before the redsox had a nation...

i realize i am exactly one month off on the timeliness of this post, but i had been looking for this photo at my folks house all summer and my mom just recently found it. it is me at six years old, kickin' it old school-style at fenway park before a redsox game in the summer of 1974. i can't be certain if this photo was taken at my first ever baseball game or not, but it's got to be close. the second pic is me at fenway park in 2002, 28 years later and a little further down the right field line. i recently came across the box scores of the first game(s) my dad ever took me to. it was a doubleheader against cleveland on june 22nd, 1974 against the cleveland indians. the indians two starting pitchers were brothers, jim and gaylord perry. i don't know how many times in baseball history that has happened but thats got to be a rarity. the redsox got blown out the first game 11-0, but came back to win the nightcap 8-3. it's amazing how many things i actually remember about that day. taking the train into the city, seeing cleveland outfielder oscar gamble's huge afro, and luis tiant hitting fungo's a mile high before one of the games. i guess these are some of the reasons i turned out to be the huge baseball nut that i am. it's sort of a family thing...if i have to explain it, you wouldn't understand.

it's alive!...

in 2003 i bought a decent home theater system for the living room. it was a philips mx3900d with a 5-dvd/cd changer, dolby dogital and dts 5.1-chanel surround sound, 5 satellite speakers, a subwoofer, and 500 watts of total system power. not a top of the line unit by any means, but a nice fit for our budget and living room. i used it on wednesday night for my annual pre-thanksgiving viewing of the john hugh's classic, "planes, trains, and automobiles", and yesterday to dish out about 8 hours worth of jazz mp3's throughout the day. at some point last night, one of my children, (although they are all employing the "it wasn't me" defense strategy) put 2discs in one of the trays, hopefully by mistake. needless to say, the discs became jammed inside the unit and wouldn't play, nor would any of the disc trays open to eject said discs. not wanting to force the trays open for fear of breaking them, i scoured the web for any means of support i could find. miraculously i came across the "philips mx3900d service manual", not to be confused with the "philips mx3900d user's manual", which explains the following in no uncertain terms: "do not attempt to repair this unit yourself, you must take it to a philips authorized repair center". yeah - right, thats' gonna happen. i sorted through the service manual and came across the process for starting the system in diagnostic mode (a combination of depressed buttons while plugging the power in) and ran through several tests, including resetting the system nvram. none of these diagnostic tests seemed to work, (at the time i didn't know about the jammed discs, all i knew was that the disc's could not be read and that the trays would not open). i then saw the section that explained the somewhat intimidating dis assembly process and decided at that point that i was "going in". now i am quite comfortable when it comes to cracking open a computer to replace a hard drive, or install memory, but seeing seeing the dismantling instructions in the manual the thought of performing surgeory on my home theater system proved a little daunting. i figured that even if the unit was broken, at minimum i would get my discs back as there were 4 inside. i knew that today, being the day after thanksgiving, a traditionally light work day and where recent surveys show that 78% of employers give today as a holiday (sorry - off topic), would be an ideal time for this project. alex, a work buddy of mine, and a guy particularly skilled with all things mechanical, assisted with the dis assembly of the unit, unjamming the jam, and putting it back together. now it's up and happily reading and ejecting disc's once again! it feels good to fix something yourself (even with substantial help from a friend) rather than taking it someplace to get soaked from a repair shop.

happy thanksgiving!

disclaimer: i did not write this, it's a straight up, cut'n paste job from an email i received. apologies to the author and for the "all-caps" but thats how it came and i wasn't about to re-type it.

I AM THANKFUL:

FOR THE WIFE
WHO SAYS IT'S HOT DOGS TONIGHT,
BECAUSE SHE IS HOME WITH ME,
AND NOT OUT WITH SOMEONE ELSE.

FOR THE HUSBAND
WHO IS ON THE SOFA
BEING A COUCH POTATO,
BECAUSE HE IS HOME WITH ME
AND NOT OUT AT THE BARS.

FOR THE TEENAGER
WHO IS COMPLAINING ABOUT DOING DISHES
BECAUSE IT MEANS SHE IS AT HOME,
NOT ON THE STREETS.

FOR THE TAXES I PAY
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I AM EMPLOYED .

FOR THE MESS TO CLEAN AFTER A PARTY
BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE
BEEN SURROUNDED BY FRIENDS.

FOR THE CLOTHES THAT FIT A LITTLE TOO SNUG
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I HAVE ENOUGH TO EAT.

FOR MY SHADOW THAT WATCHES ME WORK
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I AM OUT IN THE SUNSHINE

FOR A LAWN THAT NEEDS MOWING,
WINDOWS THAT NEED CLEANING,
AND GUTTERS THAT NEED FIXING
BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE A HOME .

