Newgen's Bachlor Party

For Newgen's bachelor party we rocked the laser tag (very fun), and then we played some Wii back at his new house in KC. Good times.

Now we are rocking a LAN party in the motel room that we have.

Ducks for the win.

We caught the second game of the NHL Finals at Willie's. The Ducks won the game and are now up 2-0 in the series over the Senators.

Also pizza with blue cheese, chicken and buffalo wing sauce tastes like what you would imagine.

Justice

Justice doesn't stand for indoor seating. That goes double for when you eat BBQ.

Back

I made it back fine from my Colorado extravaganza. So now I will be putting some words to the pictures that I have posted. But untill I get them all updated you can watch this:

Colorado Trip Notice:

I am without steady internet while on vacation. I will post pics from my phone and then update what they are about when I can get on the internet. So check back for updates about what the pics are of. (This note is sticky so new posts are below this one.)

Scurvy Dogs

Who got dressed up for Pirates 3?

We did.


Arrrg!

(The third movie is better than the second one, but not as good as the first.)

Finals for All!

When I got back from Colorado I had a good pile of stuff to do. Most of it was grading the finals for the online Statistics course that I teach.

After a long trip like the one to Colorado I always like coming home to something familiar yet mind numbingly boring to do.

Grading the tests is just that.

Some more

One day Michelle bought a smores cookbook at Borders.

That night we had a smores party -you could say we had a smörgåsbord of smores.

The best one was graham cracker, marshmallow, caramel Hershey's kiss, and apple.

Colorado Naitonal

On Saturday night we caught a race down at Colorado National Speedway. Two of my three favorite classes raced- the super stocks (pictured) and the trains (three cars linked together that race on the figure eight track). (My favorite class is the figure eights.)

Good times

Royals Rockies

I had never been to Coors Park before. I have gone to Rockies games when they played in Mile High, but never in Coors Field. So there wasn't a better time to go than when the Rockies played the Royals (my two favorite teams.)

The ball park was nice, and the Royals were able to pull out a win, despite the Rockies effort to force it on them.

Ichi Ban

There is a sushi place in Longmont called Ichi Ban that I have always wanted to go to. So we did. The sushi was very good, the udon was only ok.

The old Japanese lady that took our order gave us an order of spicy tuna rolls to try, for free. They were good, but not as good as the other stuff I got.

But I really can't complain about something that was free -and that was given to us from such a cute old Japanese lady. ^_^

One for Cold, Two for Hot

An art sale place in Boulder was giving away free tea. So we decided to get some. You can't read the sign in this picture, but it says that if you want hot water you have to push both red buttons. Let me tell you Michelle almost gave up getting the free tea until I pointed out the sign.

Mad Crazy Good

Out of the many new places that I ate at Colorado my favorite would have to be Mad Greens. It is a "New Style" kind of place (like Chipotle) that makes some really good salads and sandwiches. I don't know if it is just me, but I really think that eating at places like this beats eating at normal "sit down" kinds of restaurants any day of the week. (Even Monsday... the day between Monday and Tuesday.)

Outdoor mall as people magnet

One of the new hotnesses in Colorado is outdoor malls. Take this new outdoor mall from Boulder that is pictured above. Just last year it was an indoor mall that nobody went to. So they closed it down put a road through it and added a bit of art. Instant people attractor.

The Future Is Now

Colorado is all about the future. For example in many of the malls that we went to they had vending machines that dispensed a variety of expensive things. This one had Poractiv stuff in it, another one was a Sony vending machine, and another had iPods. It is crazy.

Also we rented movies from a vending machine called Redbox that was at a local gas station. You could get very current DVD releases for $1 a night. The furute is a cool place to live.

Taste Experiment

On the way out to Colorado we stopped by a Presto were we found these two new products. Pepsi is making a new version of its soda called Summer Mix. The soda tasted like normal Pepsi with a bag a skittles dumped in it. It actually wasn’t too bad at first, but it got old after most of the bottle was gone. It is worth a shot if you like the idea of skittles in your soda.
The other taste experiment is from Doritos. They made a new flavor of the chips called X-13D. The game is that we taste the chips and then go to their website to name it. Well we all agreed that the flavor was not good, some think it is honey onion mustard pretzel flavor, but I really think it is hamburger flavor. I didn’t enter my flavor choice on Doritos, but I am sure that I would win with the name of “Dehydrated Hamburger”.

Lay Back

Just chilling in Garden with some good food.

Summer Phase I begins

Michelle had to stay late at Starbuck’s one night when we were in Garden. The place was abuzz with packaged summer joy. I could just feel the change from spring to summer as the menus were changed from Spring Phase II to Summer Phase I. It was magical.

Kiwk Shop goes High Tech

Recently the Kwik Shop (or Kwik-E-Mart as I usually call it) has been remodeling their stores. On the way down to Garden we stopped in one and it had a big new food warmer box thingy. It’s not that high tech I guess, but I wasn’t expecting to see it there.

