Two months later or so ...

Heading back east to Lancaster for the next fortnight.

Just wanted to say hello to Pat since he's the only one still listening. Ha!

Steelers

The Steelers won the Superbowl; I couldn't be happier. The game was fantastic, and really great in high-def, with friends and a lot of food. I didn't bother watching or caring about the commercials this year since well, that was the time for a break in the action and an oporchanceity to get more food stuffed in my piehole.

In other news, I did my taxes! Only took a few minutes thanks to The TurboTax. I love how there is no paper involved at all.

Efforts

In an effort to keep myself warm on the inside, it's time to start following the wonderful world of cycling. I think I should also start doing a better job of posting things that I find while poking around online that I find interesting. Or that prove to be a nice distraction during the work day. For instance:

Johan Bruyneel, Astana’s general manager, also did not take Armstrong seriously at first. “He sent me a message about the comeback, and I said, ‘Are you at a party and are you sober?’ ” Bruyneel said. “Because I thought he was drunk.”

Rest of the story ...

Happy New Year or whatever

Let's just get this done in bullet points.

• Pitt football ended the season with a 3-0 loss. Despite watching this on the new tv in high definition, it sucked.

• Pitt basketball is ranked no. 1 in the country this week. Awesome. Let's see how long it lasts, not that it really matters at this point. I like how the program has slowly risen over the past years (pretty much right after I graduated) and it's regularly in the top 25, even the top 10.

• The new tv is awesome, as were all of the football games that I watched over the holidays. Some days it seemed like there were like, 3 or more games on. Oh wait, there were.

• Penn state lost to USC. This made the Pitt loss a lot more tolerable. It was also a blowout, so maybe now they can realize they didn't actually play anybody.

• The gas fireplaces in our house work. This is pretty neat. Growing up, we didn't use the wood-burning fireplace all that much. The gas ones seem to warm up the room fairly quickly, and don't have any smell or soot issues.

• Work is going well. The lull over the holidays is over; time to get crackin' again. First on the agenda: Trip to Ohio tomorrow morning. Be back on Friday.

• Maria and Asim are doing well. I had a really good time playing with Asim during the days off. He really enjoys running from one end of the basement to the other. He's also learning to kick a ball back and forth with me. We occasionally toss a ball back and forth, too. Mind you, the tosses are across a minimal distance -- say, 4 feet. But still.