Dancing With the Stars

Image via WikipediaGenerally speaking, I do not watch so-called reality television.  There have been a few exceptions, but for the most part it is not something that I usually watch.  I can say with all honesty that I have never watched a single episode of American Idol.  Nor have I watched shows like Survivor, Big Brother, or The Amazing Race.  They just do not interest me.

As I said, it is a general rule for me.  There have been a few exceptions over the years, usually if there was a celebrity participating in the program that I had some sort of affinity for.  For instance, last year, I got caught up in watching The Biggest Loser when it was announced that Olympic gold medal wrestler Rulon Gardner would be a participant.  I watched Celebrity Apprentice the year that Trace Adkins was a member of the cast.

Dancing with the Stars is one of those programs that I rarely watch though I have watched with some interest in the past.  I think the only full season of that program that I watched was the year that Kristi Yamaguchi was a participant and eventual winner.  I watched a good bit the year Sara Evans was on the show.  As much as I like Sarah Palin, I did not watch much when her daughter Bristol was on the show.

The cast for the upcoming season of Dancing with the Stars was revealed, and in looking at the cast, I can safely say that I don't believe that I will be watching the show.  Their is just no person on the cast that I am even remotely a fan of.  I will say that the inclusion of Chaz (nee Chastity) Bono as a member will make for an interesting study of human nature and the tolerance of the country as a whole.

Chaz was born as a woman, the only daughter to Sonny Bono and Cher.  A few years ago, she began the process of gender transformation, identifying herself as a man, taking hormone shots and having sex change surgery.  A year ago, she had the court recognize her gender as male and legally changed her name from Chastity to Chaz.  Henceforth, for the rest of this post, I will refer to Chaz in the male gender as is his preference.  Chaz will be participating in the show as a man with a female dance partner.

Personally, as a Libertarian (though very conservative leaning) I could care less how Chaz identifies himself gender wise.  To each his own is my motto.  If this is what Chaz needs to make himself feel whole and happy, then more power to him.  When it comes to gay issues, I usually tend to be more neutral than hostile to their causes.  I do, however, also understand the issues that some more socially conservative folks have, especially withing the religious community.

I do believe that the majority of this country is center-right in their social and political views.  While I personally have no qualms with Chaz participating in the show as a man, there are those out their calling for ABC to remove Chaz from the programming and calling for boycotts of the show.  As I said, I will not be watching this year, but not because of Chaz Bono.  I do think it might be interesting to see if ratings suffer at all due to his appearance, or if there would be a concerted effort to see him eliminated from the show.  Then again, their could be a push from the gay community to vote for him.

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Basement Waterproofing

Image via WikipediaTwelve years ago, I was heading off to work like any normal day.  We were expecting it to be a rainy day, with heavy wind and rain, since Hurricane Floyd was working his way up the east coast.  While I was fully expecting the inclement weather, I was not expecting everything that was to come that day.

I was in the office for our weekly departmental meeting.  I had just gotten into the conference room to begin the meeting when my cell phone rang.  It was my wife calling to tell me that I needed to come home.  Our basement was flooding.

When I got home, there was about an inch of water on the basement floor in the laundry room.  Fortunately, we never lost power that day.  I went up to the Home Depot and bought a shop vac so that I could start trying to clean up the water.  Unfortunately, it seemed like the water was flowing in faster than I could remove it

I went back up to Home Depot and spoke to somebody there to try to see what else I could do.  They told me that I needed to try to make sure the water was flowing away from the house.  I bought some downspout extenders.  I also bought some sort of gravel to try to grade the area near the house to help things drain away from the house.  I was quite a site working outside during the hideous weather.

Once I finished working on the outside of the house, I went back inside to work on the inside.  I would use the shopvac to suck up the water from the floor, then when it was full I would dump it down the drain.  After several hours of this I had all the water off the floor.  I set up a dehumidifier to help dry the carpet area and remaining moisture.

