ThatKid

September 28, 2007

Say Hello To BountyBowl

Finally, an explanation of that little gizmo on the right (and what I've been up to of late on the Internets) I originally imagined I would write this post about a month ago. That would be the post that explained (a) why I haven’t really written much on ThatKidInTheCorner for the past couple months and (b) where I’ve redirected my blogging energies, on the off chance that (c) you hadn’t figured it out and (d) you were actually interested. The answer? My fantastically satisfying (at least to me) Eagles-only blog: BountyBowl.com. Quick FAQ on BountyBowl. What’s a BountyBowl? I’ve got a more complete description up on the actual BountyBowl site, but the main details are as follows. Bounty Bowl is the name for the 1989 Thanksgiving Day game between the Philaddelphia Eagles and the Dallas Cowboys in which Eagles coach Buddy Ryan allegedly placed bounties on the heads of Cowboys...

Posted by thatkid at 2:19 AM | Comments (0)

August 27, 2007

What I Did On My Summer Vacation a.k.a. Dude, Where's Your Blog?

Where I've been for the past month when I haven't been blogging (and also some ideas about where I've been blogging) Admittedly, things have been a bit dark here on ThatKid for the past month, and not just because it's summer here in C@L and I've been out and about most nights and weekends. That would imply that I haven't been playing with the Internets, and that's not exactly true -- though it's more a story for another post. It's really a little from column A, and a little from column B. Today we'll discuss column A -- being out and about. (Column B we'll share a little later this week, when we're good and ready.) Mostly column A (what you're reading right now) is going to be a little show-and-tell with a bunch of my favorite photos from the past month. It's been a great month in C@L (and...

Posted by thatkid at 11:33 PM | Comments (0)

July 14, 2007

New Golf Clubs, Sonics, And Photos Of Food

And the only reason I'm even writing this is that there's a game on that I'm interested in watching Were it not for the US U-20s playing in quarterfinal of the U-20 World Cup this fine morning, I probably wouldn't have even gotten my act together for even this meager post. Such is the unique combination of too much salaried activities and the traditionally delayed commencement of summer here in C@L -- it's just been tough to find too much time to play with the electric internets. (Actually, that's not entirely true. I spent a lot of time on the electric internets last weekend, but that was in the service of commerce. I finally dealt with myself and bought a proper set of golf clubs. My current clubs were fine, I guess, but they were older than I am, and, well, I wanted the new hotness kind that (a) go...

Posted by thatkid at 11:19 AM | Comments (0)

June 18, 2007

The Long-Short-Long-Short-Long-Short Moving Plan

The C@L equivalent of moving from W 83rd Street to W 80th Street You'd think after a month of travel and a declaration of abandonment in re: my (now former) apartment that I'd make more of an effort to spend time in C@L. Not so much. Since returning my jaunt around the globe, I spent a weekend in Central Washington, five days in New York (little bit of a detour to the Meetings), and a weekend in Portland. On my lone weekend in town, I moved. (Not exactly a mellow and relaxing way to kick of the summer. Oh wait; I forgot; summer doesn't start until July. It was 52 degrees and raining this morning. I guess I couldn't have picked a better time of year for all of this!) This move actually fit quite snugly into what has now become a familiar migratory pattern for yours truly. That is,...

Posted by thatkid at 9:54 PM | Comments (1)

May 29, 2007

There's A Hole In My Heart Where My Couch Used To Be

Emergence Day 2 claims my couch, and convinces me that I need to move as soon as possible So I had really really hoped I wouldn't be filing any more bedbug entries here on the bloggy-blog. After the debacle(s) of last fall, which claimed my bed, my bedding, my carpet, and a bunch of my clothes, and landed me on an air mattress for the better part of five months, I had hoped that the bedbugs thing was behind me. From November until May, it was. And then we saw a solitary bedbug meandering across the back cushion of my couch on Friday. (F***********************************ck.) The malignant little jerks were back, and they'd colonized the one piece of furniture I had refused to throw away the first time around. Within half an hour, we'd located a small group of bedbugs (about 4-5 in total) in a pocket of one of the...

Posted by thatkid at 11:02 PM | Comments (0)

May 25, 2007

Springtime for ThatKid In Germany (And Paris): Three (3) Things About Munich (And Paris)

I mean, at the end of the day, it's all Western Europe, right...? I knew something was up when I got off the plane from Dubai the other day and immediately felt like I was home again. (If that doesn't seem to make sense, I spent half a day in Munich before heading the Budapest for the weekend, and then another two days there at the beginning of the week.) Yes yes, I'm not remotely from Germany, and yes yes, it's a completely different culture, but, you know, it's still the developed world -- and one of the tidier representatives thereof at that! You can drink the water, things happen on time, and transactions are conducted in something approximating real currency. I also think the fact that I'd spent a bit of time in Germany last summer had rendered the place a bit more familiar than it may have otherwise...

Posted by thatkid at 12:29 PM | Comments (0)

May 22, 2007

The Ballad Of The Whiskey Robber: Three (3) Things About Budapest

A charming weekend in one of Eastern Europe’s Grand Old Capitals I was a bad traveler last weekend. I went to a lovely city (Budapest) in a cool country (Hungary) and did about three minutes of research (if that) before I arrived. I knew that Budapest was actually two (2) different cities, Buda and Pest, split down the middle by a river. I didn’t know what the river was called, though. (Turns out it was the Danube; more on that in a moment.) I knew that Ferenc Puskas was Hungarian, that he was totally sweet at soccer, and that he kicked ass on behalf of the all-time F.C. Camena imaginary video game soccer squad. Any sort of color I had on the city was from The Ballad Of The Whiskey Robber, which is the rather colorful tale of a bank robber/ hockey goalie/ folk hero named Attila Ambrus, who spent...

Posted by thatkid at 5:26 AM | Comments (1)

May 18, 2007

Fly Emirates!: Three (3) Things About Dubai International Airport

I haven't been this excited about an airplane ride since I was seven Though I said I wouldn't be posting about layovers, we're going to have to make an exception -- Dubai International Airport was just too juicy. While there is only so much one can say about an airport, Dubai actually does merit some minor discussion. Mostly because DUBAI AIRPORT IS WHAT WE THOUGHT IT WAS. That is, as over-the-top and opulent as you can imagine an airport can be. To shore up my nerd credentials, I'm reminded of the opening lines of The Long, Dark Tea Time of the Soul by Douglas Adams, which go something like this: "It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on earth has ever produced the expression 'as pretty as an airport.'" Maybe not, but this a pretty good-looking airport. I had hoped to get out of there and check out...

Posted by thatkid at 8:01 AM | Comments (0)

May 17, 2007

The World Is Flat: Three (3) Things About Bangalore

Globalization, multinational tech firms, and cows in the street Let’s begin by admitting what we don’t know about India: everything. That is, we shall obviously struggle to say anything comprehensive or conclusive about a country that is home to one-sixth (1/6) of humanity based on three (3) days in one city (Bangalore) – with most of that time spent in a windowless conference room planning the details of an upcoming software implementation. Save for two hours of sightseeing I crammed into the end of my last day here, my time in Bangalore was the standard-issue mix of business travel vignettes that really could have been pasted into my memory from just about anywhere: the too-familiar business-traveler terrarium of airports, hotel rooms, cabs, and hotel restaurants. Still, I’d be lying if I told you the visit was generic/ boring. It is India, after all, and Bangalore more specifically. Ever since I...

Posted by thatkid at 2:37 AM | Comments (0)

May 12, 2007

Three (3) Things About The Next Two (2) Weeks

My content strategy for upcoming missions and international visits; now includes half-promises to write more frequently! Aight. My inability to maintain a regular content production schedule continues. After firing up a couple posts a couple weekends ago, I disappeared again. Sure, work's busy, and I went to New York for the weekend, but still. I need to try a little harder. So here's the plan: I'm on a(nother) work mission to distant locales for the next two weeks. My commitment for those two weeks is to produce three observations about each place that I visit. And by "visit" I mean spend 24 hours -- airports don't count, unless they're really really interesting. (I'm in the Amsterdam airport right now; it isn't terribly interesting.) At the very least, I'll do my best to put up some photos. Sound bueno? In the spirit of things, here are three (3) things about what...

Posted by thatkid at 11:24 PM | Comments (0)

April 28, 2007

Donovan McNabb's Mom Is So Totally Going To Be Pissed

Allow me to be among the first to overreact to the Eagles' first selection in today's NFL draft So this is what I get for feeling fat and happy about the Eagles' decision to trade down out of the first round of the NFL Draft. They took a what? A quarterback? With their first pick? At #36? The third QB taken in the entire draft? Seriously? I did not see this coming. Yikes. I thought the Birds would go DB (safety or corner) or DE (since they have mostly stiffs at that position right now). Instead, that take a QB, a position at which they already have three (3) veterans. WIP is already going nuts. G-Cobb is horrified. Sal Paolantonio called in and completely spazzed. Even Eagles Live! on the Birds' site was screwy; Dave Spadaro was "shocked" by the move. And suddenly, controversy in re: the Eagles and, more...

