Vegas Baby, Vegas

The trip came and went w/ out too many good stories to bring home, unless you want to count the one of me passing out in our hotel bathroom at 5am. One might think that since I blacked out at 5am, we probably stayed up way to late partying/gambling/drinking, etc... I wish that were true. For those of you who haven't heard yet, I got the flu (and probably the H1N1 virus) while out in Vegas. I actually probably got it in Indy before I left, but the virus finally kicked my ass out there. Long story short, I wasn't feeling well Sunday evening so i went back to the room around 7. Got up at 10 to go eat something light (fruit cup), met Dave at the tables to gamble a little bit, finally decided I really was sick, then went back to the room. After a few hours of sleeping, I woke up to use the bathroom and after was done, proceeded to get really dizzy, lose all strength and crumble like a ton of bricks to the floor, knocking my noggin on the floor as well as scraping my back against the wall or countertop...something to cause me to bleed. After 30 seconds or so I finally decided I needed to call out to Scott or Dave as I realized I really didn't have any strength to move. Of course after about 10 seconds of concern for my well being, they realized I was just sick and wasn't anything too serious, so the jokes and hazing of my mishap began. We did call the Bally's medical staff to come take my blood pressure and just to see what they could do. It was just an EMT, so I'm sure Scott's tee-shirt he was wearing "Trust Me, I'm a Doctor" may have been a little intimidating to this guy as he seemed more concerned w/ wanting to hang out w/ us then about my low blood pressure and 102 degree fever I was running. Once he left it was good for a laugh, which revitalized me enough to shower/shave and head down to tables at 7:30 before trying to eat some food. The rest of that day involved about 2 hours of gambling then 2 hours of sleeping, then repeat. So that put a little damper on our trip, but luckily neither Scott or Dave got sick from me. Unfortunately for Scott, the gambling gods didn't shine well on him as he took a beating. I actually won a few hundred bucks and Dave held his own, maybe losing a little bit.

I went to my 2nd high school 10-year reunion this past weekend as I was invited to the Indianapolis Ritter class of 99 reunion. I was only there for about 2 hours, but I knew maybe 30-40% of the people there, thus reaffirming my Ritter status. Their reunion sucked though in comparison to my actual Jimtown reunion.

I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving next week. Spending the day at my mom's w/ my step-brother and his wife & kids, so should be fun. It'll be good to have a nice long weekend as I'm only working Monday & Tuesday next week.

Just watched IU get beat by 20 to Mississippi...IU is really young and did not look good. Could be another long year for the Hoosiers.

Vegas is starting to catch up w/ me on my NFL bets. The weekend I was out there was a tough weekend from an NFL perspective. I went 3-4 on my bets against the spread, bringing my record at the time to 12-9 for the year. Scott went 0-6 on his NFL bets, so it could have been worse.... I went 1-1 last weekend bringing my actual bet totals to 13-10. As for my picks against Diddy, i'm 12-8 while Evan is 13-7 w/ his 2-0 week last week...so its important I nail a few of these upcoming weeks as I do not want to lose another lunch bet to a guy from Wabash Indiana, seriously.

I'm too tired to post a video, but this website has been getting a lot of pub lately, so here's the link to the beautiful people of Walmart. Oh wait, I just remembered this wonderful video of Cleveland, which apparently caused a little bit of an uproar on the local Cleveland news stations

Halloween surprise

So I threw my 3rd annual Halloween party this past weekend. A little smaller party this year than last year, but we still finished the keg off (minus half a pitcher), had some good beer pong games, and good times hanging out w/ friends. I went as the Pope, which was my costume 4 years ago. I think the best costume at my party was "Alan" from The Hangover, complete w/ baby Carlos. A new addition to this year's party was the cops showing up at like 1am when only like 5 people were left. I hadn't turned the music off outside, so one of my neighbors must have finally been fed up....oh well. I've probably thrown or "co-hosted" w/ roommates maybe like 10 parties in my life that were loud/wild enough to have the cops called. This was the 2nd time in my life the cops have came to a party i hosted, so 20% isn't too bad I guess. Overall, Halloween was another success.

