V-Day ?

What's V-Day? I don't know for sure, but it's this Thursday at 12 noon and it's all about Voltron! Is it the new movie coming out? Is it a DVD release? Not sure. But you can check out the countdown here. (LINK) Let's go Voltron force!

UCLA is in the Final Four !

In an ugly game against Memphis, UCLA took the win 50-45 in the lowest scoring Elite 8 game. Now UCLA is in the Final Four and will play LSU this Saturday at 5pm. Support your Bruins!

Now let's get practicing on those free throws...

Quick in the head !

This brain speed test will tell you how quick your auditory processing speed is. I'm a top performer! (LINK)

Here's my score:

UCLA beats the Zags !

It's 68-71 with 20 seconds to go. Ryan Hollins shoots and makes both free throws. It's 70-71. Gonzaga takes out the ball, Morrison passes it and the ball is stolen by Farmar. He passes to Mbah a Moute and they score a 2! 10 seconds later, UCLA wins!

After being dominated during the first half of the game, UCLA pulled out an amazing victory against Gonzaga after being down 20-37 toward the end of the 1st half. UCLA scored the final 11 points to win the game 73-71.

All photos are from ESPN.com

The leading scorer of the game was Adam Morrison of Gonzaga with 24 points. He was clearly the most disappointed.

For the entire game, Adam Morrison dominated (he's really good) and it was sickening to see him celebrate every time. Needless to say his reaction at the end of the game was that much sweeter.

What a great game. Now UCLA is in the Elite 8. It's time to beat Memphis!

Chuck in the buff.

Never appropriate on any computer's wallpaper, here is Chuck in the buff. Although you may not want this on your computer, why wouldn't you want it on everyone else's? To make your day more enjoyable, go to some deserving person's computer and go to www.russellandjoanne.com. Then right-click on this picture of Chuck and select "Set as background." Presto! You're done. Then, you can tell them that they've been Chuck'd. Have I done this myself? Of course.

Have a nice day!

Joel is leaving us !

Tomorrow is Joel's last day at our company. It's a bummer, but he'll be moving on to even more exciting things at a nearby aviation company. He'll also be getting his pilot's license in the near future.

Good luck, Joel.

South Park: Trapped in the Closet

I'm sure you've heard that Isaac Hayes (Chef) quit South Park because of a recent episode that discussed Scientology. What I didn't know is that the same episode has R. Kelly's Trapped in the Closet, too! It's a pretty fantastic episode and it even tells the real story behind the Church of Scientology. A must see! I know you have 22 minutes to spare to watch the magic. (LINK)

Taxes ?

I posted up a new poll asking if you've had a chance to file your taxes yet. Have you done yours?

As for the last poll, most people start with Rock (7), then Paper (4), and last was Scissors (2).

Airzooka !

Don't know if you've heard of the greatest toy ever, but it's here. Airzooka! It can shoot a gust of air 20 to 30 feet away and it's accuracy is amazing. You just pull back on the elastic cord and WHAM! You almost have to try it to understand its greatness. I've already had the pleasure of blasting several people with it.

And if you've heard of Airzooka, maybe you haven't seen Megazooka! It's the same thing as the Airzooka, but it has a trigger and a scope. I just got one and it's great!

It's good clean fun!

Congratulations, Dobby !

Well, our OOS March Madness tournament ended this past week and Dobby (aka Mike) was the winner! It was a somewhat expected closure to the tournament since Dobby was the #1 seed. His name has been put on the OOS cup. Congratulations to our first winner. Tournament upsets were made by Mags (#10 seed) making it to the Elite 8 and by myself (Hiro) making it to the Final 4!

Now that the tournament is over, we will start up the new season which will end in May, in preparation for June Madness!

As for the real NCAA March Madness, UCLA is in the Sweet 16! Go Bruins!

V for Vendetta

Impressive movie. Go see it. Go see it in IMAX. It's awesome. Cool story. Great dialog. Very visual without excessive special effects. Let me know what you thought of it.

March Madness is here !

I'm sure you all know that today is the first day of March Madness. Isn't it great? Unfortunately, my work has blocked streaming video from entering our computers, so I am stuck watching the CBS Sportsline scoreboard for my game updates. There's already been several upsets with Alabama, Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Montana! Those are 10, 11, and 12 seeds! The Boston College game went into double overtime! Okay, I'm sure many of you don't care, but oh well. I'm in several different pools, so I'm watching them very intently.

Uh oh, UCLA is down by 2 points! Gotta go.

Google Mars

Yet another Google website. The only problem is that I can't find out what freeways to take to get from Tholus Summit to Apollinaris Patera. Lame. (LINK)

Mighty Wings

Passed up this car on the way in to work. Yes, that's a Kia. And yes that's a gigantic wing on the back fit for large aircraft. Why do people think that's an upgrade? And if you have a Kia, don't you want to keep that on the down-low?

U-C-L-A !

On Friday night, I went with Shuji and Lori to the Pac-10 Tournament Semifinals. UCLA vs. Arizona and Cal vs. Oregon. We had great seats (thanks Lori) and a great time. UCLA crushed Arizona 71-59 and Cal barely defeated Oregon in DOUBLE overtime 91-87. Because of that double overtime, we didn't leave Staples Center until midnight!

