A Bigger ole hairy Friday

Yeppers, this is a bigger Friday than normal Fridays, because this is also a three day weekend. We are getting set to celebrate the Labor Day weekend and the unofficial close of summer. Although the school years have already started locally, I have always considered this the swan song of the summer and the gateway to autumn.

Tonight BOPARC will be playing their final summer movie under the stars tonight when they will have play Disney Pixar's Cars. This was a movie that I anticipated to be released so I could get it on DVD last year. If you haven't seen it, it will not disappoint.

WVU Football will officially kick off their 2007 run for the National Title when they will play hose to Western Michigan tomorrow at 3:00. With the addition of what could be three very large playmakers that are true freshmen along with the unstoppable combination of White, Slaton, Schmidt and Reynaud this could be a very interesting year. We have added the nations best High School Running back in Noel Devine as well as big time playmakers Jock Sanders and Brandon Hogan, who will be converted from QB to WR this season. It should be very interesting this year.

High school football sees both Morgantown and University High School traveling tonight. Morgantown will be heading to Brooke and UHS will be heading to Fairmont to play East Fairmont.

The Pittsburgh Steelers closed out their pre-season schedule last night and ran their pre-season record to 4-1.

Pam has now officially accepted a new job. She will leaving Neighbor Care in the middle of September and start working at Mon General. She had an offer earlier this week and she and George sat down and made a decision as to her future. I think she has made the right choice in the long run.

Sunday at Pro Performance Center, Papa Roach and Hinder will have a concert.

Have I ever mentioned that I hate snow? Note to self, send bribes to Punxsutawney Phil now. Nothing wrong with an early start. Is it softball again yet?

Have a great weekend.

First night of class was alright

I had my first class last night and think I may end up enjoying the class. The first class was more of a rah rah session than anything else. I think I will learn a thing or two from this class.

Wow did we have a heck of a thunderstorm this afternoon. My front door was open so that I could enjoy the smell of a fresh rainfall, but there was some lighting hitting pretty close to me. I think it knocked out the offices computer, I know it has messed up my cell phone reception because there hasn't been a network for a couple of hours.

Steelers will close out the pre-season tonight.

Midweek

We had our fantasy football draft last night and I am feeling pretty good about my draft from last night. I managed to draw the Ace (meaning first draft position) and took LaDainian Tomlinson with the first pick of the draft. As it snaked back down to me I got Drew Brees as a QB. Last year with our setup, there were three players who scored 400 points (Peyton Manning being the third) and I managed to land two of the three on my team this year. I think I also got a sleeper in former Oklahoma running back Adrian Peterson. I feel confident this year, hopefully I'll be in the money this season.

Tonight I enter a classroom again for the first time since I graduated college. I'm pretty sure that Gary has also signed up to take the class also. The class is one day a week from 6-9:00 on Wed.

Can you believe that there are two schools that have already started canceling classes for this school year. One in Keyser and Maysville Elementary but they canceled them because of lack of air conditioning. Give me a break, what did people do before classrooms were air conditioned? I don't know, how about opening a window?

We are now on the downside of the work week that will end in a three day weekend.

Fantasy Football Draft Night

Tonight Scott Barr will play host to a group of ten of us getting together to do a fantasy football draft for the 2007 NFL season. I have done a little more research this season and have actually prepared a spread sheet on player priority and where to draft certain positions for tonight.

I usually go into this blindly just carrying a fantasy football magazine, but I want to be in the money this year so I have done the research and can hopefully make it to the post season this year.

Another Computer problem

Nick called me yesterday evening and said that he was having trouble with his laptop. When you boot up, the BIOS was acting strange and kept asking for a password. The Bios is the initial boot that is on the motherboard that controls everything. So, nothing could be done. I even took a copy of Knoppix down to see if that could get around the problem. Much to no avail.

With phone support from Kim and Robert we all put our brains together and tried to solve the problem. Nick ended up having to call Toshiba and it is a defect that that machine has and they have to send it back to get it repaired.

