theashtraysays

I refuse to believe that either Louisville or North Carolina are as good as their thumpings yesterday would indicate.

Top 3 games to watch this weekend...

Memphis / Mich St

Xavier / WVU

UCLA / WKU (At least I hope that one's a good game...)

Another OT game... Marquette & Stanford both hanging tough.

Xavier / WVU is going to be a GREAT game next weekend.

WV playing tough in the first half. I still think they have a shot at winning this game.

I thought Clemson would advance a little more also.

Great game, Sooie. Good luck with UNC.

Miss St looked awfully good in that comeback. They'll give Memphis some trouble. Vandy was just overrated. Siena shot lights out for a while, too.

Heckuva day in Tampa.

edit: Vandy's the next victim. You heard it here first.

That was some shot...

Joe Jackson

OT!

Don't do this to me, Uconn AGAIN San Diego.

Fixed it for ya.

I expected more upsets yesterday. Some close calls, but not many suprises at the horn (K-state notwithstanding). Maybe today... I could see a Louisville or a Vandy choking today. And Duke tomorrow. I'm counting on that one.

Ugh, I can't believe I'm pulling for Duke.

That's just wrong.

Xavier is another of those trendy picks. Would be an awesome upset.

'Fraid not. At least not UGA.

My grad degree is from Xavier, undergrad from UK. So I (currently) have two teams in the bracket. They've never met in the tourney, in my recollection, anyway. It would be Final Four if they did this year. Seems kinda unlikely.

I hope it's good. "Parachutes" is good, and "Rush" is a great record. But that doesn't mean they have to keep making clones of the silly thing.

"Office productivity" is going to be at an all time low in this area here in about two more hours...

Somebody in our area called a 2:30 meeting today, to which many of us responded: "You're not from around here, are you?"

GO CATS!

Arkansas and Georgia in the SEC finals... wouldn't have picked that a week ago. Especially with UGA winning twice in one day... weird tourney all around.

I thought Va Tech played a heckuva game against UNC. They deserve to get in. They can win a couple big games.

And yes, watching Duke's loss to Clemson was pure joy.

Elvis Costello did a record a couple years ago with the Metropole Orkest called "My Flame Burns Blue". It's quite good.

I had one. I never really understood why it was a "toy". It seemed like the dumbest thing ever invented.

And I am pretty sure I saw where it was being sold again this past Christmas. New, but still just the vibrating field with plastic guys on it randomly moving around. I can't imagine that being a hit nowadays.

Now the slider hockey table game, that was some good times...

Which one sang Let It Be? I thought she was good.

Gee thanks. All that therapy right down the tubes.

Ok, the tour's not over, but it must be 80% done by now (?!).

 

Those who saw multiple shows and/or downloaded a bunch, what were the best shows? I remember a lot of buzz about Edmonton, and a couple of the west coast shows. My memory ain't what it used to be. Res nite 3 is probably my current fave, but I've only heard a few full shows from the tour. (and attended Aronoff)

The Louisville show was pretty good, but maybe that's just because I had a really, really good seat.

That, and I got to see John sing It's Just That Simple. Loved that part.

Night 5 sounds like the best of the residency to me.

A copy of Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" printed in 1920. I read it every year.

We have a really cool oak "Hoosier" cabinet that was probably made in the 20's.

THEN Saturday we went to a Mazda Dealership and drove several of the Mazda3s and one Mazda5 and were hooked. We drove one used of each, and of course preferred the new ones, although actually we didn't drive a new Mazda5 which seemed a little big for us but i liked it because all the seats fold down to make a giant cargo area. They get decent gas mileage, at least as well as the last car and Caliber was completely sucked in by the MadzaSpeed turbo engine.

ZoomZoomJen! I've driven Mazda's for 20+ years (the RX-7 / RX-8 rotary engine cars - have had 3 of those, but sadly none at the moment), and they are a blast to drive. The 5 is a little quirky - too small to be a people carrier, and not as nimble as the 3. I'd be a little leary on that one for the resale value and for Mazda trying to stretch the 3 chassis a bit too much. Have not driven a MazdaSpeed version of anything, but they all get great writeups.

We also looked at all of the compact cars last summer, and went with the Hyundai Elantra. Very happy with it after 6 mos and 9K miles. It was a lot better car than the Kia, which felt really cheap.

The other car we liked was the Mazda3. Unfortunately, the only Mazda dealer in town is a twit. I've had nightmares with them on service, and the next closest dealer is just too far away. And the Hyundai had more stuff (XM/ABS, etc) for a couple grand less. The Matrix / Vibe was also a nice ride. The Corolla was boring; the Civic was unimpressive. The Ford Focus was a dreadful plastic box.

We are perhaps the only family in America who has hated our Honda Odyssey, btw. It's big, loud truck of a thing. Not a Honda fan overall. We're out of the minivan phase now (thank goodness), but the Sienna we had was way better than the Honda. Both were better than the Dodge/Chrysler versions we had.