furiousBlog - in my diatribe » mac

Every 38 Seconds…

furiousBall — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 14:13:54 +0000

Today, I wanted to dedicate my blog to an awesome family that lives right around the corner from me, Charlie Haughey and his family. I’m going to let his mother, Julie tell you guys what they are up to…

“I am writing you today to ask for your support of an incredibly important organization, CureSearch for Children’s Cancer. As you may know, my son Charlie was diagnosed with stage 4 neuroblastoma on December 24, 2009. Three days later he celebrated his 3rd birthday and began 14 months of very aggressive treatment at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Your generous donation supports CureSearch for Children’s Cancer, a national non-profit foundation whose mission is to fund and support children’s cancer research and provide information and resources to all those affected by children’s cancer. CureSearch raises funds for collaborative research conducted at more than 175 hospitals across the nation, including CHOP. These hospitals participate in National Cancer Institute sponsored clinical trials conducted by the Children’s Oncology Group. In the last 40 years, collaborative research has increased the overall survival rate for children’s cancer from 10% to 78%. At CureSearch, our goal is 100%.

Two years ago, I ran the New York Marathon with Team CureSearch. This year, I have chosen to join CureSearch in their fight for a cure by participating in The CureSearch Walk. The CureSearch Walk celebrates and honors children, like Charlie, whose lives have been affected by children’s cancer, while raising funds for lifesaving research. I have set an aggressive fundraising goal, because all children living with cancer and those who have lost their fight deserve it. Please consider making a donation to my campaign – there is no gift too big or too small.

Thank you for your support. I can promise that you are making a difference in the lives of all those affected by children’s cancer. Together, we can Reach the Day when every child with cancer is guaranteed a cure.

With hope and gratitude,

Julie Haughey”

To donate to CureSearch for Children’s Cancer, please use this link.

Do something good today folks. A Child Dies From Childhood Cancer Every 38 Seconds. Who is ready to stand with this brave family? Make a difference today.

Movie Reviews…

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides – there’s only two reasons you want to see this movie… either you’re 12 or you would pay money to watch Johnny Depp do anything. Or both I guess.

Small Business/Tech Links…

Funny/Interesting Links…

OK, Sonic you might be on to something here… the guys from the real TV commercials have filmed a response video to Giorgio’s I Love Sonic video (posted yesterday). If Sonic puts Giorgio in a Super Bowl commercial, I (and lots of other folks) will suddenly become big Sonic fans.
Is LoMoing the New Tebowing?
Old Spice’s Terry Crews Crashes a Bounce Ad
How to ward off a mental disorder during a meeting
What every woman wishes her ex-boyfriend’s dating profile looked like
Sh*t Barefoot Runners Say - thanks Bill!
Tea Party Jesus

on tree lighting and upper deckers

furiousBall — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:48:07 +0000

Catching up on a few things today…

The tree is up!

And Abbe invented a new drink… Abbe dropped a prune into her wine glass by accident and ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the “Upper Decker”. A new cocktail recipe that is sure to catch fire…

Movie Reviews…

Water for Elephants - this was an OK adaptation of the book (which I thought was good), there were somethings left out that I missed, but overall not a bad movie, but nothing ground-breaking here. Christoph Waltz stole the show.

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just a click

furiousBall — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 15:12:56 +0000

Short Run Video – Our team has now raised over 50% of our goal of $11,000!!! Long way to go, but we’re on our way. If you can donate, please consider even a small donation ($5 or $10) – if you can not afford a donation, how about clicking one of the Share, +1, or Tweet links at the bottom of this post to help us raise money to fight blood cancers? Just a click!

Our team page for donations - http://pages.teamintraining.org/nj/wdw12/AllForLayna

Movie Review…

Atlas Shrugged Part 1 – with all of the occupy movements and the economic crisis, you would think that this movie would have received more fan fare. Ayn Rand‘s tale of the good of capitalism and bad of Marxism should be a very close parallel to the demonstrations and hullabaloo we all see in the media. But the problem is, this movie is pretty terrible. Such a shame, Ayn Rand was one of my favorite authors in college.

