Can you say, "The Summit Wallyball Tournament Champions?" Okay so it was the B division (not quite A, but definitely not C), but I mean seriously do you see the size of that trophy?! The last trophy I won was back in little league baseball. It was the only other trophy I ever won and it was no bigger than a slice of pizza. Grant it we only got one big trophy for this win, so we decided we'd just take it on tour sort of like Lord Stanley's Cup.

On a different, yet slightly related note, I met the one and only Stan Sheetz last night at the wallyball after party. For those of you not from the great state of Central PA, he's the President (though not CEO) of Sheetz Inc., one of, if not the, greatest gas station/convenient store chain in the history of the world (thanks to the MTO). Yeah I shook his hand and asked him how he was doing. Some people dream of meeting famous people like Michael Jordan, or Will Smith, or even Gandhi, but not me. Oh no; I dream bigger! Sheetz baby!

I don't understand why people on this mass we call a planet do the things that they do. If anyone could help me out with some answers here I'd greatly appreciate it!

• I don't understand why school buses stop on the train tracks and open their doors. Just about all train crossings these days have red flashing lights and drop gates if a train is coming. And if indeed the buses are stopping for safety, wouldn't it be more safe to get the bus the heck across the tracks just in case a train is coming instead of slowing, stopping, then continuing on?


• I don't understand why nurses and doctors continue to smoke. Grant it I don't know why anyone does it really, but these groups of people know more than anyone else what smoking can do to the human body.


• I don't understand why some pregnant women think that showing off their bare, full bodied stomachs, with a belly shirt is sexy or even remotely attractive. Yes I can see you're pregnant thru your clothing and frankly I think if any person finds a gigantic protruding navel even remotely close to being sexy, they need help.


• I don't understand why we have 4-way stop signed intersections. Why not just have two stops, and two yields, or a combination of stop-except-right-turns? On the same topic I don't understand why there are one lane bridges that tell both directions of traffic to yield to oncoming traffic?


• I don't understand why people should even have a choice of turning on or off their headlights while driving. What's so wrong with forcing the lights on when you put the car in drive?


• I don't understand why it's "so hard" to develop an online, internet voting application. You log on, supply your voting verification code (SSN or other unique number that only you should know) and cast your vote with the click of a mouse. Instant voting, instant results. And don't give me that security crap! Today, all I'd need around here to cast a presidential vote is someone's drivers license. And I bet I wouldn't even need that!


• I don't understand why we as an entire people refuse to rise up and help our fellow brothers or sisters when all we'd have to do is just give the slightest amount of money, or the smallest ounce of food, or the lightest article of clothing, or most importantly, the tiniest bit of time.


• I don't understand why there aren't more people that think up these same stupid questions that are in some kind of position to change things. Sort of makes you wonder what kind of people we have that are actually making this world operate the way it does.

4 doze of u dat tnk dat 0 gud cUd cum frm d Cove, gaze yr Xquisit Iyz upon dis. f ur 2 laZ 2 read d blasted RTcL, basicaly it sums ^ dat d 1st evr nat txt msgN chmpN isa teen frm Claysburg,PA. u read correctly; we nw av comps 2C hu cn tx d fastst. 13 y/o Morgan Pozgar of Claysburg, PA practiced 4t championship by txtN her bff mor thN 8k tmes a mth. Sure she may av ndless txt msgN on her ph, bt I hope her bffs cn rx em 4 fre. mayB she wl share sme of her 25k $ winnings. IDK bout u bt I tnk we may av got a lil %-) hre. btw, Morgan trns ot 2B d bff of d dautA of a fellow co wrkR. hu knw?

[Translated]
For those of you that think that nothing good could come from The Cove, gaze your exquisite eyes upon this. If you're too lazy to read the blasted article, basically it sums up that the first ever national text messaging champion is a teenager from Claysburg, PA; You read correctly, we now have competitions to see who can text message the fastest. Thirteen year old Morgan Pozgar of Claysburg, PA practiced for the championship by texting her friends more than 8000 times a month. Sure she may have unlimited text messaging on her phone, but I hope her friends can receive them for free. Maybe she will share some of her $25000 winnings. I don't know about you, but I think we may have got a little crazy here. By the way, Morgan turns out to be the best friend of the daughter of a fellow co worker. Who knew?

