so bad since Denise brought her portable DVD player. So we watched Office Space and played some card game that I just learned and don't know the name of.
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At the rental car place, what was described on Expedia as a "midsize, Toyota Corolla or similar" somehow turned into a PT Cruiser... yeah, no thanks. So after 10 minutes of the saleswoman trying desperately yet fruitlessly to talk me into upgrading to a Dodge Charger, I paid for a small upgrade to a Chrysler Sebring.

The rest of the afternoon was spent having lunch with my mom at the Quail Creek Grill and checking in at the hotel. Later on, we met up with my dad, my brother Ryan and his wife Kate at a pizza place called Sauce up in Tucson.

That was all the excitement we could handle for one day!

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Way too early to be awake!

Always a shocker when the alarm goes off at 4am. Ugh. But fortunately, it's for a good reason. Denise and I will be leaving shortly to head to the airport en route to sunny Green Valley, AZ!

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Another good night at poker

I hosted Mark's monthly poker game at my place last night. We had a pretty good turnout (not quite as good as the last couple) of somewhere around 20-25 people with 7 rebuys. This time, Mark and I had the foresight to put out a cup for a $1 donation to help me defray the $25 room rental fee. Although everyone must not have felt the need to help out since there was only $16 in the cup at the end of the night.

Anyway, I had a pretty solid night. I was pretty much middle of the road stack-wise all night until the final table. Fortunately, I got some pretty good hands at just the right times to get me into heads-up with Joey Vandermark. On the final hands, we each had pretty mediocre hands. But fortunately, it was an equally mediocre flop of 9-8-4(?). I had a 9 and Joey had an 8. He went all in, I called and my 9s held up.

With a few shootout tokens, I ended up taking home over $330. Not bad!

Monday, January 22, 2007

Pan's Labyrinth

So I went and saw Pan's Labyrinth on opening night last Friday night with Denise, Molly and Adam at the Uptown theater. If you haven't heard of it yet, it's actually a Spanish film that's been getting incredible reviews. On Metacritic's all-time list, it's currently #4.

I've never seen so many people at the Uptown before. The line of freezing movie-goers stretched around the block. Even the movie itself started about an hour late because of the difficulties of getting so many people out of the previous showing and getting all of us in. It was also due to the fact that Doug Jones himself (who played Pan in the film) was there and spoke to the crowd beforehand.

The movie itself was quite excellent. The acting and cinematography were amazing. The only thing that ruined it for me was the ridiculously tall guy sitting directly in front of me. I had to lean way to one side just to try to see the screen (not to mention the subtitles)!

Sunday, January 21, 2007

A Little Hockey and Moonlight Bowling

Last night I made use of one of my Christmas presents from my wonderful folks, club-level tickets to the Wild/Stars game. Even better, I took a certain cute little chick by the name of Denise. Despite being a pretty exciting game, the Wild unfortunately ended up losing in the shootout after like 8 rounds.


Afterwards, we met up with some friends in Cottage Grove for a little moonlight bowling where I proceeded to win 2 out of the 3 games. Yeah, wassup? I also won $2 from 2 separate money shots (for those of you who aren't in the know, that's getting a strike when the head pin is a colored pin) and another $1 by getting 4 strikes in a row. The best part is, those 4 strikes in a row were to close out a game, sealing my come-from-behind win against Nick which won me the $5 we had riding on it!

Sunday, January 14, 2007

Not a bad night at poker

Last night, Scooter, Nicky, Molly and I drove out to Eden Prairie for Mark Kantor's monthly poker game. All in all, it was a pretty impressive turnout. The original sign-up sheet had 33 people on it when the tournament started with several more people coming in late. Because of the large turnout and to keep the game from lasting until 4 in the morning, Mark limited rebuys at 9. Even better, because of the large number of players, Mark announced that he'd be paying out to the top 6 players.

In an odd coincidence, despite Mark having 4 tables set up, I managed to get seated at the same table as Scooter and Molly. In fact, I was immediately to the right of Scooter. I wasn't especially crazy about this turn of events since I'd rather not sit at the same table as people I know. Or more importantly, people who know me and know how I play. But oh well.

Anyway, I managed to take a few key pots and survive to take 4th place before getting mowed down by Jay who took out like 3 or 4 people right before me and went on to take 2nd place. For taking 4th place, I got $132. I also had 3 shootout tokens which got me another $15.

So not a bad night, all things considered!

Friday, January 12, 2007

It's that time of year again

For the second year in a row, Shaun Cooper and Kevin Dotzenrod had themselves a little wager on the college football national championship game. And for the second year in a row, Rotzen (who actually wants to shave his head) took the underdog. But just like last year, the underdog came through. This year, that happened in the form of Florida clobbering Ohio State by a score of 41-14.

So once again, I got to shave Cooper's head (with help from special guest barbers, Molly Peterson and Kevin Dotzenrod). Better luck next year, Rotzen!

Click here to see the pics.