Blogging to Blog

Not really too much going on this week. The weather sucks. Its cold, cloudy, windy and rainy out today. Where I am, Seattle? Im hoping it dries up enough by Sunday so we have an outdoor soccer game. I hate playing in the cold and wind and the league wont let us play if the fields are slop. It tears them up too badly for the rest of the season.
Well, its looking like another huge LAN party is on the horizon. One of the guys from my gaming group has secured a large room and large tables. Perfect for setting up 15 or so computers and and packing nerds and pizza into a building for 6 hours. Oh the fun!!

Another Late Update

Wow, im really getting lazy about these updates! I was just sitting here at work, and I thought... uh-oh, I havent updated the Thorpeblog in a log time!! So here I am, trying to write in a few quick things before lunch. Lets see, whats been going on? Oh yeah, my buddy Dan flew into town from LA for a family get together. I didnt get to see him much, but while he was here me, Drew and him met up at one of our favorite restaurants, La Hacienda. For those that do not know what La Hacienda is... your missing out! Its a "Tex-Mex" place that makes fajitas that are unbelievable. Im getting hungery just typing about it. Im not sure how many there are around the USA, but there are at least 3 I know of in the Dallas area alone. Needless to say, we stuffed ourselves. Funny thing, Drew has a thing for their salsa dip. So we get our bowl of tortilla chips and he burns thru 4 bowls of the stuff! The waitress gives him a bowl sealed in a to-go bag. But after he finishes his meal and the 4 bowls of the salsa he already had... he opens the bag and digs into the to-go salsa. Crazy I tell ya. haha
Also, a Texas rarity, we got hit by a "snow storm" last saturday. It was kinda neat. Reminded me of my days in Chicagoland. Although we only got about 6 inches of the white stuff, the news and weather stations here were acting like it was practically the end of the world. Talking about how to drive safe, stay warm, care for you pets and plants, how to walk in it.... it was hilarious. Drew and I were joking about how up north the weather man would have said, "... and this morning we got a little snow, looks nice out... Now on to sports." But here our weather man devotes the entire day to "Snow Storm Coverage". Too funny. Well gotta run and do some work. More to come.

A Late Update

Yeah, yeah... so it's Thursday and im doing a last weekend recap. So sue me. haha Last saturday the Dinner Club met again. This time it was off to Addison for some Mongolian Barbeque. For those that have never been to Ghengis Grill, its quite an experience! First you go thru this buffett like area full of raw beef, chicken, pork and tofu. (blah!) Then you pile veggies, stir fry mixes, seasonings and tons of other stuff into your stainless steel bowl. From there you head over and get in line around what looks like a giant, round, steel table. Probably about 10 feet in diameter. Once there, they take your bowl from you, plop it upside down on this hot steel surface and begin to beat and mix it with a pair of sticks. When your meat or tofu (blah!) is fully cooked and your veggies are done, they use the sticks and scrape it back off into a new bowl. You then get to choose between steamed or fried rice and your back off to your table. To say this food is delicious would be the understatement of the year. Its all you can eat so if you finish your first bowl, its back up for more. And if your food sucks, its your own fault... you created it. Normally im good for about 4 bowls. But this time i was tapping out after 2 large bowls. Most everyone made it to at least their second bowl. Dinner Club members in attendance were Val, me, Mandy, Therese, Craig, Becki, Cheryl and Mike. We had a really good time. Funny thing. After we left Ghengis Grill we went next door to a store called Condom Sense. We thought it would be a good laugh. Oh, it was. As i walked in, I expected to see a store that mainly sold different types of condoms. Kinda boring if you ask me. But nooooooooo. Not this place! They had a small corner dedicated to condoms. The rest of the store had every type of sex device, aid, contraption, pump, crutch, tool, assistant.... whatever. There was even a life sized sex doll for like $800!! I really feel sorry for anyone who forks out money for something like that. hahaha We walked thru the isles laughing and making jokes at just about every device we saw. It was a hoot. Just like us, most people in there were doing the same thing. Not shopping, just there after eating and having a chuckle. Sad thing was, there was this guy walking around there. Probably mid 40's. He was in the corner and carrying something he had picked up to buy. He was asking the girl working there all these serioius questions about different stuff. It was actually kinda creepy. Geeze buddy, just get it off the internet. Well, after about 30 minutes of looking around we all left. I was so full I was useless the rest of the night. Went straight home and fell asleep.
Saturday was also the first practice for my outdoor soccer team. I arrive at the fields and it is COLD! With temps in the upper 30's, low 40's and wind gusts of 30 mph... i knew it was going to be a tough practice. We were scrimmaging another team that would be in our division. So this would be a good judge of where we stood in our league. Although none of us on our team knew eachother, we had never played together before and we played sloppy... we managed to beat the other team like 4 or 5 to 0. Good showing id say. They didnt even manage to get a good shot off on our goal. After the scrimmage, the entire frozen team all decided to meet up at the local Hooters restaraunt. Once there everyone got to start talking and getting to know eachother. I didnt eat because I knew we were going to Ghengis Grill that night. (yes i know these events are backwards) :) The team ordere a platter of 50 hotwings. Ive never seen chicken wings turn to a pile of bones so fast. Wow.
Sunday was another fun day as RSi (www.red-sector.com) was competing in Mission 4 of the Azzcup Ghost Recon tournament. I was originally in the reserve pool but as the insertion time neared I was called to duty. I was briefed on the mission intel, voice comms were configured, fire team load-outs were decided and then we waited for the go command. The only thing we knew so far was it was a night time insertion into a Georgian (Russian province) rebel controled area. We were to rescue a hostage from a castle compound and assasinate their leader, then get to the EZ. The tournament isnt over, so I cant talk about what happend or our final score... yet. I have to wait until all teams have finished the final round. But i will just say, things went surprisingly well. :) Check back for a detailed update soon. (If you care)