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run all day, why hockey players are the best, and THANKS We Should Be GMs!

furiousBall — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:47:34 +0000

I had a monster run yesterday. 11.13 miles and I felt very strong; could have run all day long! Abbe and I are coming Disney, get ready!

As Bubs and I pulled into the rink parking lot, we noticed a long line of folks on the sidewalk. I asked what was going on and a nice lady said the Flyers had just finished practice and some stop to sign stuff. So Bubs and I had some time before his game and sure enough, Sergei Bobrovsky showed up and signed Bubs’ t-shirt. A little while later, Max Talbot pulled up where everyone was, got out of his car and signed stuff until the line was gone. Both players were incredibly nice and that really put a big smile on Bubs’ face.

Oh and before I forget, look at this… the folks at my favorite Phillies’ blog, We Should Be GMs put up a nice article promoting our Stand-Up to Cancer comedy night with Mo Mandel (Helium Comedy Club in Philly, December 1st – if interested in tickets, they are $15, please contact myself or Abbe for details). Thanks Corey and Carson, you guys rock!

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Louie CK and the trials of a leash chewer

furiousBall — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 21:19:39 +0000

Tonight Abbe and I are going to see one of my favorite comics, Louie CK in Wilmington. After seeing Tosh, I was reluctant to go to another show – but I just couldn’t pass up a chance to see Louie – he’s just so damn talented. I’m fighting a pretty bad sinus headache right now, really hope this goes away so I can enjoy some laughs tonight.

Our big boy, Titan is doing pretty well outside of a little ramminess last night. He’s very happy hanging out with me all day in my office while I code and we take lots of walks (4-6 usually), but this fella needs a little more mental stimulation. We are going to do the frozen kong with a treat and peanut butter inside and also get him outside for some more games of fetch.

Titan also did in his first leash… which is also part of the “not enough mental stimulation” issue…

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crossed paws

furiousBall — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 13:24:40 +0000

Titan had a much better day yesterday. He met Dr. Frame of Medford Animal Hospital for his first check-up and was given a clean bill of health. We did lots of walks and today, Abbe and I are going to take him for his first run with us. Then last night, Titan did something that we always adored whenever Yogi did this… he crossed his paws. I know lots of dogs do this, but that kinda made us smile.

We still have raffle tickets available for Giants vs. Eagles on Sunday November 20th at 8:20pm, 2 lower level tickets and a parking pass. $10 each and drawing is on November 4. I can send them by mail if needed. Remember these seats are nice and close so you can boo/cheer the “Dream”/”Nightmare” team.

If you aren’t a football fan or not in the Philly/NY area, please consider donating even $5. Why $5? What good would that do for a cancer patient?

$5 can get you a latte at Starbucks or a beer at the local bar, but to see how $5 makes an impact for cancer patients, check out how every dollar really does count:

If 2 people gimme 5…$10 provides two hours of microscope use to determine if a new medicine will stop a life-threatening lung infection in a bone marrow transplant patient.
4 people…$20 pays for a bottle of nutrients that will nourish 10 million leukemia cells grown in the laboratory for a week, enabling scientists to test whether a new anti-cancer drug halts their growth.
8 people…$40 purchases enough razor-sharp blades to prepare bone-marrow biopsy samples from 200 patients, enabling doctors to make accurate cancer diagnoses.
20 people….$100 pays for the cost of an antibody used to determine the precise characteristics of lymphoma cells, allowing doctors to determine the best treatment for a patient.
50 people…$250 buys an instrument to measure tiny volumes of liquid, which allows scientists to accurately measure the solutions needed to prepare a patient sample for a diagnostic test.
100 people…$500 purchases 10 hours of time on a flow cytometer, a machine that reveals a multitude of characteristics of blood cancer cells that could be developed into effective diagnostic tests.

