Mister Pickles Down the Stretch

Cubs Clinch 2008 NL Central

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 17:00:00 +0000

The Cubs are going to the PLAYOFFS! Go over to my sister blog, www.cubsmagicnumber.com to see my photos and videos from the game! Here's the direct link to the post http://www.cubsmagicnumber.com/2008/09/0_20.html.

And here's the clinch:

Go Cubs!

Cat in a Box Attacks

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:30:00 +0000

What do you get when you put a cat in a box and then dangle a camera wrist strap at one end of the box? CAT ATTACK. Stormy cat startled the camera woman on this one.

Your Gift Card Could Be Worthless

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 12:15:00 +0000

As a followup to my rant a few years back about gift cards, looks like there's another caveat of giving gift cards: they may be worthless if the issuing store goes bankrupt even if they don't cease operations.

Last week, The Sharper Image stopped honoring valid gift cards for purchases at their stores or web site while they are in bankruptcy. Even though laws in several states protect gift card balances from expiring, they don't protect holders from this situation.

The initial fear of the gift cards being worthless has since been eased, but barely. The store is now honoring the cards if the entire printed value is used in a single purchase and the purchase must be over twice the value of the card. If you have a partially used card, it's worthless.

With the downturn of the economy, we're likely to see more of this in the near future (already happened to CompUSA cards in December). So, if you have some gift cards, go use them ASAP. Then start giving cash as gifts instead. Cash wouldn't have fallen to this scam.

Mollusk Cruzer Shells

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 13:50:00 +0000

I took a week off from snow shoveling and went shelling instead. It's easier on the back, however it's very similar to shoveling the way we've been doing it (using a net to shovel the shells from the sea). Pictured are some of my finds. From left to right: Pear Whelk, SanDisk Cruzer Micro 8GB Black, Cerith and Lettered Olive. Guess which one is backwards compatible to USB 1.1?

Encrypting that USB Thumb Drive

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:45:00 +0000

I purchased a large USB Thumb Drive in January for various reasons: portability, compatibility and of course cheap massive storage. At the time, I settled on the SanDisk Cruzer Micro 8GB with the retractable USB plug (no separate cover) which now spends most of it's time in my pocket attached to my keys, always ready for instant storage needs. I'm very happy with the purchase so far.

One of the primary uses for the drive was to store personal and work documents. Some of these docs I didn't necessarily want to share with people, like my personal debates on the proper way to install a new roll of toilet paper. (Innie, all the way.) I originally looked for a thumb drive with built in encryption/authorization techniques like a built in fingerprint scanner, but there was quite a price hit for this additional feature. Second I looked at drives that were entirely encrypted via built in software on the device. I felt that was a bit excessive and was concerned the drive would not work on all types of USB equipped devices (like a Wii or XBOX360).

The bottom line for me was that I wanted to encrypt some of the file system and certainly not all of it. So, I began to research software solutions. I found some that integrated tightly with Windows and used what appeared to be rootkit technology to hide and encrypt. That wasn't exciting to me because it would mean a reboot on any new machine I wanted to view my encrypted files on. Other tools I found were also heavy with their installs, which was a big turn off. Also, many of these were timed demos meaning I would have to pay to get my data after the trail period ended.

What I did find was a light weight tool that even had a mobile edition that didn't require a real install to operate on a machine: Cryptainer LE. This tool did everything I wanted: secured files by encrypting and requiring a password to unlock, cost nothing and was extremely portable like the thumb drive itself.

Accessing my data requires launching the Cryptainer software, whether installed on the machine or not. I then navigate to the Cryptainer Volume I want to open (basically a file of fixed size) and enter the password. Cryptainer then mounts the file as a removable drive on my machine. I can put any file I want on the Cryptainer volume and it encrypts it on the fly. When I'm done accessing the files, I just go back to Cryptainer (sitting on the system tray) and tell it to close the volume.

