Not since ‘78 has such a travesty happened to the great state of Florida in regards to college football. Here are some of the headlines:

• “It’s a landslide: Florida teams in the loss column”…Yahoo
• “Saturday was a dark day for football in the Sunshine State.” …ESPN
• “Florida, FSU, Miami share rare losing day.”…TSN
• “0-for-Florida”…CNNSI

As much as I despise some of the other programs in Florida, it is strictly a competitive thing. Actually I just hate UF, but that is another story. If I had it my way, Florida schools would only lose to other Florida schools…thus giving me bragging rights in California. I hate having USC, or any other Pac-10 team for that matter, ranked #1.

p.s. Florida International University also lost, it truly was an 0fer day.

I just finished one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. It wasn’t one of those fly by the seat of your pants books, but was just very well written. A couple of weeks ago I was looking to start a new book, and Barbie recommended this book, the Gold Coast by Nelson Demille. She said when she read it that it reminded her of me and that she knew I would enjoy it. Well, I normally don’t prefer to read fiction, but I needed something so I took the wife’s advice.
The book is written in the first person, therefore, the author is the person in the story and everything is about what he see, does, and most importantly, thinks. The reason why I emphasize the fact that he writes what he thinks, is because the character, John Sutter, seems to think exactly like me. If I was in his situation I would be thinking the same thing, and probably doing a decent amount of the same things also. Although the book is not a comedy, I literally spent the majority of the book with a smile on my face and cracking up at all the thoughts and quick witty things that came across his mind…but did not say…such as “The three best things in life are steak, showers, and sex.” No truer statement has ever been made!

So, you now know that I loved this book, but you are still curious what it is all about. Well, it is about a man, John Sutter, who lives in the “gold coast”, a very wealthy section in Long Island, that features exorbatant mansions, country clubs, and everything else you can think of regarding those with tons of old money. John, himself, is not wealthy, but his wife is, and she comes from old money, therefore inherited. Anyways, the mafia boss of the largest organized crime family in New York ends up moving in next door, and of course things start to change as the end up becoming friends and more with the ‘Don.’ Like I said, it is not a Dan Brown type book, but is more like a Great Gatsby book, of which I have not read, but the author (Nelson Demille) compares this book to it, so I am assuming he knows what he is talking about. Apparentely this is not your typical Nelson Demille style book, but again, I haven’t read his other books, so I am just going off of hearsay. Well…my final thoughts are this…If you ever want to see what goes on inside my head, read this book…it is just great.

Here are the current betting odds on the election results:
Bush: $1 bet returns $1.65 (profit $0.65)
Kerry: $1 bet returns $2.20 (profit $1.20)

Also, if you are into superstitious betting…every time the Washington Redskins win on the Sunday before the Election, the incumbent candidate wins the Election. So, if you want Bush to win, bet on the Redskins…if you want Kerry, bet on the Packers.

Well Kymba is all German Shepherd! For those that have met her, you know she can be very sweet and cuddly…a little crazy at times…but still a very sweet dog. However, she has now seemed to have taken on the protector role as well. This morning I was woken up by a quick bark and growl. Of course I immediately got up and saw that Kymba was at our bedroom door, anxiously wanting to get out. So I got up, let her out and followed her through the rest of the house. She gave the living room, dining room, and kitchen a quick look, then fixated herself at the front door and began growling! I was a little anxious about opening the door, but curiousity got to me … could have been the best example of how “curiousity killed the cat!” Well, as you know, I am writing this, so I am still alive. As I opened the door I held onto Kymba, and slowly peered out. Sure enough, our neighbour, an elderly man you many times need to lean on the wall for support to walk, was right there. Apparentely, he had touched our door or door handle, and Kymba was able to hear it all the way from our bedroom! I must say, as sweet as she looks in this picture, she would look very intimidating if she were growling at you!

p.s. Here is another article by barbie about a recent Kymba protection morning.

One of the more recent books that I have read is a biography on the life of Isaac Newton. Call me crazy, but I actually like this non-fictional stuff. As an engineer I have had to do my fair share of math back in school…which in the end all revolved around the infamous Calculus. Now I did fairly well in Math…heck I got in a minor in it…but I was amazed that a person could actually invent this so that he could solve other problems. Well, that is what Sir Isaac Newton actually did, and he did it by the time is around 24 or 25 years old. The odd thing was, he actually left London during the plague error to go back to his hometown, where he basically lived in solitude (as he did for most of his life), so he was able to spend countless hours inventing/perfecting calculus. The odd thing is, he didn’t release his papers immediately, so another person some odd years later tried to claim he was the first to invent calculus. Although today we believe Newton was the first, we use the symbols from the other guy to represent derivatives.
Some of the things that Newton is obviously known for is discovering, or better, describing gravity (which by the way was not the result of an apple tree as legend has it). Also, inventing the 3 main laws of physics, a reflecting telescope, describing how light refracts, writing Principia, and basically becoming the Father of modern physics.
One of the more interesting facts is that he served as head of the Mint for England for a while. During this time he engineered better ways to produce coins that could not be counterfeited…one of which was putting letters and/or symbols on the side of coins. The reason for this was that counterfeiters would shave off the edges of coin in order to get part of the silver, but not enough so that coin looked too much smaller. They would then melt this down and resell. By having words and symbols on the side, it pretty much end the run of the “Shavers.” All in all this was a great introductional book into the life of Isaac Newton. It is even a Pulitzer Prize finalist.

p.s. I’m not sure how many of you remember A&E’s 100 most influential people of the millenium back in 2000. Well, Isaac Newton did not get #1, instead Johannes Gutenberg, inventor of the Printing Press, received the title. I think Newton got robbed, although somehow I don’t think he cares.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away….WAIT! Wrong trilogy! Anyways, a long time ago I watched Part I of the Lord of the Rings movies, and I must say I definitely didn’t like it. It seemed to be the same fighting scene over and over, and I never really understood what the purpose of everything was. So, then and there I decided that I needed to read the books before watching the movies.

