Home on The Ridge (Snoqualmie Ridge)

Giving credit where credit is due

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:57:36 PST

Great job by the Purdue football coaching staff and the players today to beat Michigan in the Big Outhouse today. After laying a goose egg in Madison last week which included accomplishing an amazing feat of completing just 5 of 23 passes, I must say seeing Michigan favored by only six was very tempting to bet my life savings on the Wolverines (seriously). But Purdue came out inspired today, never let up, played with heart and intelligence, and pulled off something that hadn't occurred in my lifetime - a victory over Michigan in Ann Arbor.

This Purdue team has to be the most inconsistent team I have ever seen in any sport. Last week's goose egg, a loss to Northern Illinois, a home loss to Northwestern, a blowout loss to Minnesota. On the flip side, a win over tOSU, outplayed Oregon on the road, and a win over Michigan in Ann Arbor. Granted, Michigan is not a good team by any stretch of the imagination, but they do have more talented players than the Boilers.

After the Oregon game I really liked what I saw from the coaching staff relative to playcalling and gametime adjustments. Then that seemed to disappear altogether (even in the Ohio State win, I thought OSU gave us the game more than Purdue beating them) and I thought we had seen an aberration. I saw the same strong playcalling and gametime adjustments today against Michigan. Which begs the question: do Hope and his staff have any sort of football strategy or philosophy? Or are they winging this week in and week out? Hopefully this team can gain some consistency.

A bowl is now within reach. It will take a home win over Michigan State and a road win over IU. Both very average, beatable teams, but also both teams that can easily hand Purdue a loss.

I think these next two games are important for sizing up Hope and Purdue for the coming years. If Purdue wins out I will say I am damn impressed after starting the season 1-5. If they lose out, I'd say overall the season was disappointing. In between? Then there is Hope for the future...

A night out with Spencer and his friends

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 23:54:55 PDT

With Spencer attending a new school this year, it occurred to me that he hadn't seen some of his regular friends in a while. And since our weekends tend to be pretty busy, I suggested to S-man that he invite a couple friends to a Seattle Thunderbirds hockey game so he could hang out with them for a while. So tonight I took Spencer and two of his friends from the last few years down to the Showare Center and took in our third Thunderbirds game of the season.

This was the first time I can remember that I truly got to see Spencer in his element. Normally if I see him with his friends, its either a) in some school or sport activity with lots of parents and kids around, and he's focused on some other task, b) he has friends over but not in my sight, or c) very short stints in passing. With a 30+ minute drive to and from the game, plus 150 minutes of time together in the arena, I felt like Jane Goodall observing monkeys in their element (although I'd argue it's probably easier to make sense of monkeys than three eight year olds).

My favorite part was following the three as they walked to the arena shoulder to shoulder. Spencer was happy, socially confident and comfortable, and responsible. I probably could have told the three I would meet them outside after the game and not seen them for the next couple hours, and they would have been just fine. It's a snapshot in my mind I won't forget.

Thank you, Spence, for allowing me to tag along. Can't wait until we do it again. And not just because I don't have to talk to any adults (that's just a bonus). Just hope the T-Birds put up a better fight next time.

By my recollection, that makes four

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 22:44:05 PDT

As in, four Purdue wins over top ten teams since I started following Purdue football in 1988. (Sheesh I am getting old).

Had to wait until 1996 to see my first - a blistering 9-3 win over #9 Michigan in West Lafayette. A couple years later, Purdue beat #4 Kansas State 37-34 in the Alamo Bowl, and followed that up the next year with a 52-28 drubbing of #5 Michigan State in West Lafayette. And then a 10 year drought until today's big win over Ohio State.

I still remember that 1996 win over Michigan. Back when ESPN2 couldn't even afford capital letters (remember those days?). Amy and I were two of about 33,000 people in attendence to witness that, the week after Jim Colletto announced his resignation. The goalposts came down and were soon deposited in the Wabash River.

