Happy Thanksgiving

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Happy Thanksgiving! This year, we hosted the annual festivities and had a great turnout. Most of us ate a lot more than we should have, but given the cornucopia of good stuff (c'mon, it's the only time of year I can use that word) we had no choice. 2074158725_0e19c82ac7

Another Thanksgiving means another Annual Field Goal challenge. This year, we played two rounds. The first was won by Joe (of course) and the second was taken by Ken! I have got to practice more during the year.

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Check out the pics here.

Roller Derby!

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That's right, folks... Roller Derby is alive and kicking! We joined the F&F family and went to root on Nicole and the San Joaquin Valley Vixens Roller Derby team in a bout at the Civic Auditorium. This was the first time the kids had ever seen Roller Derby and the first time any of us had seen it live. It took a while for Dawn and I to understand the logistics of the sport but once we did, we had a blast yelling at the players. These women are tough and took a lot of hard falls!

During one of the intermissions, I was selected to join the corn-on-the-cob eating contest. I took second place but could have won if the judges gave me full credit for that last cob!

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Check out the pics here.

Thunder Goes Pink II

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Dawn, Makenzy, Emily and a friend went to the Stockton Thundergame tonight, a ladies night out, for the second annual Thunder Goes Pink night. This is such a great way to raise awareness and money for breast cancer. The ice was painted pink and the Thunder players wore special pink jerseys. The Thunder were victorious and the girls had a great night out! 2054735123_40209a6ef4

Check out the pics here.

Happy Halloween

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Well, another Halloween has come and gone. Next is Thanksgiving, Christmas and then New Years... it'll be here before you know it. This year, I was Jack, as in Jack in the Box. I had a great time playing the part at work and then at the school for the annual trick-or-treat festivities. Thankfully, Mike was there to help me pass out candy to the kids because I had a hard time seeing most of them.

Here I am resting at the end of a long night. Yes, believe it or not, that's Hannah Montana on the far right! happyhalloween07withjack

One of the coolest part of the night was on my way. I went through the drive through at In-n-Out and they noticed my Jack head in the back seat. I simply said, "Sometimes, even I need a real burger!"

Next year's plan? Well, I've got some ideas....

Check out today's pics here.

Stockton Thunder home opener '07

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The Stockton Arena was rockin' tonight when we were joined by 8,640 or so of our closest friends for the first Thunder home game of the season. Tonight, our Thunder squared off against the Alaska Aces in a contest that saw not a single fight (boo hoo!). thunderhomeopener2007

Thunder scored first near the end of the first period and followed it up with a second goal that saw a few Aces players collide into the goalie. It was like a traffic accident being taken apart piece by piece. After a few minutes, when the officials awarded Stockton with the goal, the arena went psycho!

Neither team scored in the second period but Alaska did manage to get a couple of goals in the final period in regulation to tie the contest at 2. Rohlfs ended the sudden death match at 2:10 into OT with a sweet shot. We may be 2-3, but at least we won our home opener.

For tonight's game, we set in section 114, row 5. It was nice to be a little closer and see some pucks go flying as well as really hearing the glass pounding, but sitting this close made it hard to see down on the other end of the ice.

Check out pics here. I took a lot of video but no fights and no goals. I did manage to hit record just after the game winning goal went in... check it out on YouTube here.

If you want to take a retro look back... check out the 2006 Stockton Thunder home opener or check out all of our posts on the Thunderhere.

 

Leopard Arrives!

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Months after we were first teased with demonstrations of the next release of Mac OS X, Leopard was unleashed today. I arrived at the Apple Retail Store about 4:30 and waited with a bunch of other Mac faithful. The best part was seeing the reaction on the faces of the passers by asking what we were standing in line for. Just as the Apple website countdown clock hit zero (we were all verifying on our iPhones) the doors flung open to enormous applause from the gang of Apple employees. As they cheered and high-fived us, we piled into the store to claim our copy of Leopard. desktopleopard

Now for a couple of observations. Leopard was not the only thing flying off the shelves. It's no secret that Apple retail stores are sales powerhouses (see Apple Stores Now More Profitable Than Tiffany's Per Square Foot) and anyone at an OS launch day can easily see why. Anecdotcally, nearly half of the people I saw snatching up Leopard were also buying external hard-drives. I recommended theLaCie Big Disk 1TB drive to a fellow shopper but they sold out of all of them in just a few minutes. Gone, too, were the 500GB LaCie drives among most other high capacity external hard-drives. The cool thing was to see just how many new Mac users there were joining in on the fun of a new OS launch.

Two hours versus twenty? Waiting on line for the iPhone was great fun, but doesn't come close to the excitement of the Leopard launch. Sure, it might've been because we got my iPhone at an AT&T store but I still think the excitement of the crowd was still higher today. I mean, the iPhone is cool because it is a phone and it has the look and feel of Mac OS X... but Leopard is Mac OS X!

Well, I just glanced over to the PowerBook and see that the installation is complete... time to get to work. I opted for an erase + clean install on that computer. Later this weekend - the iMacs get the upgrade.

Rock on Leopard!

Did you get Leopard? Waiting on the fence? Mac-curious? Check out the greatest Mac podcast on the net - Typical Mac User.

Check out some pics here.