Posted by thatkid at 6:54 PM | Comments (0)

April Is My NAFTA Month

And other explanations in re: my extended silence on the electric internets; it has been a while So when I posted something here on ThatKid, I had just returned from a trip to Tokyo which included an unexpected mission to the emergency room due to -- in my unscientific determination -- my consumption of an evil poison cookie. (In case you were concerned about my health, the good news is that nothing remotely like the crazy reaction I had in Tokyo has resurfaced since I returned. I'm a bit more prepared these days (in that I now possess fancy allergy medicine AND an Epi-Pen that I can plunge into my heart...errr, leg...if it happens again), but we still haven't solved the mystery of the Evil Poison Cookie. That is, I went to the allergist and they tested me for a ton of stuff (including mashing up the cookie sample I...

Posted by thatkid at 3:03 PM | Comments (0)

April 2, 2007

When In Tokyo, Beware The Evil Poison Cookie!

Who knew individually wrapped snacks could be so perilous? While it had been five years since I'd last visited Japan (layovers at Narita -- overnight or otherwise -- don't quite count), it's remarkable how familiar it felt to return to Tokyo. All the essential elements were still there: the tauntingly long journey from Narita into town, the plastic food in the restaurant windows, and the heavily regimented traffic crossings (photos below). All is generally quite well in the land of the rising sun. The main intersection at Shibuya station in its "Don't Walk" state (wait for it)... And go! And certainly, there were some good times to be had as well, despite a pretty agressive schedule of meetings. We managed the obligatory trip(s) to Roppongi, a shopping mission in Shibuya (during which I picked up the new Fountains of Wayne record -- it was at the front of the store;...

Posted by thatkid at 12:25 AM | Comments (0)

March 24, 2007

The Wow Is NOW, Mother******s!

That's right, I am now running Vista on my home PC -- and I live to tell about it Against my better judgment and in the face of general skepticism from a number of folks, I went a little loony last night and installed Windows Vista on the new home computer. This had been the plan for a while (and by "a while" I mean since my old computer died and I came up with my "buy a new computer" plan), but I finally got my act together this week (and by "this week" I mean "Friday after work"). The good news is that Vista is now alive and running on my PC. Granted, I just bought this machine and it has healthy specs (dual-core processor, 2GB of RAM, nifty graphics card), but still, I'm almost a little surprised. The bad news is that it wasn't exactly easy to get...

Posted by thatkid at 11:43 AM | Comments (0)

March 11, 2007

The Toothy Yogi Boxed the Bearclaw with a Spork

I really ought to take more photos of Scrabble boards Whilst I'll admit to a long-term fascation with/ enthusiasm for Scrabble (tm), I haven't really played very often in recent years. I'll chalk that up mostly to (a) my ever-dwindling attention span having rendered me incapable of sitting still for an entire game, and (b) my free time being routinely consumed by things that flicker and blare (see also, (a)). Anyhoo, some friends put a lovely dinner together last night and we cracked the Scrabble board post-meal. Good times ensued. What I learned: (1) Not everyone is obsessed with strategy and placement at the expense of fun/ clever words. In fact, it's a lot more fun to play with people who don't obsess about strategy and placement. (Five triple word scores went unclaimed! I don't have enough exclamation points for that!!!!!!) (2) Completed Scrabble boards make for excellent photos: (3)...

Posted by thatkid at 9:38 PM | Comments (0)

February 28, 2007

Rejoining The Bedded Classes

In which I tuck my air mattress into its travel bag and buy a proper bed So I decided to move back in. Since the recent unpleasantness with the bedbugs, I've been sleeping on an air mattress. I just couldn't bring myself to buy another mattress only to have to throw it away should the bedbugs start offering enlistment bonuses to new recruits. Then, a little over a week ago, I got a relatively clean bill of health from the exterminator. I ordered these special (allegedly bedbug proof) mattress covers, and bought myself a bed. It's worth noting that in an otherwise monochromatic and/ or sleeting C@L day (my soccer game out at Marymoor in Redmond ended early on account of snow), the sun was out for about 30 minutes. And during those 30 minutes, I was able to assemble my new bed. I'm taking that as a good sign....

Posted by thatkid at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)

February 20, 2007

Failure To Deliver? Or Flowers That Disappear?

Why I won't ever be ordering flowers from FTD.com again. Ever. Again. File this one under "Grumble comma grumble." So you figure that a nationwide network of florists complete with a major e-commerce presence and a heavy Valentine's Day marketing push would be able to deliver flowers in New York City if you give them two days lead time? Right? If they're sending me e-mails with attractive offers and they have a well-recognized brand name and they're telling me they can make me a hero on Valentine's Day, you think they could sort it out? I can understand if it was some fly-by-night organization or if I needed some sort of exotic and/ or rare flowers, or even if I had called them the morning of Valentine's Day. That raises the degree of difficulty somewhat. Fair enough. But two days notice for roses? That should be well within their capabilities....

Posted by thatkid at 12:23 PM | Comments (2)

February 10, 2007

That Time I Lost Three Balls Playing Mini-Golf In Palm Springs

This was one of those weeks where I reflected on why I am an idiot for not living in a warmer climate/ Southern California So I didn't realize how desperately I needed a vacation/ trip to someplace warm and sunny until I stepped off the plane in Palm Springs earlier this week. This winter hasn't been particularly oppressive in C@L, freakish snow- and/ or windstorms notwithstanding. We had a couple cold spells, but the sun has been more involved than it was last year, and the rain hasn't been as consistently dull. Still, stepping out into the evening desert air at Palm Springs/ Playstation Portable (PSP) airport was a shock. Just the smell of the air was enough to convince me that I was someplace warm and friendly. Wow. Jackets would not be required. And when I saw the sun the next morning, it got that much better. Warm is...

Posted by thatkid at 4:22 PM | Comments (0)

February 3, 2007

Sonics Lose, Bulls Gawk At Dance Team

And here I thought I was going to complain about Ray Allen getting snubbed for the All-Star Team I expected that today's post-Sonics-game post would be go roughly like this: Ray Allen got totally screwed out of the All-Star game because he's not flashy enough and, as a result, I am beginning to believe that the national sporting press really does have a big-market bias and that no one cares about C@L and the Pacific Northwest. I would emphasize my point by pointing to his stats over the past month: 30.4 ppg in the month of January (26.7 ppg for the season) on 49 percent shooting, 42.3 percent from three, and 4.8 assists per game. I would say that it's all the more impressive in the context of Rashard Lewis's absence and the fact that other teams realize that Ray is going to take pretty much all of the shots...

Posted by thatkid at 6:51 PM | Comments (0)

February 2, 2007

Thusday Night Karaoke in C@L

Quick hits on the karaoke scene last night at Ozzie's in Queen Anne I dragged my tired, lousy, out-of-shape ass to Ozzie's in Lower Queen Anne ("The LQA" to the locals, errr, or just me) last night to join some friends for karaoke and some drinks. (I mention the tired/ lousy/ out-of-shape thing because I met them immediately following a soccer game, a game which confirmed that I'm not quite match fit.) Good times at Ozzie's, as always. That's the thing about the karaoke -- even if you're not really in the mood for it, you can trust that 60 percent of the people in the joint definitely are. That is, even if you're cold, tired, and semi-cross from having run around a semi-frozen field in a losing effort against the team you like least in your co-rec soccer league, going to karaoke will brighten your mood. And why not:...

Posted by thatkid at 11:07 AM | Comments (1)

January 31, 2007

Seeing Mountains Doesn't Get Old (For Me, At Least)

I am not remotely bored of seeing Mt. Rainier majestically hovering in the distance As much as I might whinge about my daily commute across The Dread Evergreen Point Floating Bridge (that is, the 520 Bridge), the experience is not without its charms. That is, on certain clear mornings the Eastside-bound commuters are treated to a magnificent view of Mt. Rainier just as they round the first big bend on the 520 Bridge. In fact, on those mornings when there is a view of Mt. Rainier, there's usually a hiccup in the traffic flow, as each driver slows down to take a peak at the mountain looming to the south. And, as far as gaper delays go, I prefer the scenic-view-inspired ones to the traffic-citation ones. The Mt. Rainier thing continues to dazzle me. A July snowball fight in shorts on the glacier at Mt. Rainier National Park as part...

Posted by thatkid at 11:13 PM | Comments (0)

January 17, 2007

Saying Goodbye to the Artist Formerly Known As Feast Market

Fame's Market never really had the right feel; also, a theory on why the deli was such a failure. I found out Sunday night that my old deli in New York was closing. Natural Fame's Market on Amsterdam between 80th and 81st, which until 2004ish was known as Feast Market, apparently closed for good on Monday. I shall remember it fondly! (For the record, I never really fell into line with the whole Natural Fame's Market moniker. I think the only time I would call it "Fame's Market" was to express contempt for said name change, and usually my facial expressions and body language communicated that I was attaching invisible mid-air quotes to this so-called "new deli." I just didn't see it. Therefore, I'm calling it Feast Market here.) I was actually a little bummed out that Feast Market closed. After all, it was one of two delis to which...