**Note: Claysburg may not technically be in The Cove, but if The Cove were a Papa John's pizza, then Claysburg would be the cup of garlic butter on the side.**

Okay, so I've been viewing HDTV (hi-definition television for those of you that are acronym impaired) for the past few weeks now. And frankly I have come to the following conclusion: If you don't have it, don't get it because once you do you'll never want to watch regular TV again! It's like hi speed internet. Once you get it, there is no possible way you'd go back to using a telephony modem ever again. Sure it's crap loads cheaper, but frankly it just doesn't cut it anymore. I get about ten station in HD right now with my cable plan. I'm hoping that number will increase as time goes on. I get the important channels though; all my local stations, as well as ESPNHD (love the sports!), DiscoveryHD (Planet Earth in HD rocks my flippin' world!) and two movie channels, StarzHD and HBOHD (Nicole Kidman never looked so good!). Of course I have a few miscellaneous others like TNTHD that seems to only play episodes of Charmed and Miss Congeniality (just like regular TNT) and TOCHD (The Outdoor Channel for all of you that have most likely never heard of it before) where you can see that crazy hunter guy shoor black bear in the wild with a bow.

The beauty of the HD picture though is its clarity and color. I can see the pores on people's faces for crying out loud! Sure it may not be as attractive to see the extra forehead wrinkles or the small spot of poorly applied makeup, but it is pretty darn impressive. Why would I want to watch something in a 4:3 format when I can get 33% more picture at 16:9? In other words why watch puny square when I can get beefy rectangle [grunt grunt]? In reality there is no downside to actually watching HD picture. Heck even golf is less boring to watch because you can awe about the scenery when you start to hemorrhage from boredom of the actual sport. The thing that stinks about HD is that you'll wish all your channels were in HD and you'll be quite disappointed when you tune to the Sci Fi channel only to see Samantha Carter and Dania Scully in pitiful 480i resolution with black sidebars. In the meantime Donald Trump is living it up in glorious 1080i just so I can see in more detail, how ridiculously bad his toupee is. It's not really fair, but then Pam Beesly sort of makes it balance out I suppose.

Poem #61: Starry Night

Sometimes when it's late at night
I go outside where there's no light
To gaze upon the stars up high
And slowly watch as they creep by.

I then think back, light years away
To when that star was just a babe.
And wonder just where I could be
And think that star is part of me.

From dust to dust the bible states.
What makes up me has come from space.
And then someday when I am gone,
My body will become part of the dawn.

And more of me will drift away
Back up to space where I will stay
And may become part of a sun,
A sun whose life has just begun.

So late at night when I look up high
I see myself up in the sky.
Of course it's just my body's home
Whose final stop will be unknown.

-- James Barley

In case you were curious I wrote this back in college for my poetry class. It was my favorite one. I don't think too many of my fellow Christian students appreciated the viewpoint, but then again I guess I'm not really your stereotypical Christian now am I?

It's the end of an era. We all come to them. Call them whatever you want. End of an era, the next chapter, a new path, they're all the same. Yet your end is so much more final than mine right now. It's all new for you now. But I know you'll prevail. That's all you've ever done is prevail, that's obvious. So much now comes to its finale, but there is so much that will begin anew. Who knows what's in store for each of us. Life can never stay constant. It never will stay constant. Those that expect such things are ill-considered. But sometimes it sure would be nice if it did. But you're a dreamer and your aspirations have now taken you into uncharted waters. And while it may be scary and stressful, you're not alone. The world is filled with people like you! People starting new chapters, ending old eras. We'd never grow as people if that weren't the case. And it's my guess that soon I'll be in the same boat, that's just the way Life goes. So don't ever look back. Don't ever lose hope. Don't ever give up on your dreams. Ever!

In case you have been out of the bar/club scene for a while, here's your chance to get clued in to the Do's and Don'ts of today's music hoppin', alcohol consumin', chick sweatin', smoke fumigatin', drug dopin', glass droppin', dance crazin' club scene. Keep in mind that my experience has been solely influenced by the city of Altoona, PA. In other words your bars and clubs are probably not as trashy and hole-in-the-wall-ish as the ones I frequent, but I'm sure these little helpers hold true to just about anywhere.

