Happy New Years!

It's New Year's Eve, so everyone have fun and be safe. And get ready some resolutions so you can break them in a week!

Futurama - Bender's Big Score

Finally got this DVD, I think I need to watch it again, there's just so much in it, but a review is coming soon!!

Fresno State Players Part 2A

Miss out on part one? Click here to read it.

In part 2B I'll update the guys who left Fresno in 2007, but for now I'm just going to do the guys who left before that. These stats were current as of 12/28/2007

Sam Williams, DE/OLB, 3rd round pick, #83 overall in 2003 (Oakland Raiders)
86 career tackles, 1 sack

Richard Marshall, CB, 2nd round pick, #58 overall in 2006 (Carolina Panthers)
162 career tackles
5 interceptions, 2 touchdowns
2 forced fumbles, 4 fumble recoveries

Adam Jennings, WR, 6th round pick, #184 overall in 2006 (Atlanta Falcons)
5 catches, 34 yards, 1 touchdown
20.8 yard kickoff return average
6.2 yard punt return average

Tyrone Culver, DB, 6th round pick, #185 overall in 2006 (Greenbay Packers)
9 tackles, currently on injured reserve

Stephen Spach, TE, Undrafted Free Agent in 2006 (Philadelphia Eagles)
7 catches, 42 yards
Signed with the New England Patriots December 13, 2007

Part 2B will come a lot faster than this one did! I already have everything ready to go, I just wanted to split it up!

Dead Days - Games, Girls & Gags

The new book by comic artist John Rios. I've loved Dead Days since I started at Fresno State in 2001 when it was printed in the Collegian. By the next year, it was the only reason to pick up the paper (hint: the Collegian sucks, and only had a few good writers/editors to begin with, then they graduated). After John graduated (I assume), I stopped seeing the comics in the papers, but a couple of years later, it reappeared! And I was reuinted with such awesome characters as "Math Major Man" and the 2 guys cat! In the last year, I've caught up with Dead Days, read through the entire archive, and been keeping up with the weekly updates, and it is easily my favorite internet-based comic. Just received the new book, "Games, Girls & Gags" in the mail, along with John's old book, "Cram Sessions." Like any comic collection, it's just reprints of the old comics, but there's just something about holding the book in my hand and being able to read the comic on the john instead of at my computer. So to John Rios, I give a big "thumbs up!" and I look forward to future Dead Days work!
If you're interested in Dead Days, there is a link to the website to your right or click here: Dead Days

Crazy Coincidences

Since I started working where I do a little under a year ago, I have learned this about people I work with:

One person is the previous tenant of the apartment I live in right now (she left and moved to Montana, and apparently came back, and now 2 years later we work at the same place).
One person sat at the same table as I did during a Physics lab at Fresno State.
One guy's wife worked for my old boss, except I worked for her until last year, and she worked for her at least 10 years ago.
One lady is in a Master's program at Fresno State, and her advisor is my same advisor from my undergraduate years.

Fresno State Football Players - Where are they now? Pt 1

To view the following parts, use the following links:

http://jhowrites.blogspot.com/2007/12/fresno-state-players-part-2a.html
http://jhowrites.blogspot.com/2008/01/fresno-state-players-part-2b.html


Being a Fresno State Alum, I got curious about what has happened to some of the football players. Mostly I was curious about some of these guys who've gone pro since I started college in 2001. What happened with these guys who went into the draft? Did they get Undrafted Free Agent Contracts? Are they playing football at all anymore? I'm not sure how many parts this will be, but for this post, I'm going to do some of the "stars," the guys who are getting pretty good publicity and a lot of people have probably heard of them.

David Carr, QB, 1st round pick, #1 overall in 2002 (Houston Texans)
Currently playing for the Carolina Panthers.
Over 14,000 yards passing.
62 Touchdowns.
70 Interceptions.

