One more reason I hate the south side

I know I need to give up this complaining, but for this one I just can’t.

Some Jack Ass took one wheel off my car. ONE. Who takes one tire? I wish I knew. I want it back. It’s not that I can’t replace it, I can, but the process isn’t as easy as I thought.

Now most people know I’m a man of limited means. I don’t have a lot of cash and I’m a Wisconsin Pollock, which means I don’t like to spend money if I don’t have to. So now I don’t have a choice. I have to spend money on something I never should have. (a stolen wheel)

So first things first. I called every bone yard in the area. Not one had the tire I needed. I didn’t think picking up a factory rim for a Ford Focus would be so hard. It turns out a 16 inch alloy rim is hard to come by on this model. Maybe that is why only one of my tires was taken.

I’m almost tempted to take one off another car…if I can find one. Yet as I looked for a car with the same rims on them I could not find them. It’s a factory rim so I thought it would be simple to find one. I can’t find one at a bone yard. The only thing I could find was a factory 15 inch. Not one 16 that would fit on my car. I can’t be the only one driving one of these? can I?

This is day three with my spare on. I can’t even find a dealer ship that has the wheel in stock. I have to order one. I can’t find anything in town to fix this mess. How can this be so hard.

The last thing I can do is order a tire and replace all my tires. That is the plan. Now all I need is a good three hundred dollars to do this and I’m good.

Insurance isn’t going to cover it. I have a $500 deductible, but the part they stole is only going to cost four, but as we all know you can’t just replace one tire. you have to replace two at least and the robbers didn’t even have the decency to steel the one wheel with the bad tire on it.

…and just like that….

…just a flick that’s all it takes. Just a small little gesture puts the fag is out the window. Why they hell do people do this? Why do smokers throw them out the window? They do it so casually. It almost seems like their is nothing wrong with this.

Most of the time you won’t even notice it. Most of the time you can’s see as the small slightly burning butt comes out the window and bounce along the road. No you don’t, but it happens everyday and I’m sure more then you think it might.

Yet at night you can see this sort of thing. At night the act is so visible. You can see the hot burning tobacco slide and skip down the freeway. Yet people think this is ok. It’s not ok. It’s anything but ok. It’s just as much littering as me chucking an apple core out the window. not that i’ve don’t that. Yet it’s nothing for people to toss there cigerete buts into the street.

No one says a word about it. We all let it slide. I’ve done it. I’ve seem friends just toss there their half lite cigarettes onto the grass. I’ve seen the devastation around UWM. You can’t smoke on campus so everyone stands outside and smokes. In the spring you can see the best gathering places for this. when the snow melts there are hundreds of stale wet butts littering the grass.

I don’t want to demonize smokers. I don’t care if they smoke or not. I would just like them to be as considerate as I have to be about littering, because it is a big deal. It annoys me and just isn’t right. It’s littering.

Palm Pre update: My way

There should be a group of homebrew apps that all people should have so the phone becomes useful. There was a time when I wasn’t so sure about the phone, but I have found the best way to use it. I think I like it because of the challenge to get it to do what I want it to. I want push my phone to do the exact thing I want it to. When I want it to. I understand my phone will crash now and again when I use it. I may do something unexpected now and again, but the question that should be asked is, “can I live with it?” “do the benefits out why the negatives?”

So here is what I need to get the Pre to work the way I need it too.

Homebrew apps:

• switchrow (my favorite)
• simple back theme
• my notifications
• Webos Quick install
• Preware
• Tweed
• Drpodder
• 4X4 icons
• Vibrate toggle

These extras are nice to have and I use them a lot, but I understand most people don’t really need them. It’s a good list thought and may push you into using your phone in ways you didn’t think it could do.
Extras also found on this page:

• Magic 8 ball
• Blogclalk
• Pandora
• Data toggle
• Flickr
• Music remix

Update…I updated my pre over the weekend and have found a few things interesting. I had a few problems with the update being compatible with Homebrew, It wasn’t all that bad. I was able to use the phone and all of the features, with vary few exceptions. All my tweaks disappeared, but I expected this.  It will be simpler to do a full restore instead of uninstalling all the apps and reinsatling them, which is the simplest fix. (just not in my case)

The worst part about all this is….I just got my phone to my liking…but that too is the best. I know what I want as a base so I can install thing better to keep things working best. (see list above)

Unconscious Mutterings

I haven’t done this in a while but here is :

Unconscious Mutterings

1. Alarm :: Fire
2. Guest :: Host
3. Worm :: OLD
4. Puppies :: Brests
5. Honor :: Working
6. No! :: Why Not
7. Stomach ::Pain
8. Counter :: Strike
9. Waffles :: Chicken
10. Plates :: Earth

The Return to the Pitch

Thursday night, midnight, I stepped not the indoor soccer field at Uihlein soccer park to play my first game in over a year. I can’t say I was good. I can’t say I made a huge difference on the team, but I can say I scored. We lost, but I scored. That is the way to make a comeback.