Posted by thatkid at 11:21 PM | Comments (0)

January 5, 2007

It Was A Dark And Stormy Night

Omens abound at the Sonics - Knicks game! I really should have known that this wasn't going to go well for the Sonics. I usually park on the Queen Anne side of Key Arena, most nights rougly halfway home to my apartment (never mind what that says about the absurdity of driving at all -- trust me, it makes sense). But my plan for tonight had me heading to Capitol Hill for a post-Sonics going-away party, and so I parked on the EMP side of the C@L Center. A block South of the McDonald's, actually. So I park. It's pouring out. Just horrible. Usually the C@L rain is a light but endless mist sort of thing, but this was a legit storm. Coming down hard and heavy, lots of wind, really miserable stuff. Proud denizen of C@L that I am, I typically eschew an umbrella in favor of a hood,...

Posted by thatkid at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)

December 16, 2006

Cross-X: Book Report

Oh, the hours I spent at the goofy forensics tournaments! I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised by how much I enjoyed Cross-X by Joe Miller. Given the amount of time and energy I devoted to the speech and debate team in high school (and, ahem, grade school), it's kind of a no-brainer that I'd be into a year-in-the-life story of an inner-city debate team from Kansas City. Oh, you're going to devote swaths of text to descriptions of van rides to debate tournaments, complete with details on the battle for control of the stereo? Check. You've got complicated theories about the evolution of high-school debate and the competing philosophies therein? Uh huh. You'll even include a couple pages of back and forth with Jim Copeland in re: the state of high school debate? Umm, yeah. That sounds about right. For the avoidance of doubt, I was very very into...

Posted by thatkid at 8:05 PM | Comments (0)

November 28, 2006

Snow Day in C@L

Did they really just cancel Tuesday in C@L due to an inch of snow that fell early last night? Woo-hoo! Was I ever fired up about my commute into the office this morning! Twenty-two minutes door-to-door (a weekday rush hour record) plus an absolutely primo parking spot (the likes of which one usually has to arrive by 6:30 am to secure -- not that I would actually know this, but I just assume). Instead of racing to make my 9 am, I'd have a solid 40 minutes to sip my coffee, fire off the day's opening salvo of electric mail, and peruse the sports sections of Philly.com. The reason for my surprisingly mellow morning? C@L is having a Snow Day! Yup. We had a little snow last night, the temperature dropped below freezing, and the city just completely shut down. No school for the kids, and lots of offices closed...

Posted by thatkid at 12:25 PM | Comments (0)

November 23, 2006

Happy Turkey Day From The 2-1-5

Thankful to be back in Philly for Thanksgiving So I hadn't actually been in Philly since last spring (in a my-birthday-Easter timeframe). What a treat to be back! In a lot of ways, it's sort of odd to be here in person since my internet consumption habits make me feel like I'm virtually here quite a bit as it is. That is, you read the Philly papers every morning and listen to the goofy sports-talk radio enough, and you get a pretty good pulse for what's going on. But nothing substitutes for the real thing; I will need to ingest some celebratory cheesesteaks over the weekend to complete the experience. Anyhoo, been a bit busy/ on the road of late. Some random quick hits from the past two weeks: Travel Schedule: So over the past three weeks, I've gone to New Jersey, New York, North Dakota (though admittedly that was...

Posted by thatkid at 9:15 AM | Comments (0)

November 20, 2006

Weirdest Philly Sports Day Since T.O.

McNabb's knee, Andre Waters' passing, Ryan Howard's MVP I had the honor and pleasure of being in some good friends' wedding this past weekend outside New York City. Amazing night, good times had by all -- it was a blast. As is something of a tradition, prior to the wedding ceremony, the groom gave each of his groomsmen a little gift. Typically these gifts are themed, and the chosen theme this time around was throwback football jerseys. The groom went to great lengths to select (and customize) shirts that fit with each of our particular sports personalities: Tony Dorsett for the Cowboys fan, a Mark Bavaro throwback for the Giants fan, even a #6 "R. Howard" Eagles jersey for one of the Birds fans (which, it must be said, will serve as a companion piece to this gentleman's #3 "Iverson" Eagles shirt). So you can imagine the thrill I felt...

Posted by thatkid at 4:42 PM | Comments (1)

November 12, 2006

Curling the Rock in The House

It's sort of like shuffleboard on ice, only with Canadian accents and appropriate levels of game-specific jargon Prior to last night, my experience with the sport/ game of curling had been limited mostly to snippets of Olympic coverage in moments of February insomnia. I was pretty down with it, in a sort of team handball kind of way: I didn't know too much about it, but it looked like it would be pretty fun to play. Also, it definitely suggested a darts-and-bocce-you-can-down-cocktails-whilst-you-play-it vibe. Check, check, and check. Good times at the Granite Curling Club in North C@L last night (the only dedicated curling sheet in the continental U.S. west of North Dakota!). My quick hits on curling: Excellent jargon, as expected: as might be expected from a Canadian game, curling employs a most excellent catalog of game-specific jargon. The big grantie things that you push down the ice are called...

Posted by thatkid at 3:07 PM | Comments (1)

November 9, 2006

Light Em Up, Cause We're Going Down

It was my first time with the oxygen masks Right. So I'm live from Bismarck, North Dakota. This is not by design. By design, I would have been in C@L for hours by now, nestled upon my air mattress with my eyes a mere 18 inches from my oversized television. But, due to some problems with the, um, pressurization system, my EWR-SEA flight made an unscheduled landing in Bismarck, where I am currently typing/ stewing. I mean, I guess I shouldn't be stewing too too much. I did have a first-class seat (thank you, upgrade) for the whole ordeal; it would have been much worse in coach. I thought we were going to have to spend the night in some fleabag motel; instead, we just have to hang around until 3 am to get on another plane to C@L (the good people at Continental sent one up from Planet Houston...

Posted by thatkid at 12:03 AM | Comments (1)

October 18, 2006

Now I'm Losing Patience With The Biosphere

In which I reflect on my new life, post-infestation So I don't really want to get into the bedbug blog business. I think the ones I've read (The Bedbug Blog and Bedbugger) are quite excellent, and have done a lovely job of creating an online community for those of us who are dealing with the bedbug thing. I also don't want to use this space for whinging about my minor inconveniences, especially when there are plenty of people who deal with a lot more (and have a lot less to start with) than I. This isn't actually that bad; it's just a big pain in the ass. Of course, said pain in the ass is the reason why I haven't really had the time or energy to think or write about anything else for the past couple weeks. It's not like there isn't plenty of other things I'd like to...

Posted by thatkid at 10:44 PM | Comments (0)

October 11, 2006

The Biosphere Claims Its Revenge

You know what you don't hear so many of? Bedbug stories with happy endings. So I've been a little busy/ preoccupied the past week. I had planned to write something about the new season of Battlestar Galactica and/ or at the very least something about The Most Important Date On The NFL Regular Season Calendar From The Moment The Schedule Was Announced Last Spring, Good Versus T.0. (in which Good prevailed despite the best efforts of Michael Lewis), live from the Linc. That didn't happen. Here's what did happen: I woke up Tuesday morning and found a set of small bumps on the back of my arm. The number of bumps talked me out of the possibility that they were insect bites; it must have been a rash or allergic reaction to something. Too many bumps to be bites. And I certainly hadn't seen any mosquitos buzzing around my apartment...

Posted by thatkid at 10:04 AM | Comments (2)

September 22, 2006

ThatKid Heartily Recommends "Higher"

ThatKidInTheCorner Creative and Production Director's Film Finally Makes It Online Aight, time for some shameless pimping of stuff I like. Allow me to present, courtesy of Game7 Productions and the deep pockets and nearly unlimited free bandwidth of the good people from the G-Unit, "Higher." The production notes call it "A few days in the life of a bored girl on capitol hill who finds new friends and new substances on her way to championing a big client meeting." That's pretty fair, and pretty polite. Mostly it's about the potential upside of opting out of sobriety ahead of important work-related events. Especially if you're also listening to hip-hop. It's a comedy, it'll make you laugh (especially the music video sequence in the middle), and I'll be terribly disappointed if you don't give it a whirl. Also, we've got something of an in with the producers; I was a PA on...

Posted by thatkid at 7:40 PM | Comments (1)

August 26, 2006

Hollywood Celebrates ThatKidInTheCorner Day!

In which I go to see Invincible and wonder, What if the entire world really does revolve around me? You'll have to forgive a bit of narcissism on my behalf this Saturday morning. On August 25th, Hollywood released both a Disney film about the Philadelphia Eagles, Invincible, and a Broken Lizard movie about drinking games, Beerfest. The trailer for Invincible features guys in a bar doing an E-A-G-L-E-S chant; the Beerfest commercial shows a guy shooting quarters. Birds and drinking games. On the same day. So you really can't blame me if I think this is all somehow about me. (Do you ever secretly wonder if all the other people you encounter on a given day are actually robotic drones filling out the ranks in the gigantic RPG simulation that is your life? Me neither. Never once.) Admittedly, I have yet to see the Beerfest movie (though late-night text messages...

