Costco Pillows, Vibrant Brains and Pub Quiz Champions

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/28_Costco_Pillows%2C_Vibrant_Brains_and_Pub_Quiz_Champions.html

Went to Costco because running low on provisions. Actually went to the asian market down the way first which has the best prices on garlic and ginger but not carrots.
Purchased among other things pillows at Costco. If you want free pillows, let me know.

For a while I have wanted to check out Vibrant Brains which is a gym for your brains. They had a dog who was supposed to be smart but was no Cosmo.
Perhaps as I go through the program the dog will transcend through the doggie ranks. I am sure doggies are stressed when they meet me as they are well aware about my knowledge of dogs.

We won at the Bitter End Pub Quiz which is way more fun. Andrew Lloyd Weber is still alive and is not a fan of Marcus.

--
Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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Wireless fun!!

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/24_Wireless_Fun.html

Last weekend I went to Maryland and will provide some of the wackiness that ensued.

There is some fun with the lightbulbs as they need to be unscrewed rather than using the switch.

On the way to Heritage Harbor we brought Cosmo and Stelly. They were a big hit among the residents but Cosmo was acting the fool. Stelly who was less interested in stuff falling on the floor was very good and earned her way onto the plate.
On the way back in the rental car a couple of trash cans fell out of the back of a pick up truck but luckily I was paying attention and Cosmo was not. He would not be so into the trash cans barreling towards us.

The weather in Maryland was perfect on Sunday. The best months for weather is April and October.

A celebration was had. What a difference a year makes.

I noticed I could not find the keys to the rental car and figured that Jeffereson Airplane Jr had them and I was right so he had to come back to the compound.

Andrea drove to Annapolis for her to get the laptop as she is getting FIOS. Our first stop was Sears in Annapolis which was kind of dingy and boots. They had some sort of display of stuffed farm animals but it was dirty. Plus they had no laptops. The guy then tried to sell us a TV.

We saw Jeff wandering around Annapolis Mall which was like Jeff and Landover in the 1980's. Then the tree of us went to 1) Best Buy 2) Staples 3) Safeway. Ended up buying the laptop at Bestbuy.

The guy at Staples told us way too much information on his ailments.


The next morning we drove to the Harbor and we stopped off at this Deli with wireless access. Not to go into details but I said, "Andrea!, Is this the sandwich I ordered?" as I had the sandwich half eaten.

Did some stand up for an audience.


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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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Zombie

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/23_Cold_Wednesday_Kickball_Dogs_Jade_Alphabar_with_zombies.html

It must be really easy or really hard to be a weatherman in San Francisco. Most points in the day you are really wrong or at one point you are really right on. Tuesday was beautiful but Wednesday was real windy and cold.
The game was rough but we were rich in doggies. I think Nia and Otter liked each other.
Went to Jade for Alphabar.

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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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A Cancel your cable shopping guide

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/22_A_cancel_your_cable_tv_shopping_list.html

Cable TV is too damn expensive. For the amount of TV that I watch, it is not worth what I am paying. Getting hundreds of stations means nothing if you rarely watch. This setup is saving me around $640 per year as I already had most of the items.
For years I have wanted to cancel my cable.
Hulu comes along but I did not want to watch the Simpsons while sitting at my desk. Then Netflix was offering instant streaming but once again who wants to watch Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie at my desk.
Then I saw that you could stream Netflix content from your TV via your XBox 360 with XBox Live.
This was fine for movies but I wanted to stream from Hulu. One of my Facebook contacts told me about PlayOn Media services. So there went the final reason to pay $50/month for cable and $10/month for a DVR.

Here is a cancel your cable tv shopping list. Many of the things you may already have. Plus I showed how you can pay a little less.

A PC (I am not sure if you are able to do the Netflix thing on a Mac. Let me know if you can)
A wireless router (I used a Linksys) (I got a $10/off coupon for Radio Shack from the Entertainment Book)
An XBox 360 with a hard drive (I am not sure if the Netflix thing works on a PS3)
A cat 5 cable. (You could buy a wireless adapter but this is cheaper and works better, but another cable)
A Netflix account ($10/month)
An XBox Live Account (You can get this cheaper at Costco)
Download PlayOn Digital Media Server (Which has a free 14 day trial and then it is $40).  I downloaded it and once I figured it out, it worked really well!!


