Saturday, January 31, 2004
I started watching Band of Brothers again last night. I've seen it a couple times already, but find drawn to watch it again. Band of Brothers was an HBO miniseries that was directed by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks and was based on Stephen E Ambrose's book. If you are interested in WWII, then I would highly recommend reading Ambrose. I've read both Band Of Brothers and The Wild Blue. Both incredible depictions of two different groups. The first of the Airborne division, the second of the B-24 crews stationed in Italy.
I think there are some films that everyone should see. Whether you love, or hate films on war, there some that you should take the time to absorb yourself in for no other reason then to have an understanding of what those who went before us went through to provide us the life that we have today. Not only to see what they went through, but why they went through it. There are 2 films and one mini-series that I would currently put on this list.
I Band of Brothers is obviously one, but I would also include Saving Private Ryan and Schindler's List as well. The opening scene of Saving Private Ryan is one that simply leaves you sitting in awe of the horror that they faced that morning. Similarly is the opening scene of Part 2 of Band Of Brothers when they drop into Normady. Films are made to bring us out of our personal reality for a moment to step into another place or story. In films like these, perhaps they only provide us a small glimpse of what really happened, but I think it is a glimpse that everyone should take.
Feel free to add any other films to this list...
Thursday, January 29, 2004
2 Weeks And Counting!!!! That's right kids, its only 2 weeks from Friday that Baylor Baseball's season officially begins!! One thing that you will learn about me quickly (if you don't already know this) is that I'm a baseball nut! I completely love this game. I'm die-hard St. Louis Cardinals fan and I love the Bears. I'm blessed to live in a city that is home the nations #2 ranked college baseball stadium and #11 team in the preseason polls. When it comes to creation, God just outdid himself with baseball. This year I actually made the plunge and purchased season tickets!! Blair and I both bought two tickets so it will be Blair & Jordan and Tom & ________. Anyway. Somehow I officially feel like an alumni now that I have season tickets - as if somehow buying season tickets is a sort of right of passage in your alumni status? Not sure where I'm going with this. 
The good news.... NO - the GREAT news - is where the seats are at. Box 17, Row 2, seats 3 & 4. Let me write that one time for you! Box 17, Row 2, Seats 3 & 4!!! Amen!!!! Please see attached diagram. 2nd row and right between the dugout and home plate!!! So - Feb 13th. The first game of Baylor's 2004 season! Sic'Em Bears!!!Wednesday, January 28, 2004
So what tests your patience the most? For me - being sick or injured. Today I seem to be developing an ear infection of some kind. It hurts - REALLY hurts. The worst part is that it hurts to touch my ear, which will prove to be an issue in just a bit when I try to go to sleep. This becomes a dilemma because I will be unable to sleep on my left side. You might think - just sleep on your right side, but its really much more complicated then that. See I start left, flip right, back to left, back to right one more time, and then fall asleep. Its a ritual that has been fine tuned over the years and completely unavoidable. I end up sleeping on my right side, but actually falling asleep requires 2 left side rotations (I've got issues - I know). So - clearly I'm screwed. So that covers being sick, but what really ticks me off is being injured. I broke my leg back in August in a cycling accident. This caused me to be in perpetually stressed out/bad mood for about 6 weeks. The worst part was the first week when I couldn't even move off of the couch. I thought I was going to go nuts! I was supposed to be on crutches for about 2-3 weeks and I think I managed to make it for about 1 week (almost) before throwing them in a closet and forcing myself to walk on it. I tend to be a bit stubborn about these things.
Side note - just realized this thing has spell check! Thank God, because I can't spell to save my life. Not sure when you'd ever have to save your life by spelling, but if I did - I be screwed.
Tuesday, January 27, 2004
Have you ever had one of those days where you go 90 to nothing the whole day, yet at the end of you feel more behind then when you started? I think all my days are starting to feel that way lately! Its not that work isn't going well, its that I never feel like I can catch up. Today I started my day off as usual, by swinging by Starbucks. I grabbed my soy latte and headed to the office. I've grown very fond of the latte - it really helps me start my day! The next thing I knew it was 12:00 and found myself eating a sandwich at my desk and drinking my Superfood, then all of the sudden it was almost 7:00 and I was still at my desk. 
