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For supper Monday night, I cooked the salmon patties and deviled crabs that we had picked up at Fresh Market. They were very delicious. Tuesday morning I woke up and felt like I had lice. I had scratch marks all over my face and neck. I am not sure if I did this to myself or if it was all rash. I took some benadryl and went to work. By 5 I was in bad shape. I got up Tuesday and took this awesome picture of myself. I did not go to work, instead I headed to Emily's clinic in Maben. Got a shot of dexamethasone and a prescription for more. Makes my first $4 Kroger prescription ever. Yay for 50 fuel points! The meds did not do much for me on Wednesday. By Thursday morning I was in a lot better shape. Now, late on Thursday night, my face is kinda cleared up, but I still have a lot of rash on my torso and legs. I am planning on heading back to work in the morning. The big question is, where did I get this crap from? Emily blames the crab I had even though I have never had an issue with shellfish. I blame the Lone Star Tick I found on my leg 14 days before the rash showed up. Lone Star's do no carry Lyme disease at least. It seems like I suffered from STARI, except that the rash I had was not correct either. Anyway I did not end up with a bacterial infection, just a lot of crazy itchy rash. Emily's diagnosis of a crab shell allergy may be the correct one after all. Who knows. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=954 Thu, 07 Mar 2013 22:24:20 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2013-03-07 22:24:20
Got up at 6:30. I dressed Eliza Jo in her maroon romper. The three of us made it to campus right at 8:00. Ben had beat us there from Madison by leaving at 5:45. I warmed up the grill and started cooking the bacon explosion. The heat was low so we had to start more charcoal to finish it. Also toasted the chicken and waffles on the grill. I learned an important lesson about the Kroger chicken. Kroger was out of the precooked strips that I usually get so I went with the "restaurant patties." The problem is that those patties have a slight pickle flavor to them. Not the best thing to accompany waffles and syrup. Other than that snafu, breakfast was great. I had the smoker lit by then and put the turkey on the bottom grate and the ham on the top grate. Shortly after getting the smoker going, we headed into the game. We ran into John Kennedy and then Jeremy Brown as soon as we got into the stadium. The game was rough starting out. Eliza Jo was a doll. Emily held her the first quarter and I took over in the second. Nearing halftime she was waking up and antsy so we got out as soon as the quarter was over. Of course we had to stop to get Emily two bags of boiled peanuts. We headed back to the tailgate where my smoker's charcoal was pretty much cold. I started new charcoal and pretty quickly had the smoker heated back up in the 250 range. Emily and I had Jeremy's TV so we did not miss any of the game. By tailgating north of Scott Field, we were able to hear good things happen about five seconds before we saw them on TV. Poor directv folks would have been another 10-20 seconds behind us. Right as the game finished, my turkey breast clocked in at 160. I took the turkey and ham off, wrapped them in foil, and put them in a dry cooler. Around the same time I got the pans of dressing and sweet potato casserole on the grill to warm up. Everthing turned out so awesome. Emily did a wonderful job with dressing and sweet potatoes. I was really happy with the turkey. It had a really strong garlic flavor on the skin side. The ham was a typical ham and everyone loved it. We finished the day off with pie that Jimmy brought. I was so full. So full.