To dontate: http://pages.teamintraining.org/nj/wdw12/AllForLayna

Small Business/Tech Links…

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Troy Polamalu at Madame Tussauds Wax Museum - thanks Abbe – this is really cool, watch this
Bigfoot discovered on sun

An Amazing Night of Hockey!

furiousBall — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 12:55:25 +0000

Wow, we had a blast at the Flyers-Devils preseason game last night. I knew the seats were going to be awesome, but there was a lot more cool stuff in store for us than just sitting one row from the glass. Around mid-afternoon, I checked the Flyers’ website for tonights’ lineup and found some big surprises – Pronger, Jagr, and Bryzgalov were all playing tonight! Our seats were next to the Flyers bench, right by the tunnel to the dressing rooms – 2nd row from the ice. These tickets were a replacement birthday present for Bubs – originally we had tickets for the game that was canceled due to Hurricane Irene. I really, really lucked out when I got this pair of insanely great seats for $65/piece (face value… gulp… $165 a piece) – you gotta love preseason ticket prices on the open market!

When we got there, the lower level seats were packed with hopeful fans begging for pucks from the players warming up, but we excused ourselves through the crowd and got to our seats. It wasn’t long before Danny Briere was flipping a puck back and forth on his stick blade right in front of us. He flipped it over the glass and it sailed just over Bubs’ head and a young teen behind us caught the puck with my hands on top of his. He smiled, looked at Bubs and gave him the puck. The teen got an applause from everyone in the section. Bubs was soaring now.

Then the pregame introductions happened and the folks in the seats next to us (right next to the players’ entrance offered for Bubs to come over and high five all the players as they hit the ice. And there they went all putting their gloves up and getting some encouragement from my son…. Jagr, Pronger, Hartnell, Bryzgalov, Giroux, Simmonds, Rinaldo… everyone! In fact, here’s a video of the tail end of Bubs getting fives from the guys in orange…

After the second period, the nice folks next to us left early and offered us their seats, now Bubs was sitting right next to Ilya Brzgalov. Bubs high-fived all the players two more times (coming out for the third period and at the end of the game). Our friends Bill and Lori texted me between periods. I invited them down to take our old seats next to us for the third period and they made their way down and enjoyed some crazy-close hockey too. The Flyers went on to win on a sweet goal by Jagr and I brought a very tired, but trilled 10 year old boy home. All the way home, he was asking me questions like, “so how many future hall of famers do you think I high-fived tonight?” and “Do you think I can get Danny Briere to sign my puck at the carnival this year?”

And this just in, I checked out the highlights clips from the game last night and watch this… around the 0:40 mark, after the Wayne Simmonds goal, look to the left and you can see me turn and get five from Bubs!

A horror writer named Christine Dougherty hired me to build a website for her and while game planning the site, I mentioned that maybe she could do a book signing at the Carriage Trade Cheese Shoppe. I gave Christine Abbe’s number and hoped for the best. Turns out there is a ghost tour in Medford on October 22nd, and it worked out perfectly for everyone that night! Go see Christine, enjoy the ghost tour, and have some cheese! Also, be sure to check out Christine’s books, I got my copies in the mail yesterday and can’t wait to dig in.

Small Business/Tech Links…

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Getting your Tosh’s worth and bad tires

furiousBall — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:52:33 +0000

Tosh… hmm. Well, I’ll be honest and say that the show was a disappointment. His set and the opener, Tommy Johnagin were great. I laughed my ass off. Here’s the problem – the doors opened at 7pm, Tommy took the stage at 7:15pm and Abbe and I were outside walking back to our car by 8:20pm. $130 (including parking) for two tickets and that’s all I get? I am glad that Abbe and I got a night out together and saw someone we both really enjoy. And for the short amount of time that the show was on stage – it was great.

And honestly, I don’t blame Daniel Tosh for the shortness of the show. I still contend he is one of my 3 favorite comics right now. He’s insanely overbooked right now (there was a second show that night at 10pm) and I don’t know between a poorly booked tour (seriously, why Reading?) and his show – he is probably ready to get off the road as soon as possible.