There are a few catches, as no software is perfect. First, the free edition limits you to 25MB volumes. This is enough for my needs, just some Word, Excel and MSMoney files, and you're not limited to the number of volumes you can have. There are "pay for" editions that go up to 500GB that can satisfy more serious sized files. Second is the OS limitations. The app only works on Windows 32-bit OS's, but that's not a concern for me at the moment as that's all I use (Windows Vista, 2003 and XP). Soon, however, I will need a 64-bit solution and hopefully the software will support it at that time.

If you're looking for a safe way to store data that may fall into the wrong hands, I recommend you try out Cryptainer LE. And if you find something better, let me know!

Blog Update: New Content Coming Now

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:18:00 +0000

Winter is about over and I'm getting motivated to write again. Looks like I will have more time on the now to write, which is exciting to me (you on the other hand, probably not).

Don't forget to add Cubsmagicnumber.com to your RSS reader. We're about to enter the 2008 season which is looking to be as exciting as 2007 (hopefully a better ending). The site is currently counting down to opening day, March 31st, but will begin with near real time updates of the actual number soon. So, sit back and watch as the Cubs make history (good or bad).

2007 Chicago Marathon a Blast

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 21:07:00 +0000

Well, even though I didn't get to run, I went to spectate my buddy's first attempt. It was the hottest marathon on record for the Chicago Marathon (85+ degrees). They closed the course early and ran out of supplies too. Tons of people were sent to the ER and I believe their is already one confirmed death (my thoughts are with those people).

Anyways, back to the fun stuff. I made it for the start just 20 yards from the start line. Then I met up with a friend and headed to North avenue to watch just after mile 10. Then down to China Town (around mile 20). It was so fun and everyone spectating was positive and having a good time. That's a great distraction given that I was at Wrigley just 12 hours earlier and had tickets to the game that didn't happen today.

So, Perhaps next year will be my year to make the run and the year the Cubs do it all! (Probably neither will happen).

Good news is that my buddy finished around 4hrs 50min. We found him about an hour later. He's doing well and I'm heading over to his place for Lou Malnati's pizza, Guinness and Bears! GO BEARS!

Confirmed: TBS in HD on Comcast Chicago

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:26:00 +0000

I got home last night and channel 219 was there. There will be post season HD baseball for Cubbie fans!

Cubs, Chicago Comcast and TBS HD

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 00:16:00 +0000

Update 10/2/2007 11am - Looks like we'll be OK in Chicago by gametime Wednesday after all.
---
So, TBS buying the broadcast rights to the NLDS and NLCS sucks if you have Comcast in Chicago and want to see those post season Cub games in HD. (Not to mention they won't let local TV carry the games). Apparently, if you're in Philly or Boston, Comcast added the HD TBS just in time and you'll be able to enjoy the games in HD. While, those sitting with the stupid motorola cable box in Chicago will watch reruns of Surface and Babe: Pig in the City on the Universal HD Channel (by far the worst HD station).

Good news though, Comcast is adding TBS HD as channel 219 as soon as possible, but ASAP may mean AFTER the NLDS. Apparently, there are technical difficulties (read technical non priority) in adding the channel. I don't understand how Comcast can care more about smaller east coast markets than the Chicago market.

This and the holdout on the Big Ten Network makes me really start to consider switching to a dish...

Why can't I get to video.digg.com?

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 23:27:00 +0000

Here's a small task that Digg staff can do to make it easier to visit their site... Add topic subdomains.

How may times have received a DNS failure when going to digg because video.digg.com doesn't work? For me, all the time. I can go to video.google.com without issue, but dig I have to type www.digg.com/videos. And DON'T go singular, you'll lose.

I wish Digg would add video.digg.com and videos.digg.com that simply forwarded to the video secion. Hell, I would love baseball.digg.com to forward you right to the section. I propose that they use setup subdomains for each section to mke it easier to get to and link to. How would you live to post a story and the link is to http://apple.digg.com/iPod_touch? Or how about all the stories from Apples by just going to http://apple.digg.com/.