The Alamo Bowl win is still probably my favorite win ever by a Purdue team. The defense played phenomenal against a potent, fast offense. It catapulted Roosevelt Colvin and Chike Okeafor into the NFL, and started the Drew Brees legend. Even though Drew had a relatively poor game (he completed less than 50% of his passes, for like barely over 200 yards, and had something like 2TDs and 3 picks), he had a last minute drive that was one for the ages.

The 1999 win over #5 MSU wasn't really an upset. Purdue was ranked in the top 25 at the time, and MSU, while piling up Ws, wasn't exactly a dominant team that year. I expected Purdue to own MSU, as did everyone in the stadium, and that's what happened. If I remember right Purdue jumped out to a 28-7 lead by early 2nd quarter and never looked back.

And then the drought. Much has been made of Purdue's inability to beat a ranked team, let alone a top 10 team, since 2003. Six years is a long time. Even Colletto managed Ws against ranked Cal and West Virginia, and Akers beat OSU in Columbus.

Since moving to Seattle, days where Purdue plays a top ten team is pretty much treated like a holiday, even in the past few down years under Tiller. We plan our day around it, make a party out of it, and of course wind up disappointed.

So today, while I hurried up after Spencer's soccer game to start the recording of the game, I also didn't treat it with the specialness reserved for Spoilermaker opportunities. What were the odds? I mean, this is a Purdue team that needed two late TDs to pull within 7 of mighty Northern Illinois. Sheesh.

Today's game reminded me of the 1996 win over Michigan. You watch this team, and you say "you know, there's some talent here. Not NFL talent, but talented kids who can play football." Then you watch them shoot themselves in the foot week in and week out. Then they put it together and bite someone, and actually look pretty good in the process.

Boiler Up. Who knows when we'll see a W again, let alone against a top ten team. Here's to it not being 10 years...

Spencer's Eee PC

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 20:11:38 PDT

A few weeks back Woot had Asus' Eee PC 900 for $170. I checked the memory, it had 1GB, and I damn near ordered two of them. Makes a perfect learning laptop for Spencer.

I didn't realize it didn't come with Windows - it comes installed with Linux. But it's bundled in a user-friendly way. It comes with StarOffice, and I had to play with it to upgrade FireFox to 3.0. Took a few tries, but eventually got it right.

Wireless connectivity is pretty easy, and it charges quickly. Best of all it's intuitive enough for an eight year old. I was a little worried about the X-Windows interface but that hasn't been an issue.

If there's a downside is that I will have to download some basic features to allow Spencer to do some more things with it (like view HD movies, which are not supported by the default media player).

So Spencer now has a laptop. He loves it. And like most people he's figured out how to play games on it. Although he's already created his first spreadsheet :)

I think the Lions have a QB of the future

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:24:44 PDT

After four games, Matt Stafford is showing he belongs in the NFL. I've only caught one of his games, but from looking at highlights he looks good. Strong arm, looking off safeties, going through his reads, and stepping up in the pocket when he needs to. Reading NFL defenses will take time, but I like his progress vs. what I remember from other top QBs drafted in their first year like Aikman and Manning. Can't remember a time in 35 years I've been excited about a Lions' QB.

All these bitter pills are starting to taste the same

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 21:31:58 PDT

No, I'm not talking about the Obamas crashing-and-burning in their attempt to land Chicago the 2016 Olympics (apparently the IOC is smarter than the average American). Another Saturday, another WTF happened relative to Purdue football. Danny Hope now reminds me of Jim Colletto. I don't think that's a good thing, although I didn't exactly hate Jim Colletto or the time he was here. He elevated the program from joke-of-the-nation to we're-not-as-bad-as-IU. Which was a step up.

I realize Tiller left a pretty bare cupboard. Still, I expected more out of this team at this point. I just have an eerie feeling that, just like Colletto had some early success, Hope just won't get over the hump.

And damn UW for not closing the door on ND. Not that I care about UW, but any ND loss automatically makes it a great weekend.

I'm tired of the moral victories

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 09:18:47 PDT

After 20+ years of following Purdue football closely, I'm done with the moral victories. Seen plenty of them. They're no longer impressing me. I enjoyed them during the Colletto years. I even enjoyed them during the Tiller years, but since we haven't beaten a ranked team in 5+ years, I've gotten numb to them.

