I just finished a big cleaning of my fish tank and realized that I haven’t mentioned it in awhile. The six line wrasse I added in March is alive and doing well. I also added another pair of clownfish in June and those are both doing great as well. I haven’t had any major happenings in the tank, minus a bit of an algae problem that I hope I’m on the way to resolving. The old automatic feeder that I had always seemed to dump out too much food, so I broke down and bought a much better one. It’s digitally programmable and lets out the perfect amount of food every time. This should help control that pesky algae. Next up I want to get some new lighting so that I can start thinking about adding corals to the tank.

I’m not sure if this was big news around the nation or not, but a guy used a jet pack to fly across the Royal Gorge yesterday. It was widely covered by the local media, and you can even see some video of the ride on denverpost.com or YouTube. I was scared just crossing the bridge earlier this year and cannot imagine actually flying over the gorge. The aerial tram ride that is offered might be the closest thing to the jet pack ride, though the jet pack took just over 20 seconds to cross the gorge and reached 75 mph, while the tram tops out at just over 10 mph. The video footage doesn’t do a good job of showing the massiveness of the gorge, but it’s thrilling nonetheless.

Kim and I, along with a small group of friends, headed down to the Paramount Theatre on Friday night to watch Warren Miller’s latest film titled Children of Winter. I thought at this time last year we had already been out on the slopes, but looking back at the post from the Warren Miller film last year, it appears that I was wrong. This helps put my anxiety at ease, and I hope that the snowfall this year can only be as great as it was last year. I do see there is a potential storm coming in for Thanksgiving. Now we really need to wake the snow gods and hope that enough snow dumps so we can head into the high country this coming weekend.

I thought the movie was good. It’s always amazing to see what some of the skiers and riders are capable of, and it’s very impressive that it is all caught on film. But the part that was the most interesting was the segment on Skijoring in Leadville, Colorado. This event can best be described by first thinking of slalom waterskiing, but with horses instead of boats and icy jumps instead of forgiving buoys. I can’t find any info on the competition in Leadville, but it is definitely something I’d like to see. There is a short glimpse on what I’m talking about 30 seconds into this trailer for the film:

So I’m in the market for a new cell phone, and today the Blackberry Storm has been released. Many of you may already know about this, with the amount of publicity it’s been given. I was seriously considered taking the plunge and getting this phone until I started reading some of the reviews today. I think I would really like having access to my email and the web at all times, I am just a little concerned about the specifics of this device. The push/touch screen was supposed to be a big selling point, but so far I’ve been reading very mixed reviews of it. I think I’ll try to get into a store soon to check it out in person before making a final decision. Or I’ve heard that there’s a money back guarantee through Verizon that may be worth looking into. And don’t try to convince me to get an iPhone, G1, or other device as I don’t plan to leave Verizon anytime soon.

Sunday afternoon we spent some time working on the basement project that I mentioned here nearly two years ago. I have multiple different plans drawn up in SketchUp, but prior to this day had done very little actual work toward achieving my goal. Well that has changed, and I’m posting these pictures to force myself into keeping regular updates going on the project. I’m trying to dedicate at least one night a week to the project, hoping that eventually I’ll start having fun with it and put in even more time. Right now the dirty work is not much fun at all.

So here are a few pictures that Kim snapped on Sunday. You’ll see that I am busy tearing down some previous framing that was not done very well. I figure that I’ll want my walls to actually stand up for years to come, so redoing them is the only way to go. Once we get all of the wood out of the way, we’ll be removing any loose material from the walls and then resealing them with some products I picked up from Home Depot. You’ll also see a photo an area of the floor that is not level with the rest of the basement, which I am already in the process of filling in. We are slowly making some progress and I hope I’ll be able to post some more pictures next week with some visible changes being made.

Sorry if some of the photos are a bit blurry, the camera was set to manual focus and Kim didn’t realize that.

I’ve slowly been getting back into running over the past week or so. True, winter is a strange time to try to get back into running, but it’s been surprisingly mild in Denver recently. Yesterday I believe we broke the 80 degree mark, and it was very comfortable in the upper 60s when we went out for a run just after 5PM. I actually had to dig through my closet to find my running shorts as it was so nice out. I think this is longest time I’ve gone without any any ankle problems since my initial sprain last February. I think anything I can do to strengthen it even more, and get back to the way it was before then, is a good idea. So far we’ve gone out for a thirty minute run twice in the last week, and we will continue to do so when the weather is nice. Maybe I’ll even train to run another race, but I better not get too far ahead of myself.

I’ve added another game to my recent Wii addiction, Mario Kart. I picked it up from Sears over the weekend using one of our wedding gift certificates, plus we got another steering wheel. And that pretty much sums up our Saturday night, Kim and I played for hours and hours. It was fun to get online and race against people from around the world, and we had a good time just racing against/with each other. I don’t think this game will be leaving the system anytime soon. It’s highly addictive. If anyone out there also has the game, let’s trade code numbers so we can play online.

Comcast decided to disrupt my internet service for the last 24 hours or so. I called them and complained and they credited my account, though I’m not sure how much of an adjustment will actually be made. I’m just glad that I am once again online. More tomorrow.

Woohoo! We finally got our first snow in Denver. This is much later than last year, at least two weeks later. And I don’t think the inch or two will last very long, as we’ll be back in the low 60s by Sunday. I think everyone is just excited that the season is finally here. In fact Kim and I may head up to the mountains this weekend to do a little boarding. Even though very few lifts/trails are available at the few open resorts, it’s better than nothing.

Finally, my adult hockey team won our first game on Tuesday night! This team also gave us our first point at the beginning of the season after we lost in an overtime shootout. After taking an early lead, and despite multiple penalties toward the end of the game, we were able to hang on to win the game 5-4.

Unfortunately, the results were not as good for my fantasy football team. I’m back on the losing side of things after going down 78.35 to 86.75. So it wasn’t a complete blowout, I just need to make a few changes before this week. I bet that my playoff hopes are gone now, but I should at least try to stay out of last place.

One last item, don’t forget to watch the Cincinnati Bearcats take on the Louisville Cardinals tonight tomorrow night at 8PM eastern on ESPN2. The Bearcats are now a nationally ranked team after taking out West Virginia this past weekend. Let’s hope they can pull out another big win and bring back the Keg of Nails.