Kristie is home!

Kristie has returned from her trek. Back from Alaska, with a newly minted Master's Degree and ready to start whatever comes next. Welcome back, Kris!

New Hawk Camouflage

Was driving out today - stopped at a traffic light. I happened to browse up at the electric wires. I glanced at what appeared to be four standoffs where normally there are only three.

A closer look revealed a hawk hidden amongst the standoffs waiting for prey to appear.

PSAC Winter 2013

We went to Kellie's PSAC Winter 2013 meet yesterday. Here are the videos.

• Jump 1
• Jump 2
• Jump 3
• Jump 4
• Jump 5

Off to the tundra

For those who don't already know my daughter Kristie Bresz is heading to Alaska for the next 5 months.

I am putting this to help her blog get better scores in google search.

Her blog is here:

A Tundra of Fun

Good luck Kris.

F1 and Speed to split

This is upsetting news. I've been an ardent follower of Steve Matchett , David Hobbs and Bob Varsha. Their knowledge of the sport is wonderful, their teamwork is top notch and they have just enough sarcasm and wit sprinkled into the broadcast to keep it interesting without making it silly. I sincerely hope that whatever NBC does with the broadcasts we don't end up with an entire season of time shifted nonsense. Back a few years ago when Fox broadcast a few of the races in time shifted fashion they changed broadcast crews, and they were terrible.

mint.com - Hello and Goodbye in 24 hours - Ads gone wild

Yesterday I tried mint.com. Today I deleted my account. Quicken was asking that I upgrade to the 2013 version for $60, but mint.com was free to try and could be lower ongoing, with a better interface to iPad. My account is now deleted for the following reasons:

1. Unable to set goals - I loaded all my accounts, everything, including mortgage. When setting up the goal to payoff my mortgage the tool was unable to recognize that I had a loan. LOSE
2. Too many ads - Switched to the iPad to see if perhaps it was better. Unfortunately, all that happened was a boatload of ads.
   • I see you paid an ATM fee, here's a bank that doesn't charge those
   • I see you are a good saver, ING has a great rate I have an ING account so that is a pointless ad
   • Quicken loans has great rates on your mortgage, perhaps we can save you money

Goodbye!

Mutant Alien Butterfly

Yesterday we went downtown to eat at Station Square in Pittsburgh. After eating we were walking down the steps and saw what appeared to be an alien mutant butterfly.

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Note when looking from the side those bolts next to it are those heavy duty 1" bolts used to hold buildings together.

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I did some research and it appears to be a Royal Walnut Moth. I think my pictures look better!

F1 Series so far

6 races. 6 winners. Great competition. Alonso atop the leader board. Interesting qualifying. Michael P1 in Monaco, only to be sent back to 6. Can't wait for Austin.

2012 Formula One Season Starts Now

Sitting and watching qualifying for Australia. Since some of my faceboook friends may now know results, I will post my thoughts here.

Should be an exciting season.

Six former world champions in the field.

Qualifying

Q1

Kimi failed to make it out of Q1. Put a wheel on the grass, did not make it to start/finish in time to turn a final flying lap.

Red Bull fairly far back in the pack, hopefully they are waiting for later rounds to turn it up a notch, but they are struggling for down force.

Q2

Alonso beached the F2012 half way through the session. Yellow flag then red flag.

5:00 to play - top of the time sheets looks like last year. Hamilton, Button, Vettel, Webber.

Mercedes seems to be the engine to beat.

Alonso time held for a while, but just as the session ended he was pushed to relegation. No Ferrari in Q3.

Q3

4 former champions still in the hunt: Hamilton, Button, Vettel, Schumacher.

Hamilton P1. All McLaren front row Red Bull pushed to 5, 6.

More tomorrow when the season starts down under.

2011 Canadian Grand Prix

2 plus hours of red flag. Lots and lots of rain. But a great exciting race. Vettel showed a flaw in the last lap and Button took advantage. Last 10 laps were ultra exciting. Always fun when cars switch from full wet to intermediate to dry tyres. Very glad that Fox kept the tried and true broadcast team of Varsha, Matchett, Hobbs, and Buxton. Guess that is the benefit of Fox owning Speed TV. Over to Speed TV for interviews.