So I called to cancel my cable TV service but I am keeping the Internet and Phone. It turns out it is cheaper (with comcast) to have the basic, basic cable as part of a bundle with the phone and Internet. So even if I wanted to watch a game that was on the network I could.

This setup works well if you are somewhat technically savvy and you are not really big on watching sports (ESPN etc...)

My Comcast Bill was $150 per month, know it will be $83 so taking into account the cost of the Netflix account and XBox Live (totaling $13/month) I will be saving $54 per month or $650 per year.




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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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Favorite Beatles Songs

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/16_My_favorite_Beatles_Songs.html

My favorite Beatles Songs

 

Took Bart into the city and discovered that I did not bring my iPod. So on the ride back to South San Francisco decided to kill time by writing down my favorite Beatles Songs. Now they are no songs I hate but wanted to narrow it down to five.

Three were easy (and not in any order)

1. 1)A Day in the Life
   

2. 2)I am the Walrus
   

3. 3)Norwegian Wood but then I could not narrow the rest of the songs to find another two so I figured I would get ideas from the ether....
   

They are many, many songs from great albums especially Abbey Road, Sgt Peppers, Rubber Soul, Revolver, The White Album but I want to be able to say, these are my five favorite.

so e-mail me at hydra1970@gmail.com or post a comment to round out the top two...

*This is a joke...

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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
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Bolt the door its Dominos....

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/16_Dominoes_.html

By now you may have heard about a couple of rocket scientist employed by the culinary pinnacle that is Dominos Pizza doing a bit of performance art.
Not going to get into details of what was involved, but I found the message from the CEO interesting.
He states, "We're re-examing all of our hiring practices to make sure that people like this do not make it into our stores".
This is going to be a major challenge because even in a tough job market, I am not guessing that the best and brightest are trying to work there.
I could imagine some crazy personality test which would weed out anyone that would be in their target demographic of employee.

Sadly this type of activity probably goes on more than one would expect but with modern technology, stupidity can be shared much quicker.

Perhaps they should look towards In and Out Burger which pays above market wages which attracts a better class of employee to combat this type of problem. 





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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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The ideas in my head, sometimes good, sometimes well not so good.

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/13_Garlic_juice_and_crazy_shoes.html

This morning I made juice with carrots and apple and...... garlic? The third item, gives it a special quality.
Not sure if I will be making it a habit. I am sure I can make some vague health claims. Perhaps film a documentary with some unusual music.

So I reintroduced coffee from my break and I felt a bit more anxious. Will mostly stick with tea.

Watching an Olive Garden commercial.

Was in the Sunset and went to a fred container store and saw these
http://www.swissmasaius.com/



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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
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3d

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/12_Entry_1.html

Had a really good seven mile run yesterday and a shorter two mile run today.
Not a huge fan of run where they are stop lights and vagrants and such. Much prefer paths where I am not in competition with cars and such. Have gotten used to running without my iPod when I run with others.
Ran up a couple of large hills. I need to learn to not check my watch every few minutes and focus more on the run rather than the distance covered.

Due to Easter there was no kickball as I am sure that was part of the original plan. Ended up on a shorter run with JB who got into the Nike Women's (half) marathon. After the training program for the San Francisco ends, I will do Team in Training again.

Went to see Monsters V Aliens and was sort of hoping when they were in San Francisco they would stop by Daly City. The 3D had improved greatly since Jaws 3d. Way better than that awful Superman movie a few years ago. Superhero movies are either great (Batman Begins, The Dark Knight) or garbage (Spiderman 3)

Today was the end of Lent which I decided to give up processed/refined sugar and coffee. Had some pie but I think I will cut way back on the sweet stuff as it provides a bad return. When drinking coffee, no sugar, just coffee.


