hulk face

flying in style

I guess these aren't that new, but there are official NFL planes for US Air with special team paint jobs. I believe they have ones for Phoenix, Charlotte, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh (for the Cardinals, Panthers, Eagles, and Steelers, respectively). I had a chance to fly in the Steelers plane from Orlando to Pittsburgh during Thanksgiving. The US Air employee even took this picture for me outside of the terminal so I didn't have to shoot through the glass.

Going home for Xmas

Flying home this afternoon... looking forward to the holidays and seeing everyone. Not looking forward to the weather on Monday...

Mayne Street Sucks.

Glad I tried out "Mayne Street". It SUCKS... as expected. It's like an amateur attempt at The Office. Considering they only need to write 5 minutes of material for these crap webisodes makes it even more depressing. Absolutely horrid. I hate ESPN sometimes. If it wasn't for Bill Simmons, PTI, and maybe Fantasy Focus... I would be a full-fledged Yahoo! Sports man. In fact, did you know that Yahoo! is the most visited sports site out there? Over ESPN, Fox Sports, Sportsline, etc?! They've actually had the lead since before the Olympics. I'm assuming it has something to do with their successful fantasy experience. Speaking of good sports sites, those links come from the best independent sports news source/blog I've found: The Big Lead. Check them out.

Anyway, I digress... I also wanted to share an accurate review the Daily Herald wrote about "Mayne Street"... here are some of my favorite parts:

"A Web gem it's not. In fact, it's just more proof of how the Internet is ruining the world, including the sports world, which many believed couldn't get any worse."

"'Tell 10,000 co-workers to click on it so they order a second season,' [Mayne] wrote in the chat.

"And clicks, my friends, are what it's all about in the current media environment. Page views - from different computers, not the same one over and over - are where it's at. So blogs make reference to one another and exchange links to get the click-go-round going. Altogether, it produces a narcissistic, self-referential attitude."

Ultimate Farrior

The Steelers were honored/limited to 3 Pro Bowlers yesterday. Congrats Silverback, Troy, and Farrior. Here is an oldie, but goodie MS Paint masterpiece from their '05 Super Bowl run.

orangutan on meth

(courtesy of telegram sam)

zombie fingers

(8tracks)

all smiles

What the hell is this thing? I know it's from the Amazon. Any guesses?

beeker buffoonery's 100th post!!!

100 posts! Very exciting! It's been about 1.5 years and I know I've blogged a bit in spurts, but I hope to be more regular in the future (about 2 per week). It's been extremely fun and a great creative outlet for me (instead of boring engineering all the time). I still don't have much of a direction for the blog, besides just things that interest me... and I doubt that will change.

Without question, the high point for me was the reference in the Post-Gazette's Blog N' Gold and others to my Terrible Towel in Beijing post. It was barely anything, but I had a great sense of blogging commodore. I continue to wish that all of my friends had blogs. So, if you're reading this, please feel free to email me, add me to Google Reader, follow my blog, or just check back occasionally... and I would love to read YOUR blogs, discuss blogging tech, or do any type of collaboration. Also, I update my Reader shared items much more often than this blog (that's why it's at the top - "beeker LIVE!"), so please check that and add me to your sharing friends.

Thanks for reading and thanks for your comments. Now... an ode to the buffoonery: (click to enlarge)

War with Canada

Earlier this week (12/2) there was an amusing BS Report with Bill Simmons and Cousin Sal (writer for Jimmy Kimmel Live) going through the Week 14 NFL games. When they got to the Dolphins-Bills game, here's their exchange:

Cousin Sal: Miami at Buffalo... except it's not at Buffalo it's in Toronto.

Bill Simmons: Oh no!

CS: Yeah.

BS: Is this a dome or not a dome?

CS: You know, I'm not even sure. Miami at Buffalo in Toronto. I think they play in the Maple Leaf's Gardens, right?... No, I don't know where this is.

BS: It can't be a dome. If they built a dome, we would have heard of that. I should probably find that out. But uhh... does that Toronto thing... I don't know if it helps them or what happens.

CS: I think we're looking to start a war with Canada sending them Pennington and J.P. Losman. I really do.

BS: What... does Ricky (Williams) get through customs?

CS: That's another thing, yeah.

BS: What are the odds of that? We probably have to scratch him right now.

Classic Simmons. I loved it. Good podcast. He also calls his friend to rehash some of the best moments from Rocky IV. Then he wrapped it up with a call to Connor Schell, a high ranking ESPN executive who Simmons has cited before about hating it when he calls his friends on the podcast and was allegedly the reason why the podcast was on hiatus for a few weeks. Juicy, no? The cocky Sports Guy even says to him, "If I told you that I just talked to my buddy Gus for 20 minutes about Rocky IV... would you be enthralled or disappointed?" Yikes! I don't want to ruin the suspense, but it turns out to be a dud. I'm sure ESPN is ecstatic to have Simmons during the internet age and I highly recommend the BS Report to any level of sports fan.