Mobile Blogging

My how adventurous I've become. I am writing a post on my phone for the first time. And of course, in geeky fashion, I am doing it not because I have to, but because I can. I am sitting in front of my computer and typing on my new iPhone.

The yet-to-be-renamed Ms. Fiancé is going to be interviewed tomorrow by ABC about one of her patients. She's a pretty big deal. :-)

As for me, going to Viking's training camp was great. I'm always excited for football season. I just bought tickets for the Stielers preseason game at the dome. The inlaws are Stielers fans and are coming up for the game. My parental units are also coming with to help me cheer for the Vikes.

I finished the summer softball season with the highest on-base percentage on the team. Not a bad change from last year, when I was near the bottom. I'm getting luckier with age.

Deal of the day: Vikings training camp in Mankato. Free to get in, you just have to pay $5 to park all day if you park at the stadium.

Bitten by a horseshoe

Camping last weekend was a ton of fun, even though Ms. Fiance couldn't make it. We were up at a resort on Mille Lacs Lake. Unlike the majority of the people we saw who stayed in cabins or RV's, we brought tents. Cooper and I shared my tent, which was quite spacious for just two people.

The four of us played horseshoes, croquet, 2 on 2 sand volleyball, went swimming, and went biking on the Soo Line bike trail. The bike trail was not my favorite thing. It used to be an actual rail line that was removed and converted to a combination bike and ATV trail, so it is perfectly flat and perfectly straight. There also wasn't a lot to see around us, but hey, it was exercise and we had fun biking on it as  a group.

The horseshoes, on the other hand, were fun. We played countless games, sometimes while watching the sun go down over the lake. The problem is that horseshoes are dangerous. Very dangerous. I had my camera along and was taking pictures of everything, including the games of horseshoes. I decided after awhile that I'd like to get a good action shot, so I squatted behind the horseshoe pit with the wooden  wall in front of me, and took a picture when Cooper was throwing a horseshoe towards the pit I was behind. I said to the friend next to me to tell me if I needed to get out of the way so I didn't get hit, but Cooper's horseshoe was clearly landing in the sand pit about 6 feet in front of me. I looked down at my camera, while still squating, to see that I had gotten the horseshoe in mid-flight. Sweet!

BAM!

PAIN!

Cooper's horseshoe had hit the sand in front of me, and then instead of settling in the sand, it bounced up, over the the wooden barrier, and hit me directly on the knee cap. Remember, he had just thrown this horseshoe about 40 feet, so it had a lot of momentum on it and is made out of solid metal. MOMMY!!!!!

I survived, but my knee was really sore the rest of the day. I couldn't really bike because it hurt to push down on the petals, so we moved biking to the next day. It even hurt when I was just sitting down. Luckily, my knee felt much better by the next morning, so we could continue with our biking plans a day late.

I dominated at croquet, to the point that we decided to change the rules a bit on how many extra shots you could accumulate by hitting other people's balls. Of course we were playing croquet out in an open field in the middle of the day after playing sand volleyball and swimming, so at this point we realized that we were getting crispy. Oh yeah, we kind of forgot to put on that sunscreen I had brought with me...

We did an awesome job with our food. The highlight of the weekend's cuisine was Saturday night. We built up a big fire and then cooked corn on the cob and a special potato, carrot, and cream of chicken concoction by wrapping everything up in tin foil and sticking it directly in the fire. It took awhile to cook, but boy was it good! We also cooked some pork loins on my gas stove, so in the end, it was quite an extravagant meal.

We played a little poker Saturday night as well, inside the screened-in part of my tent. Everyone lasted quite awhile, but as the night wore on, it was getting really cold. I was in the final two, so I decided to just bet everything on one hand, and ended up losing by a hair. Oh well, great fun!

Our last camping adventure took place on our way home Sunday. We stopped by Grand Casino initially just for lunch. It was my first time in a casino, and Cooper's as well. I watched everyone lose a couple dollars at the nickel poker machines, too odds-inclined to actually play a game myself. Total lost between my 3 companions: $9. Total time spent playing games: An hour? Not too shabby.

I, however, won the big one. There was a 2 cent poker machine behind where the others were playing and I saw that it said there was half a credit available. Someone had apparently left and decided cashing out a penny wasn't worth the effort. I thought otherwise, especially since it gave me a story to tell about my first casino trip. I went over to the machine (no one had been there in the 15 to 20 minutes we'd been in that area) and hit the cash-out button. A paper slip was printed saying I had a $0.01 credit. Sweet! I had Cooper take a picture of my glorious winnings, and later went to the automatic cash-out machine to claim my winnings (I didn't want to waste an actual human's time at the counter). I then took another picture outside showing my new-found riches with the casino in the background. 

So yeah, if you need some good luck, ask for me. I'm the guy that wins money at the casino without actually playing a game!

DotD: Buffet lunch at Grand Casino - $9.99 - Great food and plenty of it. And then free pop while you walk around afterwards.  And then for me, free money at the casino!

How long have you been in Fertile?

Just got back from a trip to Iowa for a friend's wedding for which I was one of the scripture readers (Psalm 121, baby!). During the rehearsal dinner, I was catching up with another good friend who is just finishing up his internship for seminary. He's in a small town in Minnesota called Fertile for two more weeks. I wanted to know how long his internship was (a couple weeks, the whole summer, a year, etc), so I asked:

"So, Ryan, how long have you been in Fertile?"

Immediately, Ms. Fiance burst out laughing. It was at this point that I actually realized what I had said and how it sounded. He took it quite well, and was laughing along with everyone else at our table.