Posted by thatkid at 1:02 PM | Comments (1)

August 6, 2006

New Additions To The Blogroll

Adding people to the blogroll never gets old Just wanted to drop a quick note about the three recent additions to the blogroll, all of which are well worth your clicks and attention(s). I've been meaning to get this updated for a while now, but, well, we've been kind of lazy with ThatKid. Sorry. Summertime, I suppose. Anyhoo, the three new links: Come On You Gunners!!: don't let the title fool you; there's actually not very much Arsenal-related content here. Mostly it's about my buddy's new baby. Cute stuff, especially the tale of The Big Day. JAZ, KAZ, LAZ & TAZ: so it isn't often that a friend up and moves his entire family to sub-Saharan Africa. Curious about what it takes to get a driver's license in Malawi? Have questions about setting up home security in the Lilongwe suburbs? Generally curious about what it's like to go from techno-future...

Posted by thatkid at 10:42 AM | Comments (0)

August 5, 2006

Final Score: Adware/ Spyware 7, ThatKid's MCE 1

In which I tempt fate on BitTorrent and pay the price I really really really should have known better. For someone who works for a, errr, leading software company, and specifically in the online advertising parts of said software company, I really have no excuse for downloading nasty adware to my home PC. I was actually reluctant to post about it; there's just no way this story is going to end up being very flattering. Shame on me. But since I feel like the story has a happy ending (or at least some intel I wish I had from the start), I'm going to give you the gory details of seven (7) different anti-adware packages I tried before I found the one that worked. I'll gloss over the awkward details in re: how I came to need to try seven (7) anti-adware packages and try not to sound like too...

Posted by thatkid at 7:52 PM | Comments (0)

July 30, 2006

The Return Of The Return Of The Rentals

Roughly 13 percent of The Rentals are back and touring The last time The Rentals released an album, I lived in Austin, Texas, and I bought it on the day it was released. I was fired up about that record; I knew all the words to The Rentals' first album (The Return Of The Rentals) and was pretty bullish on their second release. This was a band that I was planning to enjoy for albums and years to come. I was bought in. The album, Seven More Minutes, didn't disappoint me. I thought it was supercool: catchy yet appropriately nerdy, it took itself pretty seriously but still seemed not to try too hard. I listened to that record a ton that summer. A ton. And for the next few years after that. I never saw The Rentals live, but I definitely sold them pretty hard whenever I got the chance....

Posted by thatkid at 1:08 PM | Comments (1)

July 19, 2006

Back And Ready To Sign

Reflections on my extended sabbatical and ruminations on recent events that are near and dear (guess what starts tomorrow morning!) And we're back. It's been over a month since I've posted anything on ThatKid. Checking my records [draws index finger to lips, daintily moistens said finger, flips through imaginary stack of papers], I think this is the longest I've gone without posting since I started this nonsense almost a full two years ago. I'm not quite sure how I feel about that. On the one hand, it was nice to take a little break (at least from ThatKid). It's been a crazy month on a lot of fronts, and there was really no way I could have managed to keep up with ThatKid in the midst of all the action. On the other hand, I've kind of missed doing ThatKid -- it's a lovely little hobby for me, and I...

Posted by thatkid at 11:53 PM | Comments (0)

June 11, 2006

Wishing You Were Here: F.C. Camena

ThatKid goes on hiatus for the World Cup; come join us at F.C. Camena As you may have noticed, they just started the quadrennial broadcast of The Most Popular TV Show In The World. It understates present circumstances to observe that I'm "pretty excited" about the 2006 FIFA World Cup (tm). Apart from watching pretty much every game live (which is now enabled through my nifty MCE PC and orb.com), I'm actually heading on a European adventure in just a few days to watch a couple of the games live and participate in the global football culture. This is one month of wall-to-wall footy, and I get to participate. These are all very very good things. Still, the World Cup is not without its sacrifices. I regret to inform all seven loyal readers of thatkidinthecorner.com that publishing traffic here is going to slow down over the next couple weeks. This...

Posted by thatkid at 9:41 PM | Comments (0)

June 6, 2006

Because I Needed One More Nerdy Hobby

And suddenly my dreams of recording the World Cup to my PC are a step closer A few weeks ago a friend from C@L decided that Pacific Northwestern living just wasn't doing it for him and his family anymore. He needed to get away. Slow things down a bit. Typically people who are feeling that way do things like "move to the suburbs"; he moved to Malawi. (Where's Malawi?) It's in the neighborhood of South Africa, and no one expected you to know that -- I mean, Togo made the World Cup, and most people can't find them either. (Learn more about Malawi at Wikipedia.) Before he departed, he very generously willed me the remains of his first Windows Media Center Edition PC. He did do me the coutesy of doing most of the set-up work (getting the OS installed, dealing with the drivers, wiping the hard drive). So I...

Posted by thatkid at 11:27 PM | Comments (2)

June 3, 2006

Meetings, Observed

Missing the Meetings from 3,000 miles away, with high levels of wistfulness A few years ago, my Mom told me that she wasn't worried about me moving away from the East Coast, because she knew that I would make it home at least once a year for my college Reunions. Errr, ummm, thanks, I guess. Though I think my mom meant it in a semi-nice way (more focused on the "My son really likes Reunions" part and less focused on the "I can only hope to lure my son to the East Coast with the promise of 48 hours of immature nonsense with his college buddies"), it certainly struck me as perhaps 12 percent too insightful. Moms are good like that; even when you think they don't know, they know. Still, was I really so transparent? Was my enthusiasm for Reunions so obvious? Even if I really did like The...

Posted by thatkid at 12:50 PM | Comments (1)

May 24, 2006

A Wildly Unpopular Moment In The Mirage Race and Sports Book

Snippets from a weekend in Vegas So it's Wednesday now. Wednesday evening, to be specific. I think the Vegas is finally washed out of me. That is, the mere thought of Las Vegas no longer instantly renders me a cringing and frightened child. I wouldn't say that I can exactly imagine returning to Las Vegas -- that might be a little much -- but I can at least read and/ or listen to a discussion of the topic without a significant physical response. Yeah, good times in Vegas. In all honesty, I hadn't been there in a couple years. I wouldn't say a ton has changed in Las Vegas since the last time I visited; mostly, everything in Vegas just got about 22 percent more, errr, Vegas, if that makes any sense. It got more expensive, more luxury-brand-obsessed, more pornified, and more popular. Inflation, I guess; cost of living increases...

Posted by thatkid at 11:01 PM | Comments (0)

May 13, 2006

My Quick Comments On Comments

Don't blame me, blame the robo-spamming jerks who were backfilling ThatKid with their penis-enlargement claptrap As all seven loyal readers may have noticed, ThatKid now requires registration in order to leave a comment. Rest assured that the steering committee wrestled with this issue long and hard before making what was admittedly a very difficult decision. While we liked being the kind of web site that was open to the world with as few barriers to participation as possible, our hand was forced by the relentless onslaught of the penis-enlargement industry. In other words, I got sick of the every-couple-days ritual of cleaning the spam out of the site's comments. While the comments had been spammed in the past, the past couple weeks have been especially bad. Can't really explain it, but I knew something was afoot when I checked my web stats and noticed that the I was getting a...

Posted by thatkid at 6:18 PM | Comments (2)

May 9, 2006

The Answer Was, "The Drummer."

The question was, "What's the best part of seeing The Secret Machines live?" Caught The Secret Machines at Neumo's in C@L tonight. I guess I was due for my monthly rock concert on a Monday night. I was a pretty big fan of The Secret Machines' first LP, Now Here Is Nowhere, but had missed them on that tour (I can't remember why, but I wasn't around when they came to NYC...something along those lines). So you can imagine my fanboy delight when I realized I would both be able to buy their new album (Ten Silver Drops, which I picked up this past weekend) and see them live in just a couple days. At the very least, it was much more interesting than my average Monday. (If you're interested in checking out The Secret Machines, the easiest thing to do is just to check out their web site, http://thesecretmachines.com....

Posted by thatkid at 10:19 AM | Comments (1)

May 6, 2006

RJ Done Lost His Mind

Soul Position show details and general fawning in re: RJD2, complete with sample iTunes playlist Enjoyed one of my most enthusiastically hip-hop intensive days (and certainly my most hip-hop Wednesday ever) this past week, as I had the pleasure of catching both Jay-Z, P.O.S. and Soul Position (which is Blueprint as the MC and hip-hop NerdGod RJD2 as the DJ) all in a single day. (The Jay-Z thing was actually [cough, cough] an interview at an online advertising conference, but hey, I'm still counting it.) Seeing the RJD2 thing live has been a long time coming for me. I got hip to him about two years ago and have been nerding out to his music ever since. He's released two full-length solo albums, Dead Ringer and Since We Last Spoke, has partnered with MCs like Blueprint, Aceyalone, and Diverse on LPs, and has contributed the usual spate of remixes to...

Posted by thatkid at 4:11 PM | Comments (0)

April 30, 2006

And They Gave Me The Double-Double-Double-Double

The Raw-Fish-and-In-N-Out Diet Enjoyed a delightful week in San Francisco. The work parts went well, the non-work parts were a blast (and might even earn their very own post), and it appears I shall be returning to C@L relatively unscathed. I feel like I did especially well with the food on this mission. Between office colleagues with the hook-up on good places as well as some friendly locals who produced some top-notch recommendations (tip of the cap in your direction, good Mr. Snikes!), I ate especially well this past week. Of particular note in that last statement is acknowledgement that said eating well included three (3) straight days of sushi. I mean, I’m down with sushi, and I’m especially down with sushi when it’s high-end (and we had some pretty high-end raw fish), but I usually wouldn’t eat it three (3) days in a row. Not unless I was balancing...