Today is Emily and my sixth anniversary. I bought us a cast iron fondue set. because the sixth anniversary calls for iron and sugar. I made an awesome cheese fondue for supper. We used toasted Kroger texas toast bread and leftover smoked ham. Then I cleaned up the pot and made a chocolate fondue to count for the sugar. It was great. Yay food! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=953 Sun, 18 Nov 2012 22:45:26 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2012-11-18 22:45:26
On August 7th I took off for the afternoon and went with Emily to her last office visit before the birth with Dr Whittle. He set our schedule for the week by telling Emily to come back to the hospital the next evening. We came back to Starkville and had our last meal together as non parents at La Terraza. Spent a fretful Wednesday around the house tidying up. Drove over to West Point a little after 6. We picked up candy at CVS and then went to Dollar General for more candy, a small box, and some tissue paper. Emily used these supplies to put a gift together for the nurses on the short drive to the hospital. We checked in through the ER and got taken to a the same labor and delivery room that we were shown during our birthing class. I left Emily to move the car around the hospital and the nurse let me know that we would have room 23 for the night and after Eliza was born. Getting room 23 was AWESOME because is is the corner suite at the West Point hosptial. We got moved from the first room to room 23 to spend the night. We both slept horribly. At 5AM a nurse came in to get Emily up. She got a shower and we were moved back to the first room. The Pitocin drip got started right at 7AM. Pastor Hank came to visit us around 9 or so. My parents made it up by 11 and Daddy and I went to Wendy's to get some lunch. Afterward I was bad and snuck Emily some Coke and mints even though she was only supposed to get ice. Emily was such a trooper through all of the contractions she was happening. Dr Whittle came in a little after 6PM and gave us the verdict that it was section time. Baby Eliza was facing the wrong way and Emily was not progressing. So that was the scariest thing ever for us. Emily got wheeled away into the OR and I got put into the staging area to put on my scrubs. Sitting there with a mask and hairnet was one of the most stressful waiting rooms of my life. From there I was summoned into the OR and got to sit beside Emily's head. Lucky for me there was a sheet between me and the operating field. Horrible sounds came from the operating field. Dr Whittle told us that he had a smiling baby looking up at him. After a few more minutes he was able to show us a freshly born bloody baby girl at 8:05! She was a screamer. The nurses cleaned up Eliza in a corner of the OR and I stayed with Emily. They brought Eliza over to us and showed her to Emily and I. Then they let me carry her to the nursery. It was awesome! She was so calm. Her eyes were opened and they looked at me the whole time I was carrying her. After I handed her to the nurse, all of our family swarmed the nursery windows. Long after this, I finally realized my mom got a picture of me in the nursery trying to take off my shoe covers. It seemed like forever until Emily got out of recovery. She was so groggy. The nurse pulled Emily's bed up to the nursery window so she could see Eliza. I was so happy to finally see Emily and know that she was OK. At that point it was late Thursday night. Section patients have to spend 48 hours in the hospital. So that would be late Saturday night which made discharge on Sunday morning the earliest possible. So we got to spend two wonderful nights in the hospital. I purchased lots of fast food for Emily and I to eat in West Point. We finally got discharged late on Sunday. Getting home was the greatest thing ever. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=952 Fri, 24 Aug 2012 00:41:48 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-08-24 00:41:48 Tutwiler. Awesome old hotel that has been made up as a modern Hampton. Nicest Hampton I have ever stayed in by far. Best part was that I had gotten us a king suite with Hilton points. We had a corner room on the third floor. Was nice to rest for a bit and watch a few episodes of Pawn Stars. Supper was at Metro Prime, the steak place that we ate at for Bryan's bachelor party. It was excellent for the second time too.

Had breakfast at the hotel. The Hampton breakfast was pretty close to what I have grown accustomed to in Slidell on my work trips but seemed better. I guess it tasted better because of the nicer location up on the eighth floor. Then we were out for more baby shopping. We drove all around the Summit looking for the Babies R Us and finally found it at the old Bruno's. It was the motherload of all things baby. I have never seen so many strollers anywhere but Disneyworld. Hit a few more stores at the Summit and then had PF Chang's for lunch. Drove down to the Fresh Market and loaded up on some good groceries before heading home. Had to stop in Columbus to buy some more dog food so that I could pick up the heavy stuff. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=951 Tue, 26 Jun 2012 22:23:15 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-06-26 22:23:15 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=950 Fri, 22 Jun 2012 22:40:51 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-06-22 22:40:51
U-verse DNS is horrible. I learned this the hard way now that I am using the U-verse modem to handle DHCP for our network. What makes it worse is that the U-verse modem can not be configured to pass along any other DNS server than the ones they have defined.

The inlaws' Netgear AP died yesterday and I took them my airport. I set up time machine for them too with an old USB Seagate I had. The good news is that I have another airport ordered and on the way here tomorrow. In the meantime I've been setting resolve.conf on our macbooks manually to point to my local DNS server and I found an awesome new email to flush the DNS on Lion: sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder

Blew out another rear wheel bearing on the fixed gear on Friday's ride home for lunch. It was nice and crunchy. Today my new 6901 bearings were in so I put them in the rear hub. Put everything together and it felt really silky. I had noticed a little wobble in my bottom bracket and just happened to have a Tange 115mm in my stash so I replaced it too. During this replacement I noticed that my poor Dura-Ace left crank has a small crack in it right at the bolt engagement area. Years ago I calculated that I had 11k miles on it after buying it used on eBay. Guess I have gotten my money out of it, though I plan to get a few more miles out of it. I also checked on the creaky headset. It is in bad shape and will need to be replaced before too long. The brake cable was in such bad shape that I had to replace it too and the casing. Good news is that a little tune up let me see some larger problems and get a lot of noises taken care of. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=949 Mon, 18 Jun 2012 21:54:48 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-06-18 21:54:48
The biggest part of my porting my number was getting it to google voice. I ported it to google for $20. Once my internet service came back, I set up my google voice account on my newly purchased OBi100. Now I can make calls for free from my home phone base station. The biggest feature is that I can put the OBi anywhere in the house that I have a network drop. So far away from the nursery! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=948 Fri, 15 Jun 2012 20:03:44 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-06-15 20:03:44 sesser.net has its first new IP in years. This all started from a wish to move the home phone base station from the nursery where the home run phone line comes in from outside. My first step was ordering a go phone from Amazon. That was a whole $15. I added $15 of airtime to the go phone and started the AT&T process to port my home number to it last Wednesday. The rep scheduled the port for Friday and told me to call DSL support to keep my service from lapsing. My phone call on Thursday went well and I was assured that my voice and internet accounts had been broken apart. A little after noon on Friday, an AT&T rep called me and finalized the port to the go phone. We tested calls both ways and everything was good. Twenty minutes later, my DSL was dead. So I called DSL support and entered support HELL. Nothing worked. Eventually I was sent back to account services and found out that I was a U-verse customer and no longer had DSL. Seems like the rep on Thursday lied to me. The saddest part of the story was that I had to wait on equipment and could not install it until Tuesday night. To keep up with our desire for the internet tubes, I added the hotspot feature to my iPhone for a few days. The modem came in and I got it set up Tuesday night. So far it is really nice. It actually seems faster. There is less latency on my ping times to campus so this has to be a little bit better at least. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=947 Fri, 15 Jun 2012 18:32:03 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-06-15 18:32:03
On Friday I worked until lunch and then headed home. Wrapped up some errands at the house and then got on the road to Madison. I took 12 west until it crosses the Trace and headed south. Pegged my cruise on 50 and cars were still passing me. The best one was a Leake County Sheriff's car passing like I was sitting still. After a while I made it to Kevin's house and hung out with Michelle and Kato for a bit. Kevin rolled up on his motorcycle. We loaded up and headed to packet pickup. Then we explored the bike course. I felt like Cory was with us in spirit because his favorite thing ever is to drive a course the day before. Then we met up with the Sesti's and had some great hibachi. Afterward we headed to bed.

I woke up at 5AM. Kato really wanted some of my fruit cup. His temperament is a lot like Maggie's, wants attention but is very quiet about it. Kevin and I headed out a little after 6AM. Rolled into the course and was really surprised at how many people were already there. This was not a Cory+Jim race where we arrive before anyone else. The bike racks were pretty full but we found a good spot closer to the entry from the water. Because we were not going to wear bike shoes, being close to the water was actually in our favor. After a while the race started. We lined up near the rear because all of our swim times were going to be horrible. The swim course ended up being pretty shallow for the first leg. I was almost able to walk to the first buoy. I got out of the water a little ahead of Kevin and headed into T1. Got my shoes on and headed out right as Kevin got there. I almost ran over some mom wandering around with her kid in the transition area. The bike was AWESOME! By starting on the back of the swim, there was a lot of people to pass in eight miles on a bike. I lost count at 25 of people passed. It ended up that I had the 16th fastest bike in the race. Coming into T2, a guy in front of me nearly crashed in his dismount because of his bike shoes. I ran like crazy through T2 and I am sure I looked like a champ. A quarter mile out though the lack of bricking caught up with me. The first mile of the run was so hard for me. I walked a decent chunk of it. After the turn around I was able to run pretty well. As I got to the finish I was able to get a decent sprint in. Crossed the line and I got a drink and walked back a bit to cheer the rest of the crew in. Screaming at Kevin and Tommy to sprint to the finish was awesome. After I ate pizza and two Krispy Kreme's I found out that I had managed to place third in the Clydesdale division. Then I had to wait around for the rewards to get my nice little 3rd place ribbon. Happy day! From there Kevin and I headed back to his house and we got showered up. We went to Hamils for lunch. I had ribs, chicken, livers, and apparently gizzards as my meats. I did not realize what the gizzards were, I thought they were some kind of country fried steak strips. From there I said good bye to everyone and went to Fresh Market to pick up fish and lobster mac and cheese to feed to my sweet wife. I had a nice drive back up the Trace to cap off a great quick trip to Madison for a triathlon. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=946 Wed, 09 May 2012 23:17:50 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-05-09 23:17:50
This past weekend a group of the guys decided to take a quick trip to celebrate Bryan Ware's upcoming nuptials. Sesti, Kevin, and Josh came up Friday night and we ate some of the spicest pizza ever at Dave's. Everyone stayed at Bryan's except me so I stopped by Hardee's on the way over for a load of sausage biscuits on Saturday morning. After Bryan took care of his domestic chores of watering the plants and cleaning up the house, We drove to the original Dreamland in Tuscaloosa. We had to wait a few minutes for a table to clear out for the six of us. After we sat down, the waitress told us that we could take three slabs of ribs and then asked what sides we wanted. We went for all three, beans, potato salad, and cole slaw. Sesti and I ate until we felt sick. Everyone else ate just enough. Dreamland ended up being pretty cheap for the amount of food we consumed. From there we headed to the big city to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum. Of course I love old bicycles so it was really cool to see a bunch with motors strapped to them. There was plenty of awesome stuff to look at. All the while, there were a hundred motorcycles running around the track that the museum overlooks. Then we headed on to downtown Birmingham where I had gotten us rooms at the Doubletree. Yay for Hilton points! Bryan's brother in law Philip met us there and we headed out for dinner. It was a few blocks to walk to Metro Prime. This place was a lucky find, I only found it on the Thursday before we left. I wish I had had room for the Bacon Lolipops appetizer but all of us were still pretty full of ribs. I had the bone in filet medium rare with a side of lobster mac and cheese and it was awesome. I cannot wait to be able to take Emily to this place. On Sunday morning, our intention was to check out the Pancake House that was across the street from Metro Prime. The line was out of the door. We headed down to the IHOP on Lakeshore that was right up the road from Emily's old apartment at Wildwood Crossing. Of course the line was out of the door. Then we decided to scrap breakfast and just drive to Tuscaloosa to Five Guys. This was a great decision. Eating Five Guys with a bunch of friends was much more fun than my first time with just Emily. She really did not think it was so great. I am now a fan of the bacon cheese burger with grilled onions and grilled mushrooms. For dessert, Bryan and I headed next door to the pay by weight froyo place. We said our goodbyes to the Jackson crew and Bryan, Jason, and I headed back home. It was strange driving through Columbus on a Sunday knowing that Emily was working the clinic at Wal-Mart. Was a great weekend with the guys!