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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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No camera

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/10_No_Camera.html

If you suddenly notice, wow I am not seeing nearly as many pictures of dogs sitting tied to a parking meter outside of Walgreens do not attribute it to some vast conspiracy on any part of the political spectrum but rather my Canon camera stopped working and I had to send it away so Elves can work on it. I just know that I am going to see something cool like a UFO full of standard poodles and your humble narrator will not have a camera.
(I do have a camera on my phone but its not the same thing....)
Had amazing Parking Kharma today as I found without much effort three great parking spots in the Marina, the Mission and near Opera Plaza. They were all easy spots close to where I was going. From what I understand they will be exanding the hours that they are enforcing meters including Sundays.
On another note, I admire snails that I see climb on top of light posts. I can imagine those on the top are considered a bit crazy.

Here are some pictures I was able to get off my camera.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hydra1970/


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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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Kickball and the future...

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/9_Kickball_and_the_future.html

Kickball and the future

 

If I had to rank the neighborhoods of San Francisco from the top to the bottom, I would not be putting the Haight at the top.

We had our first game of the season and we lost 3 to 2. One of the best things about kickball is the Uniforms. When I was in short pants, I thought that in the future, we would all be wearing the same outfits and in a small way we are all dress alike. I thought the future would be more like Buck Rogers.

This season they have decided that of all the law breaking going on in Golden Gate park, drinking while playing kickball is the thing that must stop so they hired a ranger to make sure that the purple team is not drinking bud light. What makes this so funny is the shenanigans going on all around the ranger.

Another thing I saw that was funny was a guy driving a Prius tossing litter outside of his car. It would have been far funnier if he had one of those carbon offset stickers.

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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
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twitter = hydra1970

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Pictures

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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
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Wind

http://web.me.com/hydra9/Site_5/Blog/Entries/2009/4/2_Wind_and_Tea.html

The last couple of days have been really windy around San Francisco/Daly City. Too bad I got the kite as that is a good way to stop the wind. Went for a four mile run into the wind (well halfway into the wind).
Went to the shopping center in San Bruno and took out all the Taco Bell coupons from the Entertainment book and gave them to the diners. Not a really big fast food person and figured that would make their day and perhaps cement their friendship/relationship. They would look back and say, who was that dashing stranger who gave us all of those buy one get one free coupon. Perhaps they were having a bad day and they were doubting humanity and I strolled in and made things OK. Or they were thinking, I am going to make healthy strong choices. Push away from these various combinations of cheese and tortilla to eat true whole foods, join a CSA, better yet move from city boy to country man. Then I come along and they dash those dreams like an aisle full of 90% Easter Candy to someone giving up chocolate.
(On another note, my whole no processed refined sugar thing ends on Easter but it was far easier than I expected and unless its something good ie Bread Pudding from Cajun Pacific I am going to pass but will start drinking coffee without sugar or honey again but more tea....)
When I go to New York,
Speaking of leaving Coffee for tea, seems it is a trend.
http://blog.wired.com/business/2009/04/tech-millionair.html
Then went into Mollie Stones which is an a weird position in the Supermarket segment but they did have $.59 cent bananas which is fairly cheap. Also got some smoked almonds. If you are coming to meet me bring me a banana, a tin of sardines and some almonds and maybe a Chinese Jelly Drink. Then say, this should sort you out Governor!
Went to the Academy of Science where I got seperated from my crew which is not a big deal but I think I was supposed to give someone a ride and I did not have my cell phone. Spent the night walking around and taking pictures for some randoms. Bought a drink for a woman whose birthday it was but then gave it to the wrong one which made it less smooth.





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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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Dream Pub Quiz Growl

Yesterday I woke up from a dream where I needed to check my blood sugar. So this as a sign so I drove down to Longs Drugs to buy a glucose meter which was locked up. Had to announce what I needed to the person.
Checked it in the parking lock and it was fine....

So here is a question for you all, if you had a dream where you had something going on, would you get it checked out?

Later in the day I was running and stopped off at the Park Chalet. Saw a Rottweiler from his eyes he was not the biggest fan of Marcus (unless I was in the food section). The person said, why won't you pet my dog so I moved slowly towards the dog and he started growling. So my instinct was correct. Was kind of bummed.

While running in the park I saw a standard poodle up a hill so ran up to the dog (admit dog stalking) but this dog was nice.

Went to pub quiz and we were not at the top of the charts. Will need to get a new member to replace Jenny who knows post 1993 music. (I just found out who lady GaGa is)


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Marcus Zack Ronaldi
http://www.marcusronaldi.com

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twitter = hydra1970

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