WVU Football theme for 2007

New Domain name

I bought NickNTerri.com and am going to develop it for them based on the bar. I'll try to put a map, menu, beers served, schedule, hours and possibly a few pictures from band nights on it for them.

I have just started to develop it. Need to gather the information first. it is up and running though.

It's another big ole hairy friday

Once again it is time to cease the work and start the fun for the week as we are now at the weekend.

Tonight's movie on the Waterfront is Open Season. This is the next to last movie of the season, there will be a showing of Cars next Friday to close out the summer movie season.

For those of you wanting to see a little bit of Softball, Michael's team , Tailgaters, won a double header and have advanced to the semi-finals at 6:00 and 7:00 this evening at Whiston Field. They swept a double header last night running their season record to 17-4.

For those of you waiting for some football, Martinsburg will come to Pony Lewis Field tonight to take on the Morgantown Mohigans at 7:30. This game was originally scheduled to be played in Martinsburg, however they are putting down a new turf and had to move the game to Morgantown because production slowed.

Good luck to Mark Devault tomorrow in the Sprint Splash 'N Spin triathlon here in Morgantown. He's scheduled for a 9:50 a.m. start time.

For you school aged kids, enjoy your last weekend, school starts Monday.

I'm officially back in school

Well kind of. I have signed up for "Starting a Profitable Business" class at MTEC that starts Wed and runs through the middle of December. It's just one day a week for a few hours a night and it will give me a little insight on starting and operating a profitable business. I'm there just to learn the general model.

Happy Birthday Moke

If you see Moke today, make sure you wish him a very Happy Birthday, because today is his birthday. I haven't gotten a chance to talk to him as of late, he is now working the day shift at Ruby.

Happy Birthday Moke

Midweek tidbits

* Nothing really special today, just a day that is a little bit blaah. We are at hump day and starting our downward motion towards the weekend. However I am thinking about taking tomorrow off so that I can go to a ESRI User's conference that I have signed up for. It'll give me a little insight as to what is coming around in the world of ArcGIS.

* Moke is now working at the WVU Hospital. He started Monday but I haven't got a chance to talk to him yet.

* Randy has a job at Back Bay.

* I haven't got a chance to talk to him yet, but I hear Nick really likes his new job.

* I've been busy this morning at work. Running a lot of processes, and they are running much quicker than they have been. I guess this means less time just sitting around waiting for it to complete and me having to do a few more keystrokes.

* This is the last weekend before school starts for all the pre-college kids. Classes start again in Mon County on Monday.

Rainy Night

I was rather rainy last night, which could have made WVU's Fallfest an interesting event, especially with 25,000 college students gathered in one place drinking beer and listening to music. I kinda miss college one day a year and yesterday was the day.

Last night however we got hammered with rain showers, I was in Wal-Mart and you could just hear the rain beating off of the roof and see flashes of light through the skylights that align their ceilings. Where was my umbrella? It was at home laying on the floor. Lot of good that did me.

I was talking to Kelly yesterday afternoon and she was ready to pull her hair out. She said that they (the students) had invaded and they are coming from everywhere.

Local schools will start their school year next Monday. Friday Night the Morgantown Mohigans will play host to the Martinsburg Bulldogs in their first high school football game of the year.

Happy Birthday Jean

I would like to take this chance to wish Jean a very Happy Birthday and to remind everyone that today is Jean's birthday.

Happy Birthday Jean.

Foggy Morning

It's Monday morning and it starts out like any typical day for me when I walked out and got my morning newspaper, but this morning had a different feel to it. I can't explain it, but there is that crisp and cool smell that you can always associate with fall that I did smell this morning. I always associated the early morning smell with football season.

The visual effects could have been added this morning as I walked out and it was a little foggy out this morning. It just seemed like fall rather than summer. Of course today is the first day of classes at WVU so that could be a good indicator that the days of summer are waning and we are beginning to make the transition to autumn.