Weekend three is in front of me. The Soak Up the Sun tri is in Madison. My plan is to head down to Kevin's Friday night and we are going to run the race with Tommy. Going to be a new course this year so I am interested in how my no training time from last year will compare to my no training time this year. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=945 Wed, 02 May 2012 22:18:28 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-05-02 22:18:28
On Saturday morning Tommy and I made a nice ride on the 389/County Lake/Old 12 loop. Emily spent the day shopping for baby stuff with her mom. When I got home, I got a leftover can of paint and went to town on the eaves on the back of the house. After that I built an 8x4 raised bed box for Emily out of decking boards from Lowe's. Then I worked on supper prepwork. I made bacon/scallop/mushroom kabobs for me and bacon/scallop/pineapple kabobs for Emily. I also cut up squid that I Kroger had last week into rings. We went to the Garraway's and grilled the kabobs and I carried a fryer to make calamari. My kabobs were great. We learned a lesson that pineapple + scallops makes a gross combination. The calamari turned out pretty good. Next time I plan to use a finer grained breading than panko though.

This morning was better than a usual Sunday because Emily did not have to be at choir until 9. I helped out with media in the booth and had my first experience with MediaShout 4.5. Service went smoothly. While it was still going I got to go outside and help spread out 1000 eggs across the front lawn. The kids came out and had a blast. Afterward we had Mexican for lunch with the Smith's. Got back to the house and had the best Easter afternoon nap ever. Emily and I went to Lowe's for plants and dirt to fill the box. We planted banana peppers, jalapenos, watermelon, and okra. I had to go back and buy more dirt to finish filling the box. Right now I am about $40 in wood building the box and $30 in filling it with dirt. Let us see if we ever make this much out of it in food :) We capped the weekend off by eating China Garden with Nathan. Great times! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=944 Sun, 08 Apr 2012 22:04:45 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-04-08 22:04:45 article about local universities and their emergency notification systems. Neat because I configured the backend for Maroon Alert emails in '08 or so when I worked for Network Services at ITS. I also wrote a little translating script so that from inside banner, a person could confirm that alerts via text to their phone will work. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=943 Fri, 06 Apr 2012 10:30:38 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-04-06 10:30:38
http://toporoute.com/cgi-bin/bicycle.cgi?routeKey=GLRLBBJMYRXUALA

