End of March short

March Madness, Oh it gets worse.  In all my brackets I don't have any finalist left except 1.  Not a good year.  I did enjoy FGCUs run and the Wichita state's cheerleaders flashing the shocker symbol at the cameras....

I started a new project that I was reminded of when I started working on the boat.  I had forgotten or blocked out the fact that my fishfinder was on the fritz the end of last year and if I was to replace it I had to do it before the boat was launched due to the fact the transducer would have to be replaced.  Anyway I agonized over what to get for a few weeks.  In the end I settled on the Raymarine E7D.  I will post some of the project progress.

March Madness 2013

This year it's round 2 (technically 3) and my bracket has been busted since half way through day 1.  Every year I get some insight into how things are going to go a week or two before the tournament.  This year my insight was blurred and Recognizing this I decided not to play.  Last year I won money in both contests I entered, so I was obligated to try again.  As I said my bracket is in disarray, especially the West region where I though for some reason New Mexico was the sleeper pick of the year.  Yeah they lost day one.  Now my final fours are intact except one bracket where Georgetown blew it against Florida Gulf Coast who wasn't even in the NCAA until last year.  Well I didn't feel real good about my bracket last year either at this time and things worked out, so we'll see.

Raven's WTF is going on?

Ray retired.  Anquan Boldin gets traded.  Bernard Pollard gets cut.  Kruger we knew was gone. Those are known. Ellerbe was supposed to resign; he didn't.  Ed Reed looks like he is going to Houston or at least out of here.  Mckinney is probably gone (considering he doesn't get along with somebody).  That is 7 starters off the superbowl team.  The gut reaction is Flaccos contract did it.  The Ravens lovers would quickly point out Flacco's contract cap hit isn't much next year, so that's not the reason.  If that is so then why the shedding of players?  I think it isn't the cap for next year dictating these actions but the cap in the next 3-4 years.  By extension it is Joe's contract that is causing this, so stop trying to shift the reason off of Joe's contract.  All I can say is own up to the situation.  The team is trading a solid quarterback, known commodity, for every other piece of the team.  I get it but disagree.  The Raven's are built around the pieces on mainly on D and not a star QB.  Putting it all on Joe (and Ray Rice) isn't going to work.  Anybody remember how Joe played before Mckinney started?  Yeah he needs time in the pocket and without that solid O-line he's average.  Even with the line he looked great, because somebody made some miraculous catches.  Who was that? Oh yeah, it was Q who we traded for a 6 round pick!  Shakes head.  Next year we'll go 8-8 at best and cinci will win the division.  

Salmon cakes and potatoes au gratin

I made these salmon cakes yesterday.  Turned out pretty good.  The amount of corn seemed excessive and looked like it to, but it tasted good.  On a food eating note, I've kept my weight at 213 well 212 on a good day.  I would like to lose 10 more pounds, but working out is causing me to ache more than usual.  I'm sticking to every other day to minimize the discomfort.  I haven't injured anything specific, but it seems like it doesn't take much for me to over-do it these days. That said I'm going to try and cut out desserts.  I watch what I eat; however, I do like my cookies at lunch. No more starting today. I figure that couple hunderd calories per day is going to make some difference ATBE (all things being equal, is that a valid acronym?) .  We'll see.  Oh I dont know if I mentioned I'm trying to learn spanish.  Started with memrise now I'm doing duolingo .  Duolingo is more traditional (grammar and mechanics) than memrise in that memrise was more vocabulary.