One digression - Odwalla Superfood. That's some good stuff and I highly recommend you pick up a bottle. I'll warn you now its a thick, pulpy, and very fungus green drink. However, it has more of a fruity taste that a grass taste (yes - it does have both wheat and barly grass in it). SO GOOD THOUGH! Back to the day now .....Everything in between seems like a blur and my list of action items only grew throughout the day! After work I headed straight for the gym to do my track workout for tonite. On the schedule this evening was six 800 meter repeats. I'm enjoying doing speed workouts (just started them a couple weeks ago), but its not quite the same as 5-7 miler. Those just seem to let me clear my head more and sort through the day. On a track workout I'm too focused on my time and counting laps to ponder on the days events, but I enjoy it nonetheless. As soon as I finished that I headed up to church for "The Man Group". I was only about 45 minutes late, so not too bad. I really hate being late, but for this group its going to have to be late or not at all on most nights. By the time I got home it was 9:30 and I had still not eaten. So, warmed up a bowl of soup, watched a bit of the NH primaries results and now here I am. But, now I need to log on and do some more work. Cheers
One digression - Odwalla Superfood. That's some good stuff and I highly recommend you pick up a bottle. I'll warn you now its a thick, pulpy, and very fungus green drink. However, it has more of a fruity taste that a grass taste (yes - it does have both wheat and barly grass in it). SO GOOD THOUGH! Back to the day now .....Everything in between seems like a blur and my list of action items only grew throughout the day! After work I headed straight for the gym to do my track workout for tonite. On the schedule this evening was six 800 meter repeats. I'm enjoying doing speed workouts (just started them a couple weeks ago), but its not quite the same as 5-7 miler. Those just seem to let me clear my head more and sort through the day. On a track workout I'm too focused on my time and counting laps to ponder on the days events, but I enjoy it nonetheless. As soon as I finished that I headed up to church for "The Man Group". I was only about 45 minutes late, so not too bad. I really hate being late, but for this group its going to have to be late or not at all on most nights. By the time I got home it was 9:30 and I had still not eaten. So, warmed up a bowl of soup, watched a bit of the NH primaries results and now here I am. But, now I need to log on and do some more work. Cheers Monday, January 26, 2004
Texas weather - its a bit strange at times. Yesterday it was sunny, clear blue skies, and 75 out! That's right - 75 in Jan. Today, much of the same, however when I left the office for the evening it FREEZING!! The temp had dropped to the 30s! My northern friends are probably thinking "buck up you sissy", but you gotta admit that a 40 degree drop in temp is going to seem a bit cold, especially when it was 70 when you were outside for lunch. All this being said, I decided to head to the gym to do my run on the treadmill tonite. Let me start this out by making one thing very clear - I HATE TREADMILLS!!!! I don't mean to be harsh, but 5 miles on a treadmill just sucks. YOU DON'T GO ANYWHERE!! Pointless. Part of my boredom on treadmills is due to the fact that I tend not be able to do anything except for stare at the clock and distance in front of me. This is due to the fact that I tend to run in the direction that I look. If I look to the left, I go to the left. Seems pretty normal to me. Doesn't work so well on a treadmill though - you fall off. This would not be good for me - especially considering that there were about 10 treadmills in a row and it was me and 9 girls (although I just thought one good reason to run on a treadmill)! So - thus my disdain for treadmills - you go nowhere, you do nothing, and you stare at a conveyer belt. So, what do I feel like on a treadmill?
That pretty much sums it up
Interview feedback - another fun part of my day today. When you are people manager one of the best parts of your job is when you get to tell someone that they got the job. This is especially true when the person has busted their ass and put in hard work and truly appreciates the opportunities. One of the worst things you have to do is tell the other people that interviewed that they didn't get the job. The ones that really suck to deliver are the canidates who were truly excellent canidates, except that someone else just had a little bit of an edge on them. The ones that are annoying though are the people who THINK they are god's personal gift to your company and are the best thing that could ever happen to you. RIIIIGHT
Sunday, January 25, 2004
Okay - so I've decided to dabble in this whole blog thing for a bit. For those you who know me well, you might find this to be a bit of a surprise. Not a normal move for Tom, but hey - what the hell. Right now I'm thinking of it more then anything as hopefully a better way to stay in touch with friends and family then anything. I'm not too good at staying in touch, so maybe this is my lazy approach to improving that. We'll see how long it last. Let me know if a pool starts up - I'd be glad to put some money down as well!
