Found in today's headlines at CNN.com:

Poker draws college crowds

I'm sure this isn't news to most of us...

My cell phone is almost 2 years old now, and it's been acting up lately. I'm pretty cheap, so I'm going to hold out with this phone until it dies. So I decided to create an Excel spreadsheet with all my phone numbers just in case that happens in the near future.

And so that's what I've been doing at work this last hour. (In fact, I'm waiting for a couple projects to get back to me, so I haven't done any real work this week. I've just been reading internet articles, and doing other things to waste my time...)

Prognostications for the 2004 baseball season:

AL East
Ever since the Devil Rays joined the AL East in 1998, the division has finished in the following order in every season:
Yankees
Red Sox
Blue Jays
Orioles
Devil Rays

Already, it looks like injuries will play a large role in determining if this year will be any different. Both the Yankees and Red Sox are old and brittle, but they have the resources to avoid catastrophe. The division race will probably be meaningless since the loser should get the wild card.

AL Central
Twins
White Sox
Royals
Indians
Tigers

And the race to 85 wins is on! This division isn't as bad as the AL West circa 1994, but the only reason that the division winner won't finish below .500 is that they play each other so much.

AL West
A's
Angels
Mariners
Rangers

I know, I know. I am an Angel fan. I have faith in my team. Yes, I think they can win the World Series this year. But I'm not going to expect them to make up 19 games on an A's team whose 96 wins last year was their lowest total in 3 years.

NL East
Phillies
Braves
Expos
Marlins
Mets

The Braves' run of division titles depends more on the Phillies than them. On paper, the Phils are the best team in the National League, but Larry Bowa has a way of flushing all of his competitive advantages down the toilet.

NL Central
Astros/Cubs-Doesn't matter who finishes first, since both make the playoffs anyway.
Cardinals
Reds
Brewers
Pirates

It looks like the wild card will strip away any drama that this year's pennant races might have had. Meanwhile, the Cardinals could be the 3rd best team in the league and still finish 5 games behind a playoff spot.

NL West
Padres
Diamondbacks
Giants
Dodgers
Rockies

Formula for predicting this division: Draw a team out of a hat, and insert into standings. Repeat 4 times... Outside of the Rockies finishing first, I would not be surprised by any order in this division's standings.

I'm not gonna try to guess what's gonna happen in the playoffs. As Billy Beane says, it's just a crapshoot anyways.

Some memorable lines from Office Space:

Samir: No one in this country can ever pronounce my name right. It's not that hard: Samir Na-gheen-an-a-jar. Nagheenanajar.
Michael Bolton: Yeah, well at least your name isn't Michael Bolton.
Samir: You know there's nothing wrong with that name.
Michael Bolton: There was nothing wrong with it... until I was about 12 years old and that no-talent ass clown became famous and started winning Grammys.
Samir: Hmm... well why don't you just go by Mike instead of Michael?
Michael Bolton: No way. Why should I change? He's the one who sucks.

Bob Slydell: If you would, would you walk us through a typical day, for you?
Peter Gibbons: Yeah.
Bob Slydell: Great.
Peter Gibbons: Well, I generally come in at least fifteen minutes late, ah, I use the side door--that way Lumbergh can't see me, heh--after that I sorta space out for an hour.
Bob Porter: Da-uh? Space out?
Peter Gibbons: Yeah, I just stare at my desk, but it looks like I'm working. I do that for probably another hour after lunch too, I'd say in a given week I probably only do about fifteen minutes of real, actual, work.

Tom Smykowski: I deal with the god damn customers so the engineers don't have to. I have people skills; I am good at dealing with people. Can't you understand that? What the hell is wrong with you people?

Scary fact: Initech had a guy named Tom Smykowski, and my company's CEO is named Tom Grudnowski.

And down comes the rain.

Just in time for me to avoid getting my first car wash with a car that I've had for 7 months.