Posted by thatkid at 4:48 PM | Comments (5)

April 11, 2006

Just For The Halibut

In which I detail my weekend fishing trip; that's right, fishing trip Mixed it up a little bit this weekend. A friend generously invited me to join him for opening day of halibut season on Puget Sound. Opening day sounded good (an event, at the very least), and I knew I really enjoyed eating halibut. My buddy had all the gear: the house with the dock, the boat, and the sundry rods and tackle boxes and little fishing doodads. Most importantly, he had a working knowledge of how in the hell you go halibut fishing in Puget Sound and the patience to deal with me. I'll admit that I was pretty excited to check it out. Generally speaking, I haven't done a terribly good job of getting out of the greater C@L area and exploring the region. I mean, people are always talking all this game about how "beautiful" and...

Posted by thatkid at 11:55 PM | Comments (1)

April 5, 2006

Amateur Food Porn

Someone In C@L Decided To Take Photos Of Sandwiches And Didn't Call Me? The text message came in around noon on Sunday: Theres [sic] a story in the about taking pictures of a ham sandwich in the [C@L] times arts section today..you could totally beat this woman in this film short contest Ahem. A story about taking pictures of ham sandwiches in one of the C@L papers? Should I be worried that the entire world is revolving around me again? I immediately fired up the C@L Times web site and searched for "ham sandwich." The search worked; I found the article -- it even highlighted the word "ham" in the page. Additional research revealed that the C@L Times is apparently running a contest called Three-Minute Masterpiece, in which amateur filmmakers are invited to submit (very) short films (180 seconds max) shot with digital equipment. Reps from the paper will select...

Posted by thatkid at 11:58 PM | Comments (0)

March 12, 2006

My Very First Cartoon

I can't really draw -- but that's never stopped me before! Yup. I made a cartoon. Maybe I'll make more; I hadn't really ever tried to think in cartoon form before. Also, I can't really draw. But I'm more than happy to keep trying!...

Posted by thatkid at 12:04 PM | Comments (1)

March 5, 2006

Just Here For the Doughnuts

Is there still time for a doughnut resurgence? It happened again on Friday. I've been complaining for a while that the doughnut, as a general concept, doesn't get nearly enough love/ respect. Until the carb-counting thing kicked in, we all couldn't get enough of bagels. We made sandwiches on bagels, launched bagel chains, and invented increasingly exotic flavors of bagel. Doughnuts enjoyed a brief resurgence of popularity with the Krispy Kreme thing, but never to the degree of bagels (and oh did I long for a club sandwich served on a glazed doughnut! Oh did I long!). And, to be honest, the whole Krispy Kreme thing was always a little low-end; all sugar, no substance. So you can imagine my excitement when I moved to C@L and discovered Top Pot Doughnuts. Finally, someone with the guts to step up and own the high-end/ premium doughnut market! And own it they...

Posted by thatkid at 12:41 PM | Comments (1)

February 22, 2006

Let Me Guess, You're An Art Student

When scammed in the Middle Kingdom, the best defense is a good offense When we were in Beijing last summer, we had the extreme luxury of being led around town by a college buddy who had lived here for a couple years (and who spoke fluent Mandarin). It's the sort of thing that really makes a difference. He was able to help us negotiate situations large and small (talking to cabbies, making sure we ordered the right things at dinner, talking our way into these little alleyways that we probably shouldn't have been strolling through) and generally was a big determinant of our (very high) customer satisfaction during our stay in the capital of the Middle Kingdom. One of the important bits of wisdom that our buddy imparted during our visit was that we needed to be on alert for a scam involving young "art students" who will try to...

Posted by thatkid at 11:02 PM | Comments (0)

February 21, 2006

ThatKidInTheCorner Now Welcome In The Middle Kingdom!

A triumph of Sino-American relations not seen since the Nixon administration and Forrest Gump ThatKid is live from The Middle Kingdom (Beijing, to be specific) this week. Whilst I may have complained during my visit here last summer that I couldn't access www.thatkidinthecorner.com while within the reach of China's proxy servers, it appears that I have finally made the big time: thatkidinthecorner.com is now an approved site! My my, I must be moving up in the world! Though I suppose we could ascribe this change in status to some larger movement to open more of the Internet to Chinese citizens (especially highly prized and valuable international content like ThatKidInTheCorner), even I'm not that vain. More likely, no one had ever tried to access ThatKidInTheCorner through those proxy servers until last summer, so they had no reason to approve it. But a couple page requests probably earned it a quick scan...

Posted by thatkid at 7:47 PM | Comments (0)

February 18, 2006

A Simple Fellow, With Simple Tastes

Why I Will Never Again Stay With The Morgan’s Hotel Group At the risk of whinging and/ or posting an entire column that should otherwise be featured under the “Aggravating/ Enjoyable Travel Note of the Week” heading in Peter King’s Monday Morning Quarterback column on cnnsi.com, I need to share some quick thoughts on my recent week of business travel. Specifically, I need to share in re: my hotel choices throughout the trip. As business travelers go, I’m a pretty easy customer. That is, I’m not the sort of person who asks for another room, writes angry letters, demands upgrades, all that nonsense. If I’m traveling against a fixed budget, the hotel is not where I want to devote scarce resources; I’m more than willing to trade a nice hotel room for convenient flight times and interesting meals. Usually this means that I end up in generic and/ or dumpy...

Posted by thatkid at 9:59 PM | Comments (0)

February 9, 2006

How To Make Friends In C@L (Vol. 1): Temple Of The Dog

Not that there's anything wrong with grunge Maybe it's the crappy winter weather (which admittedly hasn't been that crappy of late/ this week), or maybe it's a general feeling that I'm sufficiently settled to have more complex opinions about the town, but lately I've felt empowered to (more publicly) have a sense of humor about my new home. This is all just a polite way of saying that I've probably been a little more obnoxious than usual about C@L of late. In what might become a semi-regular feature here on ThatKid, I'm going to offer some charming ideas for making friends should you ever be in the greater C@L area. And away we go: Imagine that you're in a bar and you spot someone sporting he sort of haircut that the good boys in Pearl Jam and Soundgarden might have sported circa 1991. While of course we respect what those...

Posted by thatkid at 12:57 PM | Comments (3)

January 27, 2006

Protect Your System Against Viruses

It isn't that we don't appreciate metaphors In the interest of fighting flu season (and the attendant absenteeism that negatively impacts productivity and allows key milestones to slip), the powers that be around the office have launched an internal awareness campaign to encourage employees to take steps to prevent sickness and the transmission thereof. Things like little Purel in your mailbox with notes attached. And, of course, some posters in the hallways. The posters show two soapy entwined hands splashing around beneath a faucet and read, in a nod and a wink to the target audience, "Protect Your System Against Viruses." Get it! Protect your system (you!) against viruses (the biological version of computer viruses!). That is, they use a metaphor in order to explain the object/ idea that was the basis of that metaphor. A couple things here: (1) Is there some fancy figure of speech for this? Something...

Posted by thatkid at 10:41 PM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2006

Don't Ever Ride Greyhound. Ever.

In which a Greyhound bus from New York to Philly ends up heading north on the Boulevard Through the wonders of corporate travel, I spent last weekend on the East Coast. Not only was this a welcome respite from the then-record-threatening 24 consecutive days of rain out here in C@L, but it also offered me a chance to pull a whirlwind tour of my erstwhile East Coast haunts: New York, Philly, and The Squan. The Philly part was particularly exciting -- a trip down to the Wachovia Center to check out the Flyboys against the Avs. Given that (a) I hadn't seen pro hockey in around two years, (b) there's no pro hockey option in C@L proper, and (c) it was part of a larger birthday experience for a buddy, I was, as they say, pretty Flyered up. The game started at 2 pm on Saturday. As an experienced New-York-to-Philly-sports-complex...

Posted by thatkid at 7:43 PM | Comments (2)

December 22, 2005

Which Day of Christmas Is This Again?

Five (5) delicate snacks before I leave C@L for the holidays 'Tis the season! Whilst previous holiday seasons may have brought out the money-grubbing cynic in me, this year I've got nothing but visions of sugarplums dancing in my head. I have lights in my windows, a holographic snowman, and cardboard Santas + reindeer taped to my wall (though they keep falling down; sigh). Anyhoo, before I split C@L for 2005, I figured I'd offer up some quick hits on the holidays and the last couple weeks here in C@L: More Well Than Sick, I'll Admit: so I shall take back some of the things I may have said in earlier posts about C@L band Harvey Danger, the erstwhile PST darlings (quick sidenote: I am extremely confident that "erstwhile PST darlings" has never been written before; this is me, breaking new ground for the English language!) have earned their way...