So - let me give you the rundown of my weekend. Friday was a bit uneventfull. One of our managers at the office is leaving to return to the mothership (Round Rock), so headed to Crickets with him and Michael. This used to be a regular event for Michael and I when we worked at the Nashville campus. We head out to Jonathan's (great bar/grill) in Franklin at least twice a week for a pizza and a couple pitchers of NewCastle. Good times! That was basically the rundown for Friday night - New Castle, pizza, and a few rounds of Cricket at Crickets. Those Brits know how to come up with some good games (darts, not the other one). Somehow I managed to look like I knew what I was doing and won both games. Tragically it was pure luck and I'll never be able to repeat the performance.
Saturday was the big night though. Blair and I have been working for about a month now to put together our first Texas Hold'Em Tourney. Wow - can I just say how much I love this game?? Anyway - we ended up with 14 players and 2 dealers for the night (much love to John and Genevieve for dealing all night!). Unfortunately due to unforseen circumstances, we only ended up with 11 players by the time the dealing started at 6:00. That was all good though - still a good group of players for the first matchup. The buy-in was $50 a person and each player received $500 in chips. Basically, you play till one person has all the chips - and then payouts are given for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. We drew cards to see who would be at table 1 and 2. Much to my dismay Blair, Austin, and myself all end up at the same table. This was a problem because (not to be cocky) the 3 of us where probably 3 of the top players in the Tourney. This would be like putting the top 3 teams in the country in the same bracket in March! NO BUENO! Luckily, one guy was late showing up, which moved me to the other table. The action was slow at our table and I wasn't landing any pots. Joel was the first to drop out at our table and Kyle and Josh were slowly building pots. Ryan and I both sat at just below our inital $500. As we were getting close to moving to one table I made an All-In move on Ryan, he took went for it and I doubled up before having to move to one table. This was HUGE for me. This gave me $600 in chips and put me in 4th place instead of 7th place with $300 in chips. Big difference. The second table started well for me early. I probably took 5-6 pots early and started to build up over $1K. Josh dropped next, followed by Mike. I'd already won 3 All-IN calls and just made another one on Chris. Chris had pocket Queens and a pair of 5s on the table. What Chris didn't know was that I had pocket Jacks with the 5s and another Jack on the table. Jacks/5s boat and a $2K pot! Not too shaby. At this point I'm sitting with a $2500 stack of chips in front of me and about a $1K lead over the next person closest to me. I'm feeling good at this point. Austin dropped out next, followed quickly by Chris. Now - down to the final 3 - me, Kyle, and JD. The good news here is that we all are in the money now. 3rd place gets $75 and that gets your money back and a little extra. Here is where things did not go well for me. It was about 2:30 in the morning now and I was FREAKIN' TIRED!!!! I think I could have won this deal, however I realized it could take me till 7am to do it. No way - I need some sleep. So, I started betting stupid. I decided I was going to force the issue and either win it and go to bed with $325 in my pocket, or finish 3rd with $75, but either way - I was going to bed. I lost my last $1K on an IDIOTIC ALL-IN bet!!! Long story short I lost to a straight when there was 4 to the straight on the table. I was so tired I didn't even see it. It sucks to get old. Oh well - I played well (not counting the last hour) and finished 3rd. Can't complain. We're looking to have another round in March - hopefully we'll get about 25 players next time!
Sunday I actually made it to church - which was a miracle considering I didn't go to bed till 4:30. I can't really tell you much about church though, because let's face it.... I was bit out of it. The bigger miracle... I actually managed my long run on Sunday afternoon. Now my diet the past 24 hours leading up the consisted of this: wings for lunch on Sat followed by pizza, pretzels, rum, and a dozen cokes. This is not the type of diet that most runners would recommend before starting a 10 mile run, but nonetheless the pavement calls. The run went well, although I paid the price for every pepper and onion on my supreme pizza. I finished in 1:25 and thought I had done 11 miles - that was a great run and under my time goal for the Bearathon. However, after driving it I realized I only ran 10 miles and was 4 mins over my time goal. Oh well, not bad considering the fuel and the less then 4 hours of sleep. Well, my pillow calls......