I don't mind fall or spring, I just wish we could have a couple days of Winter at Christmas and go right back to spring.

Maybe it has been foggy before, but I never seem to notice it anymore when I don't have to drive to Frostburg anymore.

Long day

Wow what a long and busy day. Trish Aaron and I went to the Gladiators game, they managed to win 18-14 and advance to the Championship game next week.

Saturday so far

I have to say it has been a pretty entertaining day for me so far and it started early. Trish called and one thing led to another and we ended up going out for breakfast this morning. Also has a nice little BS session, so the day started out nice. The Gladiators play tomorrow afternoon and we are planning on attending.

Late morning and early afternoon, Jean wanted to go to the chicken wing cookoff so we went and chowed down on some wings. Seems like every time I turned around I was running into someone I knew and it happened twice before I could even close my car door.

Tim Bowser was there parking cars for his brother and I saw an old college friend there also. She was there in her tight little cut off shorts to work for one of the vendors. Wow, they got my vote. I hadn't seen Bobbi in a couple of years since the last GIS conference that was at White Hall.

Not sure what is on the agenda for this evening yet, but I am contemplating going to Pittsburgh and to the Meadows, but I just checked their schedule and they just completed there season and won't start again till mid October. So much for that idea.

Big Ole Hairy Friday

Let the traffic headaches begin. Today is the day that the West Virginia Univeristy Dorms officially open up for occupancy. With classes starting Monday, this shoudl eb a traffic filled weekend.

There is no movie tonight on the waterfront, but instead there will be a free concert by The Greens at the waterfront. They were the winners of WVAQ's last band standing. The movies will return next week.

Tomorrow is the 14th Annual Chicken Wing Cookoff at the old Mountaineer Mall. It starts at 11:00 and runs till 6:00.

Tomrrow also there is a Giant Car Show at Mylan Park. Bigfoot, the legendary Monster truck is scheduled to be there.

Has anyone else noticed that the local prices have taken a significant jump recently? We're getting ready to get 27,500 students with new financial aid money over the weekend, something tells me the merchants are capitalizing on this. The TV I bought earlier this year for $179.00, was normally $199.00 is now $259.00 at Wal-Mart. Just an observation.

Have a good big hairy old friday.

30 Years ago today

Every once in a while, there is a date that we place in our minds that we will never forget. A date that has some kind of major significance and one you will always use as a reference point.

Thirty years ago today at roughly 3:00 in the afternoon I was in the backyard playing baseball. It was something I loved to do and did it on a daily basis as any other day.

I was living with my grandmother at the time as she was still alive. She opened the back door and came out on our back porch to tell me something she had just heard on the TV as a special announcement. Back in those days we didn't have the luxury of having 300 channels, we had about 13. You had the basic channels 2-13 and either HBO or Showtime, depending on what year it was. So when the networks broke in with a story, everyone heard it.

The announcement, Elvis had died. The legendary king of Rock and Roll Elvis Presley was found dead in his Graceland mansion. It became a date that I never forgot and helped me to remember other events on this date.

Ten years ago, Jackie and I went on our first date.

Where has the summer gone?

Wow we are already at the middle of August and we are a few days from being invaded for the next nine months as the WVU students will be allowed to start moving back into their dorms starting on Friday and classes at West Virginia University will officially start on Monday.

Traffic is going to start to get worse and there will be a lot more faces around town over the next few days. So my advice is to enjoy one or two more days of piece and quiet, because Morgantown's population is about to take a substantial spike here in a matter of about 48-96 hours.

Already equal to 2007

Wow can you believe this. I was just looking at my blog totals for the year and this post is my 258th post of 2007. I made a total of 258 posts for 2006, and that was for all of last year. I have tried to keep my blog active to give people something fresh to read on a daily basis and I think I have done a good job at it over the past year.