Emily has a cardiology thing all day in Tupelo today so she suggested I bring my bike and ride home :) I have complained that I never have time on Saturday to get a good ride in so look at her being supportive of my filthy habit. One mile from the hotel I flatted. I blame the rail road tracks, the gap was huge. I found a nice spot on the edge of the Kroger parking lot to work on the tire. Was a double puncture pinch flat. Of course at first I blamed an old patch and replaced it. So then two more patches to fix the pinch. Three miles in, I was on the Trace. Everything was great. Then one of my new patches let go 21 miles in. I replaced the tube on a muddy bank where the mosquitos were horrible. My intended water stop was Witch Dance on the Trace but the water fountain was not functional. I was not sure if the bathroom water was potable so I did not bother to fill up my bottles. I knew the gas station at Montpelier was not too far away. Somewhere on 389 I came across Murray's Grocery, a small beer shack / snack store out in the county. Got a Gatorade and a water for a whole $1.75. The ride the rest of the way in was pretty much uneventful. I was starting to really hurt after passing Pheba and was psyching myself out over the last 389 hill climb into Starkville. I took a good long rest on a bridge guardrail in sight of the climb and it ended up not being bad at all. The only casualties of this ride are three Park Tool tube patches, one tube, and a sunburned left elbow. Also I plan to be asleep around 7:00 tonight. I need to get a more comfortable saddle for long rides. Maybe need a Brooks on my racing bike that I can always change out for a plastic saddle for triathlons.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=942 Sat, 31 Mar 2012 16:18:38 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-03-31 16:18:38 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=941 Sat, 24 Mar 2012 19:16:14 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2012-03-24 19:16:14 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=940 Wed, 28 Dec 2011 16:36:22 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2011-12-28 16:36:22 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=939 Tue, 31 May 2011 21:53:31 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2011-05-31 21:53:31 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=938 Mon, 14 Feb 2011 20:56:58 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2011-02-14 20:56:58 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=937 Mon, 24 Jan 2011 21:20:47 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2011-01-24 21:20:47
Woke up this morning and remembered that we were going to eat lunch after church today. So I made a 8AM Kroger run while Emily got ready to leave early for choir practice. We decided on two dishes that I am good at churning out: mashed potatoes and baked beans. I made the potatoes from a mixture of a couple large russets and about three pounds of red potatoes. Seems like mixing types makes the texture better. Afterward I mashed them with my hand mixer with a stick of butter, two packages of herbed goat cheese, costs half as much as Boursin so more bang for the buck to get two, and a good splash of organic Kroger whole milk. I dosed it up with a good helping of chives to give it some more green flecks. After I put the potatoes in the serving dish, I shook some paprika over the top for color. Apparently the potatoes were well liked because the dish was almost licked clean. The baked beans were my usual; heavy on the onion and bacon. I made them a little spicy this time with a dash of my homemade dried habanero powder. They were mostly gone too so must have been at least decent.

]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=936 Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:43:59 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-07-25 21:43:59 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=935 Sat, 24 Jul 2010 15:27:42 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-07-24 15:27:42 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=934 Sat, 24 Jul 2010 15:05:12 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-07-24 15:05:12 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=933 Sat, 24 Jul 2010 15:04:49 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-07-24 15:04:49 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=932 Thu, 15 Jul 2010 20:53:03 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-07-15 20:53:03
Just got back from backpacking into the Walls of Jericho in Alabama. It was awesome! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=931 Fri, 18 Jun 2010 13:51:02 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2010-06-18 13:51:02 Spinach Chicken Parmesan which is perfect because we already had all of the ingredients. In fact already had green onion chopped up waiting to go into something! Also got some cornbread and black eyed peas cooking.

On the subject of food, I came up with something awesome the other day. Filet mignon pinwheels with Boursin and spinach (see this is why I had spinach already!). This turned out to be an incredibly tender way to cook a piece of filet and with these instructions seems to put it a little over medium well done.

• 1 filet (works for two people)
• Boursin cheese
• baby spinach
• toothpicks
• 3tbs butter, nuked until melted
• salt/pepper
• 8" cast iron skillet

Heat oven to 425F. Butterfly the filet, getting it as thin as reasonably possible. Separate the small piece of meat connected by fat if there is one and flatten it out. Just end up with a few pieces of ~3/8" meat. Put a thick layer of Boursin on the top of each piece of meat and then add a blanket of spinach. Roll each piece up as well as you can and pin with a toothpick or three and place into the skillet. Stand up the short pieces of meat and lay down the long ones. Drizzle the melted butter over the meat and the salt and pepper a bit. 20 minutes in the oven and you are done! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=930 Thu, 11 Feb 2010 19:21:13 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2010-02-11 19:21:13 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=929 Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:34:19 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2010-02-05 15:34:19

• olive oil
• garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 cups brown lentils
• 1.5 quarts chicken stock
• 1 can fire roasted tomatoes
• ~1 lb potatoes diced
• 1 lemon, zested and squeezed
• fresh parsley, chopped
• spinach leaves, a few handfulls
• feta cheese

Heat up a splash of olive oil in a heavy pot. Throw in the garlic and let it cook until it is just starting to brown on the edges. Add the lentils, chicken stock, and tomatoes. Let boil for a bit, covered. (at this point I actually turned the stove off and let everything sit so that we could go to church and work out and had to bring it back to a boil) Then add the potatoes and boil until they are done. Chop up the lemon zest, add it, the lemon juice, and the chopped parsley. Stir a bit and add the handfulls of spinach. Keep cooking until the spinach wilts. Serve hot, garnishing with the feta cheese and fresh cornbread.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=928 Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:45:17 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2010-01-12 21:45:17 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=927 Thu, 07 Jan 2010 16:02:36 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2010-01-07 16:02:36 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=926 Fri, 25 Dec 2009 20:46:27 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2009-12-25 20:46:27 Motobecane Messenger in pink. It took me a little while to put together even though it came half assembled. It is amazing that it was only $299 for the apparent quality of the components. The fit is still a little long for Emily so I am going to replace the stem with a shorter one and move the seat forward a little. For a bike this small, 49cm, it is strange that it came with such a long stem and bars that seem to be pretty wide.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=925 Wed, 09 Dec 2009 21:40:14 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2009-12-09 21:40:14 Clarion Ledger.

