Kitchen remodel 6/27

We are in the homestretch.

The new railing is in.





























Ironically, we don't drink much wine.













All that is left to do is paint the walls and other cosmetic changes (adding a dimmer for the center recessed lighting fixture, adding the moulding to the walls and base cabinets, etc.) , but the kitchen works. We have power to the microwave and electric cooktop.

I'm not the only one who hates Comcast

Another satisfied customer.

Kitchen remodel 6/15

The room looks like a kitchen
















We have a sink but no faucet. The plumber comes Friday to hook up the water. I never thought I'd be so excited about washing dishes ever.
















We don't drink much wine, but we have a wine rack.















The pantry doors will be stained the color of the cabinets at some point.

Kitchen remodel 6/6

Somehow, I haven't killed anyone at Home Depot or the contractor yet. I won't know what to do with a kitchen when it is finally competed.















Please ignore the paper on the window. The glare from it doesn't allow for a clear picture.































Allegedly, the people measuring for the countertops show up Thursday.

Line of the day

From Jason Whitlock, guest hosting on PTI

"...the Cardinals have asked rookie quarterback Matt Leinart to tone down his late night partying with no booty having billionaire bimbo Paris Hilton.'

Kitchen remodel 5/16

Please excuse the mess, the kitchen is being rebuilt.















The microwave isn't operational yet, but it is up.















Yes, the floor tiles have been fully installed.

Kitchen remodel 5/9

Progress is slow but forward.

We have a working oven! It heated up frozen potatoes sucessfully Saturday. Also, notice the lack of door to the right of the oven. It will be replaced by a simple frame.

It must be sabotage

According to the Daily News, the Knicks may be interested in pursuing Kenyon Martin.

On Tuesday, Martin did not attend a season-ending players meeting with Karl. Afterward, Karl said that he would like to speak with Martin but added that the six-year vet needs to get "mentally and physically healthy."

The Nuggets will look to trade Martin during the offseason and the Knicks and Heat have emerged as potential suitors. Denver, which desperately needs outside shooting, may be willing to take Quentin Richardson and Maurice Taylor's expiring contract in exchange for Martin, who is scheduled to earn a whopping $71.9 million over the next five years.

The Knicks wouldn't blink at such a hefty number, which is both a strength and a weakness of Garden chairman James Dolan. However, a defensive-minded power forward who competes on every possession is exactly the type of player Isiah Thomas would want to pair with Eddy Curry. Having Frye off the bench to back up Curry and Martin is another plus.

Nooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!

The last thing the Knicks need is an undersized, injured power forward with an attitude problem and a maximun contract on their roster. Isn't it enough for Larry and Isiah that they helped two teams dump their high priced players (Steve Francis and Jalen Rose) off their rosters?

Excuse me, I'm wrong. what would be even worse than have having the undersized, injured power forward with an attitude problem and a maximun contract on their roster is having the undersized, injured power forward with an attitude problem and a maximun contract on their roster taking time away from the Channing Frye. You know, the guy who showed enough promise in his rookie year to make the NBA All-Rookie Team?

They are really testing my loyalty.

Kitchen remodel 5/1

Please don't ask me why it took so long for this current post. I don't have the energy to go on the rant today.



Notice the removed soffit. The cabinets (if they ever arrive) will go to the ceiling.



The box our new wall oven will go into.

Marketing works

Today, I purchased a TaylorMade R7 425 driver. I can't hit my current driver straight, and there is no reason I should be able to hit this driver straight. But I did hit last year's version of the R7 well at a demo day, and the club looks cool. So I traded in my old drivers and got this one. Went immediately to a driving range and couldn't hit anything straight, even the irons I've owned over a year. I'm going to assume this is because I pulled a muscle in my back last week and this is the first time in a couple of weeks I swung a club with a outcome in mind.

Of course, in the back of my mind, I think I just wasted a bunch of money. Damn commercials.

David Toms - Whiner

David Toms is a very successful professional golfer. He ranks in the top ten of the PGA Money list and the World Golf rankings . Over his career, he has 12 PGA Tour victories and has made over $25 million dollars on the links. As a Louisiana native, he has been on the forefront of the golfing community, raising awareness and funds for Hurricane Katrinia relief. Under any criteria, Toms can be considered one of the finest golfers on the planet today.

And that is why his constant whining is so unbecoming.

First, at the Ford Championship at Doral, he complained players who drive the ball far have an unfair advantage on the course, specifically on the famous 18 hole where water beckons on the left side of the fairway:

"I just don't think it's fair," said Toms, who shot 6-under-par 66 and was two
strokes behind first-round leader Tiger Woods and one behind Villegas. "Why do I
have to hit into whatever that little fairway is and a third of the field can
just hit it as hard as they want to?"