For example, we could just goto:

news.digg.com - right to news technology.digg.com - right to tech video.digg.com - my want, right to video
apple.digg.com - (fanboys do apply)
baseball.digg.com - right into the baseball section (GO CUBS!) and on, and on... It's a convenience factor. This is much easier to redirect to the section than adding the much wanted pic section.
Pics.google.com - coming soon?

anyways, I rarely rant on Digg. it's a good site. I just want this...

What a Weekend for Sports on TV (for me at least)

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 12:15:00 +0000

With the Cubs Magic Number down to 8, it's all eyes and thoughts on the Cubs winning and Brewers losing. Lucky me, today both the Brewers and Cubs are on TV (in Chicago). No need to watch the Cardinals anymore, as they eliminated themselves mathematically from the playoffs last night.

Northwestern Football, which I am a big fan, is on TV finally today (I'm on Comcast, no Big Ten Network). Although they play Ohio State, which could get ugly.

Tomorrow, more Cubs and then the game of the week, BEARS at home against the red hot Cowboys.

So, the lineup:

Saturday:
-12:05 - Pirates at Cubs on WGN
-2:30 - Northwestern at Ohio State on ESPN and ABC7
-2:55 - Brewers at Braves on FOX

Sunday:
- 1:10 - Pirates at Cubs on WGN, Wrigley closer (or is it with NLDS coming?)
- 7:15 - Cowboys at Bears on NBC

Of course, don't forget that there's tons of College and Pro football on TV, like Notre Dame going 0-3. Nice.

And don't forget, Cubs playoff tickets on sale at 9am on Sunday...

Holy Cow!

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 00:50:00 +0000

It's getting close for the 2007 Chicago Cubs making the playoffs. I hate to get too excited but it's hard to hold back the excitement.

As I wrote earlier, http://www.cubsmagicnumber.com/ is up and counting, courtesy of Mister Pickles Worldwide Entertainment. To add to the fun of the race, Mister Pickles is accepting photos to post along with the numbers! Send an email to 2007@cubsmagicnumber.com with your Cubs photos today with a small caption and you may be representing the next number!

To get you in the mood, here's mine:

Teddy says "GO CUBBIES! I WANT THIS TO BE THE YEAR!"

Oh, and Cliff Floyd just hit a homer while I wrote this! WOOT! And now BACK TO BACK! DeROSA! GO CUBS!

The Cardinals' Elimination Number

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 15:55:00 +0000

Is 11. Doesn't it really suck to lose 7 in a row down the stretch.

There are over two full weeks of baseball yet to be played this 2007 season and the defending World Series Champs, the St Louis Cardinals are slipping fast. They're third place in the race for the National League Central Pennant. What's worse, they're trailing last years 4th and 5th place finishers.

I guess Cardinal Nation is still hopeful they will win the pennant. Even though they haven't won a game in over a week and only have a slight mathematical change to clinch, you can register for playoff tickets on their website. I'll be sure to register! Mister Pickles would like 4 seats please.

Anyways, it's going to be a great close for the NL Central this year. I'm in the Cubbies Camp and they're looking pretty (at the moment). Because I'm such a nice guy, I'm helping you keep track of the Cardinals woes at http://eliminatecardinals.blogspot.com/, an up to the minute elimination number tracker. Subscribe to the RSS feed so that you always know how inevitable their elimination is.

Delay Your Outgoing Email in Outlook

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 18:52:00 +0000

I discovered a feature in Microsoft Outlook 2007 recently; delayed delivery. I’m not sure this is a new feature in Outlook 2007, but it’s new to me! The feature allows you to schedule an outgoing message to be sent at a specific time rather than the second you press send.

This feature is actually quite useful. Some examples (in ascending order of deception):

-Say you have an important email you want to send and feel it's ready to go out the door. If it's not something that is urgent, why not delay the sending an hour. This way, if you think of something you missed, you can go back and add it instead of replying to your sent message (which looks bad).

-Another use is to delay all outgoing emails to the end of the day so that you can shutdown and be off before the replies come through.