Afterwards, we headed to Blind Hartman’s Tavern to meet up with our friends Holly, Jim, and a few other new friends. The food was decent and the drinks were great! We were heading to Jim and Holly’s to hang out when I spotted a really flat tire on my car. Jim was awesome to help me get the tire changed (and holy shit was that thing tough to pry/kick/karate chop off. Abbe, Jim, and I headed to their home and had a great time. It’s always really cool when you can hang at a completely new friend’s home and feel that comfortable.

On our way home, Abbe and I heard some thing and pulled over. The spare tire had nearly wiggled the lugs off. After a big “WHEW!” I tightened everything down and we got home. The ride home this morning was not fun – we stopped about every 20 mins to check the lugs. We’re home safe, but yeah… that was not fun.

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One good thing about music, when it hits you feel no pain

furiousBall — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 13:59:17 +0000

“One good thing about music, when it hits you feel no pain” – Bob Marley

And that’s the truth, picking up your guitar again after 10 plus years at age 40 is much different than getting your softball spikes back on… you’re probably not going to be limping the next day. Bob knows his shit. See this?…

It has been at least 10 years since I threw my amp, guitar, and bag of stuff I’m really good at tangling (i.e. cords and adapters) in the back of my truck. I headed over to my buddy, really good guitarist, and colleague, Bill’s place for a full day of coding, immediately followed by a couple of hours making lots of noise in his garage. Bill’s brother and also a seriously good guitarist, Jim joined us and man, it was great. My chops are seriously in need of some wood-sheddin’, but after fumbling with my amp and PodXT, I did my best to keep up with the Toffel brothers – and I hope they ask me to come play again. And a big thanks to Bill’s sweet wife, Melissa for putting up with the noise and me occupying her husband all day with coding.

And of course it was great to see their sweet pup, Ezra…

Afterwards, Bill, Melissa, and I headed to the Carriage Cheese Shoppe for a free tasting event. I always like when my friends come to the shoppe for the first time. That little shop turned my Abbe’s life around in it’s own way – any chance I have to help the shop, I do it.

Movie Review…

The Company Men – this movie version of American financial headlines from 2008-2010 is interesting, but I think the movie containing the truly interesting character study that should have been made still has not. A man losing his job is emotionally equivalent to a woman in her last trimester of pregnancy. And we get to see the different forms of reaction to job loss – anger, depression, alcohol abuse, etc. Man’s ego lashes out in an almost death rattle as his pride is stripped from him. That “What the fuck am I going to do now?” question is never really asked or answered in this movie. It’s a decent movie that is akin to a stone being skipped across what probably is a pretty interesting lake.

Small Business/Tech Links…

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batting practice, fancy phone, and my friend, the TV star

furiousBall — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:26:38 +0000

At the end of the day yesterday, Abbe and I took the kids down to Hopkins Field to hit some baseballs and softballs. Everybody took a turn and we were all a very tired, sweaty, happy mess at the end of an hour and a half of hittin’. Check out her stance…

Here’s Abbe using her very high tech replacement phone while her Blackberry is sent away for repairs…

And wow, I would be completely remiss to not mention my friend Natalie Stone’s appearance last night on Rocco’s Dinner Party! Nat brought so much character to that show it was crazy. She also ended up in second place, although all of the dinner guests really seemed to enjoy her dishes. And if you would like to try some of her amazing Bella’s Biscotti, be sure to visit her Facebook Page or you can also find them at the Carriage Trade Cheese Shoppe. Also, if you watched the show, be sure to comment on Bravo’s blog and read this review too!

Movie Review…

I Love You Phillip Morris - I can safely say this is the best dark gay romantic con-man comedy I’ve ever seen and it’s honestly not a bad flick. Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor are both great. The script is interesting because in the place of plot twists, it changes genres. I think many non-Indie film fans will be bored with this movie (especially if you rented/bought a ticket to see Jim Carrey a lá Mask).