Likewise, perennial visits to bowl games that didn't exist 30 years ago doesn't impress me either. I simply want to see a 10 win season occasionally. Say once every 10 years. Then I'll get excited. I'll suffer through some losing seasons to do it. But put together a great season now and then. Tiller got close a few times, and in 2003 and 2004 he had the talent to do it but never closed the door.

After last night's game, not sure if Hope is the one to get us there. Four games is certainly too early to tell (after all, two games into the season I liked the direction the team was heading). 1-3 against two MAC opponents and a ND game at home certainly isn't building confidence in me. And a couple things concerned me last night 1) the lack of offensive production in the 2nd and 3rd quarters, and b) the lack of aggressiveness on defense down the stretch. The former speaks to weaknesses in the coaching staff's ability to game plan and adjust properly; the latter speaks to the mindset of the coaching staff. This team will get eaten alive in the Big Ten if that doesn't change. Akers deja vu? At least Colletto consistently had offenses in the top three of the Big Ten, even if his defenses couldn't tackle to save their life (wait, didn't that happen last night?).

That said, it's been a long time (2004?) since I felt Purdue looked like a real football team, and the showings against Oregon and ND have convinced me they belong in the Big Ten. And not just because the Big Ten sucks this year. So I do have hope for this team. Just frustrated Hope isn't closing the door sooner with this team as I had expected.

In retrospect, it was a great game

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 11:19:02 PDT

When you're in the moment of Purdue giving up 17 points on stupid turnovers and missing extra points, you lose sight of one thing: the Purdue-Oregon game was a great game. 6 or so lead changes, a tie game at halftime, great efforts offensively and defensively, and last minute heroics where Purdue had a chance to tie with a minute left.

We had a great time in Autzen, of the best road trips we've had. Nothing will ever beat Purdue's 41-16 drubbing of the Irish under touchdown Jesus, and it's hard to top Penn State as an overall environment, but Oregon was an overall good experience.

The drive down was beautiful as would be expected. So long as you close your eyes through Portland. Sheesh, anyone who doesn't like Pittsburgh should really take a view at Portland. Traffic wasn't too bad, which was surprising given there is literally only two ways into Eugene. And they have great parking/transportations options - never seen anything as easy and organized as their bus system.

Autzen stadium, if you can get over the plethora of green and yellow on your eyes (if snow is God's dandruff, then the inside of Autzen stadium is God's vomit), is a nice, small stadium with lots of activites. They open their practice field up with big screen TVs, tables, and food for fans to enjoy before the game, which is a great idea - haven't seen that done anywhere either.

Overall the fans were fine. One bitch of a lady on the bus put Spencer in tears with her taunting (half Spencer's fault because he's so sensitive), but I got to yell at her so that was a bonus. Started the trip off poorly. But most fans left us alone, and a few where actually nice to us.

Of course it rained, and our smart selves left our rain gear at the hotel. Not sure what we were thinking.

Wasn't until I watched the game on tape until I realized that Adams DIDN'T NEED TO JUMP FOR THE BALL on the two point conversion. Damn, we're in OT if he keeps his feet on the ground (the ball hit him right in the chest).

Can't say enough good things about BCS

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 22:22:25 PDT

No, not the Bowl Championship Series, but Bellevue Christian School (Three Points Elementary to be specific). Located near Lake Washington and 520, it's a small private school that Amy and I decided would be worth our $$$ to send Spencer as he entered third grade. And so far I we haven't been disappointed. Spencer loves it and is enjoying it more than his old school. The teachers and admin we have met have been absolutely great to work with. He is being challenged daily, in a reasonable way, and Spencer is already being pushed far harder than he was at CVES. Plus Spencer is a bible-thumper at heart so he loves the environment. "I have chapel today Dad!" He says it like its a good thing.