It really takes a commitment to be a blogger, anyone can sign up for an account, but to add life to the BLOG is where the magic is. Think about it, if a Newspaper was just randomly published would you buy it? I blog can be thought of along the same lines, there is no one magic post that makes a blog, it is the series of posts and their continuity that either breathes life into a blog or kills it.

Being a blogger can expose parts of your life that you may or may not be comfortable with in revealing. It can show your triumphs and your heartaches and tie them all in in a time frame. Just take a good look at my life during softball season this tear as an indication.

Keep reading and I'll keep posting.

This has just been our season

Well we took the softball field one last time last night, and managed to once again lose a one run game to a playoff team. We played them tough and had a three run lead going into the bottom of the seventh and let the first two guys one base to give up a Home Run to the third batter. The next three batters managed to single and with the winning run on third we pulled out outfield in. Guy hit a line drive to one of our outfielders who threw a bullet home to hold the runner at third. If he ran it would have been a double play because he would have been DOA. Their next guy singles and end of game, end of season.

I managed to continue my hot streak by going 4 for 4 last night and drove in a few runs, however I personally never managed to score.

Now the season is over and we enter the offseason. I have to ask, is it time to start the next season yet?

Found a nice little link

I found a nice little link for those of you in Morgantown wanting to either order out or dine out. It also let's you place your order at numerous Morgantown restaurants online.

DubVMenus.com

End of the season.

Another season has come and gone, the boys of summer are getting ready to enter of jobs of fall. Yes, once again the softball season comes to a close for me tonight.

This will be our last regular season game and last game of the season, we managed to drop a few games we shouldn't have and have been left out of the playoffs this season. We have lost more games this season than the two previous years combined, so if that is any kind of indication of the year we had.

Hopefully tonight we will be able to field a team because quite a few guys have other plans, considering that our season was scheduled to be over with last Monday. Maybe it's a good thing that we did not make the playoffs this season if we can't get enough guys there for a game.

I did just hear from Phil Kaskey who is with the womens basketball team in Austrailia, we women just won 98-50. I guess we can excuse Phil for not being at the game tonight.

Youtubes all time most watched video

Not too much to say today, and I wanted to post something. So, I was thinking to myself since YouTube is the internet's biggest video site, I wonder what was the single most watched video in the history of YouTube. With over 55 Million viewings, here it is:

Steelers tonight

The Pittsburgh Steelers will be playing their second preseason game of the year tonight when they will be playing the Green Bay packers tonight at 7:30. This will be the first time new Steelers coach Mike Tomlin will be coaching in front of the home crowd.

I'll be sitting and watching tonight in hopes of seeing who the next superstar is that may emerge from this team.

Fridays and weekend events

Woo Hoo, we are once again at that time of the week when we stop the working and start to enjoy the fruits of our labor, it is Friday and the start of the weekend.

There are a few things going on tonight and this weekend. Tonight at the Family Night under the stars BOPARC will be playing Charlotte's Web at the ampitheater on the riverfront. Bring a blanket and some refreshments and enjoy a free movie.

Mon county no longer does a county fair, however don't dispair if you are in need of visiting a fair, Mannington Fair, the states second largest fair next to the state fair, is off and running in Mannington, West Virginia.

For you local sports fans the Betty Puskar FUTURES gold classic
is currently going on at the Pines country club. Congrats to my third basemen Kevin Connolly for winning the Pro-Am yesterday at the event.

If you are in the mood for some Music, the Hillbilly Gypsies will be playing Chestnut Ridge park.

On a side note, my sister Kim called me last night, go read her BLOG and look at the size of the hail that they took pictures of from last nights storm. They did a great job at illustrating the size of the hail.

Have a great Friday.

A few tidbits

* Stopped by gary's last night and showed him Google Earth. It's the first time he's seen it and I showed him all the "ooohs and ahhhs" of the software and explained to him how everything works and why some things look the way they do.

* Renee has purchased another car. She has purchased a 2004 Dodge Durango. It looks pretty sharp and I'm sure they will be utilizing it pretty soon.