Crazy that MSU has more black students, 3,622, according to the IR report than Alcorn State has students total, a mere 3,250! ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=924 Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:26:15 -0600 tag:sesser.net,2009-11-20 22:26:15 Emily and I have been to Hot Springs so we decided to try it out again with the Waldroups. Friday started with me going to class at 8:00 to catch the test review. Of course Emily wasn't ready when I got home but at least we got on the road a little before 10:00. Had a nutritious breakfast of chicken strips and potato wedges at Smokey's, the gas station that sprung up in the middle of nowhere between here and Tupelo. Memphis sucked because of the traffic due to construction and wrecks on 55 but we finally made it to Texas de Brazil. It was awesome as usual. Double awesome because we got it at the lunch price! After that Emily killed some time going to two of the stores left at Peabody Place. That "mall" is totally going to be completely dead soon. Maybe they just need some stimulus cash. From there we headed on over to Cabot and made pretty good time on 40 with all of the big trucks. I started using the GPS to set my cruise because according to it, the Accord's speed is 5mph off at 70. We got there and got a tour of the new Volvo and I got a tour of Cory's sweet new bike parts. After a while, two more couples came over and we had loads of fun eating cheese and olives.

After a wonderful night of sleep with no doggies to wake us up, we got up around 9 and had an awesome breakfast of cheesecake. We watched the episode of Glee Emily and I missed last week, I guess Tivo thinks Mythbusters is more important. After a bit we got on the road to take a detour to Pinnacle Mountain on the way to Hot Springs. Google's Street View makes it look impressive. We were going to take the western trail but there was a festival going on near that side which made the parking be not free. So we drove around to the eastern summit trail and headed up. The sign said it was only a 3/4 mile trail. That is not bad at all until you add in the fact that it ascends nearly 1/4 mile in that distance. The first half of the trail was dirt and rock strewn like I had expected. What I did not expect was to be on all fours climbing up boulders. It was a great adventure and I made it to the top even with my fear of heights. We made an executive decision to descend on the less steep western side to the bottom and then take the base trail around back to the car. It was a blast, most fun I've had hiking in forever. From there we grabbed some food at a burria to place that is a chain around Little Rock and drove on to Hot Springs. Checked into the Arlington and sent the girls on their way to their spa appointments. After a bit Cory and I went to the basement for our haircut appointments. They were slammed busy so I had to wait on Cory to be done before I got my turn. The big news down there was that Bill Clinton had come through a little while before as he was staying there for his class reunion. Walked around bath house row for a little while and ducked inside a bar to watch the end of the Florida / Arkansas game. After the girls were ready, we walked back down the strip to the Porterhouse that Emily and I had found on our last trip. It was a good thing we had a reservation because it was pretty busy. Both couples ordered the porterhouse for two which was a pretty good deal with the amount of food that came with it. We ordered ours medium instead of my usual medium rare for Emily's taste and somehow there was a bit more char on the outside of the steak than there should have been. But it was still good. And the lamb chops were the best I've ever had because they were the first! The service was awesome so I was not disappointed at all. After that we walked back down the strip and went into a few strange shops that were still open. Called it a night and Emily and I slept like logs.

I got up on Sunday morning and had the adventure of an Arlington shower. They are pretty small tiled enclosures with the shower head a whole 5'6" or so off of the ground. It was not as bad as I thought it would be. All in all I thought the Arlington was pretty good, but that was because I was expecting it to be an adventure. David had told me not to expect much out of it as compared to the Eola in Natchez. It definitely could use some work though. The bathroom in the room was interesting. From the pattern of the floor tile you could tell where the original bathroom ended and they tried to tie in more tile when they expanded it. The original bathroom was just the toilet and sink and the shower stall was added later! The "fire escape" map on the door confirmed this as it indicated a much smaller bathroom with the closet in a different location. Kinda makes sense that the rooms did not have showers in them once upon a time since the place was set up for spa bathing. Anyway we checked out and then headed to Granny's Kitchen on bath house row for breakfast. Cory and I found some on street parking that the Volvo used its sweet parking camera to get us in inches from the curb. The food was awesome and fatty, two orders of peanut butter pancakes, one of strawberry pancakes, and an awesome omelet full of meat and cheese with grits for me. The service was so so. From there we crossed the street and checked out the museum bath house for a while and the a few more shops. Got back on the road headed to Cabot and saw signs for the Pharaohs exhibit. So of course Cory called to see that it would be open and we decided to go. It was really neat, the first time I've ever seen a real mummy as far as I know. By then it was getting so late that it was time to eat again so we went to the Flying Saucer and got some good German food. Eventually made it back to the Waldroups' house and got back on the road. Eating before we left really paid off, we did not stop until Holly Springs on the way back for a break and more gas. All in all it was an great trip for us for a somewhat quick weekend getaway!]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=923 Tue, 20 Oct 2009 20:04:31 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-10-20 20:04:31 NeweggHotDeals is following me now on the twitter. They have 20k+ followers and are only following 864. So that puts me in an exclusive club right?]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=922 Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:24:13 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-10-13 20:24:13
As my favorite pair of jeans are deteriorating precipitously, I won another pair on eBay and was able to pay for them now that Paypal has reverified my ability to send money. They came in today and are exactly what I expected.