I drive him the 35 minutes to school, which is 5 minutes from where I now work. It's occurred to us maybe we should just move to Bellevue, and while we aren't in a hurry it certainly wouldn't surprise me that we make a move while the market is down and we minimize the trading up cost it would take for us to move there. The drive allows me to have some bonding with him, and it allows him to have some focused study time without his brother pestering him. Its created a riff in my work schedule, but so be it - I'll manage. And Microsoft has a great culture to support work/life balance and families, so it's almost expected that I'm not in the office before 8:30 now.

Bus transportation is actually included in the tuition, which was a surprise to Amy and I (we figured we'd be dropping another $100/month for the bus), so Spencer takes the bus to Issaquah, where Amy picks him up. She has a story to tell about the first day, just ask her about it, just make sure she is sitting down and has a drink in her hand when she tells it.

We'll see how the year goes. But I can certainly see next fall me cutting a check for 2x to send Garrett to kindergarten there.

Audios

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 22:05:56 PDT

After a little over seven years and 135000 miles, I said goodbye to my beloved 2000 Audi S4. Gonna miss my first world-class sports sedan. My goal was to drive it into the ground, and last week the engine started acting quirky. Might have been as simple as a couple bad spark plugs, or could have been something more serious. But now that I am driving spencer 20 miles to school every morning, I decided I needed something more reliable.

My S4 had front quarter panel damage from that wonderful snowstorm a few years back, the cat had died, and had a few minor issues with it. Plus plenty of scratches and dings to boot. Not worth fixing IMHO, so I traded it in last week. I actually got three times what I was willing to take for it, so I call that a big win. Of course they never drove the damn thing or took a look at all the warning lights going off, they just walked around the car. Good for me.

Spencer cried when we left the dealership with a different car. He loved the way I drove it. Sheesh, I can't wait until his first pet dies on him. Took me a while to calm him down, and even after a week he still talks about missing my car.

And thus ends summer

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 22:47:53 PDT

Almost anyway. Been a busy August. Earlier in the month we took our first trip to Idaho, squeezing a trip in three days between Amy's work and Spencer leaving for camp. In those days we met up with my uncle in Spokane, spent a day in Coeur d'Alene, and spent a day at the Silverwood Amusement park, supposedly the largest amusement park in the Pacific Northwest.

Silverwood was fun. I imagine it is about the size Cedar Point was in the early/mid 70s before CP realized that roller coasters would be its ticket to fortunes. There are a few coasters at Silverwood, include what I call a real one (one that roller coaster entuhsiasts would actually ride) - in fact its the best coaster I've ever been on. Granted, I haven't been on one for 10 years (I think Incredible Hulk at Universal Orlando was the last real coaster I've been on), so I have no clue what's new out there there days. The rest of the park was what you'd expect - lots of rides and games for the kids - but it also has a large water park connected to it. One admission price gets you into both areas. The water park has two large wave pools, and Spencer and Garrett chose to spend most of there day there. Although we did get Spencer and Garrett on one of the big roller coasters. While Garrett insisted on going, afterword he sputtered that it was too scary and he wasn't going on again. Sadly, no pictures, we didn't want to take a camera in and lose it.

I wasn't sure what to expect from Coeur d'Alene. It's probably the best known lake in the Pacific Northwest, so I imagined something 10 times busier than Lake Chelan. I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't very busy - of course we timed it so we wouldn't be there over a weekend. Then again, northern Idaho is chock full of lakes, and Lake Pend O'Reille is only 20 miles north, and Priest Lake is another half hour north. What I was surprised was the lack of watersports right on the lake. I could only find one Jet Ski rental, and they didn't rent by the hour (half a day minimum), and the kayak rentals brought your kayaks to you and you had to wait for them to pick them up. I didn't take either of them up while we were there, instead just swam in the lake with the kids at two different beaches. And got sunburnt real, real bad.

There wasn't a lot of water activity, much to my surprise. Seems much more like a residential area where the residents enjoy lakefront views. Total opposite of Lake Chelan where everything is a resort, campground, or hotel. Not bad, just different. We had a great time and we will go back soon.

The month of August saw the family take in a Mariners game against the good guys (White Sox). The good guys went yard in the top of the ninth for three runs to beat the home team, in what was largely a boring game. We went during the week and Garrett had his run of the cool play area out in center field.

