Red Sox – They keep blowing games they should win. Tonight, Mike Cameron, who should just bag the rest of the season and get his surgery, missed a catch in the outfield and blew two great chances at the plate to drive in runs, including a pathetic final at-bat of the game when he watched a pitch right over the center of the plate go by to strike out with bases loaded in a one run game. Sox left 13 men on base. Just pitiful.

Dem. Rep. Anthony Weiner – While I normally do not condone hysteria in public speaking, it was refreshing to see someone in Congress put the GOP morons in their place. Weiner said, in effect, “Sit down, shut up, and vote yes or no.” Which brings me to…

The GOP – Who should be deeply ashamed for trying to side-step a vote to aid those who responded to the 9/11 attacks.

Amendments – While I’m on a rant about politics, it’s time to do away with the practice of adding pork barrel amendments to every damn piece of legislation that comes up. Make the bill focus on one thing only. If you want money for something else, start a new bill. Think of the money we’ll save when idiotic, pork barrel expenditures are forced to stand on their own merit (or lack thereof).

Ups and Downs of the week.

Anniversary – Seven years ago today.

Red Sox – Before the All-Star Break, they found ways to win. Since the ASB, they’ve been finding ways to lose.

Shirley Sherrod Fiasco – Plenty of fail to go around on this one, except for Sherrod herself. You’d think after the Henry Louis Gates screwup that Obama’s administration would have learned to get all the facts before passing judgment.

Ups and Downs of the week.

Red Sox Management – Enough with the AAA guys and trying to reclaim has-beens. Get some real pitching, please.

Cadillac, MI – We’ve been here several times before, but this is my first visit in the summer. The town is totally different. All decked out with flowers and very much alive with festivals and folks walking around and lots going on at the lake. The weather has been perfect, too.

Tea Party – The sooner they crash and burn, the better. Just hope they don’t cause too much damage on the way down.

GOP Whiners – Ok, I know it’s just childish tit-for-tat because the Dems blasted W for his excessive time away from the Oval Office. But c’mon, Obama deserves a bit of time away and it’s not like he’s completely isolated. Someday maybe the GOP will find something constructive to say. Maybe.

Ups and Downs of the week.

Red Sox -Despite the drubbing they gave Toronto tonight, they’re showing the effects of the SRO Disabled List. Four straight losses, including a sweep in Tampa Bay, have the Sox back in 3rd place. Still, considering that they’re playing with half a team of AAA players, they’re not doing too bad.

LeBron James – The King of Ego.

Adobe Photoshop CS5 – What a piece of programming. Soon there will be no such thing as photographic evidence because it is so easy to manipulate images. You can make whole castles disappear, or tidy up a poorly exposed shot like the cafe in Salzburg with the ugly umbrella and annoying railing.

This was shot from our hotel balcony in April, but it’s appropriate for today. Fireworks over the Midway. Happy Fourth.

Ups and Downs of the week.

Red Sox -The injuries continue. The Captain, Jason Varitek, is out with virtually the same injury that took out Pedroia; a broken bone in the foot as a result of a foul hit. It’s surreal how many injuries have plagued this team this year. And still they continue winning and are a half game out of first place. Amazing.

Michael Steele – The man is a textbook psychological nutcase. And he leads the GOP. Somehow fitting.

GoDaddy – So easy to set up new URLs and websites.

Facebook – I really have a love/hate relationship with it. But it is cool how it brings you into contact with old friends.

Australian Formula 1 driver Mark Webber went for a nasty ride this weekend at the European GP race in Valencia, Spain. This view is what astronauts normally see, not race car drivers. I’m amazed how quickly he recovers and gets out of the car. I would need a week before I’d even open my eyes.

Ups and Downs of the week.

Red Sox – Faltering on this West Coast trip, mostly due to poor bullpen pitching. That said, they left the bases loaded three times last night without bringing in a run. And worst of all, Pedroia is hurt and may be out for a while. Still, they’re in 2nd place, so it’s not all bad.

Blame Game – Enough with the useless finger pointing. The disaster in the gulf is now a physics problem and will be solved as such. Finger pointing won’t make it happen any sooner.

Apple iOS4 – Nice update. Couple of big improvements to an already cool system.

Windows 7 64-Bit – A little equal time here. MS has a winner in Windows 7 64-bit. Very fast and still with some way cool features. Just bring plenty of horsepower if you want to play.

Critters – Been busy in the backyard lately.

Back-to-back sweeps. Ya gotta…

Ups and Downs of the week.

Red Sox – Playing their best baseball of the season lately. They’ve closed the gap to 1st place in the AL East to one game.

  State of Illinois economy – There’s no money to maintain backroads. The backroads here are tar and gravel and without new gravel, the tar is coming up in pools everywhere.This is just one symptom of a state that is circling the drain. And the idiots in the legislature still won’t vote for an income tax hike. Unbelievable.

Celtics – Nothing to be ashamed of in their loss to LA. They fought down to the wire. Kudos to them.

  New PC – Got a new PC for the office. Quad Core processor, 8GB RAM, and 64-bit Windows 7 Ultimate. After nearly 6 years with my old machine, this one seems impossibly fast.

  New Toy – Picked up an iPod Touch the other day. Simply amazing what this thing can do. I’ve been having a ball with it all week.