* I decided to re-upgrade to Digital Cable again. I downgraded about three years ago and thought it was about time to add a few new channels. I mananged to get a couple free months of HBO in the process too.

* The University Arts series has announced their schedule for the 2007-8 season.

• Wynton Marsalis --Sept. 10
• Wayne Newton-- Sept 23
• "Annie" --Oct 14
• Doc Watson-- Nov 2
• "Gypsy" -- Nov 4
• "RAIN, The Beatles experiance" -- Nov 7
• Peter Cetera -- Dec 3
• "Movin Out"-- Jan 16
• "Chicago" The play not the band, see Dec 3 for the band -- Feb 12 and 13
• African Footprint -- Feb 25
• k.d. Lang -- March 7
• "Hairspray" --March 8
• B.B.. King -- March 12
• The Peking Acrobats -- March 14
• America -- March 31
• "Evita"-- April 28

Wayne Newton looks to be interesting considering he plays almost exclusively in Las Vegas.


* Nick and Terri's will have a free Jukebox on Friday, DJ Dan on Saturday, mahlon Kisner on Wed and Undercover aka Strange Brew on August 17.

* The Hillbilly Gypsies will plat 6:00-8:30 at Chestnut Ridge Park. Cost is $5.00 for general public, $3.00 for campers and children under 12 are let in free.

* Reading the Sports page this morning, I have a feeling you will see a few true freshmen be seeing some significant playing time this coming football season.

Heat wave

Don't you just love this weather! I don't know if I ever mentioned this before, but I hate snow with a passion. This is my kind of weather, if it would just lower the humidity slightly, but I'll deal with it compared to the chilling snow that inhibits peoples travel.

This is one of my favorite times of the year, a time when you can sit by or in a body of water and just relax. However, I don't have a pool so I don't exactly have that body of water.

My front door is still open, just soaking in the beautiful weather and enjoying the gracious waves of summer.

Congrats Barry Bonds

America's most romantasized event of it's most romantisized sport has a new career leader as of last night. Barry Bonds who already holds the single season Home Run record with 73, last night surpassed Hank Aaron and hit his 756th career Home Run in front of his home San Fransico fans.

Happy Birthday Randy "Bub" Hamrick

If you get a chance today, make sure that you wish randy a very Happy 19th Birthday. I just talked to him and he and Moke are now rooming together and he is seeming to want to get his life on track. He's been working down at the Dominion Post as an inserter at nights the past few weeks.

If you have a MySpace account, you can wish Randy a very happy birthday through his myspace. Although I'm not sure how often he checks it. He and Moke's Phone number is 291-2789 if you want to give him a call.

Final double header last night

Last night was our final softball double header of the season. The weather was horrendous, at 11:30 last night when we finished up it was still in the 80's and as humid as an amazon rain forest. We played at 9:00 and 10:00 last night and you would think there was a break in the humidty, but there wasn't.

The first game we almost were 10 runned on a mercy rule and managed to come back and win the game. It's a team we've played against for a few years and always manage to get the better of.

In the second game of the night the opposite was true. We played against a team that for the fourth straight year we have lost a one run game to. I can't speak for anyone else, but I was just completely drained after playing a double header.

Next week is a makeup game and the end of the season for us. We're officially out of the playoffs and are once again teedering with a .500 mark with a 9-9 record on the year. Many guys will not be there next Monday, so we are going to have trouble fielding nine guys.

It looks like we may be losing quite a few guys next season. Preston is talking about making a change and accepting a job in Columbus, Kevin said that he was retiring from the game to play golf, Dan is being shipped to Iraq in December and who knows what else the off season will bring.

We're tlaking about bringing back former WVU Linebacker Alex Lake for next Mondays game.

Pictures from Josh's Birthday party

I uploaded the pictures from Josh's first Birthday party last night on my Picture Site. He looked like he had a great time, as you can tell he went to town with his smash cake, plus a little bit of help from Uncle Gary putting icing on top of his forhead.