I also took Spencer to the Seahawks home opening pre-season game. Unfortunately, the pre-game announcement of "what to do in case of an emergency" dragged on for a while, Spencer took it all in, and was scared to death the entire first half. "Dad, should we go to the emergency exit?" "Dad, when is the emergency going to be here?" "Dad, we should sit closer to the emergency exit." "Dad, do you know what to do in case of an emergency?" "Dad..." Finally I put the kid's mind at ease and we left at halftime. At least Matt Hasselbeck through a couple TD passes that Spencer got to see.

Finally, I took a day off work this week and the family went to Wild Waves in Federal Way. The kids had been there a few times (Garrett loves telling the world that this was his third trip there), and it's basically a smaller version of Silverwood. It used to be a Six Flags, which is odd because I've always thought of Six Flags as big theme parks. On the way back we caught a couple periods of the Seattle Thunderbirds scrimmage at the Showare Center.

So Monday Spencer starts at his new school in Bellevue. Not sure how the logistics will work out, I will likely drive him to school every day and he will take the bus home. There's a bus stop out in Issaquah so apparently a lot of kids outside Bellevue attend. Will cause some havoc at work because I'm used to getting to the office early so I can get out at a decent hour, this will throw a wrench in that. But I'm excited for Spencer and I'm glad that even with our late start in talking to BCS we were able to get Spencer in.

swimming in lake coeur d'alene

the boys thought the mudgy the moose statues around town were cool

spencer worried about some stupid impending emergency about to strike

i've taught garrett how to cross his eyes.

oh yeah, i forgot a rant...

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 16:49:02 PDT

... related to the Sounders game. My biggest turn-off to soccer is the utterly-frickin wussbags that writhe on the ground in fake agony when so much as the wild blows a little too hard. Makes it really hard for me to consider soccer a real sport watching that. I had to keep telling Spencer "he's faking it... yeah, he's faking it too... yep, you got it, he's faking it."

Fortunately nobody stood up and yelled "I hope he dies!" but I would have laughed at that just as I did 10 years ago against Notre Dame. Just sayin.

My first Sounders game with Spencer

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 11:02:03 PDT

Oy, I've put this off a couple days because frankly, I really don't know what to say about it. I'll start with my conclusion - I won't shell out that kind of money for a Sounders game again.

If I were one who enjoyed watching soccer, I think I would have had fun. Not quite as big of an event as the hype in this town had led me to believe, but still, quite the lively crowd, fairly knowledgeable, and a nice setting for the game. Problem is, I'm not one who likes watching soccer. Like golf and baseball, I'm a much bigger fan of playing the game than watching it.

Spencer was excited about going, he had a good time, although he liked watching the game from the club level indoors than standing in the stands. Even if we did have 20th row seats at midfield (great seats scored by me). He noted that the players stand around a lot, which is something I've coached him he can't do in soccer. I didn't have an answer for him. Thanks MLS players.

Traffic was a mess due to the construction between Quest and Safeco. Worse than a Mariners or Seahawks game, believe it or not. And boy, despite the club level not being very crowded, they had tons of people guarding every entrance to make sure someone didn't wander in who didn't have a pass. God forbid someone walks around the corridor up there without a pass. Maybe a few of those folks could have been working the long lines at the concession stands. Just sayin.

As for the game, weather was great and the two sides played to a nice 0-0 tie. Plenty of missed opportunities for both sides. And a red card for each side to boot. Not a bad game, certainly not one for the ages.

I'm not sure why I am down on the whole experience. Maybe relative to Seahawks (where the play is interesting and the crowd is abuzz), the Mariners (where the environment is fun even if the play on the field is not), or the Thunderbirds (intimate environment and constant action), it just came up short. When I factor in that I shelled out $100 for two tickets (more than I spent last year on Spencer's first Seahawks game), I think its safe to say I'm glad I took Spencer but he will be buying tickets out of his own money next time.

