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thunderlounge

Certifiably Surly
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Posts posted by thunderlounge

  1. 3 hours ago, markstanco said:

    Reminds me of a semi-related situation.  I grew up going to Caddo Lake on the weekends.  There were always between 3-6 places to eat on the lake, with 2 of them being the gold standard (Big Pines Lodge and Shady Glade for those of you keeping score at home).  Every few years, one of the others would burn to the ground.  In October. Big Pines decided to get some insurance money a few years back but they did rebuild.

     

    Did the others rebuild, or did another place pop up, finally figure they weren’t competing well, and take the flame out?

     

  2. I feel for ya on that. I puree food on very rare occasions when I get sinus migraines. So much sinus pressure it makes my upper jaw very painful from all the extra pressure on those areas. Thankfully they have very rarely happened the last 3-4 years. Sinus infections down too. Allergies still 24/7/365, which still sucks, but at least there is a bright spot. 

  3. 11 hours ago, campcrunk said:

    Similarly, I remember a lot of UMGoBlog posts (and from the UM blog community as a whole) about how they were also better than us at every position and would win every single matchup

     

    While I agree with you on Michigan, I feel it’s a bit different situation than with tOSU.

    UM lost their coach, and a lot of staff, to avoid the NCAA (like they did shit.) UM also lost their big advantage, and no more signs to steal (once the comms were finally encrypted, but we played early enough in the season the non-encrypted comm situation wasn’t really out there. (How the fuck did the ncaa NOT give any consideration to that? This ain’t nascar!)

    On top of them losing a lot of talent. 

     

    With tOSU, we pretty much only have the normal talent loss to factor in, and consider their replacements. Of course we can only look at last season tape, maybe the season before, to see a) what could be possible, and b) how much they may progress year over year. Need to take some other variables into consideration as well.

     

    I think it’s shaping up to definitely be a marquee matchup, and could honestly go either way. It could come down to who gets the right break at the right time, in whatever form. A challenged call, turnovers, blown (or wrong) assignment, etc. 

    Being game 1 is a kicker. You haven’t had a sniff at getting the live game rust knocked off, even if just one game against inferior competition.

    I expect a few mistakes, both from returning to real play, as well as a few nerves early on.

    Now, tOSU has a similar situation on their hands as well. We lost some people, and they have to also figure out and estimate how well our replacements can perform. So pretty much we both start from the same place essentially.

    With researching those players, on either side, it’s going to come down to how much accurate evaluation either team can do, along with realistic projections from research on last season and if they have one before that to establish some form of progress in capability to project the jump to this year.

    It’s also going to come down to how well each program can keep it all locked down. Whether through spin in the press; what’s fed to journalists, and maybe we continue to probe for leaks, which would be wise to continuously monitor (I assume tOSU does something similar, but who knows for real these days, so I guess don’t necessarily trust their press.)

    Barring unfortunate events in fall camp, I expect everything will be at the highest of levels and expectations, as well as all drills having some impact on preparation for tOSU, and of course for the season as a whole.

    It’s going to certainly live up to the hype, I think we can all agree on that at least. Who comes out on top when the 4th quarter hits 0:00.0? It looks to ve a close one that could go either way. I’m expecting Texas to find a way, using the tools that we can, and really hoping we don’t have to get too deep into the playbook, or maybe have a handful of plays just for this game that we don’t use later. A bit easier to accomplish being the first game of the season. Then we can focus a bit more on the main playbook the next couple of weeks during the OOC slate.

     

    Off that topic, but relating to OOC, have we considered moving one OOC opponent to November? NOT FCS, of course, but one of the non-marquee schools we’d normally play OOC.

    Seems easy enough to do, since league schedules only come out less than a year prior, and those games are scheduled well in advance of that.

     

    • Hook 'Em 2
  4. 1 hour ago, midtown said:

    2. When booking multiple rooms with different bed types.  Hilton allows you to book each room with seperate configuration.  Marriott made me book the same number of beds. So I had to make two completely different reservations.  Not a deal breaker but an inconveince for sure.  

     

    Excellent observation and point! I love that about Hilton. I don’t do Marriott very often, but my Hilton backup is IHG.

    Between those two, I’ve managed to find acceptable hotels pretty much everywhere, pushing 95%+. I can only recall a few times I couldn’t (or didn’t) get something Hilton or IHG. 

    Nashville once, by choice due to circumstances (daughter had a work conference, at a Marriott property, so we all went), and another time in Belfast where it just wasn’t convenient, and then I guess Cosmo counts now. Super small town on occasion notwithstanding.

