Everyone loves Solitaire.

Here is a nice online version of Solitaire. I like the different card backs and the fact that you can login and have it keep all your stats wherever you go.
(LINK)

The Office: Season 4 Promo

NBC has a 3 minute promo video for its upcoming season. You can find out what all your favorite characters have been up to this summer. The season premiere is coming soon: September 27th at 9pm. Even better, the first four episodes of the season will be an hour long each!

Simpsons & Star Wars

Hard to beat the combination. Some guy remade the intro to The Simpsons.

Fainting Goats

Uh, yeah...

Thanks Dobby for the link.

Friday Game Day !

Need some more online gaming entertainment for your Friday workday? Are you still playing the Paintball Game? Or Shuffle? Or the Bunny Game? Or remember Rings?

Try this one. You move your square with the arrow keys and move toward the red square (unless they tell you otherwise). Just remember you are in space so you'll fly off the screen if you don't stop yourself at a brick wall. (LINK)

Top 10 Poor Man's Versions

This is a pretty great Top 10 list from Cracked.com. You know it's a good list if #3 is Go-Bots, the poor man's version of Transformers. Plus, their commentaries on each one are pretty hilarious.

American Gladiators returns !

It's been recently confirmed that American Gladiators will be returning to TV! NBC is currently auditioning for gladiators and contenders. That means we can see Gemini, Blaze, and Nitro again! Okay, maybe not the same gladiators, but hopefully we get those cool competitive games like The Assault, Hang Tough, Joust, and Powerball.

Check out the intro the show back from the eighties. (LINK)

The Package?

Well, the "season finale" (aka Chapter 22) of Trapped in the Closet has hit the net. R. Kelly promises that there will be more chapters to come in the future, but for now we must deal with a "to be continued" cliffhanger. Just like Lost with "The Hatch," R. Kelly drops "The Package" at the end of the series. Oh, the suspense...

(I think we all have an idea of what the package is, which makes the upcoming chapters all the more interesting.)

So where does this leave us? Let's check the map.

R. Kelly will get working on new chapters right away...once his court trial is over.

Need to catch up? Check out all 22 chapters here.

Photo taken from Space Shuttle Endeavor

Here's a great photo taken by the recent Space Shuttle mission as it moved away from the ISS (International Space Station). It's got a great view of Italy and Greece in the backdrop.

The First Person in the History of the World to Dance

Straight from SNL.

7 Months with Jack

Well, almost 7 months. Jack turns 7 months old tomorrow. It's been a big month for him...major milestones met (ugh...sounds like work talking). He started effectively crawling about a week ago and also started sitting up on his own. It's truly amazing to watch him hone his skills each and every day. Every day Jack surprises us with his new accomplishments. Here's a photo update to keep you all up to speed.

Jack sure loves balloons (much more than Mom). They're sure hard to get a good grip on!

Jack is getting pretty active these days, so certain items have become obsolete. His swing isn't getting much play time these days since he always wants to keep moving. And his bouncer is only being used for feeding time. But, he just got a new jumper and he loves it. It's huge, but what it takes up in floorspace, it more than compensates in fun.

He's been rolling and crawling around everywhere...really keeping us on our toes. He rolled his way under our futon sofa. How'd he get under there?

And he sure loves paper. You can't keep him away from crawling all over it.


He loves standing up. He's got pretty good balance...maybe it's that wide stance.


Here he is demonstrating his skills in sitting up. Look at that focus.


Grandpa loves hanging out with Jack. Check out their hats! Go Tokyo Giants and UCLA!


I guess Jack doesn't mind hats on his head...no matter what they look like.


Nor does he mind when Mom messes with his hair.


He sure has a lot of toys. But he likes to spend time with each one of them.


He loves Auntie and Uncle's aquarium. He can watch it all day long.


And after all that playing, he knocks out at the end of the day. 8 hours of sleep!

Get Simpsonized !

I've been waiting to Simpsonize our family. I finally got around to it. Here is what the Simpsonizing machine came up with. (LINK)

And it's hard to go wrong with a solid set of Ralph Wiggum clips. Enjoy! It's too bad it doesn't include "My cat's breath smells like cat food" or "I bent my Wookiee."

Sport Stacking and Scrabble

This weekend is a great weekend for Alternate Sports. As you know, I've been a big fan of these Alternate Sports, including the Rock Paper Scissors Championship, Spelling Bee, and the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest. Well, tomorrow is the 2007 World Sport Stacking Championship! It'll be on ESPN in HD tomorrow (8/17) at 10:00am. Set your Tivos! If you have no clue what Sport Stacking is, I don't blame you. It's a competition where you stack cups in different formations, trying to make the fastest time. It's fantastic! The great news is that this year, a new world record for the Cycle Stack was set by David Wolf. Here is his remarkable feat via YouTube.

And so you understand what the different cup formations are, here is a rundown from Wikipedia. (LINK)

Also, the 2007 National School Scrabble Championship will be on ESPN in HD this Saturday (8/18) at 12:00pm. It's a competition between 101 teams of middle school-aged students in 2-man teams. Check it out!

And when this weekend ends, we can look forward to the U.S. Open of Dominoes later this month and the Krystal Square Off Hamburger Eating Championship this October!

Trapped in the Drive-Thru

Everyone has the fever! Weird Al Yankovic wrote his own version of Trapped in the Closet. Check out the 3-chapter video for Trapped in the Drive-Thru. It's awesome.

And if you are keeping up with R Kelly's version, here is my latest whiteboard character map. (LINK)

Bohemian Rhapsody as you've never heard it before.