It was raining all day, but that didn't seem to bother Erica Jean in the slightest, Gary seemed to bring her a battery powered squirt gun and she proceeded in making sure that everyone wasn't walking around too dry.

Overall it was a nice day despite Mother Nature not being too cooperative.

Josh's first birthday party

Val is going to try to have Josh's first birthday party today, even though his birthday was last week. I thought the weather was going to be cooperative, but a look outside and it is quite obvious that Mother Nature may be less than cooperative today.

I know Val has purchased a couple hundred balloons for water balloons today, so that is just a word to the wise for anyone that is planning on attending. New clothes might not be the wisest choice of attire for today.

I'll have my camera and do my best to make a few Kodak moments.

WV Gladiators final regular season game

The West Virginia Gladiators Semi-pro football team will be closing out their regular season scgedule tonight at 7:00 at Pony Lewis Field.

The opponent will be the Pittsburgh Pride, a team that captured a 10-12 victory against the Gladiators on July 14th in Pittsburgh. This game however will be in the friendly confines of Pony Lewis and in front of the home crowd.

The price of admission is $5.00 and those under 12 will be let in free. Come cheer on the Gladiators to victory and prepare yourself for a memorable local football season.

Weekend

Once again we reach Friday, the day when the work week comes to a halt and the weekend fun activities commence. Although for me I may work tomorrow to get myself a head start on a completetion date for a project I am working on so that I can assure myself I can make it by the target date.

Tonight BOPARC will continue its Family Night Under the Stars with a showing of the movie Barnyard. The weather looks to be very nice tonight, so grab you a blanket, the kids, some refreshments and enjoy a night under the stars at the Ampitheater with some loved ones.

My BLOG has now been syndicated as an RSS FEED as part of the Morgantown High Alumni ning site. Mark has started a couple sites on Ning, the alumni site being one one them.

I have also started a ning site for the Hall family. Feel free if you are reading this BLOG to join up to the Ning site. It will be a great way to communicate amongst the family hopefully.

Mountianeer Football practice starts tomorrow officially. The team will assemble tonight for the first time with the first official practice starting tomorrow.

Speaking of Mountaineer Football, one of the official preseason polls is out and we are ranked #6 in the country.

Enjoy the weather

Great weather

Wow has the weather been nice the past few days. It's been close to 90 and is supposed to continue to do so until next week. Have I ever mentioned that I hate snow?

However the hotter weather has caused me to go for my walks much later in the evenings when it is a little bit cooler than it is in the mid afternoon. I started last night at about 7:00 as opposed to the 3:00 time that I usually start at. This way I can get dinner made and eaten before I go out to the trails.

I stopped by the ballpark after walking last night, a few ex team mates were playing a double header and I stopped to see them. I got a chance to talk to Rick Cale and told him about Richie Varner passing away the week before.

I was talking to Brian Hill and he was telling me that his house was struck by lightning Saturday. It struck his back deck and put a hole in the roof, some of the debris even went into Braedens room.

Have a great day.

Tell me this doesn't bring a tear to your eye

Midweek tidbits

* I really haven't done a tibdits in a while, so maybe it's time for me to do one.

* Congrats to Josh Judy who picked up his first win as a professional yesterday. He pitched a couple innings in a suspended game from July 20 and got the win in the decision. So far in a little over four innings he has yet to allow a run and still has a 0.00 era.

* Josh's birthday party is going to be this Sunday. His birthday was last Sunday, but we are celebrating it this coming Sunday.

* Been a slow week at work for me. Really nothing to do and I have been sitting around and waiting for something to do. I prefer to be busy so the week goes a little faster.

* July saw me set a new personal post record for one month with 42. I didn't try to top it, I just happened to notice that I had beat June's total.

* Today is the 25th Anniversary of me meeting probably one of the most influential people in my life outside of any family. Jane and I met 25 years ago today.

* I see that my sister Kim has decided to switch a few things around in her cyber world.

* Anyone ready for some football?