January 2007

Tonight, the planets aligned and 10 of us managed to eke out a long-overdue Quizo win. Not only was it the night we celebrated Rob’s return to Philly, but a good amount of fun overall. As long as we kept our eyes to ourselves and away from the usual ugly customers like Ms. Muffintops at the next table, Slash at the bar (really dude, a scarf hanging from your belt?), the Dia-Lisa hybrid and the Old Lady from the old lady/young woman optical illusion, we were able to concentrate. Every single person was able to contribute an answer or two, my main moment coming during the movie quote round with the answer Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.

Drove down to Delaware (the home of tax-free shopping) last night to pick up my new MacBook (with Dia’s NYU student ID for an additional discount). The biggest discount came in the form of a $1,000 gift card that Dia gave to me for Xmas. So, after a long drive and many hours tweaking my preferences and downloading programs I’m almost at home on my new machine. I can blog while watching television, get a little work done on road trips, and have access to everything I used to without requiring me to be upstairs in the office.

When I was using my first laptop in college I vowed never to go back to desktops again. That soon changed when I was offered the family computer and placed it behind the couch in our Levittown apartment, where it was both convenient and luxurious. By the time we moved to our current place I had all but forgotten about my promise but managed by splitting my computing time between secluding myself upstairs for hours at a time and making do with my old, outdated and disorganized Powerbook.

Now I once again have power and mobility, and in a few months when Mac OS X Leopard comes out I’ll convert the G4 desktop to a backup system. Then the migration will be complete.

Inspired by the forgotten wedding toast that Chris never made to Lisa, which I recently stumbled across on his blog, here is my 1/3 of the speech that Rob, Ross, and I wrote for the happy couple:

“In a perfect world, Chris would have written this for me — rubbing his little nose, impatiently saying “Move over, let me sit down” (and Lisa would have copyedited).

In preparing for my part of this toast, I could only compile a list of things I shouldn’t talk about. The relatively quiet love life punctuated with West Philly squatters and Rob’s mom seemed like it should be off-limits. And the allegories I came up with seemed like a bit of a stretch and all involved The Triangle: silly lines like how she was his first mistress — using him up while putting out every Friday — they don’t work (even if she did introduce the happy couple).

One major problem, it occurred to me, was that most of my not-so-clever anecdotes were from years ago. You see, We don’t see each other every day like we did in college, and that’s how I know he’s found the right person: that I don’t have to worry about him anymore. He has the right woman to appreciate his brilliance and force him into having adventures for years to come.

Lisa, thank you for taking this old man, my best friend, under your wing.”

What an up-and-down weekend. Saturday was a gorgeous, sunny, relaxing day at a record-setting 70 degrees. Al and I spent the morning at Ikea goofing around with Kelly and Geof and their kids while they picked out a bookshelf for their new apartment. After watching a few incompetent South Philly shoppers load their cars like idiots it made me glad that Geof reached out for some help; it also made me want to head down again for future installments of How Not To Load Your Vehicle. With my car completely empty except for the Castle’s new shelves I turned the keys over to Al for our car swap. He helped transport the furniture and continued on to New York to pick up a washer and dryer. Dia and I spent a quiet day cleaning and organizing in preparation for this weekend’s Sixth Annual Holiday Party, and I met Al later that evening to help him unload his appliances for storage at the office.

Things got a little more exciting Saturday night with a Dallas Cowboys loss thanks to a bobbled field goal attempt and subsequent fumble by QB Tony Romo. It set the tone for the rest of the weekend as we traveled to northern New Jersey the next morning to watch the second two Wild Card games. Unfortunately, the Jets were unable to beat the Patriots, but the Eagles played sufficiently well to defeat the Giants.

It wasn’t the Birds’ greatest performance but the game was a nail-biter. It came right down to the end, where a perfectly managed game clock and game-winning field goal on the final five-minute drive won the game. Adding to the fairy tale ending was the fact that the team had signed veteran holder Koy Detmer before the playoffs and just in time for this very occasion. JT, Tim, and I met Ross and Ben at Mulligan’s to watch the game with dozens of other Eagles fans. It truly was a haven in the heart of Hoboken: a sign reading “Welcome to Eagles Country” outside, and inside our bartender ejected two Giants fans before they could start any trouble. After the game we strutted down Washington Street, whooping it up and shit-talking opposing fans on their own turf.

The Eagles play again Saturday night when they will hopefully march all over the Saints’ overly symbolic rebuilding season. Since it’s during our party, we’ll probably incorporate a little home tailgating with the usual food and games.

In the interest of keeping more data on myself (information that I don’t mind sharing), I decided to sign up for an account at boardgamegeek.com. I liked the idea of tracking my biking statistics so much that I decided to track my board game stats as well. I’ve already set up my collection and rated it — or as much of it as I could remember, really — and starting yesterday I’m going to keep track of the games I play. It would be absurd to try to backdate something as extensive as the number of games I’ve played, so the new year should be a good place to start. So far I’ve played two games of Khet, a Chess-like laser game that Mike got for Christmas, and it has already made my BGG wishlist.

Now, all I need is a few more tracking sites for tailgating and vacationing and I’ll never have to blog again.

The Philadelphia Eagles, their second and third strings no less, defeated the Falcons yesterday during one final, otherwise unimportant regular season game. The Giants and Cowboys made it as well which should make for an extremely interesting post-season. Tim and I watched the Superbowl game from two years ago where McNabb almost single-handedly lost the game to the Patriots. It’s a great feeling that the team still boasts many of the great players fromt that team and none of its losers. Three great wide receivers and a slightly older yet more accurate quarterback — it’s going to be a great postseason.