I was going to have to be traveling soon for work, and I did not want my wife to have to worry about a flooded basement again while I was gone.  It was at that time that I made a call to a local company that specializes in waterproofing basements.  It cost me a few thousand dollars to get the work done, but it was well worth the investment.

Shortly after we had the work done, we had a couple of minor trickles of water.  We had to have the waterproofing company come out a couple more times.  Finally, one of the technicians found a spot in the front foundation that was slightly cracked which he sealed with cement.  Since then, we have not had a single issue with water in the basement.

Even though for the past 12 years, I always get a little paranoid during heavy rains.  I always end up going downstairs during particularly bad storms just to make sure we haven't sprung a leak.  After the past two weeks, though, I think my worries are over.

First, we had Hurricane Irene come through.  Even though we lost power for half a day we stayed dry.  The last few days it has been raining constantly with the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee.  In the last 24 hours we have had over 6 inches of rain.  Still bone dry.  Yep, waterproofing the basement is one of the best investments I ever made.

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Summer Break is Over

I always get a tad melancholy whenever my son has to go back to school.  It has been 10 months since my son was accepted and the county agreed to have him attend school away from home.  While intellectually we know it is the best place for him to get an education, emotionally it still takes it toll, especially on me.

When we first began this journey, I wanted to go with him every time we took him back to school, and I wanted to go with my wife to pick him up whenever he had a scheduled break to come home.  My office was very willing to work with us to allow that to happen, however, we eventually decided that I did not need to go to pick him up.  This way, I could build up my leave in order to be able to take a family vacation like we did in August.

We soon discovered that my son was very much in tune to my normal work schedule.  He knew that it was normal for me to be home on the weekends.  He also knew it was not normal for me to be home during the work week.  Consequently, if I stayed home on a Tuesday he knew it meant he was going back to school.  He would refuse to get off the ground.  We would try tricking him by having me leave and go somewhere until my wife gave me the sign that he was in the car.

After a couple of wasted days off where we could not get him back to school, we eventually came to the decision that I would go into work on the days he went back to school and my wife would try to get him back to school on her own.  So far, that has actually worked fairly well.  She has been able to get him back to school on time, though she has had to resort to a little trickery and/or deceit to do it.

As I said, I always get a little bit down when he goes back to school.  Yesterday, however, I was moping around the office a bit more than usual.  I don't know if I was more tired than usual, which certainly could have contributed to my malaise.  The big part of it is that I did not get to say goodbye to him before he went back.  Yesterday, he was still sleeping when I left for work.  A lot of times, he is awake and I can at least tell him I will see him later, even if it is a few weeks later. 

I suppose I should dwell on the positives.  In the past 10 months we have seen some improvements that we had not seen previously, though we still have a long way to go in a lot of areas.  I could also think about how much easier it is around the house when he is at school, and how I have the freedom to watch what I want on television or do what I want on the computer because he isn't around to take those things over.  Or perhaps I feel guilty because I do think about those things.

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Bowie Baysox Ripped Off

Image via WikipediaThis will probably come across as a little bit of sour grapes, but being a rule of law guy here goes.  I have mentioned many times here that my family and I are huge Bowie Baysox fans.  As the baseball season was drawing to a close, the Baysox were in the hunt for a playoff spot.  Going into yesterday's games, the Baysox needed to win their final game of the season, but needed the Altoona Curve to defeat the Richmond Flying Squirrels in order to make the playoffs.

For those that are not familiar with the game of baseball, a game typically consists of nine innings played.  In the event of a tie at the end of nine innings, they do play extra innings.  However, their are occasions when a game can be shortened due to rain or other circumstances.  In order for a game to be considered official, at least five innings need to be played.  There are other rules that govern when a game is considered official.

In baseball, the visiting team bats first and the home team bats second.  If the home team is ahead after the visiting team has their final set of at bats, they do not bat.  In the event of a rain shortened game, if the visiting team scores runs in the top half of an inning, the home team has to have an opportunity to take their turn at bat to have the opportunity to win the game.  In other words, each team should have the same number of at bats, unless the home team is ahead.