Um, because it is a sport, David? Bigger, stronger, faster has always been the way of sports. Unless you believe players are cheating, or have access to different equipment that you, what leg do you have to stand on? How long should players be allowed to drive the ball, only as long as you can?

At least the driving complaint is rooted in his ability to make money at golf. Most recently Toms had this to say about the Masters tournament:

"To me, it's still a place where the players walk around on egg shells, not knowing if they are in the right place,'' Toms said Tuesday in a conference call. "They're worried about their cell phone being on, having to stop by the hut on the way in to scan your ticket, making sure you only have one parking
pass and somebody else doesn't get in there.

"It's the only place all year where the players don't feel like they're the most important thing there,'' Toms said. "That's the way I see it, and I don't think I'm the single opinion on that.''

Allow me to translate this for people who don’t follow golf regularly:

“It isn’t right that this tournament doesn’t kiss the ass of the players like other tournaments do. For a week out of the year the world is not my oyster and I’m not happy about it. Don’t you know who I am?”

There is nothing I dislike more as a fan of golf (and sports in general) is a blatant sense of entitlement. David Toms is one complaint away from being the poster child of the self entitled.

F*%k you, watch me

Jason Whitlock writes an entertaining column on the Page 2 portion of ESPN.com. His latest piece talks about the current season of The Sopranos. He isn’t too enamored with it because he feels the show makes him think too hard to understand it. Late in the article, he makes this comment:

David Chase has either forgotten why we watch "The Sopranos" or he doesn't care why we watch. It's probably the latter. He wants us to watch the show "the right way."

This should have been in the beginning of the article. Because David Chase doesn’t care about you.

Have you ever heard the phrase 'fuck you money'? If you haven't, it is the amount of money you would have to have to feel comfortable to tell anyone you don't want to deal with (bosses, spouses, parents, etc.) to fuck off, regardlesss of the consequenses. Chase has a fuck you show. He doesn't have to worry about ratings, since he is on HBO. He doesn't have to worry about actors getting pissy; none of them were such stars at the beginning of the series that they have many demands, most of them have been so typecast by the show they dare not leave (except maybe Edie Falco) and if any of them annoys him, he can just kill them off. He's killed off characters he likes, why wouldn't he kill someone asking for more dough.

David Chase is like Dave Chappelle in this way; he is a true artist who's art is wildly apprecaited by the masses. Because he did not have to compromise his art to achieve public acclaim, he can have three episodes of Tony Soprano dream sequences without worrying about any backlash. Becasue he didn't have to compromise his art, he can take two years off between seasons without batting an eye.

I enjoy the program. And when I hear people complaining about it, I just laugh to myself. Chase is taking us for a ride, and doesn't much care if you don't like the scenic route.

Kitchen upgrage 4/12

Not a kitchen, but an empty room with random circuits and duct work coming from the floor.

Kitchen Upgrade 4/9

The kitchen before any work has been done

It is hard to root for the Red, White & Blue

I’m a golfer. I like and follow professional golf. I’d like to think the average professional golfer isn’t a pampered, spoiled horse’s ass. Then something happens to make me realize otherwise.

The President’s Cup, a set of matches pitting a team of American golfers against their international counterparts, begins Thursday. The players have been practicing this week at the course hosting the event, where the following brouhaha occurred:

Presidents Cup captains Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player engaged in an animated
exchange over players signing autographs during practice rounds at the
Presidents Cup on Tuesday.
Nicklaus, who is captaining the U.S. team for a
third time, confronted Player on the driving range and accused the International
team captain of breaking an agreement to not allow players to sign autographs on
the golf course.

World No. 2 Vijay Singh, Retief Goosen and the
International team in general were seen signing autographs throughout the day as
they practiced at the Robert Trent Golf Course. Later, some U.S. team members
also signed for fans.

After talking with Player, Nicklaus told fans
around the driving range -- as he was signing autographs -- that some of his
players thought the Internationals where making them look "like jerks," said
Nicklaus.

…

The European team drove the U.S. to distraction at
last year's Ryder Cup in Oakland Hills near Detroit, signing autographs and
mingling with American fans as part of a major charm offensive designed to help
diffuse some of the hostility they might face during the event.
The plan
worked as the Europeans received a mostly warm welcome from the pro-American
crowd as they rolled to record-breaking 18½-9½ victory.