I started with the Hobbit…which is actually the prequel to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. This book was actually read to us in school back in Junior High sometime…it wasn’t really a graded class…just something to pass the time. Anyways, it was ok back then, but I guess it has gotten better over the years. So, in case you can’t put two and two together from that last comment, I enjoyed the book. It was one of those books that just had a good description of the characters and developed them very well, so that you actually felt concerned about what would happen. Obviously the whole hobbit and warlock thing helped also, but I still thoroughly enjoyed it. Since it was the prequel to the trilogy, it helped to explain what the Ring was all about, how it was found and what the overall purpose of it was. Obviously I then decided to read the first book of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

The Fellowship of the Ring basically continued on where the Hobbit left off, although not directly. The characters were the same, but perhaps older and the main character changed from Bilbo to Frodo, but Gandolf was still around protecting the Hobbits. This book ended up also being an enjoyable read, and definitely brought some serious clarity to what was going on in the movie. I mean I finally figured out where Frodo and his crew were trying to go and why. There didn’t seem to be as much fighting as I remember in the movie…actually I really only remember the one with the elves near the end in the woods. It was also interesting to see how my imagination pictured the characters as opposed to the book. I must say they nailed the character of Frodo!
One of the most interesting things in the book, although not directly part of the book, was the prologue. Reason being that J.R.R. Tokien (the author), describes how readers had pointed out some inaccuracies in his book and how he had to create a full map of everything he is talking about and how he edited things here and there to make up for some of these inconsistencies. I never realized people got so into things, and that an author would really change his book to suit them. So, in conclusion, the book was good, although I wasn’t so thrilled with the fact after reading 450+ pages of small print, that it left me hanging. Then again what was I expecting of a book that is supposed to continue on for two more sequels.

There is a ton of talks about embryonic Stem Cell research and whether it should be allowed or not. Well, here is a different view from what the media powers keep presenting. After reading this you may want to do some investing!

• Ron Reagan Wrong on Stem Cells
• California’s Stem Cell Scam

Well, after starting 0-6 (the worst start in the history of the franchise), the Miami Dolphins finally got themselves a ‘W’!! Somehow I just like using the letter ‘W‘ right now. Anyways, what was the sad part is that after they scored 14 points, they said it was their highest point total of the year so far! Well, they actually ended up scoring 31…which will probably end up being their highest point total for the rest of the season…but heck, at least they won’t go without a ‘W‘ (there’s that letter again ) throughout the entire year. With the Yankees blowing it, it was good to finally have one of my professional teams coming through!

Well, as most of you know John Kerry didn’t get my vote, but I think the following snide remark from his wife, Theresa Heinz, might cause some of those on the fence to lean more towards Bush in the end…especially the women. Here is her quote referring to Laura Bush…”I don’t know that she’s ever had a real job — I mean, since she’s been grown up…” As facts would have it, she was a school teacher and librarian for about 8 years back in the 70’s, followed by raising the Bush daughters…which is a full time job in and of itself.
The thing that amazes me is that Theresa is not someone that comes from the wrong side of the track and had to work “real jobs”, so why she said it baffles me. Obviously she has already apologized stating she forgot about the First Lady’s previous jobs, but the damage was done.

p.s. Polls show that if it were a race between Laura and Theresa, Mrs. Bush would win by something like 70%-30%.

Our friend Tom gave this book to me to read, not necessarily to try and sway me politically, since I’m already a republican, but instead to just make me laugh. This book is simply a bashing of Democrats and/or Liberals. She basically just goes from one thing to another about what Liberals say and do, and then proceeds to counter with facts and figures. I’m not saying everything Liberals say are false, she just happens to pick and choose and then disprove.
Since I wasn’t really into politics before moving to Europe, go figure, it was quite enlightening to hear about the different media outlets and the differents slants. Hence, I have become much more aware of the infamous media slogan called “the spin.” For those that don’t know, this is basically taking any event, good or bad, and spinning it so that it always comes out good for your political party.
I must say after a while I got tired of the constant Liberal bashing, but I still enjoyed the reading. I could only wish that I had all the notes and facts somehow stored in my head for easy retrieval at a dinner party where people are spewing off supposed facts about this and that.

A miscellaneous fact on this book is that it is 260 pages long, with 46 pages of footnotes…I could only wish that Michael Moore provided as many facts for his films. To be fair, I did watch Bowling for Columbine after reading this book. I agree with his portrayal that the media is to violent, and only seems to show bad things. However, I disagree with his portrayal that guns are the reason for violence. At one point he basically blames Dick Clark for the fact that a young kindergarten kid shot another kid in school. The background and facts leading up to his conclusion are the following:

1. The kid’s mother could no longer afford her rent, despite working two jobs, one of which was at a Dick Clark restaurant
2. Dick Clark’s restaurant was in a special program to hire people who are basically uneducated and can’t get jobs elsewhere
3. The mother moves in with her relative (brother I think) since she can’t afford rent
4. Relative leaves a gun out, and the kid takes it to school and accidentally kills another student
5. So Michael Moore claims it is Dick Clark’s fault for not paying enough money to his employees, thus causing the mother to be away from her child too much, which thus caused the death of an innocent school child

Somehow I don’t buy this. It is not Dick Clark’s fault that the kid’s mother left the kid in a house with a gun that was available. The mother should have checked the house, or the relative should not have left it out. Dick Clark is doing these people a favor by hiring them at a specific wage, which I’m sure is governmentally regulated, thus giving the mother an opportunity to stay off welfare, which is good for everyone. Just my 2 cents.