Football Fever

After signing us up for football on Tuesday I started to feel the Football Fever. So I went to Futureshop and picked up a copy of EA Sports Madden NFL 07 for the 360. So far I'm playing a franchise with the Seattle Seahawks (I think they are due this year) and I'm 2-1 in the pre-season on Pro difficulty setting (not bad at all, I usually set it on Easy). The game play is the best I have ever experienced for a football game and that definitely is a good thing ;) But this hasn't quenched by football thirst yet and I think I will do a football pool with the guys. I'll start thinking of something and set it up before the first game next week.

Flag Football Fall 2006

Another year goes by and we are looking upon another season of Intramural Flag Football at the University. We have played in the league for the past 2 seasons. The first year we made it to the first round of the playoffs but lost, the second year we didn't even make it to the playoffs since we pulled off a dismal 2-4 regular season. This year will be different, or so I hope! We are not going to be called the Crazy 88's/Yellow Fever this year, instead we have opted for the name Ocelots. Ocelots?! Well it is a clever Acronym developed by Todd M. It stands for:

Old
Can't run
Everything hurts
Lungs on Fire
Out of shape
Too tired to keep up
Slow

I know it seems a bit negative, but at the same time we are just poking fun at ourselves. However most of us will not experience this (hopefully) and I hope this will be one of our most successful seasons. I'm excited!

Go OCELOTS!!!!!

20"...

I wish it was that big, heh. Actually I ordered a 20" Apple Cinema Display last week using my students discount on the online Apple Store and it just came in today. My work space is ultimately geeky now! And yes I know...I'm a Mac whore. But once you go Mac, you never go PC ;)

My setup on my Desk

Multinova....

..oh how I love you. I actually got this a month ago. Too bad I didn't have my new rims on there :P

Wet T-shirt World Cup

I don't think I need to say much about this, the title explains it all. Go here for the contest!

P.S. I have a one track mind today.

Oh my...

I requested to be Jessica Simpson's Friend on Myspace.com and she added me. Oh my... hehe Tuyet's going to kill me!

Also the contest to meet her is only eligible to residents of the United States. BOOOOO!

A Public Affair

Mmmm Hmmm...now THAT'S what I'm talking about Miss Jessica :D

Cornbread Muffins

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 15 minutes
Ready in: 25 minutes
Yields: 12 servings






Ingredients:
1 3/4 cups cornmeal
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup white sugar
2 cups buttermilk
2 eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). Lightly grease or line 12 muffin cups.
2. In a large bowl mix together cornmeal, all-purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and surgar.
3. In a seperate bowl, combine buttermilk, eggs and vegetable oil; beat well.
4. Pour buttermilk mixture into flour mixture; stir until blended. Pour batter into prepared muffin cups.
5. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean.

Notes:
-First time I tried this recipe, it seemed like I used too much cornmeal, perhaps use less this time around
-Goes great with the Fried Chicken recipe
-Follow the ENTIRE recipe and INCLUDE the sourcream

Return of the Drive-In in YYC

I've missed having the drive-in up on 17th Ave S.E. They have been closed ever since the Hub Oil explosion in 1999. I used to go there all the time in the summers between grade 11 and the summer after grade 12. It was a great place to hang out with friends on a nice summers night while enjoying back to back movies. Now perhaps we are seeing a comeback of the drive-in? Race City Speedway is holding a drive-in night every Friday starting August 18th (today). Anyways here are the details.

Where: Race City Speedway
1550 - 68 St. SE - Calgary, AB
Tel: (403) 272-7223
When: Every Friday, starting August 18, 2006. Gates open at 8:00PM
Playing: Ice Age 2 and Grease
Admission: $10/person

Go here for more details.

I can't wait. I love drive-in movies.

Snakes!!!!!

Fantastic, absolutely fantastic! I went to see this last night at 10pm and I wasn't disappointed at all! The action is hilarious and the lines are fantastic. I would definitely check it out again and actually pay full price! Ahhh what a great movie.

P.S. I should get a tatoo of above picture on my arm, hahahaha.

Home Style Fried Chicken

Difficulty: Easy
Prep time: 15 minutes
Inactive Prep Time: 4 hours
Cook Time 25 minutes
Yield: 4 to 6 servings

2 Cups buttermilk
1/4 cup seasoned salt, divided
3 tablespoons onion powder, divided
3 tablespoons garlic powder, divided
2 1/2 pounds chicken (various parts)
5 to 6 cups peanut or canola oil
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flower

Method:
In a large baking dish (or big freezer ziplock bag), combine buttermilk and half of each of the seasoned salt, onion powder, and garlic powder. Add chicken pieces to marinade and turn to coat (seal bag and shake). Marinate in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours. If using baking dish then flip chicken every hour. If using bag, flip bag over every hour.

Heat the peanut/canola oil to 360 degrees F in a large cast iron skillet (a pinch of flour should sizzle when dropped in the oil, or lots of bubbles should form on chopstick when dipped in the oil).

