You have to love it when the temperature drops from around 50 degrees to 23 in a matter of hours…

Sunday was a beautiful day but as soon as the sun went down it turned into freeze city and has stayed that way since.

I woke up this morning and the temperature was hovering around 23 degrees with a feels like temp of 10. 10!!!

For those who do not know, Texas Tech University is the second largest campus in the U.S. (second only because the Air Force Academy counts their runway), so walking from one side of campus to the other is not one of those fun college experiences that you tell your friends about.

Granted, I could have taken a bus and been late to class, but I opted for the “I’ll freeze my butt off and be on time” option. Guess that’s what I get.

A co-worker just bought a 40GB iPod Photo over the weekend and I am truly amazed at the little piece of machinery.

At first glance it looks like a standard 40GB iPod but after picking it up and messing with it a little I noticed that it seemed thicker and a little heavier (which it is). Those were not huge issues but something that you just notice is different.

The dock for the iPod came has an S-Video out so that you can plug it into your TV and get 800×600 resolution on your photos (sweet!!).

All in all it seems like a neat little toy. I doubt that I will be spending $500 on one as I am just fine with a black and white screen for half of the price.

Here are a few of the Thanksgiving pictures that I was able to get uploaded.

Myself, my little brother Ryan, and my middle brother Brant.

Me doing some skeet shooting.

Brant, dad, me, Jennifer (friend from last year), and Ryan.

Sonny Cumbie about to take the snap and handoff to Taurean Henderson.

Well, that’s all for now. I may post some more up as I have time. For now though I have to study for a Political Science test tomorrow.

The Nirvana boxed set was released this past Tuesday and all I can say is “wow”. The three CD set contains a huge collection of never released Nirvana demos and B-sides. Most notably is the release of the “Endless, Nameless” track that was only available as a secret track on the first 200 Nevermind albums (of which I have one), “Sappy”, “Verse Chorus Verse”, “D-7”, and “Oh The Guilt”.

The set also contains live perfomances of other unreleased tracks, ones that I am guessing they did not have demo tracks or B-sides for. The set is definitely a must have for any grunge or Nirvana fan.

I would suggest buying the set at a local store though because of the Amazon price that is close to $50.00. You can buy it in the store for $35.00.

I had a good Thanksgiving with the family (as I hope you all did). We spent most of Thursday in Snyder, about 70 miles southeast of Lubbock. The men/boys left the women in the kitchen (hey, it’s what they wanted) and headed out to go quail hunting. One of the guys that took us hunting brought a Brittany Spaniel to “point” and we hunted with her for about 2 hrs. It was really cool to watch the dog just follow her instinct. She had no training but knew how to go ahead of our hunting line, find the quail, and point them until we caught up with her. The only downside was that she had no retriever in her so when we did get something she would not go pick it up (we had to search through the brush). We only got 4 quail, none of which were mine or my dad’s. We had a good time though, which is all that matters.

After hunting we ate lunch as a group and watched the Indianapolis Colts and Detroit Lions game.

And what better way to end the day than some good old fashion skeet shooting. I figured out that if I would have done this before going quail hunting I probably would have a lot more. Ah well.

It was a great Thanksgiving and I had a really good time. Hope you all did!

Tomorrow we are going to see Texas Tech take on Oklahoma State. Wreck ‘Em Tech!

Over the last few days I have come to the realization that we as a society are focused more on treating the symptoms of a problem rather than finding the source.

Example. I called my neurologist yesterday because of some very sudden and very painful headaches. I wanted to know if he wanted me to come in or what he suggested. After waiting about 30 minutes for a return phone call the nurse finally calls me back and says that she is calling in a prescription for me. I don’t want a prescription! I want to know what is wrong!

But that’s the way we work as a culture now. Don’t find the root of the problem (and get a solution), just keep on treating the symptoms, even if they get worse.

I see this kind of behavior in developers as well. A client calls with a bug, they want it fixed as soon as possible. The developer takes a look at it but doesn’t look for a bug, instead he looks for the easiest fix for the problem, which is usually just fixing the symptoms. Later on the problem arises again and again and again until finally it is costing too much to just treat the symptoms and the problem has to be found. Now that they have wasted so much money on treating the problem will the company that the developer works for want to continue trying to support that client? Will the client want to stay with a company that does not really help them but makes them wait even longer? Probably not.

Last night I was on my way to Dairy Queen with some friends and we saw a hearse that was being used as a pizza delivery vehicle. As soon as we saw it the girls that were with me immediately started digging through their purses looking for a camera. Sadly, none of them could find one in time. But just seeing it made us laugh for a while…

I have been getting ready for family to come into town this Wednesday for Thanksgiving. They should be arriving around 3:30pm since they are leaving Houston sometime around 5:30am.

So what’s the plan for Thanksgiving? Well, Thanksgiving morning looks like it will be spent going quail hunting with my brothers, my dad, and family friends in Snyder. We’ll then be eating lunch with our family friends at their house. After that, who knows. I have no idea what we are doing Friday but we may go see a movie at the local drive-in theatre. Saturday is the Tech/OSU game.

My family will be leaving early Sunday morning to get back home. It will be good to see them.

Scott Yang has a great analogy about Pharisees and Sadducees and how they relate to modern day Evangelical Preachers and Liberal Politicians.

I think Scott’s post pretty much sums it up. I watched a special on CNN this evening and it really showed what Americans think of Christians. Not just Evangelical ones, just Christians in general. They questioned whether prisons that use church as their center are constitutional, stating that God may not be what rehabilitates prisoners and that they are pressing their faith on others. I cannot say that every prisoner that attends church will be rehabilitated but I believe there will be some that are. The people who ran these prison churches said that they did not press their beliefs on the congregation of prisoners or force them to accept Christ. They witnessed to them.

The one stunning thing that they did show was a young girl who’s parents had raised her in a Christian home. That’s fine. What was disturbing/confusing was that this girl claimed to accept Christ when she was 3 yrs. old. I am not sure I understand that. At what age can a person accept Christ and become born again? I am not saying the girl is not saved because that is not my place to judge, I am just trying to understand salvation at such a young age.

If you have not seen or heard anything about the fight that broke out last night in Detroit between the Indiana Pacers and the Detroit Pistons, you need to. The fight started out as some name calling, pushing, and maybe a few swings and ended up being an all out brawl with players going into the stands and beating fans that had thrown cups full of drinks at them.

People are saying that the players should not have gone after the fans and to a point I agree. But, no player deserves to have stuff thrown at them by a drunk fan. If you are dumb enough to throw something at a person who is much bigger and stronger than you than you are dumb enough to face the consequences, which, in this case was a right hand to the face.

To make matters worse fans came out onto the court and were taunting players and throwing more stuff at them. One guy even took a swing at Ron Artest and Ron did what any other person would do, he swung back.

I really do not know how I feel about the whole situation. No, there should not be fighting but there also shouldn’t be people throwing things at players.

You can watch the video here.