Bernard Berrian, WR, 3rd round pick, #78 overall in 2004 (Chicago Bears)
Over 2,000 yards receiving (best year 2007 with 883 yards as of 12/10/07)
12 receiving touchdowns (best year 2006 with 6 touchdowns)
1 Super Bowl appearance

Logan Mankins, OG, 1st round pick, #32 overall in 2005 (New England Patriots)
Starting Guard for the New England Patriots since he entered the league

James Sanders, FS, 4th round pick, #133 overall in 2005 (New England Patriots)
123 career tackles.
1 career sack
4 career interceptions (1 TD)

So that's a few of the easy guys. I need to do some research on some of the other players, and will bring you some of the "lesser known" guys in part 2

San Diego Chargers Vs. Tennessee Titans

Awesome game. Was glad to see the team rally. Rivers did start out the game pretty weak, but I was happy to see him step it up in the second half and especially the 4th quarter. Very happy to see him play well when it mattered most. Once we hit overtime, I was happy to see that Norv played it smart and gave it to the best player on the team, unfortunately I didn't actually get to watch any of the overtime, but in that situation, I do want to know that the ball is in LaDainian Tomlinson's hands. Woohoo!

New Dead Days Comic

Last night I ordered the new Dead Days book, a collection of comics by local artist John Rios. It's a great comic, go check it out!
http://deaddays.net/

How you drive does affect gas mileage!!

Normally when I go down the freeway, I travel about 70-75 miles per hour, based on driving conditions. Back in September I drove out to Monterey doing this, and got 33.4 MPG. In October I drove to San Francisco and got 32.1 MPG. This past weekend I drove down to San Diego, and the last half of the drive it was pouring rain, so 65 was about the maximum speed I got to, and actually spent a lot of time going slower than that. on that trip I got 35.5 MPG. That's close to a 10% increase in efficiency! Unfortunately, I don't have my exact average speed, but speed was a significant factor, and it made a pretty big difference.

Wii vs. PS3

I think we made the right choice getting a Wii!!

Fresno State and the BCS

I was talking with a guy at work about how the last 2 years we've seen 2 teams from the WAC play in a BCS game (Boise State and now Hawaii). Since I moved to Fresno and started going to Fresno State, it has been publicly stated by Pat Hill that his goal is to crack the BCS. I think he probably wanted to be the first school from a non-BCS conference to do it, but he's way too late now. But the goal's still there.

But what does Fresno State need to do to make it? Their best chance was with David Carr, he took them to #8, beating Colorado, Oregon State, Wisconsin and Colorado State. But what happened? A mid-season slide losing to else but Boise State and Hawaii. This is a great example of Fresno State athletics, they tease you, get your hopes up, then let you down in the end.

So now that I've gotten off topic, what does Fresno State need to do to make it to the big time? The running game is strong, so they need to keep doing what they're doing there. The defense could use some bolstering, but really any team could say that. We decided that the key spot Fresno State needs to bolster is the quarterback position. I know it's obvious, every team needs a quarterback! But what they need is someone who is going to make opposing teams nervous. I don't think the current quarterback is doing that. What they need is someone who can walk in as a freshman and be the best quarterback the team has. Let him play, let him struggle early on, let him learn. Continue to play big schools, don't worry about the loss, look to the future.

The reason I think like this is Paul Pinegar. He started at quarterback for 4 years. Early in his career he played some big games, losing on the road to Tennessee and Oklahoma. But later in his career he learned how to play the big games, beating #18 Virginia in the MPC Computers Bowl. And in probably the biggest game of his career, he took #1 USC down to the very end of the game.

Basically what we're looking for out of Fresno State football is for them to continue to play the big games, get that exposure and that experience. Get a good quarterback, someone who can learn early on, and truly frighten other teams. Win the WAC! Sure, you can play with the big boys, but Fresno State isn't even winning their own division games. All-in-all, they need more consistency.

Super Paper Mario is awesome!

Been playing a lot of Wii this holiday weekend, love the Wii Sports, and I have to say that Super Paper Mario is one of the most fun games I've played on any system in a long time!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone enjoys the day, so have a safe, happy Thanksgiving!

I am funny

Updated 3/14/08
This has become one of my most popular posts, but I think people are coming to this page looking to see if this is true and you're going to get some money from Bill Gates if you forward on this email. I'll save you some time and let you know that "This is fake! There is no program that tracks your email and Bill Gates will not send you any money." I think the first time I ever saw was of these emails was easily 10 years ago when I first got online. Now that you know this, please keep reading if you want to have a little laugh!