What a Battle!

Well my Thursday night soccer team finished the regular season in fourth place. This got us into the playoffs, barely. Our first round match was against the first place team. If we beat them, we are in the final against the winner of the 2nd and 3rd place game. We battle hard early in the first half. Later in the half, I get the ball on the left side. A quick shot fake, I cut it inside and fire off a right footed shot that slides right into the lower left corner of the net. Goal! Seconds ticking away in the half. One of our guys is down in the corner fighting for the ball on the offensive end. He blasts it into the corner and it comes out to me right at the top of the goalie box. I hit it with a one touch, left foot shot. Goal!! Again in the lower left corner. The buzzer goes off and we are all pumped up. We are beating the first place team. They are stunned and silent. Second half starts and they come out very aggressive. Before we know it, they go on a 4 goal scoring streak! We are down 4-2. But we arent done yet. Collin and another one of our guys (cant remember his name off-hand) score 2 goals. We are tied and back in it! Then we commit a foul near our goal just outside the goal box. We set up a poor defensive wall and they shoot one in. 5-4, them. We pound away at their defense getting so close each try. The clock is ticking down fast. With just seconds left... they score on another free kick. 6-4... final whistle blows. We are on to the consolation 3rd place game next thursday and they are in the final. Oh well, we gave the top seeded team a scare. They expected an easy match against the lowest ranked team in the playoffs and instead almost got beat.