Of course the worst part of today is that the white MacBook's hard drive is failing. It still boots, but very slowly. After it boots I can't run anything but Terminal, everything else bounces in the Dock and never loads. dmesg indicates that there are read errors on the hard drive. So I ordered a new 250 gig to replace this failing 80 from newegg for a sweet $55 with free shipping. And because it will likely ship from Memphis tonight, I should have it at lunch tomorrow and have a functioning laptop pretty soon.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=921 Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:46:47 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-10-13 19:46:47
The tailgate was awesome this weekend. Tommy and I got out on Friday afternoon and put up three tents right at 5. There were nine of us who met up for dinner at the Veranda later on. I had the shrimp and grits which were weird. Instead of what I expected of a usual shrimp and grits, the grits were deep fried wedges and everything was in a soupy mess of some sort of butter/broth sauce or something. Got up early on Saturday to run the "Get in the Game" 5K with Tommy, Luke, and Jessica. It was five laps around the horse track at the horse park. I ran a slow 28:00 according to my watch which is a whole 3:05 off of my PR, but this is the first time I think I have actually ran a whole three miles in a long time without any walking breaks. I got back to the house and got cleaned up so that Ben and I could head out around 10AM. The tailgate site was great, and once the Garraway's showed up we had a four tent compound. Of course I had forgotten the Directv receiver at home so I got David to drive me there to pick it up. Back at the tailgate it was an adventure to get the satellite aimed but it worked out. The first round of food was done then, mini burgers and hot dogs, so we had a bit to eat. Around 2PM Bryan and I rode back home on bikes to let all of the dogs out. By the time we got back it was fajita time which was awesome! There was so much food! Eventually we went into the game. Emily sat with us during most of the first half and finally went up to the portal to watch it and not be crowded. It was a decent game even though we fumbled nearly every possession. Bryan and I finally left as the fourth quarter started. All in all it was a great tailgate. And we will always remember the scary old lady who came and saluted our flag. It was creepy.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=920 Sun, 04 Oct 2009 21:58:01 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-10-04 21:58:01 The Veggie Tales Theme Song as sung by Rebecca St. James is awesome! Also I've been listening to Polite Dance Song by The Bird And The Bee over and over and over. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=919 Fri, 25 Sep 2009 18:27:01 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-09-25 18:27:01 Glad ForceFlex with OdorShield trash bags? I think I am really that domestic now. Well really the cheapo Kroger bags that we just finished up sucked so bad. I've got high hopes for these wonders of technology to cover up the smell of puppy poop.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=918 Sun, 20 Sep 2009 23:01:00 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-09-20 23:01:00 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=917 Wed, 16 Sep 2009 18:41:57 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-09-16 18:41:57
Awesome night ride tonight. Seven of us this week. The pace was picked up this week since there were no mtn bikers. Way hotter this week too. I can't wait until it cools down some.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=916 Tue, 08 Sep 2009 21:57:49 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-09-08 21:57:49
Aunt Sue's funeral was on Wednesday so I got up early and drove to McComb in the Toyota. David and Deborah were in a hotel down there so I me them and got into my suit. We were way ahead of schedule so the three of us went to the mall to waste some time. Was a productive trip because David found a new jacket and I found a MSU polo on super sale. We met up with Mom and Dad at the church in Summit. There was a ton of food for the family and we all got a little to eat. Afterward we went back into the church. There were so many people and more flowers than I have ever seen at a funeral. Dad said that at least a third of the flowers were missing from the visitation from the night before. It had been a few years since I had seen Aunt Mildred and I sure can't remember the last time I saw her and Granny in the same place at the same time. After the service I got on the road headed home. I got back on 55 in McComb and saw the funeral procession heading south on 55. Filled up with gas in Brookhaven and found that the 20 year old Toyota had made 31 MPG! I finally made it back to Starkville after dark, in all covering 400 miles in a day when the truck had only moved 1000 this year before this trip.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=915 Sun, 26 Jul 2009 13:42:24 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-07-26 13:42:24
On the way home, I floored the Accord to pass some slowpoke on Hwy 16. After that we could tell that the car was not idling right at all or having much power to get up hills. This morning I drove Emily to work in the trusty Toyota before 7AM. I worked on the car a bit, added Seafoam to the gas and for the first time ever ran a portion through the intake via the brake booster hose. This was scary but we apparently effective in cleaning up whatever has had the "check engine" light on for years. The car still had a rough idle. Then at church the "good" microphone had a fit during Kidz Church and did not cooperate. After church I went to Autozone and got a PCV valve (redundant?) and replaced that. The idle problem appeared to be solved until I put it in gear and it began to idle roughly. That's when I took some Zaxby's out to Emily at work. I called mom while driving and she said that she'd call me back. After I got home she called to let me know that Aunt Sue had passed away. They were on their way to Granny's to tell her. I have not heard anything past that. I got back in touch with Emily at the hospital to let her know. Mr Joe called me a little while later and I let him know too. In the meantime I kept working on the stupid Accord. I removed the throttle body and its myriad of vacuum hoses and electrical connections to get to the IAC valve on the bottom to clean it. After reassembling everything, it still doesn't work right so it is possible that the IAC is broken or about 10 other things could be wrong. Stupid car for working at 1k+ RPM but sucking for anything under. Today has not been the best day every for many people.