All in all it felt really good. My knees, both of them, where a bit sore after the game and into the next day, but that was to be expected. At least that is what I expected. My lugs burned while playing, mostly in the second half when my body became fatigued. Yet for a while everything felt good.

Sure there where nerves and a bit of fear when the game started. I ran a little slow and didn’t throw my self into situation I would have in the past. I won a few good balls, on header even. I made a few good passes. I even as I pointed out scored.

So what the team lost. We had a full squad, but the other team had an army. By the middle of the second half I was not the only one tired. Yet we played on and dropped one more goal in the second half.

This game gave me a gauge of my status and I have a long way to go before I’m ready to play man’s again. But it’s a start and you always have to start somewhere when making a comeback.

No Soccer For Me

All games this weekend have been canceled…even with all the nice weather. So I have yet to make it back on the pitch. Lets hope this changes soon.

Triumphant Return plus 1

The news is good. There is at least one more over thirty game and it is this week. So once again there is a count down to the comeback. This one is going to be a bit on the close side. I’m ready to go, but rain is, as it was on Sunday, ready to spoil it.

Maybe I shouldn’t be such a baby about this comeback. Maybe I should just play indoor tonight at midnight. Yet I don’t really want to play indoor first and I don’t really want to play at midnight. I know people have to, that is the time our team is going to play…but then again that is not my team. It is a Brewers team, but I did not sign up for it. I did sign up as a sub and in the near future I will step up and play that role.

Until then I can only hope to have a good fall out door game under my KNEE and my confidence will be restored…to a point.

FOOTBALL HERO

Nothing goes a Planned

This weekend was a bust….well that is anything but true. It was a good weekend. I saw a few friends I have not seen in a while and had a few drinks with people I don’t normally hang out with. But all in all the weekend was disappointing.

The game that was planned for this Sunday was canceled. I don’t know why. It doesn’t seem like anyone really knows why, but the game never was. I find this a shame. The day was nice, warm and dry. I could see no reason why I could not play soccer. Every one of my criteria was meet for my Triumphant Return. The only thing missing was the game to play in.

So this points me to a new game to start playing in. I don’t know which one. Right now I’m still not on a team. I might just start to pick up an indoor game here or there when I can. I think indoor starts this week, but I don’t know when. Even if I did the first few weeks of any season everyone seems to show up so…I’ll just wait a while and see when I am needed. I won’t be all that useful till my conditioning comes back, but I should be able to fake it.

The Triumphant Return

Tomorrow is A day. It is not the day. The day is yet to come. I have once thought that the day of clearing was the day. It turns out that was just A day.

Tomorrow I get my brace. I get to try it on and see if it fits. If everything is cool I get to take it home. This I hope I can do. Then I can be ready for THE day. I don’t know when that is going to be. The last out door game I think I have a chance to play is this Sunday, but I don’t think I’ll be ready to play just yet.

I know I need to get my brace and run around with it to see if I can do what I need to do. I’ve already run and kicked a soccer ball without my brace and it seems like I still understand the skill and the principles behind the game. That is all I think I need.

My original hope was that I’d have a game I could point to as my return…but that doesn’t seem to be. I could wait and start with the indoor game, but I don’t really want to, both, wait that long or play indoor.

Yes I am a bit afraid of indoor soccer right now. that is where I hurt my knee last year in February…I’m sure that is when I’ll really come back and try to play competitively. “so i took a year to get back….so?” I don’t think I’ll play men’s. I’ll play one of the two co-ed teams or maybe even on the over-30. The latter might be best.

I am, as it happens, over 30, but I would like to play one last run at the men’s team in the spring. I don’t know right now if that is going to happen. I’ll have to up my conditioning and my training. I never had to do that sort of thing in the past. I played so much soccer that I keep in shape, my job was physical and I was just much more active then I have been over that last seven months.

The good news is that I’ve been running at least once a week at this point. I hate it and I don’t really want to do it, but at least once a week I get on my shoes and head out for at least 20 minutes. I should do better and maybe come up with some kind of distance run, but I don’t. Simple as that I’m not motivated enough to do that. (shame on me)

My final words today on this is that IF it is nice out on sunday, IF it is dry on sunday and IF my knee feels good on sunday….I’m going to at the vary least warm up with the over-30 team with my brace to see how well that goes.