Catching up on last weekend

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 21:47:54 PDT

Last weekend was pretty eventful. I took Friday off and did a premium hike taking on Granite Mountain and winning. Views were amazing, the hike exhausting, and the solitude refreshing.

On Saturday I had the boys all day, and we went and saw the Seattle Thunderbirds practice. I was excited that their hockey store would be open with 25% off everything; turns out all they were selling was their crappy stuff they can't get rid of during the season. Still, the boys had fun, and we stayed there a full hour an a half, which is an hour longer than I expected them to hold out.

After that we did a quick tour of the Museum of Flight, and checked out the new control tower exhibit, which, except for the new signs, I could not distinguish from the old control tower exhibit. The museum is very hands on which the boys love.

On Sunday, we went back to the Museum of Flight to partake in a biplane ride. We shelled out more money than we probably should for a 20 minute flight from Boeing field around Elliot Bay and back. Because there were four of us we couldn't do an open seater, so we were tightly wedged into a cabin plane. The takeoff and landing made me a wee bit nervous, Garrett couldn't see because he was too short, but Spencer loved it. It was quite the experience and glad we went on it.

Wii Fit Plus

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 10:46:50 PDT

Just saw on twitter that Wii Fit Plus is due this year. Haven't read what it will be, but here's what I'm hoping: let me workout, please.

After a year of trying I've basically given up exercising on Wii Fit
for one reason: it loves to interrupt exercise and waste my time. I don't need to hear instructions over and over. I don't need feedback from a virtual trainer. I don't need to know my "score" or how I rank over time. I just want to exercise. 30 minutes of time spent on Wii Fit amounts to about 10 minutes of real exercise. Bah, I've got better things to do with my time.

A great feature would be to let me set up my routine, set up rests between them, and go! That would be a simple feature to deliver.

I do like that I've learned a little yoga, but at some point I am way beyond learning and into practicing, and the wii fit doesn't recognize that.

I love the idea of the balance board, heck, tracking my BMI automatically in the wii is worth it for that alone. Here's to getting some good exercise programs on the wii in the future, the promise is there, someone please deliver on it.

A quick trip to Mount Rainier

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 19:00:35 PDT

Quick of course is relative - for us its a two hour drive to Sunrise, the closest point for us in the Mount Rainier National Park. It sits 6400 feet up, about 40 minutes inside the park boundaries. It affords an up close and personal view of Mount Rainier, which almost doesn't seem fair that one can drive and get a better view than climbing one of the various peaks of the Cascades.

Weather was beautiful today, but hot. We didn't do much hiking, we will save that for a cooler day.

This is at a vista about 5 miles out from Sunrise.

You could see Mount Saint Helens today; you can always recognize it due to its flat top.

A close up of where a huge amount of snow has broken off. Making me rethink that I want to summit Rainier someday.

Amazon Fresh on Snoqualmie Ridge

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 17:00:16 PDT

Woot! Just learned that Amazon will start delivering Amazon Fresh to the Ridge starting Tuesday. Boo ya! I like the new grocery store on the ridge, but they don't do everything, and their prices on some things are pretty high. Competition will be good.

Success with the Orion

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 16:35:53 PDT

At some level I have to call this a success. I set out today to try my hand at using my Orion "cooker" as a smoker, something that everyone on the Interwebs says can't be done. I didn't have high hopes, and used a small, cheap piece of 3.5 pound pork shoulder to give it a try today.

After a generous rub on the pork and stuffing it with as much garlic as I possibly could, I lined the bottom inside of the Orion with some large mesquite wood chips, ensuring that the wood was in contact with the walls of the cooker. I actually wedged them between the walls and the drip pan, keeping them in place. I also stacked them a couple high where I could, convinced that I couldn't get enough smoke anyway to do the trick. Note that I did not soak the chips in anything - I left them dry, knowing the cooker generates enough moisture on its own.

After putting the shoulder on the top rack and sealing it up, I used less charcoal than it normally calls for, and to compensate I cooked it longer (5 hours instead of 3). The result? A wonderful, black, fall-apart-in-your-hands hunk of meat rich with smoky mesquite flavor. In fact, I think it's a little too smoky. Looking forward to how it tastes with a generous helping of Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce during tonight's neighborhood gathering.