• Do make sure you have your ID ready at the door. Especially if you don't attend the club every Friday and Saturday, or if you don't have a pretty face or big boobs or if the bouncer is a complete idiot and doesn't remember you when you show up every Friday and Saturday.
• Don't complain to your friends at your table when you are NOT carded because you’re 30. Quite frankly all your friends will do is laugh at you because you’re old.
• Do make sure you hold on to your drinks tight when you’re going at it like Ricky Martin on the dance floor, especially if you’re sweating.
• Don't try and pick up your broken glass or bottle that you just dropped with all the other Ricky Martins going at it like Jim Carry with a frog down his pants. This may cause severe painless bleeding that won’t be perceived until you have a giant blood stain on your pants or your foot is wet and red.
• Don't make a face or comment if you’re a waitress and your customer is drinking a Pepsi instead of a beer. I’m sorry for upsetting you when I’m trying to be responsible. Clearly, what am I thinking?
• Do make sure you still tip your waitress after they throw a snide comment your way because you’re not drinking beer. This ensures that the flow of Pepsi will continue to be regenerated in your direction.
• Do make sure you wear underwear under your extremely high-cut mini skirt, especially if you plan on dancing. This ensures that, even though you’re slutty and high as a kite, you don’t end up showing off your privates to half the dance stage.
• Don't be hypocritical when it comes to whom you dance with. If you’re willing to dance with anything that has two legs but then as soon as no-underwear chick shows you her real hair color you get appalled, you can't leave her and go over to your friends and say, “Wow that’s just nasty!”
• Do be friendly with the band especially if they come to talk to you or if they ask you to sing into the mic while you’re on the dance floor.
• Don't yell requests at the top of your lungs in between songs from your table, especially when the songs you’re requesting are complete crap and no one wants to hear them, not even you.
• Do make sure to do some people watching and keep a smile on your face at all times. It will make you very approachable which is good if that's the kind of thing you're after.
• Don't be the creepy lone staring person that stands on the edge of the dance floor with their drink in hand, arms crossed just watching the whole night long as if pondering which person they are going to grab, abuse and then throw in the trunk of their car, or more likely the bed of their beat up pick-up.

So remember, the club scene can be a fun time. If you abide by these Do's and Don'ts you should never have a problem enjoying yourself. Now of course there will be memories you wish you didn't have from that evening, but then again, when are you not out with friends where you don't come away with wanting to not remember something? Oh yeah, the final Do: Do make sure you're with good friends and not ones that ditch you for the band, no matter how trashy and disgusting they may be (the band, not your friends, although I guess that could work for a friend too, but I doubt you'd be their friend if they were trashy and disgusting).

You've obviously come here for the now annual Easter Weekend Recap. Just like the previous years (2006, 2005), this one did not disappoint. So without further ado, here are my favorite moments of Easter At Grandma's 2007:

• This year's major theme: What edible materials did my grandma have that did NOT expire in 05?
• Schooling my now 7 year old cousin once again in Mario Kart 64. Yes I know, I'm a competitive freak!
• Again being told I was to let her win or she would break my glasses.
• Spreadable Land-O-Lakes butter that looked like soup. Guess what, expired Apr 05 (and was probably present at the last three Easter Dinners).
• Whipped cream that shot out of the can so fast it knocked the strawberries right off my grandma's cake! You guessed it; expired Dec 06.
• The Brother-In-Law and I waiting at least 15 minutes while the rest of the fam picked up my cousin from kiddie church. Funny how there was no one else coming out, the next service was coming in and the excuse of the time delay was, "We just couldn't move back there, there were so many people!"
• My uncles going at it at dinner like their own episode of The Odd Couple. I nearly lost the fruit salad in my mouth.
• The dinner conversation this year going from whores, to inner-racial relationships, to mocking Chinese, Spanish, and Native Americans in a matter of minutes (I do apologize for the disrespect given to all people at the dinner table by my relatives)
• Who is this Joe Jencho and why does he keep coming in to to any and every story ever told at the dinner table?
• My grandma's female dog apparently wanting a relationship with my cousin's leg. But don't worry, it's completely non-sexual . . .
• After drying myself with a towel when getting out of the shower Sunday morning, I had dog hair in my mouth! No place is safe in that house!
• Pick your salad dressing of choice: Ranch Lite, expired Sept 06, Fat Free French, unopened, expired Jan 06, No Carbs Italian, expires May 07.

So yeah once again it was nothing but laughter the whole time. If I ever wend up taking a significant other to this event it could very well be the last family event they ever attend. I'm not exactly sure why The Brother-In-Law continues to come back year after year, but despite the judgments and gossip that gets tossed around like a dead fish at the market, if you just picture yourself as a star in a soap opera it should all really be all right. Who doesn't like Easter Weekend with the fam?