So someone at work sent out one of those "Bill Gates will send you money if you forward this email on!" emails. It was funny because it was sent to at least 50 people, someone replied back to everyone saying that it was fake, and a 3rd person replied to apologize for sending it out (I assume she sent it to a few people, one of them was the person who sent it to everyone). After all that...someone who had received it...forwarded to on again, to everyone again. So I decided to change it a little bit and send it out again (to people with a sense of humor). Maybe it was one of those situations where you had to be there to appreciate it, but everyone seemed to think it was hilarious. Below is what I sent out.

Read carefully...
>
>THIS TOOK TWO PAGES OF THE TUESDAY USATODAY - IT IS FOR REAL
>
>
>
>To all of my friends, I always forward stupid messages, but you already know that!
>
>But this is from my friend Fred Thompson and he really is
>
>an attorney (on tv).
>
>
>If he says that this will work - It will work. After all,What have
>
>you got to lose besides your patience with humanity?
>
>
>SORRY EVERY BODY.. JUST HAD TO TAKE THE CHANCE!!! I'm a
>
>law school dropout, And I kind of know the law. This thing is for realsies. Rest assured
>
>AOL and &nbs p; Intel will follow through with their promises for
>
>fear of facing a multimillion-dollar class action suit similar to the one
>
>filed by PepsiCo against General Electric not too long ago.
>
>
>
>Dear Friends: Please do not take this for a junk letter.
>
>Bill Gates sharing his fortune. If you ignore this, You will repent
>
>later. By burning in hell.
>
>
>
>Microsoft and AOL are now the largest Internet companies
>
>and in an effort to make sure that Internet Explorer remains the
>
>most widely used program, Microsoft and AOL are running an e-mail
>
>beta test. Also, Intel recently changed it's name to Microsoft, apparently.
>
>
>
>When you forward this e-mail to friends (or enemies, I don't care), Microsoft can and will
>
>track it (If you are a Microsoft Windows user) For a two weeks
>
>time period.
>
>
>
>For every person that you forward this e-mail to, Microsoft will pay
>
>you 245 pesos. For every person that you sent it to that forwards it on,
>
>Microsoft will pay you 243 lira and for every third person that receives
>
>it, You will be paid 241 yen. Within two weeks, Microsoft will contact
>
>you for your address and then send a thug to come steal your wallet.
>
>
>
>Regards. Charles S Bailey General Manager Field Operations
>
>1-800-842-2332 Ext. 1085 or 904-1085 or RNX 292-1085
>
>
>
>
>
>Thought this was a scam myself, But two weeks after receiving this
>
>e-mail and forwarding it on. Microsoft contacted me for my address and
>
>within days, I received a check for $24, 800.00, but i stay working here for the people. You need to respond
>
>before the beta testing is over. If anyone can afford this, Bill gates is the
>
>man. Or possibly me after I get my money from the deposed Nigerian dictator's wife.
>
>
>
>It's all marketing expense to him. Please forward this to as many
>
>people as possible. You are bound to get at least $10, 000.00, and if you don't, you have no friends and are totally lame.
>
>We're not going to hel p them out with their e-mail beta test without
>
>getting a little something for our time. My brother's girlfriend got in
>
>on this a few months ago. When I went to visit him for the Baylor/UT
>
>game, she showed me her check. It was for the sum of $4,324.44 and
>
>was stamped 'Paid In Full'. But for some reason the check was from some place called "Deja Vu." I think that's a Microsoft subsidiary.
>
>
>

So forward this on or you'll never find love, everyone will mock you, and an Incan dwarf will come and kick your dog.

Team Myspace Page

I'm putting together a myspace page for our bowling team, you can check it out at http://www.myspace.com/teamfugly

I like numbers

So here are some numbers:
This past Friday night I bowled, and I averaged 192. This season, through 60 games, I am averaging 198. Overall, I get a strike 49.84% of the time. I am converting 66.25% of my spares.

On my last tank of gas, I got 22.30799 MPG. Since September 1, 2007, I am getting 26.3956 MPG.