“Dasani makes it to second base on the first date!”

I feel product placement has risen to a whole new level. This picture (snapped from my TV) is from the Red Sox @ Orioles game yesterday afternoon. Apparently this young lady really enjoys her bottled water. I just love when people are oblivious to the fact they’re on TV.

This sign is from one of the tunnels behind Niagara’s Horseshoe Falls. Judging by the picture, the sign should really say “cover that pile of shit with your jacket before sitting on it”.

Not the greatest picture in the world, but the best I could do with a 300mm lens out my back window. Just before 10:00pm ET, the moon took on an amazing shade of reddish-brown.

Just a quick note to wish everybody a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

I’m not sure what’s worse… bowling a perfect 300 game in practice (see Mr. 300) or bowling a 299. Yesterday in a city tournament, I threw the first eleven strikes and then a 9. I blame the 9 on nerves and an arm that felt like jell-o. Oh well, maybe next time.

I reached a true milestone earlier today… I completed my restaurant trifecta. You say you’ve never heard of such a thing? Well, it’s when you go to three of your favorite restaurants in a single 24-hour period.

It all began yesterday when we brought in P.F. Changs for lunch during a work meeting. I don’t get to eat there that often, but it is sooooo good. I ate so much I didn’t think I would need to eat for a week.

Then for dinner, we were walking through a shopping area and spotted The Cheesecake Factory. Another favorite both for their food and their drinks. At that point, it was the first time I’d been to these two favorites of mine in the same day.

So back to earlier today and the completion of the trifecta. I was in Raleigh Durham International Airport and stopped by another favorite of mine, an A&W Restaurant. It’s not so much the food as it is the fresh A&W Root Beer and Root Beer Floats. Yummm.

And there you have it… The Restaurant Trifecta.

My brother got married on 7-7-7 and I finally got around to taking the pictures off of my camera. A selected sampling of pictures from the evening’s festivities are available on Craig’s site. Go check them out!

Wow, we’ve neglected this blog for almost a year! Amazing how fast time flies. First order of business – we’re having a get-together on Saturday, Sept. 1. So mark the date and let us know if you’re free!

No major updates to report… we’ve been working on a number of projects around the house. Gone are three ugly bushes from in front of the house and we’re looking to build a retaining wall sometime this summer. Leanne has been busy painting one of our spare bedrooms, the back hallway, and the living room. I finally took the time to finish the recessed lighting in the basement… so now we just need to clear out all the stuff we plan to sell on eBay and we’ll have our home theater back up and running.

You can’t handle the truth… but I’ll say it anyway. There are a handful of companies that I’ve come across recently that are worth checking out (at least in my opinion). They are, in no particular order:

• SunRocket – VoIP service for under $10 a month. I signed up with these guys a few months ago and am extremely happy with them. They are actually more reliable than my old Verizon voice line! And if you’re worried about power outages killing your phone (like I was), head on over to Costco or Best Buy and pick up a cheap UPS (it will pay for itself with the money you save by switching to SunRocket). Oh, and yes – you can keep your current phone number. Sign up for their unlimited plan using the link above and get 3 months free. (see comments)
• GrandCentral – Recently acquired by the evil Google empire, GrandCentral allows users to pick a single permanent telephone number from almost any area code in the United States. Use it so you have a single place for all your voice messages (which you can listen to and save right from the web), have it ring your work number when you’re at work and your home number during the evening. You can even block specific numbers, create custom greetings, and much more. Check them out, it’s all free.
• Mozy – Free online backup services, up to 2GB… and under $5 per month for unlimited storage. You can have Mozy automatically backup your most important files (or all your files if you desire) and then access them from the web or via a Windows Explorer interface right from your desktop.
• Crabersen – Very affordable domain names and web hosting is just a click away. Ok, I’m a little biased, but check them out. They offer very competitive web hosting rates in state-of-the-art data centers. Secure. Fast. Reliable. That’s the Crabersen advantage.

This post really serves as a reminder to myself… so I don’t make the manly mistake of forgetting my anniversary. It would be worthy of many nights on the couch if I forgot this one, since it is our first…