Posted by thatkid at 8:13 PM | Comments (1)

December 14, 2005

Here's The Ring, I'll Meet You At The Car

As if proposing in the second quarter of a Sonics - Warriors game on a Tuesday wasn't clumsy enough Best Sonics game of my tenure as a season-ticket holder last night. Sure, the Sonics lost (sigh), but they lost in the most exciting and dramatic possible fashion: a three-pointer to win from the Warriors' Baron Davis with 0.4 seconds remaining in overtime. On top of that, embattled Sonics coach Bob Weiss got tossed for protesting a sequence of horrific calls on controversial Sonics forward Danny Fortson. (In general, I love trafficking in sports-adjectives cliches as above; that is, I have to assume that 30 percent of all articles about Weiss and Fortson contain the words "embattled" and "controversial" as modifiers of the respective names. It's worth noting that "embattled" just means "he'll get fired before the end of the season," and "controversial" means "he's a jerk." Just like "controversial wide...

Posted by thatkid at 4:12 PM | Comments (1)

December 9, 2005

My C@L Bona Fides, Music Edition

Now that I've seen Death Cab For Cutie, I just need to pick up some performance fleece Lately, I've summed up my fondness for the city of C@L's highly evolved taste in music as follows: C@L is one of the few cities its size where most of the residents -- whether they're into rock music generally or indie label pop specifically -- know what a "Death Cab For Cutie" is. You don't need to listen to the exquisite local indie radio station (though it certainly doesn't hurt) to know that Death Cab For Cutie are a very popular local band that you sure wish would really hit the big time. Even the Ashlee Simpson fans, the Andrea Bocelli aficionados, and the folks who just don't really listen to much music all are pretty sure that they've heard of something called Death Cab For Cutie. That's the kind of town C@L...

Posted by thatkid at 9:12 PM | Comments (1)

December 5, 2005

My Totally Rocking Crazy Party Of A Saturday Night

It was just like going to a really awesome party, only with more sogginess and barely audible cursing Let me begin by saying that it wasn't as though I had gigantic plans for Saturday night. My Big Night this weekend was Friday. Friday was appropriately exciting, complete with an out-of-town guest, engaging pro sports (Sonics versus Cavaliers, starring BronBron; big win for the Sonics, AND there was a full-on brawl with punches, kicks, beer dousings and ejections in our row -- you really can't ask for much more than that), and even a late-night trip to the local greasy spoon. So, in all fairness, by the time Saturday night rolled around, I was definitely ahead of my fun quota for the weekend. Of course, that wasn't so much on my mind Saturday night. My gigantic plan for thie night involved picking up some DVDs and heading up the street to...

Posted by thatkid at 8:59 AM | Comments (2)

November 22, 2005

Wedding Video: Director's Cut

In which we survive a big wedding celebration and manage to not humiliate ourselves too badly You know you had a good time at a wedding when it's 5 o'clock on Monday afternoon and you're still a bit weak-kneed from the festivities. My oh my -- it was quite the party. At the risk of revealing too much/ talking out of school (while at the same time acknowledging that I was very involved in the event), I'd like to offer a short tribute to some of the weekend's events that likely won't make it into the official wedding video. I'm Glad We're Recording This: so as we're milling about in one of the many upstairs salons and warrens of the wedding facility prior to Go Time (and there were indeed many upstairs salons and warrens), I decide that I'm going to try to make some funnies about the extent of...

Posted by thatkid at 1:10 PM | Comments (1)

It Also Rains In New York

An Abbreviated Defense of the C@L Climate It's pouring in New York today. Just awful. This isn't a misty drizzle, this is a full-on downpour. It's windy, it's cold, the rain is coming at odd angles -- all in all, it isn't so sweet. Since I've moved out west, I've gotten a lot of questions in re: the rain thing in C@L. Which is fair. Rain is a big part of the C@L brand. (If I had to pick three things that C@L is all about, it would be (1) rain, (2) lattes, and (3) The Space Needle. Narrowly missing the cut were salmon and Bill Gates.) And it does rain in C@L. However, it is worth noting that said rain tends to be gentle and not entirely inconvenient. And why isn't it entirely inconvenient? BECAUSE I'M NEVER OUTSIDE IN C@L. That is, I had to slog a few blocks...

Posted by thatkid at 8:14 AM | Comments (0)

November 1, 2005

Rebranding My New Home

Welcome to sunny C@L! So I've got the nickname problem. Can't be helped. I get a kick out of coming up with monikers for people and places that aren't actually their real names. You could argue that it's some sort of juvenile dominance/ control mechanism (just like the President!) and you probably wouldn't be that wrong. Guilty as charged. Most of said nicknames tend to be plays on words: homophones, homonyms, swapping around syllables, phonetic spellings, etc. Verbal or textual, they all work for me. Still, since moving out here to the Upper Left Side of America, I've struggled with some of the nomenclature. The toughest one, on an ongoing basis, is the proper word for a resident of my new city: Seattlite? Seattletonian? Seattleno? I'm lost. Seriously. At the same time, there have been some great early wins, specifically "Madrona, Home of the Monkelopes" as a name for a...

Posted by thatkid at 2:44 PM | Comments (0)

October 27, 2005

Setting Sail For Blackout Soccer Field?

Been rained out, been snowed out, but I've never been blacked out Can't say that I was completely fired up for my rec-league soccer game the other night. It was dark, cold, and raining when I left work; I wasn't exactly thrilled at the prospect of running around on a muddy field (shockingly, there's no grass on the soccer fields in Seattle; you would think with all the rain the grass would do just fine, but apparently the year-round use tears the fields to pieces). I was sort of hoping that maybe it would be rained out while at the same time acknowledging that, umm, it's Seattle, they're going to be cool with playing in the rain. The Gods of Laziness must have heard my prayers, because they did me one better than a rainout -- they turned off the power. That is, there was a blackout in the neighborhood...

Posted by thatkid at 10:10 AM | Comments (0)

October 19, 2005

That Creep Can Roll

In which I extoll the virtues of non-snarky (and cheap) bowling alleys It seems somewhat fitting that I should go bowling the weekend before the release of The Big Lebowski Achiever Edition DVD, if only because I'm completely incapable of getting anywhere near a bowling alley without my brain rebooting in Big Lebowski/ Walter Sobchak mode. That is, I was on my fifth "OVER THE LINE!" by the time we hit the parking lot; waiting for a lane to open up in the tastefully appointed lounge area (more on that later), I had more of an "Eight-Year-Olds, Dude" vibe going on. Generally speaking, I really enjoy going bowling, and not just for the opportunities to speak Big Lebowski. Bowling just makes for a lovely night on the town. You get a quirky activity to accompany your alcohol consumption, a little competitiveness, a little teamwork, even the occasional wager. Throw in...

Posted by thatkid at 10:31 AM | Comments (2)

September 19, 2005

That Last FTE Stole My Thunder

I know, I didn't believe it either. I'm not quite sure this merits its own entry, but I'm still reeling from it. Generally speaking, I don't meet a lot of people who share my first name. Not that it's so exotic or so uncommon, but there just aren't a ton of us walking around. Certainly there haven't been other people with my first name at any of my previous employers. Sure, there have been one or two at school with me, but hey, those are larger populations, and these folks have typically been "international," which I think somehow adds an asterisk to their official score. So you can imagine my surprise when I met the guy in the office next to mine. Same first name. Whoa, I thought, pretty cool. Kind of weird, but also pretty nifty. So we get to chatting a bit. Turns out that he just started...

Posted by thatkid at 11:16 AM | Comments (0)

August 30, 2005

The Shifty Deviousness Of The Great Outdoors

And here I thought I could trust an urban park system. Mellow weekend in Sea-Tac. Checked out a little nightlife, did some touristy stuff, hung out. And by “touristy" I mean we went to the fish market where they throw the fish. Guess what? This one dude chucks the fish to the other dude; also you can buy fish. Many people gathered to watch. (Not us, though. We even bought our fish at another stand. We preferred as-yet-unchucked seafood.) (Brief Digression: so in one of my b-school classes the professor showed us this Sixty Minutes feature about how the throwing-fish guys from Seattle had started a consulting business where they teach corporations about teamwork through the metaphor of fish-tossing. Remarkably, the point of showing said vides in class WAS NOT to demonstrate how you can take a stupid gimmick from a fish store and use it to rip off dumb-ass...

Posted by thatkid at 8:14 PM | Comments (0)

August 24, 2005

Welcome To ThatKidInTheCorner Version 2.0

We Got Ourselves A Birthday Present! Sigh. It seems like just yesterday that we posted our first-ever musing at the domain www.thatkidinthecorner.com. That's right -- one year ago today, ThatKid went live. And my how we've changed! We started with just this crappy WYSIWYG software to get the thing running, before upgrading to this snazzy blog management package around the holidays. That was all very lovely. The tone has evolved, but I think the content's mostly stayed true to the original mission: to be a spot on the Internet where I can write whatever the hell I goddam please! We're celebrating our first birthday with a design resnazzing. I suppose I could have tried to figure out some new functionality or bells/ whistles, but I didn't really know how. I'll look into it for the fall, though. In the meantime, satisfy yourself with a slightly evolved design theme! The thinking...

