Monthly Archives: September 2006

Disc Golf 09/09/2006

The group went out to the Rivery today. All the usual suspects, and one long-time lost player: Michael Chapel. I guess the pendulum swung back the other way… I think it has been 8 months since he played last.

I wonder what caused this? High winds, lightning, lack of water?

We split up into groups and I teamed with John. We got into some trouble today. Like the time when we were deep in the trees. The best group of the day was Jon and Adam.

Mike had been here once, but that was way back before they changed the course around. So most of the course was new to him. We introduced him to the holes and he introduced himself to a cactus. A nice, large, friendly cactus.

Update: Adam had a quote “that was entirely sock and shoe oriented” but as the mists of time advance, I can’t figure out what that was about… teeing off?

Asparagus Gruyére Tart

I tried another recipe out today. On some PBS cooking show, I saw them make an asparagus tart with Gruyére cheese to bind it. So, I bought the supplies and prepared to make it. And then I wussed out and searched for a recipe and found this. It is really simple to make. Although I did manage to mess it up. I used a plastic pizza cutter to straighten the edges on the puff pastry dough. And then I tried to cut a border with it and “dock” the middle part with a fork. Unfortunately, I didn’t cut deep enough and the whole sheet rose up. But it was easy to recover from. I recut the border with a knife and pushed the middle down with a fork.

Next time, I will add some prosciutto ham to add another flavor note to the medley…

I also used two 1250 watt halogen lights to brighten up the picture. And to compensate for this yellowish light, I used an Expodisc. This is an 18% filter. You take a picture and use that picture (see above) as the color temperature of the following pictures. It is pretty surprising to see just how brown the light is…

Disc Golf 09/08/2006

I forgot my wallet and phone so you are saved from the blurry photos. Today, I was doing pretty good. Well, better than pretty good. John and I were keeping neck and neck in scoring. But then I started pulling ahead. On hole 10, I threw my farthest shot. So far that it sailed past the hole. But I was able to birdie it on the next shot. I stayed in the lead as was able to win three shots ahead of John.

It also felt cooler out. And the grass seems to have sprung back thanks to a couple of rainy days. We were able to play the course really quickly (within an hour). And when I was driving to the Mexican Ice Cream place, I look up to the temperature gauge and saw that it was 90 degrees out. It was surprising just how acclimated I was to 103 days to think that 90 was cool.

Game Day 09/07/2006

Elasund

We started out this game day with six people. So we split into two groups of three. Mike suggested Java. And I nominated Elasund. Yeah, I know Ed and Susan might revoke my meaty card, but I was in the mood for settlers!

I like this settlers. It is different enough from the other settlers games to justify itself as a stand-alone game. And it has a nasty bite to it. You see, your buildings which you built are not safe. People can build over them if they play correctly and there is space around your building. Jon was in a tough position. The dice were not going his way (no big surprise there. Someone always gets hosed in settlers games). And Francesca and myself were attacking his buildings. Towards the end of the game, his hope was to save enough money to build three church pieces for the win. But I was able to build a medium sized building on a double-windmill spot to place two cubes for the win!

Carcassonne

Next up, was Carcassonne. Which I haven’t played in a while. I was burned out for quite a long time when I played it a lot in Russcon. But it made it back on the table. And this time Francesca dominated in the game. She was able to score many large cities for the win.

Masons

Finishing out the night was a quick game of Masons. I like Colovini games and their abstract feel. However, this game is a little bit too reliant on the luck of the card draw. I was able to get good cards for most of the game. But Adam was able to score more than I during the end game. My three choices were not that great. Peter and Francesca did not have that good of luck in drawing cards either.

I think that perhaps instead of discarding one card and drawing two during a scoring round. You should be able to draw four. You are already giving up on a lot of points (anywhere from 6 to 20 or more points other people can score in a round). I think that drawing two cards is not enough of a compensation for missing out on a scoring opportunity. The other option would be to start off with more cards in your hand (instead of 6).

Other games played:

Java

links

Programmer’s bill of rights link via

Create your own panorama planet link via

Wifi camera link via

The War on Terror, as viewed from the Bourne shell link via

X-Ray records link via

Dealer’s choice link via

Deblurring camera link via

No seatbelt, no excuse link via

The little girl giant link via

Analog phone + cell phone link via

Commodore 64 USB keyboard link via

100 Acre Deadwood (NSFW) link via

1,000 cars racing at the same time link via

Man wins lotto again reenacting how he won in lotto link via

What color is the moon, really? link via

Confidential “do not distribute.” link via

Paper cut link via

Softening Us Up for Torture, 24 Hours at a Time link via

Lunch Time Tichuers 09/05/2006

Another game where a lot of hands have uneven card distribution. For the first two hands, I had all of the winners. So it was unsurprising when I called and made Tichu. And for a sense of completness, on the last hand, our team had all the cards for the win.

