Carolina beat Miami Saturday

And that makes Carolina the only ACC team to beat the two big Florida titans in official conference games. Meanwhile NC State lost to a rather lackluster Clemson team. Since I don’t really pull heavily for either of these two teams I love being able to weigh my non-biased opinion: Amato’s team is over-hyped. All the State students and fans I know always have an excuse for States poor performance and will quickly place the blame on some other factor than Amato or a player.

Carolina fans on the other hand have come to expect their team to lose, and they usually don’t care. That seems to make a victory like the one over the Hurricanes even sweeter. But this year before the State fans can denounce the Carolina win as a fluke they must first explain their own loss to the Tarheels. John Bunting’s coaching career may have been saved by these wins.

Durham, NC – Armpit of the south

If you’re considering sending your kid to Duke University, you should be aware that you are sending them into one of the most crime laden areas of the south. The growing gang problem in Durham, NC is only one problem this sleezy, pathetic, poorly run city has to deal with. Most people say Raleigh-Durham when referring to the area. I can tell you personally that Raleigh and Durham might as well be 2000 miles apart. In case you haven’t heard most of Durham is the personification of the criminal element.

.asp mail handlers

imageLately I’ve been working on the Dillon Supply Corporate Intranet. I spent all day writing a custom .asp form mailer and configuring a virtual SMTP server on the IIS host. The hardest part was getting the SMTP routing correct. I learned the hard way that you have to add a remote domain under the default virtual server and then route the form mail to this new domains “Smart Host” (a.k.a. the Exchange Server). After six hours, and many entries in the /mailroot/badmail folder, I finally got it working.

Sweet 16

imageAmy’s cousin Katie celebrated her 16th birthday today so we attended yet another party (I think that’s three this month). Connor had fun getting passed around to relatives again. We had a small battle about putting him on a trampoline, which I disapproved of (I don’t think many medical professionals would recommend it so I’m not sure the idea would sound too good in the ER). It’s quite a drive to Wilson Mills, NC where the party was held plus we got lost when we missed an exit on the way. Luckily they had cheap gas in Clayton ($1.89/gallon).

imageKatie got a jet black 2004 2-door Honda Accord from her father as a birthday present. I’m sure the insurance on that scenario is a lot of fun$$$. Connor’s getting to be a lot of fun. He’s even getting better about having his nails trimmed and I’m getting faster at doing it. Now if we could just find a way to get him to quit biting… I’m open to suggestions.

First Haircut

imageBefore: My dad took Connor to get his first haircut today. He was really okay with it. He didn’t fuss at all. The women at J.J.’s Kids Cuts even commented on how well behaved he was for his age. We were amazed. He took a 2 1/2 hour nap before going which probably had something to do with it.

imageAfter: Amy has his first curls in a bag to divide among grandmothers. We left some of the curls in the back. When he was done he got this balloon that was promptly released to the stratosphere once we got in the parking lot. Luckily his attention span is so short right now he didn’t even realize it was gone.

I voted today.

imageI’m glad that NC decided to let people vote early. I won’t have to face any crowds on Nov. 2nd. It took me less than 20 minutes today at the NC Board of Elections headquarters, one of the benefits of working downtown in the state capital. I’m not going to post who I voted for (big mystery huh?) so all I’ll say is it would be great if NC turned blue this year.

New Catagory: Local Music

I’ve just added another catagory to file entries under. I’m going to use it to write reviews of live performances I attend which will be pulled from the raleighmusic.com and Independent music calendars. It should help give this blog some purpose and direction. I promise to be fair but honest in my opinions. And that’s all it will be is opinion. Anyone who doesn’t agree is welcome to respond with their own comments.

NC State Fair 2004

imageMy prediction was correct. There were a lot of people in Raleigh yesterday. The fair was packed. Sometimes the crowd got so large all movement would just stop in a human traffic jam. Amy and I rode the Zambala (or something like that), the large Farris Wheel, the Orbiter, and the best ride I’ve ever been on – The Fire Ball. Some young girl told Amy she could just close her eyes if she got too scared. I want to go back and ride it again. The best part was that I got to go do something with fun with Amy by ourselves. I”m glad we didn’t do a group outing.

There must have been 3000 pair of overalls in attendance. Amy had a good point: if you’re not feeling good about yourself, go to the fair. In general the American public scares me. Most people claim to go for the food – and it shows.

Not so terrible 2’s.

imageMy niece Skylar turned 2 yesterday and today we went to her birthday party at 2:00 in a park way out in Zebulon, NC. It was nice outside and the kids all had fun but it was cut short when another group showed up at exactly 4:00 with reservations for another birthday party in the same place. It was a quick packing job, we didn’t actually get out of there until 4:30.

imageAmy and I had planned to go to the fair after the party. My mom and dad were going to take Connor home with them for the evening. But then Connor got quite upset when mommy left him held by a “stranger” (Tim’s Uncle Junior). After that we didn’t have the heart to separate from him for the rest of the day. We’re going tomorrow instead. My prediction is that it’s going to be crowded, crowded, crowded.