Let me put this in another way. The American team basically said to the International team ‘Look, we have no urge to be cordial to the people that help pay our salary by signing a few autographs, but we don’t want to be called out as the jerks that we really are. Could you not sign autographs either so we can pull off the scam that we can’t possibly tear ourselves away from practicing for a second? Thanks a bunch’. The International team agreed, waited for the American team to leave, called them a bunch of wankers/blokes/chumps/hosers and ignored the request. And since the America side is not just pampered and spoiled, but thin skinned, they couldn’t for a moment be seen as the bad guys and out came the Sharpies.

Mr. Nicklaus, if the International team has no problem signing autographs during a practice session and the American team does, the Americans don’t look like jerks, they are jerks. Also, Mr. Nicklaus, if the American team can't learn their lesson when competitors used the nefarious autograph signing gambit just last year, not only are they jerks, but they are dumb jerks.

A letter to Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele

This is the text of a letter I wrote to Michael Steele, the African-American Lieutenant Governor of Maryland regarding the late action of the federal government in helping victims of Hurricane Katrinia, specifically the ones in New Orleans

Lt. Governor Steele:

My name is Anthony Nurse and I am a resident of Montgomery County. I moved to this state in 2001, so I am not intimately familiar with Maryland politics in general or you in particular. I do know three things about you though; you are the Republican Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, you are rumored to be running for U.S. Senate in 2006, and you are black.

I’m sure you, along with the rest of the country, have watched in horror the devastation Hurricane Katrina caused in the Gulf of Mexico, particularly in New Orleans. I have been absolutely stunned by the late response from the federal government to help people stranded in the city without food, power or water. I’ve seen what this country can do for people in need both in and outside this country during times of natural disasters, and it wasn’t done in this case in a timely matter. The only difference in this case is the majority of the affected are black, like you and I.

Outside of rank incompetence, I can’t think of any other reason the federal government would be so lax in helping people, except that the pain of black people doesn’t mean much to them. The federal government which is currently controlled by your party.

I want to be wrong. I don’t want to be so cynical about the current leadership of this country that I believe latent racism would cause a delay in getting help out, but I don’t see any other reason. I don’t want to believe a man like yourself, who must have a level of intelligence and personal success to be chosen for such a significant post would willingly throw his lot with a group who thinks less of people that look like you and I. That is why I have written this letter to you. I want you to convince me otherwise.

If there is another reason for the failings of the federal government, I need to know. If there isn’t; if the rank and file members of the Republican party can’t be bothered to help black people, like you and I, in a time of desperate need, I can’t be bothered to vote for any members of the Republican party. Including ones who run for Maryland senate seats.

For the second post in a row, I’m talking about a fired radio host.

Michael Graham, who hosted a midday political talk show on WMAL-AM in Washington D.C., was let go this week. A couple of weeks ago, he called Islam a ‘terrorist organization’. He was suspended, and when he did not agree to apologize on air for his remarks, he was let go.

While I agree that comments were wrong headed, that is not what brought me to post. Instead, these comments made by Graham after the firing got me going:

As a fan of talk radio, I find it absolutely outrageous that pressure from a
special interest group like CAIR can result in the abandonment of free speech
and open discourse on a talk radio show (emphasis mine)

Ah, the old ‘free speech’ crutch. Used my many broadcasters when their comments get them in trouble. I looked up the text of the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of
the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the
Government for a redress of grievances.

No where in that text does it say a member of the media has to keep their job when they say something that offends people.

The First Amendment protects Graham’s ability to say Islam is a terrorist organization without being arrested. He could stand in front of the Capital building in D.C. and sing it to the tune of ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’ and not get sanctioned by the government.

Graham didn’t get fired because he broke the law, or because the Federal Communications Commission was breathing down WMAL’s neck. He got fired because WMAL decided Graham was bad for business. He got fired because the Council on American-Islam Relations, ‘special interest group’, was threatening to go after WMAL’s advertisers, i.e. cut off WMAL’s money. And since WMAL is a business, it took steps to protect the money. And if a midday radio host has to get the boot to protect that cash, so be it.

Here is a tip for Mr. Graham, Larry Krueger, and the next media member to wrap him or herself in the Constitution when they say something stupid and pay a price; when someone is paying you to say something, the speech isn’t free.

LeBron doesn't listen to Chris Rock

From ESPN.com:

Coca-Cola will test LeBron James' crossover appeal when the company puts the Cleveland Cavaliers guard on Bobby Labonte's hood this Saturday night.

A comic book character resembling the 20-year-old NBA marketing icon will
be plastered on the hood of the No. 18 car for the Sharpie 500 at the Bristol
Motor Speedway to promote POWERade's new James-inspired flavor, SourMelon.