Now, I'm not going to argue that this is smoked to perfection. I'd certainly rather have a real smoker to do the trick. However, I challenge the blogosphere that claims you can't get any smoke out of the Orion. And, I still say with the Orion that most of the time I'd rather have 95% flavor in a third of the time (and a tenth of the work). Today was actually an exception - I did have the time to attend to a full bbq, and I wished I had a real smoker. Sigh.

Next time, I would probably do the following:

soak some of the wood chips a little. A little steam won't hurt. But, need to have enough dry ones to create the smoke.
find smaller wood chips. Chunks of wood really don't help when trying to wedge between the drip pan and the outer wall.
sprinkle the wood chips with some seasoning. I think the chips will get hot enough to do the trick for this.

Bon Apetit to moi.

Geocaching.com iPhone app review

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 11:28:11 PDT

I don't yet have my own iPhone, I will be getting that in August. But since my wife has had hers (December) I've found more and more reasons to use it. The best one just might be geocaching.com's application.

The iPhone 3G has a built-in GPS receiver (GPSr), which I don't believe the first gen iPhone does (don't quote me on that). I certainly wouldn't use it to geocache, but it's accurate enough for car navigation or location-based services. The geocaching app can use the GPSr to find nearby caches. It will list them out by name and distance; clicking on one will give you more detail - size, description, logs, and hints. In other words, all standard fare you get on the website or as part of your .gpx downloads. You can also use the app to navigate to the cache, which will bring up a map (you can set whether you use Google Maps or Bing maps, for example) showing both your current location and the cache location. Or you can bring up a compass view - showing you direction and distance to where the cache is.

But the best feature, in my estimation, is that you can record your cache logs right from the phone. These are called field notes, and you can record found it/didn't find its and record a log. These are then submitted to your geocaching.com account to your field notes section. They don't post directly to the cache listing - you have to do that from the website. Not sure why they force another step, but still better than trying to figure out all the caches you found when, say, you're on vacation for a week and find a couple dozen.

The app also allows you to save cache descriptions for offline use. And this is a really nice feature of the app - it recognizes that people doing serious geocaching are probably not within distance of a cell phone network or Wifi, so the app is offline-friendly. You can't search while disconnected; however, you can still submit field notes (they are stored locally until you connect again).

This app will set you back $10. Considering you'll never had to download pocket queries again, it is a no-brainer companion to your geocaching toolkit.

The $25,000 question is whether you could realistically use only your iPhone for geocaching (assuming you pretty much do urban caches), and I think it would be a challenge. The GPS is just not accurate enough on the iPhone. But damn is it nice having a device able to pull down any nearby caches you want no matter where you are.

Happy Birthday America!

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 06:04:57 PDT

What a great country we still live in to enjoy the freedoms we do. I just wish the more people understood that with freedom comes responsibility.

Going to try to make some pulled pork for this evening's grill out, and also going to make sure all the kids go to bed tonight with all their fingers. Other than that, a relaxing day with the kids.

Two down, five to go

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 22:37:09 PDT

I have a goal of hitting all the major mountains in the Snoqualmie River Valley by the end of the year: Mount Washington, Mount Teneriffe, Mailbox Peak, Mount Defiance, Granite Mountain, Silver Peak, and capping it off with Snoqualmie Mountain (ouch). I did Mount Si, Bandera Mountain, and McClellan Butte last year, hence the seven and not the full ten.

I hit Mount Washington in the snow a month ago to kick off the season, and I failed to complete Teneriffe last week (I had done Rattlesnake Mountain the day before, and I am just not in good enough shape yet to tackle back-to-back hikes).

Today, I completed Mailbox Peak, by far my most challenging hike yet. Doing so gives me confidence to hit Teneriffe next week when the new trail is complete (will be just as steep as Mailbox), and pretty much leaves me in a state where I can take on the other mountains in prep for a hike up Snoqualmie Mountain which is a killer.

