• Rush soars in blistering sets- PennLive.com:
  Awesome show, possibly the best concert I ever saw and heard.
  tagged as: rush, music, 2008, concert
• Rush Interview And Tom Sawyer on The Colbert Report:
  Rush has gotten used to kicking so much ass and being awesome.
  tagged as: rush, colbert, music

Shared bookmarks for del.icio.us user Scott Buffington.

• Rush soars in blistering sets- PennLive.com: Awesome show, possibly the best concert I ever saw and heard.
  tagged as: rush, music, 2008, concert
• Rush Interview And Tom Sawyer on The Colbert Report: Rush has gotten used to kicking so much ass and being awesome.
  tagged as: rush, colbert, music
• Xbox to Stream Netflix Movies: Gold membership - check, Netflix membership - check. This combined with a recently gifted Apple TV (Thanks Jules) gives me a lot of streaming options. So glad I held off on the Roku.
  tagged as: streaming, movies, netflix, microsoft, xbox

Tuesday July 15th, 2008 I again sat with my son who was intently watching the second inning of Major League Baseball's All-Star game with the time now after 9pm.  I find that as each year passes I grow particularly more frustrated with professional sports.  I realize it is a business but does everything always have to be about making a buck?  I will be surprised if MLB does not seriously pay for snubbing young fans someday.  What am I complaining about?  Why is a game in which the league wants to showcase their all-stars on at 9pm on a weeknight?  There is literally no chance of a young fan watching the entire game. 

The World Series is already a mess that any kid that goes to bed at a reasonable hour never gets to watch.  My son is 6 years old and the latest he stays up on a non-school night is 10pm except for very rare occasions.  But MLB has demonstrated on numerous occasions that all they care about is when the advertisers want the game televised. 

While I am at it, today’s players do very little to preserve the game.  Sure they will threaten to sit out an opening day game played in Japan unless their managers and coaches are paid bonuses like they were to play.  But I have not heard any MLB player say anything about ending the Hall of Fame game that had traditionally been played each year in Cooperstown.  Nope, the players have no interest because there is no money to be made with playing the game.  MLB does not care about the game because they could not make any money from the game.

The NFL has its problems but I do have to take my hat off to them that they still play the Super Bowl before 8pm on a Sunday.  The NFL at least stays with some traditions and seems to understand that a game finishing at 10pm is a lot better than a game finishing at midnight or later. 

Major League Baseball has a six year old fan that wants to get to know its players, he wants to watch your game and you continually program around him.  Keep doing those sorts of things and someday you might not demand any ratings.  I turned the game off after the six year old in my household went to bed at 9:30pm.  You lost several adult viewers with that kind of programming, jerks. 

Harrisburg Mile
Originally uploaded by scotbuff

I have never run a distance race competitively.  Probably the closest thing was the old Presidents Physical fitness tests in school.  I ran a lot of laps training for sports like wrestling where I needed the cardiovascular system of King Kong.  But since leaving school I have not run distances very often and I have not run anything other than sprints in years.  I was always a 100 meter guy.  That all changed about six weeks ago and my lower legs are still not cooperating.  I did achieve my goal though, under 10 minutes.

The time I crossed the finish line was 9:44, no idea what I will officially be listed at.  I was told before hand to watch that I did not go out too fast, I was looking to run around a 2 minute quarter mile.  I got caught up in the excitement and ran a 1:36 quarter mile, much too fast.  I suffered pretty badly through the rest of the run, moving at a near crawl through the middle.  However I ran the last quarter mile better and did not look too bad at the finish, although I did do a quick check where the medical staff was.  The crowd was really good and cheered everyone on throughout the race.

My lower legs are still not used to running, but I intend to keep at it and come back next year to crush the 9:44 time.  I think I will concentrate on logging longer runs, maybe work toward a 5k.  I would like to run a 7 minute mile next year, but that might be a tall order.  I finished and managed to walk to the free beer tent to reload some carbs.