-A creative use is to schedule well written emails to go out at all hours of the night. When the boss asks what you were doing up late composing great emails, you can say that you take your work so seriously, that sleep takes a back seat.

There are two problems I see with the delay delivery feature, though; your Outlook client must be online and delayed messages have the original “sent” time recorded in sent items. The first, must be online, may be because I’m using Outlook in an Exchange 2003 environment. This makes the scheduled emails sent at 2am to make my co-workers think I’m up working at all hours and my bosses amazed a bit more laborious. This may not be an issue with Exchange 2007, but I'm too lazy to actually look. As for recording the sent time inaccurately, that's a pain but goes with the territory.

Anyways, I like the feature and use it often, but I don't do the late night thing.

Here's the instructions on how to do this: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/HP052427901033.aspx. There are two general ways to delay delivery: setup a rule for all outgoing messages be delayed by a set interval with a max of 2 hours or set a "deliver by" time on individual messages. I prefer only using delay only on particular emails. However, if you're prone to sending emails prematurely and want to avoid that "Did I just send that?" feeling (and perhaps vomiting if it's real bad like this one), then the second is all you.

Marathon Dreams Postponed

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 11:46:00 +0000

For those who care (I'd count who does, but I'd be done before I started), I have no intentions on running the Chicago Marathon this year. The shin splint has sidelined me and I'm border line going to see a physical therapist. The good news is there is no sign of a fracture or anything more serious going on. I'll be regrouping when well and see where I stand for maybe an attempt next year.

My buddy is still going strong though and I plan to attend to spectate.

Disable System Alert Beep in Windows

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 18:17:00 +0000

One of the most annoying things on my Dell Latitude D620 laptop is the system alert beep being extremely loud with no respect to my current volume settings. On the surface, there's no easy way to disable that feature as it's not part of the sound scheme of my profile.

A little searching on Google got me to this page. Step by step on how to do it within Microsoft Vista. For XP, I'm not certain if you can perform the same steps. However, I do know you can go into the registry and disable it that way. I do not recommend that for average computer users, so perform those steps with caution.

Another improvement

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 18:47:00 +0000

Mister Pickles World Wide Enterprises has acquired the rights to www.misterpicklesblog.com. In a move in line with the overall goal of world domination, you should now visit www.misterpicklesblog.com to see these words of entertainment.

I accept full responsibility for this change and I appreciate your cooperation in the matter. We will get through this change with reckless abandonment. We will make it down the stretch.

The Chicago Cubs Magic Number

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 18:40:00 +0000

Is 24 and is a bit higher than I would like. I've re-launched http://www.cubsmagicnumber.com/ and will be updating it during this final month of baseball. The Cubs have a chance and could make the playoffs, but let's not get too far along.

Enjoy the number and I hope it will be updated very often! Go Cubs!

iPhone Spotting

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 01:20:00 +0000

While writing a portion of this I spied my first iPhone on the train. Some older lady (late fourties, early fifties) was navigating around and looks like she was doing an email or something, no headphones. From the 10 feet away looking down on her, I can say the menu screen transition animation is hypnotizing, but other than that, it looks like she’s struggling typing. Oh, and everyone standing around her (no more seats) is looking at her. I guess I’m in the group, but I’m on the upper deck and sitting.

I'll just say, I'm not going to have an iPhone anytime soon, if ever. Just not praticle for corporate email at this point.

On the bench

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 01:09:00 +0000

Apparently, being a beginner runner is not a walk (or run) in the park. I was on holiday last week and right on schedule with my training. I did 8 miles without stopping the first day with my buddy and we even ran at our desired pace. It was perfect. Then later in the week, I did a three mile, five mile and three and a half mile spaced between days of rest. I was finally doing the full training plan…

As the week progressed, I felt more and more pain in my right leg, which had previously been pain free. A few weeks back it was my left, but it was perfect. The new pain was in the middle of the shin and just inside of the tibia. It was a weird pain. The pain was really only after periods of non-use. When I would stand from sitting, it would hurt for a while, for example. It wasn’t nagging, just felt like I needed to stretch. Getting out of bed in the morning was the worst, as I felt that I couldn’t put all my weight on it. After stretching, though, it was O.K.