The weather did not cooperate today, which means no good views (thus no pics) of Rainier, Baker, etc. That's not surprising, as the "two months of perfect weather" doesn't start until mid-July. Still, tough killing myself 4000 feet up and nothing but cloud vapor to stare at.

Looking forward to the rest of the season.

This one was hard

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 07:39:22 PDT

I've waited a couple days to post this to calm down from Stuart's stupid first period penalty Friday night. I won't blame the loss on him - the Wings had their chances - but man you cannot kill your momentum that way.

Though not nearly as bad as the Wings' early exits in 93, 94, or 96, this one was a tough pill to swallow. The Wings were a better team, with home ice advantage, and it was theirs to lose. And they lost it. I thought Anaheim and Chicago were better teams, and maybe having to play them wore the Wings down to the Pens' benefit. Regardless, a huge opportunity to erect another pillar in the Wings' dynasty was lost. I really wanted Lidstrom to get his 5th Cup (that would be more than Gretzky or Bossy by the way), maybe next year. Or maybe I can't stand the thought of an overrated classless whiner like Sidney Crosby hoisting the cup.

It's still an amazing 20 year run the Wings are on.

And Holland is crazy if he hands Hossa another $7M in the future. I'd rather take my chances elsewhere for that kind of money.

No consequences for Malkin, of course

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 12:07:08 PDT

I agree that Malkin shouldn't be suspended for game 3 for his instigation penalty with 20 seconds left of game 2 (Of course I think the instigator rule is stupid to begin with). However, you can't let the guy off scot free - the guy served 20 seconds for an instigation for Chrissake's.

Maybe the rule should be you sit for 5 minutes the following game, or for all instigations you sit for 30 minutes of ice time or the rest of the game, whatever is longer. I don't know what the solution is. But basically the NHL just said you can drop the gloves when the other team is outclassing you and there is no consequences. That makes no sense. Either fighting is in or it is out. Pick one, Bettman, and be consistent about it.

Bing is not Google

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Thu, 28 May 2009 13:35:57 PDT

Actually, I don't know what Bing really stands for, and I wasn't part of the branding/marketing behind it. But I am part of the team that is working on the shopping part of Bing, and I must say these are exciting times. Although not as exciting as when it is actually released (even if I will be spending all night in the office).

My favorite writeup so far.

Update: I now have a new favorite writeup. Er, video.

A great Original Six series

noreply@blogger.com (James V Reagan) — Wed, 27 May 2009 20:16:24 PDT

I'm almost ashamed to admit it took me a couple of games for me to get fired up about the Wings/Hawks series. A very different Chicago team than the last time the Wings faced the Hawks in the playoffs. No Belfour. No Roenick. And Chelios now dons the Winged Wheel. Go figure. The Hawks of old were a much easier team to hate. The reverse is also true.

Still, I like what is hopefully going to be several years of a renewed rivalry. The Hawks showed some skill, but lacked the poise and grit that the Wings have acquired over the years. In fact the Hawks remind me of the Wings teams of the late 80s/early 90s. Except they had good goaltending.

Despite the Wings domination I still really enjoyed this series. Primarily because I watched most of the Hawks/Canucks series and saw how well Chicago came back from multiple goal deficits, keeping me on edge despite nice leads.

Now on to a rematch with the Penguins, and I really, really hope the refs are not as soft on the Pens as they were last year. This is hockey, folks, Sidney (girl's name) is going to get bumped from time to time. He's not a quarterback, after all, and this is a real sport. I must say I wish the Wings were playing someone interesting the the finals. The Pens just don't do it for me.

It is still amazing this is the same organization I followed 30 years ago. Back when there were 21 teams, and the Wings were perennially one of five teams that never made the playoffs. Now if they are less than a 2 seed you call it a disappointing regular season, and anything short of the Cup finals is a choke. As big of a joke as the Detroit Lions are, the Red Wings are a model professional sports organization. Maybe they should make Illitch CEO of Chrysler.

Looks like two more weeks of the beard. By then it might actually look like one. Amy says I've set a world record for longest time without shaving and still not having a beard.