Summer Tour 07

Summer is here! And Nicole and I are celebrating in style. We are currently touring the high plains making appearances at select locations such as Wichita , Garden City, and various locations in Colorado. Get your tickets now to see the sensation before they are all sold out!

(Tour dates and events to be published as the happen, stay tuned!)

Hoist the Colors!

Friday was a momentous day in the history of the Grog Islands. Their beloved ruler obtained the degree of Master of Arts.
Chris is now the most educated citizen in the whole Grog Islands empire.

(Nicole made Chris a Grog Islands flag for his graduation. It came out really well.)

Stat club picnic

Oh yeah!

The Joys of Grading

Who knew that grading finals would be this much fun? And by 'this much fun' I mean really boring and frustrating.

My two final questions on the exam were meant to be free points. One asking about what statistics is, and the other about interpreting a simple confidence interval. They are messing these easy questions up too much for comfort, especially the confidence interval one. He is the question:

[6pts] Say Manhattan is debating a law about banning transfat in restaurants. People that are for the law say that in a study rats lived 0.42 years longer on average when they did not have transfat in their diet. Since you know a little bit more about statistics than the common folk, you take a look at the research and you find that the research does indeed say that rats lived 0.42 years longer when they didn't have transfat in their diet with a confidence interval of [-1.03, 2.52]. What would be your response to the people that want to ban transfat based on this study? (Explain why you say this.)

More than half the people say that the ban is a good idea because the average, 0.42, is inside the confidence interval. That is *so* not the right answer. No wonder policymakers are taking non-significant studies and turning them into ill conceived laws. Arg! After two semesters of statistics even my students still don't get the simple things.

(The answer I was looking for is that this study does not provide evidence that a transfat diet reduces the lifespan of mice since the confidence interval covers the number zero. Essentially the study was inconclusive.)

Mystery

A couple nights ago during one of the storms that rolled through I heard a really loud pop. At first I thought lightning had struck somewhere near by, but after thinking about the sound it really didn't sound like lightning. After a bit more pondering about it I decided that it must have been a transformer that blew. That solution satisfied me and I went back to sleep. The next day I went to go check out the transformers that are behind my apartment for signs that they popped. But they all looked fine. I figured that they were hurt on the inside and just tried to cover it up with makeup and smiles.

Well yesterday when I got back from school I noticed some kids playing up the hill a bit. And whadda-ya-know there is a huge tree that fell down. That must have made the loud pop. Mystery solved.

Bioassay Rocks!

Half way done with finals.

I scream

Bioassay gave me a take home final that is going to take me forever to do. That is why I am at the Union eating ice cream.

80 man-hours of suffering.

It is good to know that my pain and suffering from a couple of days ago did not go to waste.

The 1 to 16 exchange rate of my suffering to theirs is at an all time high. My advice is to sell now before summer starts and there is no suffering at all.

Starbucks in Aggieville

I got a green tea frappuccino from Starbucks the other day. It is the best thing that I have gotten from there...

it was ok.

Blueberry Tea at Houli's

Classes are over now, all that is left is to do is finals. But since I like taking tests it is like summer has already started, and the finals are just a bonus.

No, not really. I don't like taking tests. I wish it was already summer. I had you going there, didn't I?

Acquire

I am now $40,000 richer due to my shrewd investments in Quantum, a technology company.

If you need some financial advice you know where to come.

ABJ is back.

Tonight was the triumphant return of one of the best local bands: Anything But Joey. They rocked it out to a fairly packed house down at PJ's. And they were even kind enough to get the show done by midnight. What swell guys.

Guess who is back.

Making the Final

This is me.
I look dead.
That is because I am bored to death.
Because I am writing a final.
It isn't fun.

"Pop" Goes the Web 2.0 Bubble?

May 1st may have been the start of the end of "Web 2.0". The reason is because Digg has been trying to hold off droves of people from posting the code to crack all HD-DVDs. And it isn't working. So now it looks like everything is going to have to change. I may be (hopefully) making too big of a deal about this but I'm not the only one that thinks this. Joe has a very good write up about the going ons until now.

Update:
Here is a good summary of what went on.
Also now Kevin Rose has also posted this on Digg, saying that they will not delete the story anymore. And what do you know the number isn't every story on Digg now, in fact there hasn't been a new story about the number since Digg decided to allow the stories. But this may mean the end of Digg, and people will have to think twice about investing in companies like this. You have to give it to Kevin and the guys at Digg though, they are probably going to lose Digg over this number and to fight HD-DVD. And recently Digg had been valued at over $150 million. That's a good chunk of money.

So Long

Two truths and a lie:
1. We ate dinner at So Long Saloon
2. Chris passed his masters defense
3. They botched Jenette's face lift.

Which one of the above statements is a lie?

Panera + Civ > Finals

There is something about having a final to write that makes me want to go to Panera, eat some bagels and play Civilization on my computer. I think that some people call it 'procrastination'. I like to call it 'International Play Civilization Instead of Write A Final Day'.