Week In Review

Lets see where I left off. Ah, last friday night. That following saturday, I get a call from my buddy Craig. He says, "pack up your pc... LAN party!!" Turns out it as a Halo and Ghost Recon LAN party to be specific. And everyone else except for one other had Mac's. There were about 7 of us crammed into the living room of a small house. The floor was covered in wires, cables and hubs. We played for a couple hours then ordered pizza and drinks. Then, played on till about midnight. I was exhausted! Without missing a beat I was up the next morning at 8:30am for a Sunday paintball game down at the Corp of Engineers woodlands near the lake. Me and Courts get there and find we have 8 others already there! It turned out to be a great day of paintball. It was a little chilly but all the running and crawling thru the woods really helped keep everyone warm. I carried my camera with me for a couple rounds and took some pics. They are up on the site under Hobbies\Paintball. What i found funny was there are all these guys there with $200 plus guns and im getting just as many kills or more with my $20 paintball gun. Its gotta be the shoes? Or just my mad skills. haha We played till about 4:30 in the afternoon. A 20oz. tank of air and 1000 rounds of paintballs later I was home and beat. Spent the rest of the evening watching the NFL playoffs and vegging on the couch. It was nice. That night I went over to Val's and we decided to venture down to the new Jupiter Cafe coffee shop. We get there and even though its about midnight, the place is packed! Not an empty seat. So we got our coffee and Chai Tea and headed home. Monday we were off work for MLK day. I spent most of that chilling at the house cleaning the place up and working on a couple PC's. Nothing exciting. Tuesday comes and its back to work for the week. Whoopee! A pretty un-eventful week at work. We are preparing for the big ICMA conference we are hosting so we're working hard to show a clean house to our guests. Im not quite yet sure if I care. Thursday rolled around and it was time for my Dallas teams soccer game. We played a Mexican team who were very aggressive and almost violent in their style. I started the scoring off early with a back post header from a cross that looped over the defenders. At that point I thought we'd kill them. But they fought hard and scored a tying goal. It was deadlocked until late in the second half. They scored to make it 2-1. But in the end their rough play and fouls caught up with them. The whistle on the 6th foul meant a penalty shot for us! Our guy made the shot and it was tied 2-2. It ended that way and i was happy to get a point out of the game. Now, here we are back on a Friday. My mom leaves Sunday for Florida so I went up to their place to help her with some computer issues. I came back and jumped online for the traditional "freaky friday" on the RSi GR servers. We played till almost 2am! Man, what fun. Tomorrow I am suposed to have a first soccer practice with a new outdoor team ive joined. But it looks like it will be rained out. Which means I can make my GR training session at 1pm. Should be a good weekend. I'll update later on!

Mix'n Match

Thursday night is one of my two soccer nights. This teams game are all in Dallas, so its a bit of a drive for those late games. So this last Thursday I had a 10:30 pm game. I pack all my gear in my bag and head down to the indoor playing field. I get to the practice field, next to the game field, and sit down on the turf to begin stretching out and putting on my gear. I open my soccer back and find out I left my soccer shoes at home on the floor!! DOH! I ask my entire team if they have an extra pair of shoes I can borrow. Nothing. No one has anything extra. I wore Addidas sandals there, so I couldnt play in those! I then had an idea. I ran to the main building and went upstairs to the office. I asked the guy, "where's the lost and found". He points me to the room and I go to work. Its a huge pile of short, shirts, kids shoes, coolers, soccer balls and even a pair of underwear. (eww) Finally after digging for a bit, I find one size 10-1/2 New Balance cross trainer shoe. I set it aside. I keep digging. I then found a size 10 Addidas tennis shoe. So now i have a right and a left athletic shoe!! I throw them in my bad and hustle back the field. I put them on and my teammates hit the floor laughing. I look like a homeless guy that threw on whatever i found in the alley. HAHA! I played ok. The shoes really felt strange to play in. My touch was off and I had a hard time shooting in them. We did win the game 4-3 so i guess thats all that matters. Hopefully I'll never have to dig for free shoes again. Oh, and if you were wondering... I left the shoes on the bleachers so they would be returned to the lost and found.

Paradise Ends

Well my vacation flew by! My 11 days total of time away from my work place has already come and gone. But it was a busy week! I got lots done, although i didnt get to update Thorpeland. But thats in my plans soon. We are playing another round of paintball this weekend, and I WILL post pics from that. I took my video camera to the last one, but my brother isnt the battlefield camera man he thinks he is. Most of the video is way too shaky and un-usable. So im going with still pictures this weekend. Toward the end of the week, my girlfriend Val moved into a bigger apartment. So we had a "moving party". We had Mike, Cheryl, Craig, Becki, Mandy, Val and myself all carrying stuff from the apartment to the trucks and up to the new apartment. The new apartment was on the 3rd floor. UGG! It wasnt easy getting the washer, dryer and couches up there. And the entertainment center was just as tough. Surprisingly, I wasnt too beat up at the end of the day to go out and have a little fun that night. Me, Val and Craig headed over to the Jupiter Cafe on the square in downtown Denton. Its a new coffee house thats open 24/7. Its about time we got one here, and its a pretty cool one. The only thing they are missing is Wi/Fi connectivity! Im about to head over to Val's place tonight to continue the excavation known as unpacking. But im excited to get her new place all set up. Its a really nice apartment. Its a 2 bedroom, 1-1/2 bath, that is 950 sq. ft! Ok, im off to go help her. Later Thorpeland Fans!