• Slashdot | TrueCrypt 6.0 Released:
  Truecrypt is the bomb, works on every OS. I use it over any built in encryption on all my usb thumbdrives in the event of loss. Protect your privacy!
  tagged as: encryption, privacy, security, freeware

• Saints Standout Colston Joins AIFA Harrisburg Ownership Group:
  Arena Football coming to Harrisburg. SWEET!
  tagged as: football, news, arena, harrisburg
• Asterisked Bonds Ball Arrives at HOF for Display:
  Properly asterisked, the ball that Barry "cheater" Bonds hit for his steroid assisted HR record finally arrived at the HOF. In a few weeks the ball will properly mark the cheating era in MLB and be displayed at the Hall of Fame.
  tagged as: asterisk, cheating, Bonds, homerun, baseball
• Harrisburg Giants:
  On June 30th, 2008 the Senators honored the Harrisburg Giants of the Negro Leagues including wearing throwback uniforms. They looked great, but lost to the Bowie Baysox. Jake got a foul ball.
  tagged as: harrisburg, baseball, giants, senators

I have been considering returning to school for a while now and finally decided that this might be the time to take the necessary steps.  In preparation for some online classes I thought I would dual boot one of my computers with a Microsoft operating system.  At a Microsoft event a few months back I was given a free copy of Windows Vista Ultimate edition.  I still have Windows XP laying around, but thought I would give Windows Vista a valid try.  

So over the weekend I spent some time installing, configuring and using Vista Ultimate edition.  I can say with absolutely no bias, Vista is really crap.  Believe it, and I hope for your sake you do not have to experience it.  The firewall is a mess and confusing or apparently lacking any standard outside of Redmond.  Even when you allow connections they might not be allowed by the machine, the network seems non-compliant with anything that is not Microsoft.  I ended up turning the firewall off completely, the router is enough for the little bit I will be using Vista.  Also when the firewall takes an error, you are told you cannot see the error without switching to this other screen, stupid and left me wondering why.  Using the Vista desktop reminded me of using Linux back in 2000 when it was not ready for the desktop.  Nothing seemed to work well together or without extra clicking.  Vista is a huge step backwards as far as a graphical user interface.  Also, when installing something I had to okay the installation at least twice for everything I installed in the event I changed my mind in the last second I suppose.  In reality I think I clicked more than twice to allow the installation before I was finished.  The entire experience is horrible. Seriously, Windows XP is like a dream compared to Vista.  During my prior use on a virtualized machine I never really did anything with Vista.  Now that I actually started setting the thing up for use I can honestly say it feels unfinished.  Which if it had not been out for something like two years I could maybe understand.  At this stage, should it feel that way?  I remember being impressed with Windows 95 and even liking XP when it first came out. 

The network seems to be among the biggest problems.  I have had absolutely no trouble accessing my Mac or Linux computers from one another, but for the life of me I cannot properly remote connect to the Vista machine from the Mac or Linux computers.  If my kids are going to be using a computer I want to watch their use from my computer.  Within the walls of my home you are not in America, you are in Buffland, a dictatorship run by me.  Vista is interfering with my parenting and I AM NOT running another Microsoft operating system just to get to another Microsoft operating system.  I spent enough time over the years repairing Microsoft computers ruined by teenagers to know that when it comes to family computers freedom is bad.  If you monitor your kids behavior they will not be chatting with one of those weirdo’s Chris Hansen always exposes.  I would not even consider keeping Vista on this computer if I had not been given a free copy from Microsoft.  If I had paid for this, wow, I would have to say I would feel like I was sold a lemon and seriously pursue a refund.  Even now I am considering reloading the computer with Windows XP. 