Posted by thatkid at 7:32 PM | Comments (2)

August 14, 2005

This Battlestation Is Partially Operational

And we are live from the Upper Left Side (of America)! It's been almost a year since I first came to Seattle as a grown-up. (I had visited as a twelve-year-old, but that doesn't so much count.) All seven loyal readers (back then, probably more like two) might remember that I even posted a little ditty describing the trip. For the record, that was the second (2nd) ever posting on ThatKidInTheCorner. Alert the official archivist! At that point, actually moving to Seattle and/ or living here was essentially inconceivable. Not that I didn't think the town was great. Not that I didn't have a blast. Not that I didn't meet a bunch of cool people. It just wasn't on the radar. I was about to start my second year of b-school in the cit-ay, home of all of my friends and close to my family, and source of many viable...

Posted by thatkid at 4:39 PM | Comments (0)

August 5, 2005

Some Splainin' To Do

Hey -- whuh happened? I'm going to flatter myself and say that at least someone out there (one of the aforementioned seven loyal ThatKid readers) noticed that we had some technical difficulties this morning. At least one person. Seriously. Someone did. Said person might have also noticed that, AHEM, we're missing, errr, all of the old content from the site. Right. The quick answer is that I changed hosting companies this week. The long answer is that I had been overpaying to have my site hosted at Yahoo! Small Business for the past year (since it was pretty easy/ user-friendly and I was just getting started with this nonsense anyway) and was a decently happy customer until there was a change on their end that didn't fully support my blog management system (Movable Type) and when I called tech support three times no one had any idea what I was...

Posted by thatkid at 2:50 PM | Comments (0)

June 23, 2005

Back And Ready To Sign

In which I rejoice in my newly resurrected PC; also, some random notes And we're back. Much like CNN International in China returning from a programming interruption/ censorship opportunity ("And in Beijing today...[blank screen, 45 seconds of silence, and then we return to]...while in Tokyo...."), we are back in the United States of Freedom, land of potable water and operational indoor plumbing (except in our apartment, of course)! But we're not just back in the United States. We're back on my Compaq Presario 700, albeit with a new hard drive. As loyal readers (or anyone who's seen me cursing at my computer over the past 10 months) are well aware, my computer has been on his last legs for a long time now. To paraphrase Michael Corleone, it's been dying of the same design flaw for a full year. Until now. In retrospect, it's pretty embarrassing that it took me...

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June 16, 2005

Mad Props For Karma

In which the Gods balance the cosmic scales and smile fondly upon us in Hanoi I wouldn't say that I was feeling terribly great about Hanoi the last time I posted. It was hot and loud and we had just been scammed by a bunch of uniformed officials at the airport. (I think it was the structural nature of the scam that was so unsettling; it wasn't like we got in the wrong cab. Anyhoo). Things have really improved since then. We did two-days-one-night tour with ODC Travel ("Small Groups, Big Adventure!") on Halong Bay. Complete touchdown. There were only ten of us on the boat (the aforementioned "small group"), and we had a blast (see above, "big adventure"). Met some fun folks, saw some gorgeous stuff, got to explore the bay on kayaks for a bit (which completely rocked), and generally had a great time. And, in an even...

Posted by thatkid at 1:02 AM | Comments (0)

June 13, 2005

Nearly Shanghaied In Hanoi

In which we can attest to the value of the Lonely Planet guidebook for Vietnam My last post talked a lot of game about how we were "planning" to go to Hanoi the following day. Right. So that didn't "exactly" happen. Apparently that Saturday (when we were planning to travel) was some sort of holiday. The bad news was that we couldn't get on a flight to Hanoi that day. The worse news was that we also couldn't get on a flight to Hanoi the following day. Uh oh. (Vietnam Airlines isn't entirely uncomplicated in re: their customer service and ticket purchasing functions.) So we improvised a bit. We decided to stay in Hoi An for one more day, then do a day in Nha Trang (this translates as "we decided to go to the beach for a day") and then head to Hanoi on Monday. Today. And here we...

Posted by thatkid at 9:37 AM | Comments (0)

June 10, 2005

Home Of The Shiny Green Suit

In which we have an awesome time in Hoi An and break the awful truth about Paris Hilton to some interested locals Unlike the United States of Freedom, our group had little trouble leaving Saigon. I mean, Ho Chi Minh City. We were there for about 20 hours total. It wasn't a bad 20 hours, but I wouldn't say we were disappointed to skedaddle. It was pretty Big Cityish, and we were in a pretty Backpackery part, and I think we needed a change of pace. And a change of pace we got! We got to Hoi An yesterday afternoon and have had a complete blast. Great stuff here. The people have been extremely friendly and welcoming, and we really can't say enough good things about this town. Some yarns and bulletpoints.... Just Like Saville Row, Only Really Cheap and You Can't Drink The Water: so the deal in Hoi...

Posted by thatkid at 10:53 PM | Comments (0)

June 8, 2005

I Was In Junior High Comma SomethingHead

Enough of that so-called Middle Kingdom; time to get in-country And we're back! Some minor technical problems with that last posting (which have since been remedied) due to the, ahem, rather restrictive policies in re: the electric internet in the PRC. Mad props to the other half of ThatKid for hooking things together whilst I was relatively incommunicado. Posts should be more lively over the next week since the Commies in Vietnam don't seem to be as effective in censoring the Internet as the Commies in China. We just arrived in Saigon/ HCMC for a brief stopover before heading north. Not too much to report from Vietnam yet, other than (a) this trip will confirm that I really do like Vietnamese food more than Chinese food (it's a Monsoon v. Ollie's thing) and (b) there's a certain thrill to dividing everything by 16,000. Some quickies on the past couple days.......

Posted by thatkid at 10:36 AM | Comments (0)

June 6, 2005

Shanghai: The Hartford Of Asia

In which we explore sleepy, boring, quiet, clean Shanghai Yawn. Shanghai is soooooo boring. Nothing to do, nothing to see. The streets are empty at most hours, and there's just no life or excitement to the place. Sure, it has a couple big buildings and some highways (and a few billboards), but after spending a couple days here, it's really no more exciting a city than Hartford, CT. Still, even Hartford has its charms (even if you aren't an insurance regulator): Cough, Cough, Cough: so we've been hacking and coughing since our plane landed. I mean, I don't know for sure that it's the "air quality," but I do know that neither of us are smokers and we don't have colds. And yet we...just...can't...stop...coughing. Luckily for us, it's apparently totally chill to just spit on the street at any time here. So that's nice. Also, there's that nasty haze in...

Posted by thatkid at 8:55 AM | Comments (0)

June 4, 2005

ThatKid Too Hot For Red China!

Even the commies can't stop ThatKid on the road; they can only contain me.... An apology to begin. I really did mean to post something sooner. I'm travelling in Asia for a couple weeks, and wanted to whip up some content from the road with details of exciting adventures in faraway lands. Right. What I didn't realize was that the Chinese Government "wasn't so down with that." That is, www.thatkidinthecorner.com is not on the list of approved sites. (This probably explains why I have 1.3 billion fewer hits per day than I had projected.) So. The degree of difficulty has been elevated. Luckily, we have some clever ways around that. (But I can't divulge my Big Secrets.) I was planning to write something a big longer, but I'm in a dark, stale room on the second floor of a building (no sign in English) that is the Shanghai version of...

Posted by thatkid at 7:13 AM | Comments (0)

May 26, 2005

The Great T-Shirt Reckoning of 2005

In which I attempt to thin the ever-expanding ranks of the pile of t-shirts in my closet My t-shirt shelf is three-and-a-half feet tall. I don't know that said shelf was intended for use as such by whichever erstwhile resident installed the shelf system in the closet, but given the space's dimensions (42 in. x 13 in. x 12 in. -- I measured!) and my, ahem, rather significant t-shirt holdings, the poor thing never really had a chance. For the past three and a half years, it's been the proud home of my tower of t-shirts. And when I say tower, I'm not kidding. The space was full, top to bottom, at all times (and that assumes that at any given moment a solid 5 percent of my total t-shirts are in circulation in a laundry pile or some other drawer or something). Never mind that a "tower" is probably...

Posted by thatkid at 4:34 PM | Comments (0)

May 17, 2005

Deportivo La Camena CF Season 5 Review

Double Cup Glory For Young Camena Squad While Domestic League Championship Continues to Elude; Changes Expected As he surveyed the remains of a half-empty training room at the Sorry Perhaps(tm) 153 Center the day after the final game of Deportivo La Camena CF's fifth season, a 3-0 win over Borussia Dortmund that clinched a second-place finish for Camena in the League D Championship, veteran midfielder Park Ji "Parkie" Sung, 27, had a look on his face that -- if not quite smug -- was certainly very satisfied. "If you had asked anyone before the season if they thought we had a chance to win two trophies this year, playing on Level 6, they would have laughed at you," he explained, shaking his head, "I guess we surprised some people." Indeed, given the vast investments in younger players made by club technical director Rob Freewer in last summer's close season --...