This guy was on KROQ this morning. He's a manualist...he can play songs just making fart-like sounds with his hands. Amazing.

What's in a UPC symbol?

I thought this was interesting...a breakdown of a standard UPC barcode that we all know so well.

Left Hand Guard Bars - These bars serve as a starting reference point for the scanning devices.

Number System Character - This digit identifies the type of manufacturer or how the bar code will be used. For example 0, 6, and 7 are generally used in the retail industry, while 3 is assigned to the health and drug manufacturing industries.

Number System Bars - These bars correspond to the Number System Character.

Manufacturer ID Number - Each company must apply for a Universal Product Identification Number with the Uniform Code Council. The UCC assigns each company a unique six digit identification number for use on all of their products. The number is composed of the Number System Character and a five digit manufacturer's code.

Manufacturer ID Bars - These bars correspond to the Manufacturer's ID Number.

Tall Center Bar - These bars serve as a middle reference point for the scanning devices.

Item Number - Each company is responsible for assigning a unique five digit number to each of their products.

Item Bars - These bars correspond to the Item Number.

Modulo Check Character - This digit is derived from a mathematical formula based on the unique set of numbers in each bar code that helps ensure the accuracy of the data scan.

Modulo Check Bars - These bars correspond to the Modulo Check Character.

Right Hand Guard Bars - These bars serve as an ending reference point for the scanning devices.

I found this information at this website.

The Craze is Back !

Today is the 13th, which means the 13th chapter of Trapped in the Closet comes out today! We get a new chapter each day for 10 days!

Go check it out! (LINK)

I've redrawn up the TITC map on my whiteboard so we can continue building the spider web.

Happy Birthday, Lego!

Today is Lego's 75th Birthday. Happy Birthday.

On August 10, 1932, a Danish carpenter, Ole Kirk Christiansen, began building toy blocks that eventually developed into the Lego brick we know today. He came up with the company name by combining the phrase "leg godt" which means "play well".

Did you know that just five Lego bricks (2x4) can be formed together in over 10,000,000 configurations?

Did you know that the Lego Group produces over 306 million miniature tires each year - more than any other tire manufacturer in the world?

To honor Lego, here is a scene from Return of the Jedi, which I created with my Legos over 6 years ago. Good times.

Paintball Game

It's Friday and I know you want to play a game. Just draw lines anywhere on the screen to make the ball get to the square.

Painfully addictive. (LINK)

Trapped in the Closet Refresher

As the hype builds for the upcoming release of Chapters 13-22, now is a great time to refresh your memory of Trapped in the Closet. We all remember the brilliant lyrics, the tangled spider web, and the tip-top acting. But seeing it again reminded me of exactly how great it was. Now you can check out Chapters 1-12 in an easy-to-use interface. And if you've never seen any of them (heaven forbid), now is the perfect time to catch up before the new chapters come out on Monday! (LINK)

We're in Escrow !

That's right! We're almost home owners! Joanne and I are really excited about our new purchase. We won't move in for another month, but things are looking good after a thankfully uneventful home inspection. For the past month or so, Joanne and I have been learning all we could about the world of real estate. It's been quite a ride, but we're happy to take the plunge. We found a great spot in Lakewood, right across the street from a nice little park. I took some pictures of the house during the home inspection last week. I only hope we can decorate the house as nicely as the previous owners have. Say hello to our soon-to-be new home (and goodbye to financial freedom).

Click on the picture for a photo tour.


Buster will finally have a real yard to run around in.
And Jack can't wait to move into his new home!

Can you see his new tooth?

X-Games 13 !

Went to go check out the X-Games this past Sunday to watch the Skateboard Vert and Rally Racing events. Of course, Home Depot Center mentioned that "pro style" cameras were not allowed, so I didn't even bother bringing in my camera...boy was that a mistake. Everyone had an SLR camera! I was a little bummed all day long because there were lots of great photo ops. You'd think with all my luck sneaking cameras into "no cameras allowed" venues, that I'd learn my lesson. Oh well. You're going to have to deal with my awesome cameraphone pics instead.

The skateboard vert event was fantastic! Shaun White (The Flying Tomato) dominated the pipe on his final run...making it a clearly uncontested Gold Medal.

After the skateboard vert, we went to our seats in the soccer stadium to check out the Rally Race. The hype was big after the tight race last year between Travis Pastrana and Colin McRae (when he flipped over on his last lap). They had one of Travis Pastrana's cars on display.

We had a great view of the track...check out Travis Pastrana in mid flight on the jump!

Colin McRae had another tough year...he just couldn't keep his car on the road. In the middle of the picture, you can see his car on top of one of the barriers after he flipped his car.

Next time I'm bringing my camera.

Tom, Jerry, and the Smurfs

I don't know how this got past me, but they released a new Tom & Jerry cartoon (written and directed by Joe Barbera) last year on the Cartoon Network. It was titled "Karateguard." It's not their best cartoon, but it's amazing to catch a new Tom & Jerry cartoon after all these years. Anyway, here it is via YouTube. (LINK)

Some of my favorite Tom & Jerry cartoons were the ones with the duckling in it. Just to take more of your precious time, here is one of the cartoons.

In other great cartoon news, The Smurfs are coming to DVD on December 4th! How Smurfy!

And why not throw in a quick Smurfs cartoon...with Jokey trying to outsmurf Brainy on April Smurfs Day by playing smurfy pranks on him. Brilliant.

And, no, I haven't grown up.

Name all the Presidents.

Been a while since I've had a game posted, so here you go. Name as many Presidents as you can in 10 minutes. (LINK)