...

Coca-Cola will be flying in James to see his first live NASCAR race.

"I really like the look of the race car," James said in a statement. "But I'm thinking we need to add some new rims."

We will never get ahead as a people.

Oh yeah, I have a blog

Some sports related articles have caught my eye recently:

KNBR, the flagship radio station for the San Francisco Giants, fired talk show host Larry Krueger. While station management gave other reasons for the firing, Krueger was a center of controversy for stating the Giants had too many "brain-dead Caribbean hitters hacking at slop nightly," during his post-game show. Giants’ manager Felipe Alou, among other Latin players in and out of the Giants’ organization, was publicly upset about the remarks.
Fellow KNBR host and San Francisco sportscaster Gary Radnich thought the firing was unwarranted and said the following;

"Felipe Alou got rolling, got a head of steam up, and in this politically
correct world, you don't get a second chance any more,"

Excuse me as I whip out the smallest violin and play a tune.

First of all, if you are a broadcaster and you are stupid enough to insult a whole group of people, you get what you deserve. Why should Latin people in the Bay area listen to KNBR if they are going to get insulted during a post game show?

Second, Alou did nothing wrong. Blaming him, however subtly, for Krueger’s firing is like blaming a mugging victim for reporting the offense to the police. Tiger Woods caught similar flack for not throwing a life preserver to Fuzzy Zoeller after he made the chicken & collard greens crack at the Masters in 1997. It is not the job of the insulted to bail out the insulter. If it is in the heart of the insulted to do so, like Yao Ming did with Shaquille O’Neal’s "Tell Yao Ming, 'ching-chong-yang-wah-ah-soh." comments in 2003, so be it. If not, tough luck.

Filip Bondy, columnist for the New York Daily News, takes the PGA Tour to task for the lack of diversity of players in the upcoming PGA Championship;

“Don't let the skin color of Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh fool you, over the
next four days of bleached television coverage. The top levels of this sport are
not getting any darker, any more diverse, any more accessible to minorities in
this country. Woods stands alone, in more ways than one.

As of early this week, there were 156 tentative entrants in the PGA
Championship, and 90 of them were from the U.S. Of those 90, there was one
Asian-American, one Hispanic-American and one Asian-African-American, who
happens to be the greatest player in the world. The rest were white guys. The 24
club pros who qualified for this championship were all white again, which tells
you that the mid-level pipeline is not pumping out diversity.

We are still seeing too many pros who had enough money to hire the
right coaches, or to grow up around a golf course when they were young. Woods'
success has not enabled or energized the black population to take up irons in
earnest.”

Okay, now what?

Is the PGA Tour doing anything to keep people of color away from the links? No. I believe PGA Tour officials would jump up and down in glee if they had more golfers of color on their tour. I watch a lot of golf (much to my wife’s chagrin), and I see a number of The First Tee promotional messages, bringing golf to places where it wasn’t played before (read: the ‘hood).
Is golf in general doing anything to keep people of color away from the greens? No. If you think golf coaches wouldn’t like to get their hands on the athletes that are currently playing basketball, football and baseball, regardless of color, you are crazy. If an Al Queda follower could hit a 300 drive straight down the fairway, he would get a college scholarship faster that you could say As sala'amu alaikum.

There are few to no golfers of color at the highest levels of the sport because golf is expensive (as I unfortunately know, it would be cheaper and less addictive if I took crack cocaine up as a hobby) and because golf has only become cool in the last decade, corresponding with Tiger’s accession to the top of the golf world. The kids who Bondy describes growing up with a club in their hands are in their teens now; too young to challenge Fred Funk and Sergio Garcia.

By the way, if you want to see the first waves of Tiger Woods’ effect on high level golf in America, look at the LPGA. The teenagers threatening to take over the women’s tour (Michelle Wie, Paula Creamer, Morgan Pressel) were in grade school when Tiger won the Masters. While 17 year old boys can’t contend on the PGA, 17 year old girls have been able to place well in LPGA tournaments.

I don’t see any solutions from Bondy on how to get more color on the PGA Tour. I’m not one to buy into the ‘patiently wait, your time will come’ idea of getting what you want, but in this case, patience will reap rewards.

From the rumors section of AllHipHop.com:

Mary J. Blige once had a classic album called No More Drama but, from what
I hear, she can still bring it. Apparently, Mary is fast at work on her next
album and was dealing with a younger R&B starlet. Something happened in the
studio and I heard that Mary issued a smack down. I don’t know who the younger
singer was, but if I find out, I’ll let you know.

Is it so wrong for me to hope this is Ashanti?