Posted by thatkid at 5:49 PM | Comments (0)

May 6, 2005

CAPS LOCKED

IN WHICH I EXPLORE THE EFFECTS OF CAPITAL LETTERS IN ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS VIA EXTENSIVE USE OF SAID CAPITAL LETTERS SO ALREADY THE PAGE LOOKS PRETTY WEIRD. IT'S THE SAME ALPHABET. SAME CHARACTERS. SAME LETTERS. SAME WORDS. SAME LANGUAGE. SAME FONT. YUP. AND I HATE IT. LET ME BE THE FIRST TO ADMIT THAT I ACTUALLY DO HAVE A VISCERAL REACTION TO AN PAGE FULL OF CAPITAL LETTERS (ESPECIALLY IN AN E-MAIL -- HISS!!!). A REAL, ACTUAL, PHYSICAL REACTION. I SEE A PAGE FULL OF CAPITAL LETTERS, AND MY BLOOD PRESSURE RISES. IT'S REALLY UNCANNY. IT'S AS THOUGH I'VE BEEN CHALLENGED TO A DUEL -- I SEE THE CAPITAL LETTERS, AND IT'S LIKE SOMEONE IS GETTING UP IN MY SHIT. YOU TALKIN TO ME? WHY YOU GOTTA USE THE CAPS? IT'S ACTUALLY TOUGH TO TYPE THIS, IN THAT I KNOW HOW IT'S BEING READ. I DON'T MEAN TO BE THIS AGGRESSIVE;...

Posted by thatkid at 3:23 PM | Comments (0)

March 8, 2005

Eurotrip(!)

I had no idea how good German doughnuts would be Hello from Amsterdam! I'm on Day Four of my improv Spring Break Eurotrip. Going to try to keep it quick, partly because (a) I'm at one of those Internet cafes where the meter is most definitely running and (b) the keyboard on the computer at said Internet has what looks to be the remains of a chocolate bar (dearGodIhopeit'sachocolatebar) jammed between the R, T and F keys and it's kind of nasty. I wouldn't say I've been eating healthily: I mean, I knew German food was heavy. What I didn't know was that my diet there would mostly consist of coffee, pastries, and beer, in that order. Also I had schnitzel (there's no way that's spelled properly). Jaegerschnitzel, to be in exact. It means, "in the hunter's style" or "covered in heavy cream sauce." Good luck storming the castle: true...

Posted by thatkid at 5:28 PM | Comments (0)

February 4, 2005

Et Tu, Slimming Black?

In which I bicker with a journalist regarding Andy Reid's wardrobe Ugh. So I got into it the other night with the dude who writes the "Uni Watch" column on ESPN's Page 2 (Paul Lukas, formerly of Slate and the Village Voice). He wrote up a Super Bowl uniform preview, itemizing each element of the Eagles' and Pats' uniforms and predicting an Eagles victory based on their superior battle togs. (He contends that history demonstrates that the team with the better uniforms wins the Super Bowl more often than not.) I certainly took no issue with his endorsement of the Birds' uniforms. With the possible exception of the white shirt-green pant look (assuming of course that the black shirt-white pant combo doesn't even merit mention), I think the Birds' current uniforms are pretty cool. Though I may miss the silver pants of yesteryear, the kelly green had run its course;...

Posted by thatkid at 11:45 AM | Comments (0)

February 1, 2005

The Story of the Film So Far

In which I write a guest column on snikes.com! The following appears today, February 1, 2005 on snikes.com as part of a large-scale content and services sharing agreement between our respective firms; further details on the deal will be available shortly. Among the many leading indicators of my increasingly unhealthful obsession with the Philadelphia Eagles (a.k.a My Most Favorite Entertainment Property or Brand) is the fact that I am currently 2-for-2 for the week in viewing ESPN2's Cold Pizza and, perhaps even more distressingly, I have actually found myself agreeing with commentator/ blathermonkey Skip Bayless. Though I am a loyal ESPN consumer, I've long eschewed Cold Pizza as the sort of crap that even I'm above; it reeks of ESPN's ill-fated attempts to broaden its audience by co-opting traditionally successful program formats (Beg, Borrow, and Deal, we're looking in your direction), in this case, the network morning show. More importantly,...

Posted by thatkid at 9:46 PM | Comments (0)

January 4, 2005

And Starring JB As Himself

A Jack Russell terrier moves in for a week -- with predictably hilarious results! Fittingly coinciding with the turn of the new year, my sitcom existence enjoyed a pretty cool season finale episode this past week. As longtime viewers of the show certainly know, we traditionally end the fall season with our big New Year's Reunion Show, in which we bring back all of your favorite guest stars from previous episodes for the very special two-hour New Year's Bash Spectacular (we do something similar in the spring as well). Yet unlike previous finales, this year's episode boasted a few shocking twists: we eschewed our traditional road trip to central New Jersey for a location in NYC, and we had a dog for a week. A dog! I did not have a dog (or any sort of pet) growing up. Neither did any of my close childhood friends, though some did...

Posted by thatkid at 12:21 AM | Comments (0)

December 24, 2004

Welcome to That Kid In The Corner Version 1.5

Our little corner of the Internet just got an upgrade for Christmas! It's not that we didn't like what the site used to look like. We did. (Thus, this new one looks pretty much like the old one.) But we also knew that old That Kid In The Corner was going to be a temporary sort of thing -- it was more important early on for us to be doing anything at all rather than sweating some sort of long-term development solution. More essential to put pen to paper than it was to actually take advantage of available technologies. But, at a certain point, one realizes just how much better one's little web site could be if one only took the time to figure out and implement one of the many free content management packages available on the electric Internet. And figure out and implement one has! (At least a...

Posted by thatkid at 2:55 PM | Comments (0)

November 25, 2004

Happy Poultry Day From The Upper Left Side

Official That Kid In The Corner recipe edition! The luster of certain holidays has waned as I've gotten older (Easter, Christmas) while others have dramatically improved (Halloween, New Year's Eve). I'd like to pretend that this transition isn't completely due to, ahem, the integration of alcohol into said improved holidays, but hey, ain't nothing wrong with a snifter of port around the holidays. Into the improved (and improving) holiday category, I think I can confidently add Thanksgiving. Though I've always been fond of the turkey-and-mashed-potatoes meal package as well as professional football on television, it wasn't until recently that I managed to really immerse myself in the sublime pleasures of Thanksgiving. Mostly, I didn't have enough respect for the idea of a whole day devoted to overeating and then passing out in front of the TV. A WHOLE HOLIDAY! Just for stuffing my face and sleeping! I mean, I'm happy...

Posted by thatkid at 2:34 PM | Comments (0)

November 17, 2004

Bad Content Provider, Bad!

The resurrection of my Compaq Presario 700 Whoa. Finally my computer hath returned! I've been a bad, bad, bad content provider the past couple weeks. However, as I've learned at length in graduate school, when the shiznit starts to go funky, blame someone else! In this case, the AC adapter on my Compaq Presario 700 notebook, purchased (ahem) two years and nine months ago. This computer has been dying a slow, slow death since last spring, due, I would guess, in no small part to the daily thumpings this poor little box has taken over the past couple years. Lots of commuting miles + daily jostling on subway = internal structural damage and regularly scheduled "Oh my God this thing is finally dead" moments for its owner. But for now, we live! And we soldier on! La France -- where's Leroy?: took a wild trip across the ocean for the...

Posted by thatkid at 1:15 PM | Comments (0)

September 8, 2004

Best Souvenir EVER

For someone who has lived in New York for going on five years and who is a pretty devout sports fan with at least a passing interest in tennis, I am ashamed to say that 2004 was the first year I made it out to the US Open Tennis Tournament. In fact, I had never actually been to any sort of professional tennis tournament, much less the most important one in the United States of Freedom! At the same time, I do maintain a weakness for David Foster Wallace, and so was more than a little curious to see what the denizens of the real-world Enfield Tennis Academy looked like up close: The US Open, presented exclusively by the following thirty-one platinum sponsors!: my my my, if the US Open wasn't just a unique opportunity to engage middle-to-high income consumers in an immersive and unmatched promotional milieu! Unlike gauche baseball...

Posted by thatkid at 11:34 AM | Comments (0)

September 2, 2004

SEATACLAX, Pronounced See-Tuh-KLAX

Changed scenes in media res and spent a couple days in El Lay. I am fond of that Los Angeles place, though more in a visiting way than a living way (I just think I'm too much of a wuss as regards the traffic). Good times in LA all around: LA is Much Better When You Avoid The Hollywood People: and I don't so much mean the people who hail from the well-branded universities and expensive suburbs and populate the halls of the agencies and production houses, jockeying to prove their worth(s) as arbiters of high-revenue marketability and taste as regards the half-hour sitcom format and the star-driven romantic comedy feature film, though some of those can be brutal as well (but no more so than in any other field that draws from said well-branded universities and expensive suburbs). I mean more the silicone-enhanced cupcakes and pouty-looking actor wannabees trying...

Posted by thatkid at 6:34 PM | Comments (0)

August 30, 2004

Leftsiiiiiiiiiiide! Supermuseums, John Kerry, and the Glories of T-Town

In which we venture to the Left Coast for some R and/ or R Thank you, Greater Seattle-Tacoma metro area for your generous hospitality this past week! I kept meaning to write whilst I was in Seattle, but my oh-so-generous hosts made sure that the schedule was fully loaded for the entirety of my stay. For that I am grateful, and more than a little bit tuckered out. Massive respek. If in Seattle, I highly recommend the following: Go To The Experience Music Project: so the architecture is completely over-the-top (iridescent reflective pink and purple and located at the foot of the Space Needle -- when the sun is shining, you can see it from across town). So the prices a