Over a few days, the pain became regular. I had to quit on my 6 mile run after doing just a mile as I could tell I was limping. From what I’ve read, running with pain is fine. If your mechanics change, you need to stop. So, I stopped. The pain continued and I went to the doctor early this week to make sure it wasn’t a possible stress fracture, which would be a pretty serious and require at least a month of rest from running.

The doc confirmed it didn’t appear to be skeletal, but rather muscular. So a regular shin splint, not serious. I got some anti-inflammatory meds and ordered not to run for at least two more days after the pain completely subsides. Then I’ll have to hash out a gradual plan to get me back on schedule. I’m figuring this will throw me off about 2 weeks, but I can still do it. I AM NOT THROWING IN THE TOWEL.

This is a minor setback and a learning experience. Tons of shin splint prevention techniques are only a Google search away.

In the meantime, I can do other aerobic exercises as long as there is no pain. So, biking will be back in fashion and I get to dust off the elliptical. Need to keep as much endurance that I can.

I'm feeling better today, one day after the doc visit. Hopefully, I'll be back on the road in a little more than a week.

Gmail on my Blackberry

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 13:50:00 +0000

Aparently, it's extreemly easy to add external email accounts to you BlackBerry and many of you will think I'm out of it for posting this. But I am and yes, I am out of it. I started this post sitting on my couch procrastinating before my 4 mile run at 5:30 in the morning...

Previously, I had only used my BlackBerry for what they refer to as "corporate email", which I guess is an accurate term. I've always been using the enterprise service which means our company has a BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) that bridges our Exchange server with BlackBerry's service. I guess there are a lot of BlackBerry users that are in situations without such infrastructure or have a BlackBerry for personal use, so being able to use Yahoo, Google, HotMail or any other free email service is vital.

Anywho, here are the easy steps as performed by me on GMail and my Sprint Blackbery 8703g. Your results may vary. (I used this article when going through it originally)

1) Go to Gmail, login and enable POP on your mailbox (Settings -> Forward and POP).

2) On the Blackberry, go to "Email Settings" on the main menu

3) Set up an account if you haven't already

4) When asked for email address enter your Gmail email address (i.e. somebody@gmail.com)

5) Enter your Gmail password (twice for verification)

Now you'll see a new icon just to the left of your main Messages icon that's a globe with a letter behind it. Your Gmail messages will arrive there, but for some reason, I get them in both my main bin and the Gmail bin. That's a bit annoying, but I'm sure it's just a setting somewhere.

It took about 40 minutes for me to start receiving messages after completing the initial setup. You can send mail as well. The delay between a message in your Gmail box and on your device is in seconds, not minutes, so it's very functional.

Anyways, I know people have been doing this for years, but it was interesting to me. Oh, and I did my 4 miles, but man is it humid outside. No more cotton shirts for my runs.

I survived the 2007 Cicada Brood XIII

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 21:04:00 +0000

Well, almost, as they’re here for a few more days. Where I live, there have only been a few. I've really only seen 3 in my neighborhood and heard a handful of others. Last week, there were some wind blown and awfully lost cicadas in the Loop.

My sister's place was crawling with them. One of her trees I refereed to as the "living tree". We were there in late may when the brood was emerging. There were literally hundreds coming from the grass while we were there. Thousands were already in the trees. It was a sight.

We were there again on Father's Day and snapped this short video. Notice how we have to talk loud because the noise of the bugs is overpowering.

I didn't get to eat any this time around, but maybe next time. I've got 17 years to build up the guts, specifically stomach. So, I'm happy to say I've survived the 2007 cicada's in NE Illinois. I will see you again in 2024.