    But yeah, I tend to get stuck with group planning for trips, and it’s definitely a noticeable convenience with Hilton to be able to put multiple room types on the same reservation. IHG, not so much, and I usually just call them direct. IIRC, even their agents have to split it, but I still call. At least maybe the agents get tired of it and complain enough.

  5. 2 hours ago, Vic Mackey said:

    .24ed481333cea60a1b72652a2807f800.jpg

     

    That’s really a rough call. So much influential music up there, and I had them all. Damn those were the days.

    How many of those albums up there took those artists from well known and very good, across the line to superstardom?

    Not talking career launching, but taking them to the top levels of the industry?

    Whomever put that list together at least seems to have put some good thought into the participants.

     

    • Hook 'Em 1
    • Like 1
  6. 4 hours ago, GhostOfTomJoad said:

    Stockton is indeed an orthopedic surgeon & was a kicker & punter for Texas '98 - 2000. Pretty damn reliable & had a walk off kick to beat the aggies at DKR as well.

     

    Does he have any eligibility left? Could we get him a covid year?

    • Like 1
  7. 3 hours ago, TexasEd said:

    My goal is to get my family (5 or 6 of us) to Europe and save money or improve the travel conditions for the parents.  Kids can fly coach.

     

    Last I saw, a r/t business award on AA was at least 200k miles.

     

    3 hours ago, TexasEd said:

    So if no amount of Chase "miles" or points is going to get me a good deal then so I just find the best cash back card.

     

    Chase points can be transferred to BA, and I think AA. I haven't looked in a while.

    I run everything through BA, and have it way better on AA than if I ran it all through AA.

    The BA site will let you use cash + miles, and pick how much of each. 

     

    3 hours ago, TexasEd said:

    I have an American Citi-Advantage card and about 38,000 miles in my account now which is good for one coach round trip in May 2026. Am I better off trying to build up enough miles for a couple tickets (5 or 6 people traveling) or to get enough to upgrade my wife and I to better seats?

     

     

    You might get enough for a couple of tickets. But remember, you also have to be able to find the space available to use them. That's the hardest part. Not to mention that if you do find a few award seats, now you're forced to that itinerary with the award tickets and those seats may very well be a good bit higher than other flight options.

     

     

    3 hours ago, TexasEd said:

    I have some time and plenty of credit card expenses to earn points but just need to figure it out.  We could get my wife another AAdvantage card which comes with 50,000 points, no annual fee the first year.

     

    If going the credit card route, I'd look into something like this:
    Get a sappire preferred from Chase, both you and your wife separately.

    Then look at the British Airways card, once again getting one each, separately.

    Once the bonuses clear, wait for a promotion where you get more miles when you transfer to BA. Then move your points from Chase to BA.

    Also note that you can set up a family pool with your BA points. So you and your wife would be in it, and pool your points together.

     

     

    • Hook 'Em 1
  8. To be flat honest, you may want to consider just getting your tickets outright, or go through BA (fly AA metal, if preferred), and use some points to upgrade. 

    Of course you would have to have a BA account, and transfer points from chase to BA.  Chase will have “sales” from time to time, where you get a better transfer rate.

    I say this as finding award flights, in the class you want, with anything close to acceptable scheduling, is an absolute bitch.

    Also beware there are sometimes “surge” prices with miles as well.

    It isn’t the easy game it once was, and redemption is absolutely more difficult. 

  9. 5 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

    Weather related.

    There was a ground stop at LAS yesterday.   High winds.

     

    I figured it had to be something like that. There wasn’t anything on the radar, go figure being in the desert, so figured it had to  be wind or heat related issues.

     

     

    4 hours ago, royiv said:

    That’s an odd diversion when PHX is just down the road.

     

    Not really. Probably the closest runway that could accommodate the aircraft and crew, while passengers were ferried up to Vegas by bus or another plane. Using a couple three charter buses would probably be quicker anyway, unless they could have got another plane and or crew to go up. Logistics of those pretty much suck, but at least PHX is close, and a hub. 

  10. 6 hours ago, UTPhil2006 said:

    @JohnnyM and our team dabbled in creating a title company. Maybe @Dbeasy too. But the only way we would do it would be to take the aforementioned above title lady and her team. I gotta think it's a relatively easy job outside of the actual lawyer behind it, but you're fighting for loans just like any other LO/realtor 

     

    Certainly would be interesting, and help the mortgage side out too 

    Also, I’m sure you could make them an offer they wouldn’t be wise to refuse.

     

     

    6 hours ago, hornian said:

    I'm your huckleberry. Seriously, I want to get into the title company game, and I have lawyers to throw at it. 

    Lunch date soon? You're buying. 

