Conference Tourney Weekend
Friday, 2:30 pm
Well the first game is over finally. It was pretty good except for the loud-mouth score book keeper who would go "yeahhhh yeahhh" in this very grating baritone voice. I am pretty sure this is the reason why you can't freely buy tranquilizer darts and guns in the US.
Carthage managed to win5-3, so they will face the number one seeded team Illinoies Wesylan at5:30pm tonight. Now my brother did a good job in that game, although errors contributed to his pitch count and he got taken out in the 7th because of it, with two earned runs. After that they almost lost it with the first relief pitcher. However, don't tell my brother I complemented him. :-)
...
We're now at losers bracket game burning time.
Last weekend in Iowa was fun. The bad thing was that I had to come that weekend. I really couldn't do it the next weekend. Of course that meant that there were a couple people I didn't get to see, including Nate.
On the other hand I got to spend a good amount of time with Steve, Terry, Dan, and Lisa. There were a few more than that, but you do what you must. I got to see Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy with Lisa. That was fun. I really liked how they portrayed the ship and Marvin. Marvin was absolutely perfect. There were some made for movie changes, but it was a pretty good I thought. They cut stuff rather than doing it all half assed and far too quickly, as some book to movie interpretations go. That was a good night spent there.
One of the disappointing things I suppose is the fact that lisa had this feeling of being uncomfortable around me. However, I that is really to be expected since she now has a new boy friend. Still disconcerting considering she's still one of my closest friends. I'm sure time will render more comfort, especially since is the first time dating since me. Personally I'm really ready for dating and a new girlfriend myself. However, my current situation doesn't really lend strength to that pursuit. Not to mention unless something changes severely I don't plan on being in Wisconsin past next December. It wouldn't be cheap to run a relationship six hours away in gas and time. During school I might be able to get out twice a semester, considering my next semester shouldn't be too easy. I do need some more A's for my GPA.
Well the first losers bracket game is in the bottom of the third inning. Augusta has five runs and probably twice as many hits. Obviously my brother did well in holding them earlier today, because their batting is just creaming the North-Central pitching pretty badly here. Obviously my brother wasn't having a bad day and just struggling to hold them down. We have over a half hour before we can check into the hotel room for the night still.
Back to where we were... Now if I could have convinced Lisa to go up to one of the apartments in the evening it would have been nice, because she didn't want to go to a noisy place like a bar. Noisy places are hard to avoid late at night in Ames. (Probably most everywhere in the US, really.) Although I suppose just for talking sitting in the car does just fine. I'm still surprised at how used to these weird quirks I still am.
I am going to miss those that are leaving this semester. Steve, Anne, and David Rodgers in particular. Congratulations on your graduations guys. You've worked hard and done well. Good luck in finding jobs to Steve and David. Unfortunately the economy is not any better than it was when I got here. If anything it worse.
We're going to check in now.
...
Ah, a pretty reasonable, although obviously not a real nice room. There is a micro fridge though, which is real nice to have. Unfortunately I'm afraid their continental breakfast won't provide much in the way of stuff to eat while on the diet. (Eating reasonably early this spring got away from me with all the stress from my Dad being sick and all.) Damn, breads do sound really good right now.
At any rate, when I get home I'm going to have to get cracking on the final project for my Java class I'm taking this semester. I'm programming a meet manager, and I have all the base components, but I am still working on the control structure in the thing. There are a few things I need to go back and correct in my dialog boxes, however, hopefully that shouldn't take too long. On the meet manager side, however should go much faster since I can template it all on the current control functions for the GUI. Since all the data algarythims are basically written it doesn't take too long. However, I'd like to get an A in this class, so doing well on this final project is a must, and with the final exam, too.
All and all I am glad I took this class. Java isn't a bad language, although I do miss the ability to use structs and the structural options that C++ provided as well. While object oriented programming is great, I don't think that it is the end all be all over structured programming. Hell, people use static functions in Java to get around that. Also, the missing headers isn't the greatest thing in the world, really. My instructor is really into pure object oriented stuff, though, so I do have to live with it for a few more days. Final exam is this coming Thursday and the final project is due Tuesday.
I do really hate job hunting. I must have applications out at about 100 different places and I have yet to get anything past the initial interview. It even lead me to cheating this past week. I really do hope that either Cory, my boss at Cooper Power Systems last summer, gets back to me or that IT firm that I put the application in to. I really need a job bad at this point and it is frustrating when it seems like everywhere has a ton of applications and you are never the one it seems who is selected.
Well I sign off for now. Bye.
...
Game 2: Wesylian vs Carthage,winners bracket
Well it is the sixth and Carthage just got the first run of the game hit on them last inning of the game. So they are down 0-1, but this is a pitchers duel that could go either way, really. Only takes a couple good hits in a row. But we need to get some runs soon. We are down to 10 outs now. Correction 9 outs... Coming out of the losers bracket will not be a good thing, since it will put us one pitcher down to the fourth string pitcher if we get back to the championship games when the other team should be on their third best pitcher.
Well now I've gotten the retainer stuff done for my vampire character on Metro. That took a good little while to work up, but I can't exactly use my retainers for income or services if they aren't noted properly. One is about two years late getting a description put on her.
It is good that I'm getting some writing stuff done that I wanted to. A palm + keyboard is a really wonderful thing, even compared to a laptop, since it gets a lot more battery life than the laptop would. Damn, they just got another one scored on a passed ball. Really it is fairly comfortable and easily used in the stands with touch typing. Of course I could use the pen, but that is so much slower and I can't really do that by touch. A laptop wouldn't quite replace this.
It is also nice to spend some time outside, since recently I haven't been getting enough of it. I wish I could program outside, but that would require a laptop which is about$700 out of my budget. But it would be nice this weekend forgetting my project done I suppose.
Damn, another inning, with a couple bad calls by the up. I'm going back to the game.
...
10:30pm
Well we lost pretty bad. Things got bad and the umpire really got bad and inconsistent in what he was calling. Hate to say it, but it really just precipitated a bad spot. We have to win the next three games to win the tournament. Not likely considering we have to win two against the team we just lost to and be one pitcher further down in the staff.
....
Saturday 12pm
Well our third game is tunning into a close one. They just picked up a two run lead, but it looks like we aren't yet going to switch pitchers. Augustana can really hit, so hopefully we can score at least a few more runs, in the next four innings and gain ourselves some wiggle room.
This has been a good game, really. Now if the people picking the music to play between innings on the sound system had some good tastes we'd be getting somewhere. :-P At the very least we've been hitting, so there is a good chance we can make up this debt if we can just not leave runners on.
Oh, how I wish red hair didn't come with such easily burnable skin. I really needed something more like 55 rather than 45. I hate being red every time I spend a significant amount of time outside. I swear I really need like SPF100. Fortunately at this stadium there is a good place to sit underneath the press/scorers box where I can get out of the sun in the stands. Not to mention it is really just perfect temperature wise in the shade.
...
Top of the 9th inning and 5-2 Augustana. We have to score three or go home. First guy on a single.
Well so far I have developed 8 full NPC's, 4 of which are politicians. It has been very productive. -- Out #1-- I think if I get one more done I'll at least have the basic fleshing out of the city council done that I told people I'd do. Now only if I had brought some wraith or exalted materials to read with me. Then I could have apped one or two characters maybe.
Augustana just got the third out. We're headed home now. Game over. Will post when I get home.