Season the flour with the remaining seasoned salt, garlic powder, and onion powder. Remove the chicken from the marinade piece by piece and coat in the flour. Then add to hot oil to fry. Fry until internal temperature of the chicken is 160 degrees F. Make sure that your oil does not get too hot, otherwise the colour of the chicken will turn dark before the chicken is actually done. Transfer chicken to paper towels to drain. Taste the chicken to make sure the seasonings are right. Serve.


Notes:
-Try adding a few tablespoons of cayenne pepper/thyme/paprika to the flour mixture to liven things up.
-Make sure the chicken is a dark brown (everywhere) before taking it out of the pan
-Serving it a bit cooled down makes it very yummy
-Great for picnic eats
-Probably good to get a thermometer for the oil and chicken
-Fill the Skillet only about 1/2 way up with oil.
-Canola oil is a great subsitute for the expensive peanut oil

Paris Hilton - Stars are Blind

Is it just a cryptic title or meant to be artistic? Oh well whatever...enjoy.

Firefly Season 2?

I loved Firefly Season 1, but then it was cancelled. The writing by Joss Whedon was absolutely brilliant. Yet it was cancelled. Now there are talks that there might be a season 2 in the works! I hope it pans out! Check it out here.

100 x 100

I absolutely LOVE In-N-Out burger. Everytime I go down to SoCal I have to at least have it once or the trip down there isn't complete. However this guy (and his friends) took their love for In-N-Out to a whole other level. Click here to see what I mean!

Guitar Hero

I went over to Christians on Saturday for his birthday bash and it was a ton of fun. And while I was there they introduced me to a game I only heard of before through my brothers gaming magazine, Electronic Gaming Monthly. The game is in similar fashion to Dance Dance Revolution, Karaoke Revolution or the older Bust A Groove games but much more fun (my p.p.o.v.) as you use a guitar to "strum" out to some super great rock tunes! You don't need to be a good singer with great pitch or make yourself look like a twit jumping up a down, you just stand there with a guitar and "strum" away. I had so much fun with the game that night at Chris' that I impulsively went out and grabbed myself a copy (comes with guitar) and played for about 6 hours yesterday! The game is so damn addicting and sounds great on the home theatre. I definitely recommend that you try it, it's great for a group of friends (if you can find a second guitar).

Back to the game now!

My Vancouver Trip

I finally finished my little summary on my trip. It was a lot of fun and Vancouver is a beautiful city with lots of culture. Click here for my adventures in Vancouver aka the home of the Vancouver Casucks...Canucks, hehe.

DC Comics Superhero Stamps

I never asked for these but I guess my Mom remembered that I loved my comics so she sent me over a set of these. Way cool!

Thanks Mommy! hehe.

I'm her Daddy...

I haven't posted a video in a while so enjoy this one!

Back from Van City

Tired. I'm so tired right now. We ended up leaving Vancouver at 2PM MT and arrived back in Calgary at about 12:30AM Tuesday. The trip as a whole was awesome. Vancouver is an amazing place. I loved their downtown life in the day and night, I loved Stanley Park and the Night Festival in Richmond was amazing! I'm so tired right now though as I went to see the lawyer about the Condo Contract this morning at 8AM and really didn't get into bed until 4AM, so I will be writing about my trip to Vancouver on a later post. But now that I am back in Calgary all I want to do is head back to Vancouver!!!!

Vancouver for the long weekend

I left for Vancouver Friday afternoon with Tuyet and my little brother and we arrived in Richmond just before midnight. The drive wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. We took it easy and barely sped as we really could not speed as the roads were heavy with traffic for the first half of the trip (and my rental SUV couldn't really "speed" b/c it is a Hyundai Tucson...Hyundai...uggg). The roads were super windy (curvy) and at times and I was wishing that I had taken the accord (I ended up renting a SUV from Enterprise to avoid putting km's on my beloved car).

Anyways our Saturday is over now and we did half the things we wanted to do... shop, shop and more shopping! We will finish the other half of our "to do" things tomorrow (Sunday) and I will definitely recap everything when I come back (I can just gauge your excitement for the recap of my trip, heh). Tomorrow's agenda? More shopping and Stanley Park to watch the sun set into the ocean. Hopefully the weather holds up and I get some great pics!

Time for some shut eye now!

P.S. The atmosphere in downtown Vancouver is amazing, I wish Calgary's downtown was similar.

On an impulse?

The gf says that I bought this on impulse but I beg to differ. I have been wanting this lens for my camera for quite some time but never have gotten around to getting it. And since I was downtown already today I decided to stop by The Camera Store and have a look at it. When I saw the lens I wanted it and I bought it...so I guess that it was an impulse. But as my defense I have checked out prices on ebay and Vistek and it was a lot cheaper at The Camera Store!

Oh here is the lens, its a Canon WC-DC58N Wide Converter and it is for my Canon G6. It makes my camera look huge! Anyways I will post up pictures that I take with the lens so you can see the difference.

Oh Mel...

First you say that your movie "The Passion of the Christ" was not anti-semitic, but when you get pulled over and arrested for DUI you yell out anti-semitic statements. Me thinks that can't be good at all, heh.

Check out the incident and Mel news here

V for Vendetta

This is a great movie and it comes out today. I totally recommend it. Pick up your copy today! It's on at Future Shop for $19.99 today!