In case you were curious, here are two pictures from the world's most elaborate, and expensive popcorn machine. Built and controlled by your's truly and my co-workers at The Workplace, the popcorn machine models an actual blacktop batch plant. It's controlled by custom written software (written in VB6 thanks to me and Ashley) running on a laptop and an Opto22 B3000 SNAP rack and modules. For you non-technical people, that reads gobblie gooblie ploppie ploo. Check out the pics!

This ain't no April Fools joke, but if you're ever in Gettysburg, PA looking to transport a giant 15 foot stalk of bamboo and root, get something larger than a van.

Like Chappie says, "The state will pull you over and give you a ticket for not wearing your seatbelt, but they won't do a thing when you have a giant marijuana plant obstructing your view."

I think it's safe to say that we all have free will. That's what I believe anyway. I hate thinking that I'm not in control of the choices I make. I mean really, what's the point of living if everything has already been determined? Predestination just doesn't do it for me. We're given free will for a reason.

I think of Life this way. When we're born, we pretty much have one path to walk, er crawl. We can't make decisions yet on our own so we just go with whatever Mom and Dad decide. Then as we get older we acquire the gift of choice. We have the ability to determine how our lives will play out. The more we live, the more our Life path forks and splits and veers and at time's we'll want to just get off and other times we'll want to go back and walk the same path again! Every path we take, has purpose. Every path we take has direction. Higher-ups show us our options and say, "All right, go to it kid!" Then it's up to us. What's amazing is that The Man With The Plan is not concerned about our choices. He has set it up in such a way that no matter what path we chose, we will make a difference on this planet (if that is out desire). Sometimes our own paths will cross and we'll wend up in the same place even if we had chosen a different route. Sometimes we'll end up in no man's land with what initially seems like no way out. In the end though, all paths lead to the same destination, unless of course we give up and take the easy path to nowhere. So we start out on a single path and end on a single path, but in between that there is a huge web of trails to take! In the end, it's up to us to chose. We have been given that freedom. We can ask for help and guidance and then just sit around all day long for a response, but sometimes, I think, our choice doesn't matter, there is no guidance. Sometimes we fail to see it, but this annoyance, this difficult wall we come across time after time, this choice we have; it's a luxury, because in our walk of Life, all roads ultimately lead to the same end. A luxury that at times definitely seems like a huge dilemma.

So what do you do when you're in that situation? Yogi Berra (the baseball player, not yogi bear, the picnic basket stealing cartoon bear) said, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." That's exactly right. Make a choice and have faith that it's the right one. If you do what you think is good and right, you'll be taken care of. No matter what you chose you'll have suffering no doubt, but you'll also have times of great joy and happiness. Difference decisions, different time lines, different lifestyles. Same result! It's amazing isn't it? Nothing about our lives here on this planet is simple, yet at the same time nothing about them is complex.

The best advice I can give when needing to make a choice is to just pick something that you will be at peace about. If you're going to be concerned about whether or not you chose the right way, choose another. No matter what your choice, it will be fantastic. And it will be scary. Probably very scary. But like I said before, you'll never be alone. Ever.

"Get busy living or get busy dying. That's goddamn right" - Ellis Boyd 'Red' Redding (Shawshank Redemption [1994])

I mean did you watch American Idol last night? Sweet fancy moses! So check it out dawg. This is my third season of being an avid viewer of the show. The last two seasons I've been pretty impressed with the contestants. This season, not so much really. I mean yeah there are about four or five I think are really good, but the rest just aren't going to cut it. Now I'm sure this next guy has probably gotten a lot of slack from the blogging community, but he's about to get a little more. This Senjia kid. Frankly the boy creeps me the heck out! He's like a cross between Michael Jackson and Prince, but without the singing and dancing skills. And lets face it, without their dancing and singing skills those two artists are only left with creepy. Last night's rendition of You Really Got Me originally by The Kinks made me want to get up from my seat and lock all the doors in my house! And did you see that 10 year old girl balling her eyes out? She must have went thru some kind of drama before the show because really there is no one there to cry like that over! Especially Creepy MJ/Prince Boy. Was she crying because she was extremely happy or extremely traumatized? I don't know, I don't understand it. Right now my two favorite picks are Blake Lewis - The Human Beatbox and Melinda Doolittle, the humble backup singer from Tennessee. My next two favs are the rocker Gina Glocksen and white fro boy Chris Sligh. Is it just me or do all the contestants seem the have names like rock stars already? Anywho, perhaps if Nicole Kidman or Campbell Brown was in the competition, I might have had something to cry over.