WOOO WHOOO!!

Im on vacation offically today. For the next 7 days I get to just chill and work on projects that ive been putting off because of lack of time or energy. Now im faced with such questions as, will my apartment get cleaned? Will Thorpeland.com get an update? How late will I get to sleep in? haha Those questions and more will soon be answered.

Just Too Funny

About 8 months ago I broke up with the girl I was dating at the time cause things just were'nt right. She didn't get it but I knew I was doing the right thing. So, all these months have passed and I thought id go to her personal web page to read her "whats going on now" page to see how she's doing and how her holidays were. I was surprised to see one immature posting after another immature posting... as resent as this week, making bashes directly pointed at me. And that... is just too funny! Most normal people are able to look back months later on an ended relationship and say to themselves, "yeah, it was for the best it ended". But not her. She continues to make it a point to live in the past and vent her still fuming anger at me, in each of her posts. Well Jenna, if you visit the page and read this post. I only have one thing to say directly to you. GET OVER IT. MOVE ON. There, its out of my system. :)

Fun Times

Well I survived New Years Eve and the day after. Val and I met up with Criag and Becki at her house. There was supposed to be a party there but for some reason or another, everyone canceled. So we all loaded up in her car and headed out to another group having a party. I didnt know them but they were a group of Craig's ex-coworkers from his World Comm days. There were about 6 couples and TON'S of food. I was starving so I introduced myself to the room and hit the buffet with a vengance. haha Later, they decided to play DVD Trivial Pursuit. This is the new version of this old game where your piece lands on a color and you have to watch a short video clip off a DVD as your clue. It was fun. My team won the game on a very ironically funny question. To make a long story short, the answer to the winning question we were faced with was a very bad movie which I recieved for christmas and couldnt stand to watch. (Sorry Steve, its a bad movie. It just is.) The movie being "The Adventures of Ford Fairlane with Andrew Dice Clay". Wow, what a stinker. So after the party we are driving back to Becki's house and I start to get really car sick. And I had not even had anything to drink! I was on the edge of throwing up. But I made it back to her house alive. It was past 3am by that point and they suggested we just stay over. We did and I was out cold asleep within 5 minutes of hitting the pillow. In the morning we all got up and Craig and Becki whipped up a GREAT breakfast! We had waffles, fruit, scrambled eggs and juice. I came home and spent the rest of the day just being a bum, doing small projects around the house. I go back to work tomorrow for one day. Shortest week ever I guess. Im on vacation all next week so I am just wanting Friday to be over with. At 5pm, my vacation begins! I plan on updating my site since I'll have time. I have a lot I want to do but havent had time to. BE SURE TO CHECK BACK!!

PARTY TIME!!

Happy New Years All! Im about to head out the door with Val to Craig and Becki's NYE party. Should be a lot of fun. Im taking my camera with me to get a few pics. Hopefully i can post them on the site. Last night we had a really great Dinner Club outting. We went to a place called Thai Tango. WOW. Simply some of the best Asian food Ive ever had! Great atmosphere, great food and great friends. Overall, a great time! One of our friends flaked out and bailed on us just before dinner. Oh well, her loss. There were 6 of us, including CURLY, (ha!) and we all had a really good evening together. Well im out of here. I will update the site with party info and pics from tonight!