Let's continue on with the GUI, yuck, the graphical interface, yuck, even with all the graphics turned on, yuck.  Does anyone actually think this works?  It resembles a bad OS X rip-off.  Who came up with that design?  It looks like a poorly designed webpage where someone found widgets from all around the web and embedded all of them.  I switched to classic view, which still has problems.  With all the bells and whistles turned off Vista uses over 500MB of memory.  In regards to the behavior of the GUI, I have to click on everything to accomplish anything; nothing is done for me as it was on prior Windows operating systems.  To go into programs I have to click the folder and to expand program folders I have to click each of them.  This feels broken and old.  I am used to just hovering and each would open.  Thankfully I always set up the Quick Launch toolbar to access almost all my programs.  Task Manager has been routinely hanging in a way that the close button disappears.  I have to find task manager in the task manager list and kill it.  This is a NEW install with all the updates, what the hell?  More on Task Manger, why as an admin do I have to tell it to show me all the programs running?  If I am left to do all this clicking and killing of programs, what is Vista doing with all that memory?

Every operating system has pieces you would like to see function differently, but never have I seen any group literally cripple their operating system to the extent that Microsoft has done with Vista.  Vista Ultimate, I would really hate to experience the five other versions and learn what they are lacking.  Perhaps in the next week I might get to do some actual computing, if I can stand it.  Now we know why Microsoft has extended XP support until the release of the next Windows operating system.  Vista deserves all the flak it is getting and it probably deserves more.

• Diablo III is Coming!!!:
  The game returns and yes I WILL be playing it, and it will still be hack and slash crazy with of all things, a computer mouse! ;) A wink from my previous bookmark. I hope there is still a Paladin, I was the master with Diablo II.
  tagged as: diablo, entertainment, games, gaming, blizzard
• The Mouse Is Dead:
  I try to use the keyboard over the mouse, but this article is misinformed. The mouse and keyboard is still the preference for PC gaming. First person shooting with a mouse cannot be matched with a controller.
  tagged as: computer, hardware
• RIAA Radio Needs To Pay:
  99.5% of radio is Recording Industry garbage. I hope radio fights it, either way it does not affect me much. I think it is the final bullet in the foot for the RIAA personally if they push it.
  tagged as: copyright, media, radio, riaa, music
• The Associated Press: George Carlin mourned as a counterculture hero:
  RIP George Carlin
  tagged as: people
• Fantasy Baseball Owner Rips Team:
  Onion writes Brutal Deluxe style fantasy sports article.
  tagged as: baseball, humor, sports, fantasy
• New York Times Article on xkcd:
  My favorite Internet comic, xkcd.
  tagged as: comic, Internet, geek

A few years ago I came to the realization that I simply will not put the time or money into golf required for me to maintain the quality of play necessary for me to enjoy playing. I played golf for enough years to realize that your swing needs to be practiced at least weekly, realistically several times a week to maintain the type of golf game I want to play. Golf is a wonderful challenge and for me I just cannot fully embrace a challenge if I am not able to do so whole-heartedly in the manner I deem necessary. I announced my retirement from golf sometime back in 2003 to my friends until the kids have grown. For me golf is not about beating another players score, it is beating the score you previously shot on the course you are playing, it is about beating the course. Like it or not this involves large investments of time away from family and yes golf costs a lot to play. One day I will return to the game, older, wiser and yes probably not quite with the same athleticism I had. But all is not lost; time with the family allows you other pursuits.

I have not golfed in so long, it is sad. I have however been playing wiffle ball at least once a week. I played Thursday, Friday and Saturday evening. So, although my golf game is suffering, my wiffle ball game is all-star material. I made two amazing diving catches on Saturday; both would have been Sports center material.   I also hit homeruns on Thursday and Saturday, overall I had a great series.

Shared bookmarks for del.icio.us user Scott Buffington.

• Suse 11 Hands On: I really dug Suse in the early 2000's. I have since grown to prefer Ubuntu as my Linux of choice. That being said I do not agree with everything said in this hands on.
  tagged as: suse, linux
• Harrisburg Senators Manager Interesting Baseball Career: Perfect attitude you want for a manager and to teach young players. The guy was best known for standing up to Dave Parker, breaking Parker's cheekbone in a collision at home plate.
  tagged as: Senators, Harrisburg, Stearns, manager, baseball