Heading to Vegas w/ Scott and Dave this Saturday, will be there till Tuesday, then when I get back I have the rest of the week off work. definitely looking forward to my vacation. I have a good feeling about this Vegas trip....i feel some magical blackjack sessions coming for all 3 of us, which will definitely make the trip that much better!

The NFL season is halfway over so it's a good time to check in on my predictions I made 9 weeks ago....this is gonna be ugly.

• The Colts go 11-5, but lose to the Chargers in the 2nd round of the playoffs, again, for the 3rd straight f'n year [Since we are 7-0 now, we should finish better than 11-5, however our schedule gets much tougher the rest of the way. I'm thinking 13-3 now]
• The Cowboys finish 8-8 or worse [5-2 now, w/ four easy games left on schedule (Wash x2, Oakland, home against SD, along w/ a few tough divisional games left. 10-6 is looking for like it for Big D]
• The Packers will win the NFC North [The Pack are struggling, but I still think they'll eek into the playoffs. I just wasn't buying the Viking hype before the season. I was just plain wrong]
• The Vikings will miss the playoffs, but the Bears will make playoffs 8 [See above about Vikes. The Bears are 4-3, but really haven't beat anyone outside of getting lucky against Pitt. Remaining schedule isn't easy w/ only 2 "should-be locks" (St. Louis/Detroit). 8-8 or 7-9 sounds about right for them, missing the playoffs]
• AFC playoff teams - Pats, Chargers, Colts, Titans, Ravens, Steelers [midway prediction: Pats, Broncos, Colts, Cincy, Pitt, Houston]
• NFC playoff teams - Eagles, Pack, Saints, Bears, Giants, Seahawks [midway prediction: Saints, Eagles, Vikings, Cowboys, Arizona, Pack. The Giants have a tough schedule rest of the way and they just haven't looked good the last 3 weeks, so I'm dropping them.]
• Super Bowl Champ will be the AFC rep, which will be either the Pats or the Chargers, and they will defeat the Packers [I'll leave the Pats here, but will sub in the Colts. Also, the Saints or Vikes are gonna represent the NFC...and please God let it be the Saints so we don't get bombarded by Favre media coverage for 2 weeks leading up to the game]
• Michael Vick throws/runs/catches for at least 5 TD's this year [I have the same amount of TDs as Michael Vick has this year...nuff said]
• The Raiders finish 2nd in the AFC west...at 6-10. [not happening. maybe 5-11, but not 6-10. Luckily the Chiefs are in their division, so they'll only finish 3rd in the AFC West]
• The Bengals finish 8-8 or better (i love Hard Knocks). Vegas has the over/under at 7 wins (and yes, i already have that prop bet booked) [Definitely my best prediction. currently 5-2 and still have the Browns, Chiefs, Lions, and Raiders left on their schedule. Good job, Me!
• I will dominate my work fantasy football league. Seriously, I possibly have the greatest team ever assembled for a league that has 10+ teams [I have a good team, but got off to a slow start, however, I'm still 5-3 and should still be a force to reckon w/ come playoff time]
• I will win at least 62% of my bets. I'll explain... [Yep, 9-4 on my actual bets this year....so far so good. Diddy and I are both 10-6 in our picks against the spread, but there have a been a few weeks where I haven't been able to get to a computer to check the spreads for the early games, so I haven't actually "bet" on 2 games every week.
• I hope that at least 3 of my predictions above come true [I'll say that I have 3 of my predictions right (Bengals, Bets, and 1/2 correct on AFC rep winning Super Bowl prediction and 1/2 of my playoff teams right)]

Let's see, what else... Mackey (my cat) had a bladder infection last week. Apparently urinating blood isn't a good thing. Poor guy, but I got him on some antibiotics now and he has responded nicely. Back to his same old self, which is terrorizing everyone that walks by him.

My sister turned 26 today...Jesus that's old! which just means that i'm 28 and even older! oh well, such is life. Yanks about have the World Series up as I type this (up 7-3 in the 7th)....although it'd be sweet to see a collapse so that we get a Game 7 tomorrow night. I'm afraid we aren't that lucky though.