That brings me to the point of my rant today.  Both the Baysox game and the Richmond game were shortened yesterday due to rain.  In the case of the Baysox, they were the home team in their game.  Going into the final inning, the Baysox were ahead in their game 3-1.  The visiting team scored one run in the top of the inning making the game 3-2 when the rains came halting play.  The game was called due to the rain and the Baysox got the victory.

In the case of the Richmond/Altoona game, Richmond was the visiting team and Altoona the home team.  The score was tied 1-1 going into the top of the 8th inning.  Richmond took a 2-1 lead in the 8th inning when the rain started and halted the game.  It was determined that Richmond was the winner of the game, even though baseball's rules would dictate that Altoona would need to bat in order for the game to be considered official.

Now it is very likely that Richmond would have managed to hold on and win the game anyway to secure their spot in the playoffs.  Had the game not had any importance in terms of the teams that would make the playoffs, it would probably not be that big of a deal to me that it was decided that Richmond was the victor in this case.  However, I can not help but feel that my Bowie Baysox were royally ripped off in this case. 

Music Monday-Victoria Justice "Best Friend's Brother"

My son's August break is just about over.  He is scheduled to go back to school tomorrow if my wife can get him in the car.  During the two plus weeks he has been home, we have had a lot of activity.  There was the trip to the beach, a few baseball games, and the Baltimore Grand Prix.  There has also been a lot of watching Nickelodeon on the television.

Before he went away to school, we rarely watched Nickelodeon.  We thought we had missed the whole Spongebob Squarepants scene.  However, at school, they watch a lot of Spongebob in his dorm area.  They also watch a lot of other Nickelodeon shows at home.  Consequently, when he is home, we get to see a lot of Spongebob, iCarly, Victorious, and Big Time Rush.

While my son enjoys Spongebob a lot, he really likes the other shows because they have a lot of music in them.  He has CDs of Miranda Cosgrove from iCarly, and he has a few songs from Victoria Justice from the Victorious show.  Here is one of the videos he watches a lot on YouTube from Victoria Justice.  It is a catchy little tune, but I can't help but wonder if there is some other reason he likes it.

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. Rules are simple. Leave ONLY the ACTUAL LINK POST here and grab the code below and place it at your blog entry. You can grab this code at LadyJava's Lounge Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted without prejudice.

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Another Long, but Fun Day

Image by JasonTromm via FlickrWe have had a lot of activities this Labor Day Weekend.  Friday night was Autism Awareness night at the Bowie Baysox game, so we naturally had to attend that.  Yesterday was our day at the Baltimore Grand Prix.  We originally were not going to do anything after that, but the house was hot because the air conditioning isn't working again, so we headed out to the Baysox at the last minute for baseball and fireworks after the game.

The Baysox lost each game on Friday and Saturday nights.  They have been fighting for a playoff berth, but they really hurt themselves with the two losses the past two days.  Still, they have an outside chance of making the playoffs if they win their last two games and the Richmond Flying Squirrels lose their last two games. The Baysox did their part by winning their game this afternoon.  As I write this, Richmond is tied with the Altoona Curve 0-0 in the 6th inning.  Come on, Altoona.

We also went to today's game.  It was "Meet the Team Day" and "Fan Appreciation Day" at the stadium.  It was also the day they have their annual crab feast for the team, front office staff, and the Baysox Boosters.  The Boosters do a lot of work for the players that the team does not do.  They provide dinners after every Sunday home game, provide travel bags for road trips, and give each player a personalized scrapbook at the end of the season.  As members of the Boosters, we get to attend the season ending crab feast.

It was another hot day at the stadium.  Still, it was better than sitting in a hot house without air conditioning.  On this particular day, they have all of the players sit on the concourse level for about an hour before the game to sign autographs.  A member of the ground crew that we are friendly with gave my wife a game used, cracked bat used by Ronnie Welty.  We got to the game early so that she could wait in line to get him to sign her bat.