Another interesting note from the weekend: When I was first asked to be one of the scripture readers, I asked the my friend (the groom) if he wanted me to read from a particular translation. He said probably the same one they used in their church, which was NRSV. I hunted around my house to found my first bible, given to me in 2nd grade, which was NRSV. I brought it with me to the rehearsal, and all three of the scripture readers used it since there was no bible up in the pulpit. After the practice, the pastor came up to me and asked me which translation the bible was. I replied, "The one the groom requested." As I was saying this, he grabbed the bible (which was in my hand), and read the spine himself to make sure it was the right one, and then said "Good." I thought it was a bit strange. I guess just hearing us all read our versus moments earlier wasn't enough reassurance that we weren't using the Hawaiian Pidgin bible or something.

Regardless, the whole wedding went very well and the reception and dance were great. The reception was at the Iowa Arboretum, so some of us took a little time to walk around outside and take some pictures. Ms. Fiance and I did a lot of dancing, so much so that I think I lost about 50 pounds through sweat alone. We made sure to do enough Swing dancing to be ready for the next time we see Janet. And since there were no polkas played, my parents started to polka to one of the songs on their own, so Ms. Fiance and I joined in. After a bit, I switched to go polka a little bit with my Mom (which let Ms. Fiance polka with my Dad), followed shortly thereafter to dancing the polka with my Dad. My parents are awesome dancers. They were teaching a couple of the little kids how to do the twist, and pretty soon one little girl kept hanging around my Dad to dance with him. It was really cute.

DotD: Da Jesus Book (Hawaiian Pidgin New Testament) - $10.41 - "Da peopo dat know Jesus, if dey goin do good job fo help odda peopo find out bout Jesus, an teach, dey gotta use peopo's language, so dose peopo can know him fo real too."

Great Outdoors

I can't wait until the work day is over. Immediately afterwards, I'm heading home quick, packing a few last minute things (like food), and then Ms. Fiance and I heading to Interstate Park. It's going to be a short camping weekend, but it should still be quite fun.

This is our alternative to the SonShine Music Festival which is going on right now. I had to take a bunch of vacation days during the school year to get various projects done, and I need to save some vacation for next year, meaning that SonShine got the axe. It was sad, but we're doing the next best thing, which doesn't require about 3 days of vacation.

We're coming back Sunday just in time for the last TEC meeting. Can't believe next weekend is TEC already! These past couple of weeks have flown by. I need to get my little body in gear to get stuff ready for next weekend.

Oh, and there's going to be a card night on Tuesday, which means Monday night I need to make some decks. It's going to be a busy week!

DotD: Norton Internet Security, Norton Partition Magic, and Norton Ghost bundle - $0.00 - Pretty sweet deal if you ask me, and easy on the wallet (after mail-in-rebate). This bundle has it all: Antivirus, Antispyware, Antiphishing, Firewall (incoming and outgoing), partition management, and disk imaging and backup. Did I mention free? 

My short career as a uniform salesman

I just got back from Boston yesterday. It was a really short trip. I flew out on Sunday night after leaving early from the TEC meeting, had an all-day UML training class to attend on Monday, and then flew back Tuesday morning.

The class itself wasn't really worth the trip, since we've covered UML in my undergraduate and graduate level courses quite a bit, but the entire software team was required to go. I could have condensed the useful-to-me training from 8 hours to 30 minutes. Basically all I learned was the new changes to UML 2.0 (which are actually quite nice). I did, however, get to have dinner with a former coworker who lives out there now, and I got to play with his new iPhone on Monday night. That was fun. 

I did have some travel-related quirks to the trip, however. Because of the storms that rolled through on Sunday, instead of arriving in Boston at 10:30, we were delayed and arrived at the hotel at 2:00 am. Then, when I went to check in, they couldn't find my reservation. As I was searching for my confirmation number, they desk clerk found my name, but said I'd already checked in.

Say what?

Yep, according to their records, I had checked in early that evening, and that person was in my room. Furthermore, when that guy checked in, he said he worked for a company that sells uniforms, not exactly my company's line of work. That room was already switched from my credit card to direct billing to the uniform company, so I didn't have to worry about being charged for their stay. But still, very odd.

The guy at the desk was very apologetic, however, and was joking with me about my career change and my apparant multiple personalities. He also upgraded me to a room with a jacuzzi. 

Now, since I had to be up in about 4 hours for the class, I didn't get to take advantage of it that night. But I did try it out the next night. It was nice, but a big small for my legs. There was no way to completely stretch out my legs, so either my feet or my knees had to be out of the water. Such poor living conditions, I know... ;-)

And thus, Tuesday morning, my career as a multiple personality uniform salesman came to an end while I checked out of the hotel. It was a nice run while it lasted.

Oh, and watching episodes of Star Trek: Voyager on an iPod is an excellent way to pass the time at the airport and on the airplane. I decided to start watching the series from beginning to end, since I've only seen a few of the epidodes up till now. I made it through about the first 5 on my trip. Favorite moment so far: the doctor slapping Tom Paris in the face to show that holograms aren't just images. It was hilarious!

Oh, and Baron thought I looked very manly at the TEC meeting when I ran into him in the hall. It made my day. I'm not sure if it was because of my handsome good looks, or because I was holding onto Ms. Fiance's purse for her. Or it could be because he was so excited to see me that that's the best compliment he could think of as his brain shut down in wonder. I'm going to assume the latter.

DotD: Free Squishee (Slurpee) at 7-Eleven today-only to celebrate the 80th birthday of 7-Eleven.