In celebration of Pi Day (which ironically enough falls on Einstein's birthday), I figured I'd tell you my top 10 reasons for being obsessed with the number pi. If you were hoping I didn't know it was Pi Day today, then think again friends, think again, because it's time for Captain Jimmy's Top 10 Reasons for Being Obsessed with Π!

• In one of my favorite movie trilogies, the Matrix, Neo has exactly 314 seconds to reach the "source" of the Matrix in The Matrix: Reloaded. Coinkie dink? I don't think so.
• Π is a Greek letter and what is not to like about the Greek? They love food, so do I. They love to party, so do I. The ancients loved mathematics, what do you know, so do I!
• I remember this little rhyme from my Calculus class in high school. Cosine, secant, tangent, sine, three point one four one five nine!
• You really can't get any more random than the number π. In fact if you ask me, π is the epitome of randomness as all the numbers from 0 to 9 each appear eerily close to 600,000 times within the first 6 million digits of π.
• I knew a guy in high school that could calculate any equation you threw at him instantly in his mind. He'd approximate π with the square root of 10 in his mental calculations. He also always wore sandals and denim shorts every day to school, even in the snow. And he made up his own language of grunts and odd sounds. This doesn't really make me obsessed with π, I just find it funny.
• Π is an irrational number (and not in the same sense that women are irrational). The fact that π is infinite just boggles my mind. You can't comprehend forever or even half of forever! For a number to just go on and on without repeating is nothing short of spectacular! I'd say the same for e or the square root of 2, but the only downside is those aren't Greek letters.
• Π is also a transcendental number. This generally means that you can't use an algebraic equation to obtain a root value of π. This also means that someday π will be just as confusing as my 10th grade English class.
• Ever hear of the Buffon's Needle problem? Consider this. We have a floor with parallel lines evenly spaced, drawn on it. Because we're insane, we drop an infinite number of needles of known, consistent length on the floor. Provided that the space between the parallel lines is greater than the length of the needle, the probability of having the needle lie across one of the lines after we drop it is, you guessed it, π!
• While you can't eat π, you can certainly eat pie, and as you are now well aware, pie is one of my favorite desserts!
• Π is always π. Even if it isn't called π, the ratio of a circle's circumference to twice it's radius is always, now and forever the same number, 3.14159 blah blah blah. I don't care if you're measuring in inches, miles, kilometers, furlongs, parsecs or what-have-you. Unless your circle exists in warped space-time or a non-euclidean space, this will always hold true no matter what age, planet, galaxy, universe or state of mind!

I can't comprehend where you could possibly be right now. How will you come back from your deep dark thoughts and emotions? How will you possibly survive when you're entire world is taken away? How will you hold back the anger? How will you possibly find peace? How will you ever find your way, when you think your Light and path have been stripped away forever? Life can give us such joy and happiness and then take it away again in the blink of an eye. To you, there are no reasons anymore. There is nothing anymore that is fair, nothing that is right, nothing that is true. And in this deep disparity, there are no words. No words that will comfort, console, or caress. For there is only us, and our thoughts and our prayers. And while it may seem worthless now, it's not. Because while lost in your anger and fear and confusion it will be that Light that guides you back. It's a Light that can never be distinguished ever after being abandoned. And in time you'll come to find and rely on it once again, for you'll be lost forever if you don't. You'll never forget what Life was before, and you'll never forget what it will be to come. All will be made right. The only words I can muster now are, "I am so, so sorry for your loss." And in all honestly, what good does that really do you right now?

Wow! I just found out that I am officially ranked in the nation in the GAV (Great American Volleyball). Check it out! It may not be much, but it is me!

I'm sure you all know and have heard that we are observing a new Daylight Saving Time this year, and for a couple years to come. What you all apparently don't know is that it is NOT Daylight Savings Time. Please stop saying it that way, and typing it. About the stupidest thing I have seen yet is an email I got at work about updating my PDA for the new DST. I was so happy to see the subject "Daylight Saving Time" and read about Daylight Saving Time in the first sentence. Unfortunately every sentence after that it was back to Daylight Savings Time. We are not keeping a multitude of savings of daylight here people. We are saving daylight in the singular form on a daily basis. And since I'm on the topic of pronunciations, it's pronounced Alz'hime-ers. No where in the word is there a T, and no where should there be a hard T sound. It's not All-timers. And the planet is NOT your-anus, it's yer-a-nis. And the last time I checked, you were going to get your prostate checked out, NOT your prostrate. And the word height never did and never will have a th at the end of it. Sweet fancy moses!