Another feature of Fan Appreciation Day is a series of raffles sponsored by the team.  There was no charge to enter the raffle, and they had a lot of different memorabilia from autographed baseballs and bats, bobble head dolls, and gift certificates to local restaurants and businesses.  My name was one of the first ones called.  I walked away with a black Louisville slugger baseball bat signed by the team. 

After the game, we were treated to an all you can eat crab feast. In addition to the crabs, they also had hot dogs, hamburgers, grilled chicken, assorted salads, and a lot of different desserts. Oh, and you can't have crabs without beer so they also had Bud and Bud Light on tap.  My wife provided a big batch of her chocolate chip cookies.  That is usually her contribution as a booster for the dinners each Sunday. 

We also had the opportunity to say goodbye to one of our favorite members of the Baysox front office staff. She has accepted a new position with a minor league hockey team and will soon be moving to Norfolk VA. We have known her for four years and she has always been very sweet to our son. She talks to him, and teaches him all of the between inning dance steps. When he nearly back out of his ceremonial first pitch, she was the one who got him down on the field. I nearly teared up when I thanked her for all she had done for him.

We left the house this morning just before noon and got home a little after 7:30pm.  All of that time was spent outdoors in fairly hot and humid weather.  My son usually would lose patience quickly on a day like today, but he was well behaved the whole day.  The Baysox have one more game tomorrow unless they manage to make the playoffs. We were originally planning to go, but they are saying that it may be stormy most of the day. We will either be at the game or at Dave and Buster's playing skee ball followed by wings at Hooters.  

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Baltimore Grand Prix

Today was a new experience for our family.  We had tickets to the inaugural Baltimore Grand Prix that is taking place over this Labor Day weekend. They set up a temporary track on the streets of Baltimore for the event.  Our seats were right in front of the Baltimore Convention Center as you can see from the photo below. One of the companies that my company does business with, Muscle Milk sponsors a car in the American LeMans Series.

There were five different racing series running different events over the course of the weekend.  Since Muscle Milk had their car running the Le Mans race this afternoon, they provided us with tickets for the day.  The racing concludes with the Izod Indy Car race on Sunday, featuring my son's favorite driver Danica Patrick.

Even though the Indy car race was tomorrow, there were a couple of opportunities to see Danica driving.  One of the first events of the day, at 9am, was practice for the Indy Car race.  Shortly after noon, they also have the qualifying laps for the race.  My son's eyes lit up and a smile came to his face as soon as she drove by.  I was able to get a few nice shots of Danica racing around the track during those times.

Our day started fairly early.  As I said, we wanted to see Danica during practice at 9am so we had to leave the house a little bit before 8am to head to the light rail system to go to the event.  After the early practice, I met my contact with Muscle Milk who took us to the garage area where they were working on the car.  They had some mechanical issues earlier in the week and were frantically trying to get the car ready for the race.

I did not take any pictures because I did not want to get in the way of their work, though they did show us the chassis of the car and showed us the rest of the parts that would need to be reassembled once the car was repaired.  We also were able to meet a couple of their drivers, get some hats and t-shirts, and get a few autographs.  The good news is they were able to get the car repaired in time to start the race.

Because we had such an early start to the day, and my son was getting pretty tired, we did not stay very long for the Le Mans series race.  It started some time after 4pm.  We did get to see one short race of one of the minor car series.  The cars roared past us in front of the Convention Center and one of them had an accident in the first turn.  I did get this shot of one car making a pass on another during that race.

All in all, it was a very enjoyable day, but tiring and very loud.  We had to buy some ear plugs from one of the concessionaires.  We were also able to find one concession stand dedicated strictly to Danica Patrick.  My son walked away with a Hot Wheels car of her #7 Go Daddy Indy racing car.  We are all looking forward to attending another race in the future.

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