Another One Bites the Dust

Well another Christmas has come and gone. It was a good one this year. Everybody together with lots of great gifts, given and gotten. It started out Christmas eve. I went with Valerie to her parents house. They do their big feast and present exchange on the 24th. They had so much good food I could barely walk when I left there for the drive to my parents house, two hours later. I got one of the coolest gifts from my girlfriend Valerie. Long ago I had talked about getting a hermit-crab. She rememberd and got me a very large hermit-crab with a 10 gallon tank, sand, food/water bowls and play things for him. The next day I went down to the pet store and bought another hermie and another fake driftwood thing with plants growning on it so they have something to climb. I named the large hermie, Krusty... and the newest one I bought, Sideshow Bob. Soon I hope to get my web cam up so I (or anyone else) can watch them during the day. Most the time they are pretty still. But sometimes they get very adventurous and roam and climb around in their tank. As for giving presents, I got Val a few things she had been wanting and needing. One of those things being the movie Finding Nemo. We watched it. Pretty funny for kids or grown ups. I also got my brother a starter paintball gun. We plan on playing again on Jan. 4th and now he has a gun to shoot back with. I plan on taking quiet a few action shots and even some video I can share on the main site.
On another note, the Ghost Recon club I play often with, Red-Sector Inc., accepted me in as a full member! Read all about it at www.red-sector.com .

Chillin on Saturday

Im just hanging out at the pad right now, waiting for Val to give me a call up. We're supposed to go out and do some final Christmas shopping. I still have to get my Mom, Dad and sisters presents. Its all under control. I might go see The Last Samuri tonight with Craig. Looks like an excellent movie. The weather is really nice outside right now. Its close to 68F out and sunny. Sometimes I do miss the snow of Chicago, but i cant complain when i can just wear a long sleeved shirt and jeans and be comfortable. Well Im off to get things done.

The Un-Dead

Today I read one of the most interesting news articles that ive seen in a long time. It was a story from London, England. It seems that the CCTV (security) camera's at Hampton Court Palace, home of King Henry VIII, captured a ghostly figure. Some security guards noticed on their monitor that the double doors of a fire escape were open. They walked out to inspect for intruders and to shut the doors. When they got there, the doors were shut. So they go back to their office to review the video tape. To their disblief, they see a figure in a long thick robe, step out of the darkness of the doorway and close the doors! The freeze frame picture of the figure is incredibly creepy. The palace museum swears it was not a hoax or a prank. They have no explanation for it. From the picture, Id have to say if it was a joke, they did a VERY good job. Its one of the best ghost pictures Ive seen in quite a while. You really just have to see it for yourself. Have a look!!! Go to www.thorpeland.com/ghost.htm

Man Down!

This past Sunday we played another game of paintball. Man, what fun! This time we only had 5 guys, so we played games of 3 vs 2.... hunter/seeker. The 2 man team would go out into the woods and hide. The 3 man team would proceed to slowly hunt them through the woods. Once the teams found eachother, a fierce firefight would break out. Paintballs were flying everywhere, splattering through the trees and branches. With everyone using semi-auto paintball markers, you can shoot as fast as you can pull the trigger. In a single firefight, I would easily burn through 200 rounds of paint. I actually had a pretty good day. Only hit twice all day long. While on the other hand, I was able to land game ending shots on Paul, Courts, Adam and Ken. I even fired a few extra rounds into Courts after he was "dead". He said he yelled "Hit!" but I told him I thought he yelled "Not yet!". Hahaha It was a fun day for everyone. We all went home with humorous war stories to think about until the next time we play. Which should be in a couple weeks. Probably after christmas. I took some pictures with my camera phone, and I may post them if I get the chance.

Wal-Blog

I'm sitting in the checkout line in walmart blogging on my Sidekick. Kinda funny. Man this line is slow. Oh, good news. I found out today that I've been taken in as a "candidate" with a Ghost Recon gaming club (clan), called RSi. Check them out, www.red-sector.com. They are a great group of guys from all over the world. Not to mention they are pretty decent gamers. Geeze, why can't parents control their kids?! The kid in front of me in line is on the floor smashing all the candy in the in line display. The mom just keeps looking down at her and smiling. Will mommy do somthing about this kid or do I need to drop kick it out of the line? Harsh? Maybe.

Surprise, Surprise... Surprise!