Someone explain to me why a urinal cake would be completely missing from a bathroom urinal? Now I know that eventually the urinal cakes disintegrate and/or chip off over a very long period of time from people that urinate sand and small stones apparently. But there is no reason why a cake would be there in the morning and then not there in the afternoon. Especially when the cake is actually in a plastic cage. The only possible reason would be a change in cakes, but of course this would involved a cake replacement. You know, where a new cake (that isn't invisible) gets replaced with the old one. This brings me to the only conclusion. There is someone who thinks it's funny to reach into the urine infested porcelain manifestation, lift up the cake holder, grab the urinal cake and then walk out of the bathroom with the cake in his hand. While I find this much more disgusting than power peeing sand, it is unfortunately much more believable.

I’m not exactly sure how I feel about older women sporting nose rings or studs. I was at Bed, Bath and Beyond the other day and the cashier that checked me out, err checked my items out, err assisted me with my purchase rather, was wearing a nose stud and was probably in her late thirties. Now my dad would probably knock me for considering her an “older woman” but let’s face it, late thirties is more than ten years older than I. Anywho, her nose stud caught me a little off guard. Now don’t get me wrong; I have some friends with nose studs although grant it they are roughly all my age and I don’t think they look bad. My thought on nose studs is this: the nose stud doesn’t make you more attractive, but it can be an enhancement if you are already attractive enough to pull it off. Makeup, for instance, can make someone more attractive. If you’re an ugly gal and apply some makeup, generally this will make you less ugly (unless of course you stink at applying makeup). If however you’re an ugly gal and decide to pierce your snot factory, you will not become less ugly. That’s just how it is.

So back to my original thought. Can older women pull off the nose ring or stud? Let me just clear something up right now. I’m not a fan of the ring. The stud is quite all right, but the actual ring, well it’s just makes you look like a bull. I think really only time will tell who can pull off the nose piercing. Right now I think it just looks weird for older women (and it always does and will for men) to show off their studs but as my generation gets older it will probably become more commonplace and less awkward looking. I do know this for sure though, any grandma with a giant piece of metal in her tongue will never ever look normal to me.

I don't even remember why I was writing this post to begin with. I really need more of a life here.

In case you didn’t know, I love to eat pie (I also love the number pi, but that’s a different story all together), and the best pies in this entire galaxy are made by my Grandma B. In case you have been entirely sheltered your extremely bizarre life and never had pie before, here’s The Captain’s list of all time favorite pies if you’re looking to live a little and eat one sometime. Of course my opinions on this matter are completely biases as all the pies I’ll be referencing are made by my grandma (did I mention she makes the best pies ever?). So without further adieu, here’s Captain Jimmy’s All Time Favorite Pies (not Pis; there’s only one of those).

8. Chocolate Pudding Pie – While I do like chocolate pudding I’m not a huge fan of the egg white foam topping off this delicious pie. Basically that’s the only reason this pie bottoms out at number 8. Saying this pie is my least favorite of the pies though is like saying The Phantom Menace is my least favorite movie of the Star Wars saga. I’m still obsessed; there are just better ones out there.

7. Shoofly Pie – Evidence of my Pennsylvania Dutch heritage, this pie’s wonderful molasses center sticks this pie at the number seven spot. My only aversion to this pie is that my add-on whipped cream topping doesn’t stick to the soft powder-crumb topping. No worries though. A scoop of whipped cream followed by a scoop of pie with my fork never hurt anyone!

6. Lemon Pie – As a child I hated this pie because I thought it tasted like Pledge, you know that cleaning solution stuff. Recently I had a taste of this pie again 15 years later and while it still tasted like Pledge, my taste has apparently changed for some reason to really like the taste of Pledge, oddly enough. The only reason this pie couldn’t clean up anymore than number six is because I’ve only had it once in the last 15 years.

5. Cherry Pie – This sweet, yet sour pie really tests my taste buds. While not quite as American as apple pie this pie might be the next well know type of pie (I’m sure you’ve heard the song Cherry Pie by Warrant). I don’t quite know how both the sweet and the sour tastes can exist at the same time, but it’s definitely the cherry (pie) on the top of my sundae!

