Fishing Retrospective

Fifty days fishing, 29 fish caught, one three-pounder, one broken fishing pole, and one purchased kayak. All and all a pretty enjoyable first fishing season. It has been a refreshing experience because everything is so new to me. Learning to tie knots, then learning to tie better knots as the first ones broke. Trying new spots and styles, a slow retrieve versus fast, etc. Needless to say I am probably hooked for life, and quite frankly I really don't mind that I am not all that good at the sport. It's tranquil and fishing gives me a chance to unwind mentally from all of the other challenges that life presents.

Vacation

The only disheartening thing about vacation is that I sometimes end up spending half of it worried that it's almost over. It isn't even that I don't like my job, I have worked very hard to get to the seat I have, unfortunately, all things being equal work is still work and I kind of enjoy not working. I guess that's why they call it vacation.

Fall Foliage in New Hampshire

Thousand Word Thursday from this website http://rajeshprabhu.net/blog/?p=144

Fox News?

So what did I do to deserve an appearance on Fox news? In the last year I have appeared on Fox News (once) more often than I have watched it. Apparently, amid the latest hullabaloo over whether Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton are destined to switch seats for the 2012 election the network showed an old clip from Biden's speech in Nashua when I introduced him. I show up at screen right at about 1:02 and cough. If your curious about my thoughts on Hillary I clap a little too softly on Biden's comments that she's qualified and laugh a little too loudly at the notion that the one-term celebrity senator is more qualified than Biden. I wonder if I can sue for using my image without permission? If Joe Biden reads this blog he would know, as a former constitutional law professor.

On edit: I am aware it is not World Wide Wednesday, I just thought that the Fox News thing was too funny to wait three days.

Day 17 on No Cable Island

So we have made it to day 17 of no cable without any real signs of mental breakdown. We did sign up for the Netflix 1-at-a-time unlimited plan with unlimited online viewing ($9.95 per month). This gives us a decent stream of online TV and movie content and we still appreciate a savings of $110 per month. I still miss my sports a little but I am adjusting to the concept of listening to games on streaming radio and watching GameCast style content online. All in all we are watching less TV as there is a lot less to loss but we are spending more time together as a family and being a little more selective in what we watch. I for one was someone who put the TV on by default and next thing you know six hours of my life is gone.

As an aside I have basically been sick for two weeks so going to bed a little earlier sans TV has probably helped a little. Right now I am typing this obviously but I am listening to Air Force football free online and I have Yahoo's GameChannel on so I can check up on the stats.

Things I missed while fiddling with my Netflix

So the trouble with NASCAR isn't that the sport is unexciting. The trouble is that the the excitement is spread out over three days of pageantry and buildup followed by four to six hours of somewhat redundant racing. For the love of god, shorten the races. I know the advertisers pay the bills but would you rather pay for six hours worth of ads on an event no one watches or three hours worth of ads with a nice consistent Nielson rating. As a matter of fact here's three tips to improve your sport;

shorten the races, I swear I've turned off races after five hours, who watches anything for five hours.

single elimination chase (12 in the first race, 11 in the second, etc. down to three drives in the chase for the final race),and finally

work on your scheduling in two ways: start all of the races at two times (Saturday night at 8 or Sunday afternoon at 3). Everyone in the English speaking world knows when NFL games are on. The second way that you can fix your scheduling is to dust off the wipers and rain tires, I'll bet the ratings were just fine for that race in Montreal a couple of years back. Racing at 70 instead of 170 is still racing. Does anyone ever watch the race on Monday afternoon?

But whatever you do make sure you let guys keep doing idiotic stuff like this, it's funny and it's ratings gold.