My friend Jarod is graduating from college this semester and his girlfriend contacted me and our group of friends to say she's organizing a suprise birthday dinner for him tonight. Should be fun. It's at a Thia food restaraunt. Ive never had Thia food, but I like most other asian cuisines so I'll give this a good try. We are meeting tonght at 7pm and Jarod thinks its only he and his girlfriend, Andrea, having the dinner.
On another note I heard a funny story today. My friend Brandon, Valerie's brother works for a local video rental store. He tells me yesterday he gets a call from a guy who says, "my movie is due tonight but Im not going to be able to bring it in. How can we take care of this over the phone." HA! Brandon politely tells the guy he cant. He has to bring the movie back... thats just the way it works. The nerve of some people... thinking they can talk their way out of being charged when clearly they are at fault.
Tomorrow is another Paintball War day. We are meeting at our wooded location at 9:30am and will battle it out for a few hours. This should be a ton of fun. We are expecting about 10 guys. I'll try to take some pictures.

Woo-Whoo!! ... DOH!

Well this weekend in the NFL it was a weekend of good followed by not so good. First off, the dallas cowgirls lost BIG TIME to the Philidelphia Eagles. That was awesome! With McNabb back and healthy, the Eagles easily picked apart dallas' weak secondary and handled all of the dallas blitz packeges like champs. On one of them, McNabb scrambled out of the pocket away from the dallas players for a 30 yard gain down to the 4 yard line. They scored a couple plays later. On the not so good side of things, my Chicago Bears were leading the Greenbay Packers 14-0 but later blew it to lose 32-21. Oh well, still a good weekend.
As far as activities this past weekend it was pretty low key. Me, Val, Craig and Becki went over to Dave & Busters Friday night for dinner and games. That was a whole lotta fun. We did learn one thing. Of the four of us, Valerie is the best shot with a basket ball. On the time B-ball shooting game where you have 24 seconds to make as many baskets as possible, I shot 21, Craig shot 8, Becki shot 4 and Valerie shoots out the lights with 32!! Great fun.
Also, I started playing FIFA 2004 online after playing enough one player games to be proficient with the controls. My first match up was against a guy from the U.K., using Real Madrid. I knew this would be a tough game so I went with my favorite team A.C. Milan. It turned out to be a very well balanced game. Both sides getting plenty of scoring chances. Late in the second half I had my shot bounce of the goal post, almost a game winner for sure! Moments later, he gets a break away with David Beckham into my penalty box. In a last second desparation tackle, I bring him down and are called for a penalty shot. Well my instincts were correct. I guessed to dive right and made the penalty save! Then, with less than 30 seconds left, he fires one from the top of my penalty box which deflects off my defenders leg and into the upper right corner of my net. He runs out the clock and takes the 1-0 win. Oh well, it was a fun game. Im sure I will win more in games to come!

Blown Chances

Well its the morning after my game which i mentioned in my last posting. What should have been a sure victory, ended in an embarassing 8-8 tie. Lots of mistakes and sloppy defense gave our lesser opponent plenty of chances to get shots on our goal. And they did. By mid second half, we were leading 7-2. Normally this would be enough to secure a win if we just play smart and run down the clock. But no, we didnt. They pulled it to 6-8 with :44 seconds left on the clock. They score and then one of our guys takes his time returning the ball to the center after the goal, so the ref calls a delay of game penalty on him giving him a 2 minute penalty in the box. So now we're down a man. They throw everything they have at us the last :40 seconds, scoring the tieing goal with 6 seconds left. I grab the ball run back to the center circle and look up to see their goalie still high-fiving his team. The ref blows the whistle to start play and with 3 seconds left I chip the ball deep towards their goal hoping to catch him unaware. Their keeper dives back towards the goal line to make the save and tips it just over the open net. Saving the spoiler for them. We had our chances, we should have won. We have to get better.

Untested Opponent

Im preparing for my 9pm soccer game tonight. We're playing a team that is new to our division. So we really arent sure what to expect. But, we have a good squad this season so I think the odd's are strong we'll get a win tonight. But you never know. I'll update soon after the game. After last weeks huge 18-4 slaughter we dished out, team morale is at full throttle. I doubt will score that many again. I hope we do though.