4. Pumpkin Pie – Everyone who celebrates Thanksgiving Day, or Christmas probably has the traditional pumpkin pie for desert with their giant meal. What The Brother-In-Law has quickly learned however is that this pie shouldn’t really be treated as a seasonal goodie, but should be eaten during any time of the year. While I have no idea how a pumpkin made up of giant seeds and orange stringy glop can be formed into a fantastic custard that tastes so wonderfully delicious, I could really care less. I don’t know whether it was the Pilgrims or Native Americans that the stories say brought this item to the first Thanksgiving dinner, but I do know that whomever it was, they were one heck of a pie connoisseur.

3. Blueberry Pie – It’s sweet, it’s good, and it’s purple. What’s not to like? If pies could talk trash to other pies I’m pretty sure this one would do its share by saying stuff like, “You taste like smut,” or, “Your momma was a hooker,” or possibly even, “I had sex with your wife!” Its attitude is well justified though as this pie nearly tops the charts at number three.

2. Peach Pie – While this is The Sister’s favorite pie, it falls just short of the obvious number one on my list. In reality, what is there that this pie cannot do? I’m still working on the calculations but somehow I’m going to prove that the Golden Ratio is used in making this pie. I don’t know how, but anything that tastes this good has to have some kind of beautiful mathematics involved. I just know it!

1. Apple Pie – I feel like the movies have really put shame to my big number one pie of all time. This is not a pie that should be screwed around with (literally). Unlike America’s football team, America’s pie definitely soars above its competition (that’s right, I said the Cowboys stink!). The Bible surely left out a verse in Genesis because after God created the universe we have come to know, I guarantee He sat down and had Himself a ginormous piece of apple pie. Then He saw that it was good and thought that His children could only eat something that good in moderation so He made pie pans roughly 9” round. Tasting this pie is truly like tasting the divine (only in a non-cannibalistic way of course).

So there you have it. The Captain’s top 8 pies of all time! If I missed your favorite pie it’s probably not because I didn’t like it but because I never had it. So if you want me to critique your favorite pie, come make it for me. Of course my list left out the infamous pizza pie, but let's face it. Pizza is in a category all in its own.

I gripe about driving quite often on The Blog, but frankly people irritate the crap out of me with their driving and here’s why:

The first thing is merging. Sweet lord do people stink at it here. In case you were curious (which obviously no body is) the proper way to merge onto a major interstate is to get up to speed before actually merging onto the interstate. Now let me define the “get up to speed” part because that apparently confuses people too. Now I understand that by definition speed limit means that is the fastest you should be going. But in reality this means that by all means you should be making your best effort to maintain this speed, if not go 5 over. I’ll come back to this after I finish my gripe about merging. So yeah, when you cross that white line to officially be on the highway you should at that point be going the speed limit. The actual highway is NOT where you should be accelerating. If you are, you merged completely incorrectly and I am now flying past you, staring with a confused look on my face that says, “What the flip are you doing?” in the left lane. The same goes when getting off the highway. Decelerate once you are off the actual interstate. Now there are times when the deceleration ramp is too small to do this, in which it is okay to slow down before getting on the ramp, but frankly here in PA, rarely will you find this. We have obsessively large entrance and exit ramps for our interstates and we should use them as such.

Now, back to the speed limit grip. Yes I understand sometimes the weather calls for you to slow down to under the speed limit. However one example when this is not the case is when there is snow on the side of the road (key words there are side of the road). If there is no snow on the driving road, or there are perfectly dry 2 feet wide tire paths, the speed limit should then be maintained until driving actually does become hazardous. Also just because its nighttime doesn’t mean the speed limit has decreased; remember that. 50 MPH during the day is the same speed as 50 MPH during the night. Just like Shakira’s hips, your speedometer doesn’t lie. Oh yeah and just blatantly ignoring the speed limit by going slow is just irresponsible and obviously tells me that you are not paying attention to road signs whatsoever and you should be removed from the roadways immediately.

I’m not exactly sure why these things bother me. I’m not really in a rush to get anywhere. I guess I just think if we are allowed to drive vehicles weighing thousands of pounds and affect tons of people all around us, we should not be driving in a idiotic, brainless, dim-witted matter. Of course, just like everything else on The Blog, this is my opinion.