As you may already know (or not even care), UCLA went on to win the Pac-10 Championship, defeating Cal 71-52. And as of Selection Sunday yesterday, UCLA is a #2 seed in the NCAA tournament! The madness starts on Thursday!

Here are some of the pictures I took at the games:

The starting 5: Hollins, Farmar, Bozeman, Afflalo, and Mbah a Moute


Ryan Hollins going for the dunk.


Cedric Bozeman at the line.

Jordan Farmar with a fadeaway 2.

Darren Collison shooting a 3. He led the team with 15 points.

UCLA wins!

After the UCLA game, Cal played Oregon. It's the California Golden Bears vs. the Oregon Ducks. Take a look at these mascots.

The duck is alright, but the golden bear is downright stupid. Look at that thing. He looks like the lamest, weakest bear I have ever seen. Oskie needs help. Time for an upgrade.

Here's the Cal Team, led by Leon Powe.

Chamberlain Oguchi, the powerhouse that took down Washington in the quarterfinals.

For all 43 pictures, go here.

Now, it's time for March Madness. Start filling out your brackets!

Here's one from ESPN. (LINK)

OOS March Madness Update

Round 1 of the OOS March Madness Tournament just ended yesterday and 2 of the 10 contenders have been eliminated! Since it is quadruple elimination, some people have 3 remaining chances while some only have 1. Here's the breakdown of the Sweet 16:

Dobby 3, Jackaroo 2, Sprague 3, Haya 3, Lep 1, Hiro 1, Santaur 1, Mags 2

I only have 1 more chance!

And I've also made a trophy for the winner of the OOS tournament. Check it out!

For my peeps...

As some of you know, I am in charge of the candy bowl here at work. This duty requires year-round commitment to maintaining an ample supply of candy to my nearby coworkers. This also means the candy bowl is stocked with candy themed by the current or upcoming holiday. Everyone knows that the day after Halloween passes, Christmas starts, and as soon as Christmas ends, Valentine's starts, then Easter, then 4th of July. Then there's maybe a month or two when the market doesn't impose another holiday on the American public. Then, before we know it, the mother of all candy holidays returns...Halloween.

Anyway, it's Easter time (even if you're non-Christian). Bring out the bunnies, the eggs, the chicks. It's also time to bust out the Peeps! No, I myself do not enjoy eating Peeps, but I am fascinated by who likes them...fresh or stale. So, two years ago, I bought some Peeps and kept one of them out (they're not too popular). I let it hang around until the following Easter when I bought it another companion. Now there is yet another new Peep in the mix. You can see the 3 Peeps here: 2 years old on the left, 1 year old in the center, brand new on the right.

Oh, and then there's mother Peep behind the kids. 2 year old Peep is rock solid...1 year old Peep is very hard, but with a discernible softer core...brand new Peep is already getting a little hard. You can even see the progressing color fade. Look at how bright brand new Peep is!

No, there's no plot here. Just giving the Peeps the recognition they deserve.

Happy Talk in Third Person Day !

It's 3/3 and Ti3P is here! Celebrate the world's newest holiday by referring to yourself in the third person all day! Russell quickly woke up this morning and was instantly put in the third person, as was Joanne. Russell and Joanne's early morning conversation did not involve the words: I, me, we, us, or our.

To celebrate, you can now go to www.ti3p.com to get to the official website. Russell wants you to tell your friends!

Enjoy the day!

OOS March Madness !

For quite some time now, we have been playing a game similar to PIG using a Nerf hoop in my office here at work. We named the game OOS (out of spec) since we are engineering nerds and have acronyms for just about everything. Since the beginning of January, the competition has become intense, sparking even more competition. Naturally, we needed to start our own March Madness tournament. Here's the honored OOS Nerf hoop.

We kept stats during the regular season to develop rankings and seed positions. With 10 "teams" in the tournament, we created a quadruple-elimination bracket complete with play-in games.

We just finished the 8 play-in games and we start the 1st Round tomorrow! I've already been eliminated in 1 of the 4 brackets. Wish me luck! I can hear Joanne now. (*sigh*)

Tomorrow is Ti3P!

Last UCLA home game.

I made it out to UCLA's last home game of the season against Oregon. We dominated 70-53! Now UCLA is ranked #13 (ESPN) in the nation. Here are some of the pictures I took at the game:

Here's a view from our seats. We were pretty far back. Good thing I had the telephoto lens.

Coach Ben Howland about to argue with the ref.

Arron Afflalo and Jordan Farmar driving at the hoop. Afflalo had 14 points and Farmar had 11.


Since it was the last home game of the season, it was the last home game for the seniors. Farewell to Michael Fey, Ryan Hollins, and Cedric Bozeman, the last of the Lavin recruits. Good riddens to Bozeman. :)


Arguably the best name in college basketball, Luc Richard Mbah a Moute scored 14 points!


And here's the Bruin Den waiting for Ryan Hollins to drain a free throw.

Now it's time for UCLA to defeat Cal tomorrow and dominate at the Pac-10 tournament next week!