So - let me give you the rundown of my weekend. Friday was a bit uneventfull. One of our managers at the office is leaving to return to the mothership (Round Rock), so headed to Crickets with him and Michael. This used to be a regular event for Michael and I when we worked at the Nashville campus. We head out to Jonathan's (great bar/grill) in Franklin at least twice a week for a pizza and a couple pitchers of NewCastle. Good times! That was basically the rundown for Friday night - New Castle, pizza, and a few rounds of Cricket at Crickets. Those Brits know how to come up with some good games (darts, not the other one). Somehow I managed to look like I knew what I was doing and won both games. Tragically it was pure luck and I'll never be able to repeat the performance.
Saturday was the big night though. Blair and I have been working for about a month now to put together our first Texas Hold'Em Tourney. Wow - can I just say how much I love this game?? Anyway - we ended up with 14 players and 2 dealers for the night (much love to John and Genevieve for dealing all night!). Unfortunately due to unforseen circumstances, we only ended up with 11 players by the time the dealing started at 6:00. That was all good though - still a good group of players for the first matchup. The buy-in was $50 a person and each player received $500 in chips. Basically, you play till one person has all the chips - and then payouts are given for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. We drew cards to see who would be at table 1 and 2. Much to my dismay Blair, Austin, and myself all end up at the same table. This was a problem because (not to be cocky) the 3 of us where probably 3 of the top players in the Tourney. This would be like putting the top 3 teams in the country in the same bracket in March! NO BUENO! Luckily, one guy was late showing up, which moved me to the other table. The action was slow at our table and I wasn't landing any pots. Joel was the first to drop out at our table and Kyle and Josh were slowly building pots. Ryan and I both sat at just below our inital $500. As we were getting close to moving to one table I made an All-In move on Ryan, he took went for it and I doubled up before having to move to one table. This was HUGE for me. This gave me $600 in chips and put me in 4th place instead of 7th place with $300 in chips. Big difference. The second table started well for me early. I probably took 5-6 pots early and started to build up over $1K. Josh dropped next, followed by Mike. I'd already won 3 All-IN calls and just made another one on Chris. Chris had pocket Queens and a pair of 5s on the table. What Chris didn't know was that I had pocket Jacks with the 5s and another Jack on the table. Jacks/5s boat and a $2K pot! Not too shaby. At this point I'm sitting with a $2500 stack of chips in front of me and about a $1K lead over the next person closest to me. I'm feeling good at this point. Austin dropped out next, followed quickly by Chris. Now - down to the final 3 - me, Kyle, and JD. The good news here is that we all are in the money now. 3rd place gets $75 and that gets your money back and a little extra. Here is where things did not go well for me. It was about 2:30 in the morning now and I was FREAKIN' TIRED!!!! I think I could have won this deal, however I realized it could take me till 7am to do it. No way - I need some sleep. So, I started betting stupid. I decided I was going to force the issue and either win it and go to bed with $325 in my pocket, or finish 3rd with $75, but either way - I was going to bed. I lost my last $1K on an IDIOTIC ALL-IN bet!!! Long story short I lost to a straight when there was 4 to the straight on the table. I was so tired I didn't even see it. It sucks to get old. Oh well - I played well (not counting the last hour) and finished 3rd. Can't complain. We're looking to have another round in March - hopefully we'll get about 25 players next time!
Sunday I actually made it to church - which was a miracle considering I didn't go to bed till 4:30. I can't really tell you much about church though, because let's face it.... I was bit out of it. The bigger miracle... I actually managed my long run on Sunday afternoon. Now my diet the past 24 hours leading up the consisted of this: wings for lunch on Sat followed by pizza, pretzels, rum, and a dozen cokes. This is not the type of diet that most runners would recommend before starting a 10 mile run, but nonetheless the pavement calls. The run went well, although I paid the price for every pepper and onion on my supreme pizza. I finished in 1:25 and thought I had done 11 miles - that was a great run and under my time goal for the Bearathon. However, after driving it I realized I only ran 10 miles and was 4 mins over my time goal. Oh well, not bad considering the fuel and the less then 4 hours of sleep. Well, my pillow calls......