     

    Or, um, some clients buying, right? 😂

  11. 3 hours ago, Celery Man said:

    I mean wtf if you’re actually working 14 hour days regularly.

     

    Pretty much, yeah. Granted, not straight through usually, I tend to take a few minutes here and there to throw clothes in the washer, pull clothes from the dryer and maybe fold or usually make them ready to fold across another break or two.  But overall, yeah. Been that way for about 6 months, and will probably last another year before I’m situated enough with putting band-aids on one app that was contracted out (that’s shit, and we’re just trying to get working as best we can, just to get off the legacy app); a new app that I’m writing from scratch to replace the contracted pile of shit (which is slow going until we have all the business logic sorted and correct, because right now it’s beyond fucked up), plus having to keep up with legacy, although that is mostly fixes and not new work (thankfully!)

    When I kicked the hours up a bit in  mid January, it was for a trade show a couple months ago. It just carried over with so much on my plate.

     

    3 hours ago, Celery Man said:

    You said above that you started at 235. That’s awesome. It’s going to suck tomorrow when you inevitably bounce above 200 again (because that’s how it goes every time you hit an imaginary threshold) but sliding under 200 is awesome.

     

     

    I’m not tied to a specific weight either, just a range. I’ll get there eventually. 

     

     

    3 hours ago, Celery Man said:

    My wife takes care of dinner, so that’s my hack. But, I am happy to eat a small number of things pretty frequently and that works well for me to stay in a calorie range.

     

    My wife isn’t much for cooking overall. She does a very few things that work, the rest… not so much. Not that there’s much beyond her couple three things.

    I wouldn’t ask her to follow a recipe, mainly because of interpretation and how you just know things when you cook a lot. Like substitutions, cooking something a different way, etc.

     

  12. 2 hours ago, Mittens said:

    A friend suggested MyNetDiary as a tracking app and it was perfect for me as far as being able to add both prepackaged food (barcode scan), homemade (90% of what I'm eating today, saving custom recipes/meals, etc.

     

    This is my nemesis, mainly due to my work “schedule” which is pretty much 7:30-8:00 to 9, 10, 11 at night.

    Was doing hello fresh for a good while, but got to the point it was just backing up in the fridge.

    So I try to make 2-3 big meals a week, so there are leftovers for a day or two. Then 2-3x/week we get takeout from a real restaurant.

    I fluctuate a bit, sometimes more than others.

    I guess my real question is whether something like hello fresh is a good alternative? I’ve got a shitload of recipe cards from them, and could now just get the stuff to make things from there.

    I guess that’s ok, health-wise?

  13. 3 hours ago, Js1 said:

    They shouldn’t have signed a huge contract with a company that’s a financial mess. The finances are so bad, they just paid out the wazoo to curry favor with Trump and get a merger with Sky Dance approved (lol he got his money, they’re gonna be left in the wind)

     

    Were they already in talks before p+ was really fucking up?

    As careful as Trey/Matt have been with their IP, I’d be surprised if they went into negotiations in  the current state of p+, unless there were clauses in their current/previous one that gave p+ a bargaining window?

     

  14. 2 hours ago, WBT said:

    DVD box sets or gtfo!

     

    My wife insisted on getting every season of Supernatural on……

     

    DVD. 

     

    Not bluray, not 4k-bluray… D. V. Fucking. D. 

     

    What a waste of money. (On the format, not the show.)

     

  15. 3 hours ago, Red Five said:

    Watching all of their constant emotional rollercoasters that take place over 28 minute episodes is exhausting. How have all these people survived this long.

     

    You sure you weren’t on facebook?

    • Like 2
  16. Skenes getting chewed on a bit by the cards. At the mid-70's mark in pitch count (Pallante just finished the bottom of the 4th at 52, for reference), with 5 hits on him so far. Still in a stalemate at 0-0 though, so hanging in there. 

  17. 16 minutes ago, 'stache said:

    They lost that status last season when they only had 2 members and I don't think they'll get it back based on the new additions. So as it sits they are not part of the autonomous (i.e. power) conferences and I doubt they would even try to regain that status.

     

    Right, but that’s everyone else's perspective. I’m just wondering what the pac thinks. I’m guessing they know their place. 

  18. Kinda torn on that one.

    Part of me digs it. Hella little show off there.

    The other part is freaking out because it’s on a major freeway, and one little slip or oopsie could fuck a lot of people over.

    Come down too soon and shits now zooming down the highway at traffic, or he wipes out and severely injures or kills someone or himself. 

    Would have rather seen that on a deserted highway, so the only real issue (provided it wasn’t dry AF) was hurting himself and nobody else. 

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