FOR ALL THE COMPLAINING
I HEAR ABOUT THE GOVERNMENT
BECAUSE IT MEANS
WE HAVE FREEDOM OF SPEECH. .

FOR THE PARKING SPOT
I FIND AT THE FAR END OF THE PARKING LOT
BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM CAPABLE OF WALKING
AND I HAVE BEEN BLESSED WITH TRANSPORTATION

FOR MY HUGE ELECTRICITY BILL
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I AM Cool.

FOR THE LADY BEHIND ME IN CHURCH
WHO SINGS OFF KEY
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I CAN HEAR.

FOR THE PILE OF LAUNDRY AND IRONING
BECAUSE IT MEANS
I HAVE CLOTHES TO WEAR.

FOR WEARINESS AND ACHING MUSCLES
AT THE END OF THE DAY
BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE BEEN
CAPABLE OF WORKING HARD.

FOR THE ALARM THAT GOES OFF
IN THE EARLY MORNING HOURS
BECAUSE IT MEANS I AM ALIVE.

AND FINALLY, FOR TOO MUCH E-MAIL
BECAUSE IT MEANS I HAVE
FRIENDS WHO ARE THINKING OF ME.

up to date...

after careful consideration and weeks of contemplation, i have decided to forgo the annual thirdthoughts web template overhaul indefinitely. i spent some time and researched some other options regarding changing the look of this blog, a habit i developed over the last few years. i factored in several key reasons as to why thirdthoughts should stay "as is" at least in the foreseeable future. it all boiled down to time, motivation, my convincing myself that i feel that the look has aged fairly well even after 15 months, and the fact that i'm probably the only one who cares either way. rather than put myself through hours of labor, editing, cutting, copying, and posting code, uploading pages and hoping everything renders properly, i decided to stay put. to prove that i haven't given up completely, i have updated information on the "about","interests", and "family", pages including some new photos of the kids on the family page. now, the edits are more subtle than drastic, but the information posted therein is as accurate and as up-to-date as possible. these changes, combined with the fact that i recently upgraded my web-package and increased my storage space to 10 gb, makes me feel that the current state of this site is at least adequate by my standards. it doesn't help that the time-warp that exists between thanksgiving and new years is nearly upon us and juggling work, family, and social activities usually occupies about 99% of my time. so, to you, gentle reader(s), accept my thanks for overlooking my laziness and general lack of creativity.

into, and out of, the wild

alaina returned from wolfridge friday night right on schedule. she apparently had a great time and took the pictures you see posted above. she brought all of us souvenirs either from the gift shop, or from nature. mine was a wolfrige fridge magnet so i'll assume it was from the gift shop.
speaking of wild things, i went to see "into the wild" this past weekend. i was really looking forward to it and was all set to right up a glowing review, because it was based on a book by jon krakauer, who is a brilliant adventure author. i have read, and thoroughly enjoyed several of krakauer's books including "into thin air" and "eiger dreams", but this movie, based on his book of the same name, and directed by sean penn, fell completely flat in my view. maybe the book is better, i would think it would have to be, but if you were considering going to this movie, save yourself 9 bucks because nothing happens....ever.

the great outdoors...

my oldest, and her entire 5th grade class, left this morning bright and early for wolf ridge for the entire week. wolf ridge is an environmental learning center located in finland, mn, which is just north of silver bay and west of lake superior. she and her classmates will spend the week studying science, ecology, recreating, and team-building. wolf ridge's mission statment goes as follows:

to develop a citizenry that has the knowledge, skills, commitment, and motivation to work together for a quality environment

they meet their mission by:

Fostering awareness, curiosity and sensitivity to the natural world
Providing lifelong learning experiences in nature
Developing social understanding, respect and cooperation
Modeling values, behaviors and technologies, which lead to a sustainable lifestyle
Promoting the concepts of conservation and stewardship

at any rate, she looked like she was heading off on a himalayan mountain expedition when she left this morning. she had a backpack, a rolling pilot case, and a huge bag which contained her snowsuit, boots, and sleeping bag. the weather report says daytime highs in the mid 30's in that area this week. although there were no electronic devices allowed on this trip (guess it's hard to learn about nature while playing with a nintendo ds) you were allowed to take a disposable or digital camera. she took my old 1 megapixel camera with a 64 mb memory card so we'll see what she comes back with. it's the first time she's ever been gone for any length of time so mom (and dad) are naturally a little uneasy. she's planning a mid-week call so we hope for a positive report from the north. more soon...