I don't know what this week is going to bring. Cory and Sarah will be here Wednesday night. It will be the first time for us to see Cory since last July since he has been overseas a bit in between. I have no idea what the plans will be for Aunt Sue.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=914 Sun, 12 Jul 2009 22:45:49 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-07-12 22:45:49 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=913 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:45:29 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-07-01 22:45:29 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=912 Tue, 30 Jun 2009 22:56:43 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-30 22:56:43
In all the fun last week I managed to nearly destroy one of my toenails. I was just locking up my bike after the crazy long work day and bumped the tire with my left foot. It made my second toe's nail point up at an angle. I think it needs to fall off. I'm sure not going to let Emily pull it off like she volunteered to do. I've kept it band-aided with antibiotic ointment which makes me feel better at least. But I come near crying when I catch it putting on a sock. I've got to heal before I can race and run seven miles!]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=911 Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:51:40 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-30 19:51:40
Also this week, there was a horrible rain cell that came through at 5PM on Tuesday. I had my helmet tail light with me so I figured I could make it home. Biggest problem for me was that I had my dark lenses in my glasses. So I was in a position of protect my eyes from laser rain but not see because of the darkness of the lenses. I headed out because I am brilliant. This was the hardest sideways with waves on the ground I have ever ridden in. I survived and made it home even though everything on me was soaked. In fact my shoes had ~1/4" of water standing in them once I took them off. My phone/iPod did survive in my bags zippered pocket even though the rest of the bag was soaked!]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=910 Sat, 27 Jun 2009 17:22:41 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-27 17:22:41 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=909 Sat, 20 Jun 2009 17:13:07 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-20 17:13:07
I'm going to Disney World! Booked the Caribbean place this morning with the travel agent. ]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=908 Mon, 15 Jun 2009 21:55:38 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-15 21:55:38
I'm so ready for Phi Mu Alpha's national convention! Going to be a sweet Orlando/Disney vacation!]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=907 Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:42:25 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-14 17:42:25
For the last weekend of May we had the first annual "train trip to New Orleans." With a $44 roundtrip fare from Jackson it is a win win deal. Jimmy came over on Thursday and us with Tommy checked out the new UMI's new hibachi grill. Jimmy rode down with us to Madison where we picked up the Sesti's. We were so ahead of schedule that we killed some time at the Renaissance by dropping the girls off at Ann Taylor's. After the males of the group killed some time in the grocery store we picked up the girls and headed downtown. I dropped everyone off at the train station and managed to meet up with the Gray's in the parking garage one block up Capital. The cars were so thick we were parked on the 4th level. The train ride was crazy smooth. I had no idea that a train would feel so good. Especially compared to a plane as huge as the seats were. New Orleans was great. Emily and I had great meals at the Bourbon House on Friday night, Deanies late late Friday night with the Garretts, the Coffee Pot (at 714 Saint Peter) for breakfast on Saturday, a cash only place on Decatur that I do not remember the name of where I had a wonderful burger, Remoulade for Saturday's supper, and at the Palace Cafe for brunch on Sunday. The trip was a success. Everyone had a wonderful time and we really enjoyed getting to see the Aquarium yet again and the WWII museum for the first time. It was a wonderful trip made ever more perfect because the parking ended up being free.

This Saturday we made the long drive to Jackson for Emily to go to class. I drove out on the Trace to the Reservoir Outlook after being delayed by the triathlon going on. I met up with the Garretts and we had some good Mexican and then went to the ghetto Jackson Zoo. I had a wonderful time. We also went out to the reservoir and found out what the boat rental rate is to plan a lake trip for August. Afterward I went and picked Emily up and headed home after some horribly boring shopping.]]> http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=906 Mon, 08 Jun 2009 22:10:50 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-08 22:10:50 http://sesser.net/?action=one&num=905 Tue, 02 Jun 2009 22:09:54 -0500 tag:sesser.net,2009-06-02 22:09:54