09/05/2006 The scorecard for a game of Tichu

GT or T bet made or lost

This team scored more points than the other or one twoed
GT/T	Team #1	GT/T	GT/T	Team #2	GT/T
GT/T	Ed & Jon	GT/T	GT/T	MarkH & AdamR	GT/T
	10		T+	190
	10		T+	490
	40			560
T+	165			635
	165			835
	195			805	T-
	285			815
	355			845
	520	T+		880
	565			935
	565			1135

Disc Golf 09/04/2006

For Labor Day, we went to a disc golf tournament. This was our first tournament since the other one that we tried to attend was rained out. It was the inaugural Blue Skies Over Texas Tournament. We met at Starbucks on 620 at 7 am to carpool down. When we got there, Jon realized that he forgot to transfer his bag of discs to the car! Doh! So he bought a new bag and some discs and borrowed some more.

We entered the novice division. And luckily, I was grouped with John and Jon. It seems that they used alphabetical order for the groupings (Gravitt, Grimm, Hamzy). We were grouped with “Nacho” who was a pro and who was also our guide for this round. He was laid back and fun to play with (and also quite the mary-jane smoker).

Each hole had sponsor signs by the tee box. Beware the Blair Keebler Project!

John lost his disc in a tree. So we invoked Jon’s super powers and got him to climb up the tree. Unfortunately he was not able to quickly get to the top of the tree and we were holding up other golfers. So he dropped down. Luckily, the next group was able to knock it down and gave it back to John.

After we were finished with the round, we went and ate lunch. They provided us with hamburgers and hot dogs. And after that, was the ring of fire. The ring is a contest where everyone gathers around a goal and putts at the same time. Whoever’s disc makes it into the goal gets to putt again. Until there is one putter left and that person wins a prize. Sadly, I did not win any prizes…

After that we still had an hour before the next round of golf started. So we played a game of Tichu and introduced Curt to the game.

09/04/2006 The scorecard for a game of Tichu

GT or T bet made or lost

This team scored more points than the other or one twoed
GT/T	Team #1	GT/T	GT/T	Team #2	GT/T
GT/T	Jon & Curt	GT/T	GT/T	JohnG & MarkH	GT/T
	55			45
	75			125
	100			300	T+
	150		T-	250
	150		T+	550
	205			595

For round two, we played the course backwards. They had reversed all of the tees and goals for the course. This created a challenging and completly different experience. Fun! This time I was only grouped with Jon. It seems that they used the scores to create the new groupings.

My House redux

I bought a Lensbaby as well and experimented with it. It is a real manual lens that uses a rubber bellows to achieve focus. You push or pull on it and twist it around to get a picture that you like. With the end result being a part of the picture that is in focus and the rest out of focus. It highlights and draws attention to a part of the picture.

I also experimented taking a picture of the Roads and Boats box cover. And, on a whim, submitted it to the geek. I was not surprised at all when it was rejected for being “too blurry”. That is the whole point, people! It was also “irrelevant to the subject”. Huh?

I do want to take it to Ed’s some game day. I want to get a picture of Susan performing an act of goose-thieving! Then that picture would represent what was going on in my head when I was full of rage. Gooooooooooooooose thiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeefffffffffffffffffffffffff! Hehehe…

Game Day 09/02/2006

Titan

Tim had gaming during the Labor day weekend. There were the most number of people there that I have ever seen at Tim’s! We started out with this classic dice fest. We even had two games of it going. I was with Marty, Mary, and Scott. I started out okay. Better than Scott, who was having terrible rolls.

And speaking of good rolls, look at my roll! My Cyclops obliterated two Centaurs!!!! He needed sixes to hit and boy did I ever roll them. Six of them! Marty was having correspondingly bad luck. His monsters could not hit worth a damn and I was able to hurt him by killing his Wyvern. He had to leave after that. And a little later, Mary’s Titan attacked one of my stacks. I was defending in the Jungle and I was able to keep two Behemoths alive to summon a Serpent. It was enough to give me the edge and I was able to kill her Titan for the win. Fun game…

Can’t Stop

Kevin and Deborah showed up which surprised me. They live in Houston and drove up here for gaming. It was fun to chat with Kevin and catch up. We played another dice fest. Little thought required. Just play, have fun, and socialize…

Disc Golf 09/02/2006

That tomatoey plant is still there at the Cat Hollow disc golf course. But it is blooming now. Strange. It looks like it has fruits but it is flowering… Doesn’t the flowering come first?

I was teamed with Jon this morning. And he threw a good first throw at hole 6! We were on fire today! According to my records, we birdied five holes! But were were only partly on fire. Jon was not putting well and the weight fell on my shoulders. Unfortunately, me missed a couple of putts for pars or bogies.

Interesting. They moved a hole! A new house was built next to the existing hole and the metal fence was like ten feet away. Needless to say, I bet they got some discs thrown at their new house. So the home owners must have complaned and moved the hole. Well, duh! Don’t build next to a target!

Another course improvement: chairs. Let’s get the party started…

Curt lost a disc in a house’s yard. He left afterwards to go retrieve it…

Mark Hamzy's weblog

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