Vista finally working

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 02:33:00 +0000

After 7 months of full time use, I will say that my laptop is as good as it was with XP. I'm not sure what happened when, but I must have done some updates that made the sleeping/power management work. The machine is now living up to it's potential.

I still won't play games with Vista, though. The loss of frames per second is just too much, especially with a Dell Latitude D620 with the lousy Intel video card.

7 Miles Down

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 23:00:00 +0000

Saturday was a great day. My buddy and I meet early to do our run with the goal of 7 miles. The weather couldn't have been better: mid 60s and overcast with a sprinkle every once in awhile. We paced ourselves well at 9 minute miles and actually hit it. We didn't have the typical run fast early and drain towards the end.

The Nike+ recorded the run as you can see now as my furthest run. I'm finding I'm running out of tunes on my play list, as we're now running for over an hour. Next week, we're doing 8 miles, which should be doable.

I hit Fleet Feet in Lincoln Square today and bought some shoes, socks and energy snacks. The service was great. I can't even remember the last time I went to a shoe store and actually had someone fit me to my shoes (maybe 15 years ago?). I got a great consultation which included observing my running style to find the shoe that works well. It was awkward running to the corner and back 5 times, but it's apparently normal there. Much better than going to Sears in February and picking up a pair that said New Balance because I heard runners prefer them.

The shoes I ended up with were Nike, which was unexpected. I thought they were not so great, but I'll find out soon enough when I try them on the trail. These are the shoes, Air Structure Triax+. They've got the build in Nike+, which means the pedometer chip goes into the soul of the left shoe. I guess Nike got me eventually to buy that...

I found out my feet are wide and you could tell on my old running shoes that my feet were spilling out and pushing out the top of the shoe. The new shoes are wide and roomy, but I don't slip. I haven't had any blisters yet and I'm hoping to keep it that way.

After the run yesterday, we ran over to the Cell to catch the cross town classic. Let me just say, it was a great day, as the Cubs won and I reached my mileage goal. Go Cubs!

Do we look tired?

Mister Pickles Marathon Stretch

noreply@blogger.com (Mister Pickles) — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 12:00:00 +0000

Last year, while waiting in line for a portable toilet outside a U.S. Cellular Field, a buddy and I made a "before we turn 30" proposition. We apparently had too much to drink before the game...

The prop: we both run the 2007 Chicago Marathon (Oct . If I don't run, I pay his wife $500. If he doesn't run, he pays my wife $500. And, if we both bag it, the wives still get their payday. There are no stakes on finishing or time. Also, an injury would null the bet.

So, you can see the motivation to run it is there. You could argue that I just have to pass the start line and you'd be right. Before we started training, I kept stating that all I have to do is make it to mile 6 where there's a good bar that was my old stomping ground. However tempting that would be, it's becoming a personal challenge for both of us. We're going to try to finish it. That's our goal.

I began pre-training, getting up to 30 min running without stopping, in April and now have started formal training. This week's long run was 6 miles, almost a quarter marathon, and wasn't terrible. I fell into the zone at about 3 miles and it became automatic. Next week, we up the distance to 7 and then retreat to 5 (here's the long run schedule we're following). It's going to be interesting.

I track my runs with the Nike+ iPod, which is a great tool if you already have an iPod Nano. It has a pedometer that sits in your shoe and connects wirelessly to your Nano via a small attachment. When you finish your runs, it uploads them at sync to the Nike+ website, where it tracks your individual runs and history. So, it's basically a running journal.

When I hit a total of 50 miles recorded, the site added features that allow me to share my runs to some extent. I've added those features to my blog. The furthest run, which currently is yesterdays 6 miles, and then my last five. They alluded to more features when I hit 100 miles, so perhaps I'll be able to share more or make it more interesting. I'm at 62.5 miles now since I got the thing in early May. I'll probably hit 100 in early July, so we'll see.

Wish me luck towards my goal of completing the marathon and if you want to see my progress, drop by. If I'm slacking and there have been no runs for awhile, kick me. I need to do this!