An excerpt from Baseball Prospectus 2004:

The Tampa Bay Devil Ray organization is completely and totally dysfunctional. There is nothing of lasting value here. In nine years of existence, the Rays haven't even managed a cave painting for which they might somehow be noticed, much less remembered.

From the fractured and ineffectual ownership group through the incompetent front office, there is nothing of importance or interest in this organization. It is a complete and total wasteland.

Fans of the Devil Rays, if any ever existed or remain, will have to wait until Naimoli and the other partners divest themselves of the club, and an ownership group takes over that has some idea of how to build a club before there's even a possibility of future success on the diamond.

This may sound like an overly harsh assessment of the personnel working for the Devil Rays. But it's not personal...

Reason 194 to get a Costco membership:

Gas prices are at a nationwide all-time high, and California has the nation's highest gas prices (averaging $2.14/gallon for regular unleaded.)

But at last check, Costco gas was still under $2.

I've almost been in 2 car accidents in the past 10 days.

-The first near-disaster happened on the Richmond Bridge. Most of the cars were going 40 mph when everyone in front of me suddenly started to slow down. Several of the cars in front and behind me almost hit the cars in front of them, and I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the car in front of me.

Unfortunately, the car that was 5 cars behind me didn't stop in time and there was a pretty big accident. From what I could tell, the 2 cars involved were smashed up pretty badly. I'm definitely lucky that wasn't me.

-The second time was while I was driving to work today. One of the cars ahead of me badly cut off the car behind him, and this caused a similar reaction as the story above. The car behind me had a lot of smoke coming out of his car as he pushed his brakes to the max, and I ended up running over a piece of someone's hubcap. Fortunately, there wasn't an accident this time.

Thank God I'm OK, and hopefully I'll stop following cars as closely as I have been.

Here is a sampling of one of the topics of conversation I had with my co-workers today (over lunch, no less):

Vets give panda crash course in sex ed

Since I'm no video game expert, I'll leave the review of MVP Baseball 2004 to IGN.com:

Overall rating: 9.0

Presentation: 8.0
There's plenty of Hall of Famers, classic unis and stadiums, AAA and AA teams that matter, and a great Dynasty Mode, all of which offsets a lack of Home Run panache and deep stat tracking.

Graphics: 8.0
Three-quarters of this game is outstanding. Great character models, nice stadiums, unbelievable animations. The other quarter is bad textures and poor face scans.

Sound: 8.0
Decent play-by-play has a lot of variety, even if it's occasionally wrong. The crowds make this one come alive with multi-tiered audio to better gauge the excitement. Great crowd chants.

Gameplay: 9.0
Never has a baseball game made fielding as realistic. Total Control is a work of art and the Dynasty Mode additions make it one of the best ever, but questionable AI hamstrings a perfect score.

Lasting Appeal: 10.0
Finally a baseball game that will truly last an entire season. AA, AAA, and a Dynasty Mode that makes you accountable for personnel. Tack on quality extra modes and summer never has to end.

I just got MVP Baseball 2004 for Xbox. It's pretty sweet...

If you're in the Bay Area and want to play, let me know.

Here's a look at the weather around the country:

Berkeley, CA: 76 degrees
Los Angeles, CA: 86
Chicago, IL: 37
New York, NY: 37, rain
Washington, DC: 45
Seattle, WA: 52
Dallas, TX: 68, with winds gusting up to 20 mph
St. Louis, MO: 48, with winds gusting up to 22 mph
Tampa, FL: 65, with winds gusting up to 18 mph

Isn't it nice to live in California?... Too bad I'm indoors and I can't appreciate it as much.

David Letterman's Top 10 list from February 25, 2004

Top Ten Things Heard Outside The New Mel Gibson Movie

10) "Hey -- no shoving, Monsignor!"
9) "I don't know why they added subtitles -- everyone speaks Aramaic"
8) "I'm hoping my medium Mountain Dew will miraculously be changed into an extra large Mountain Dew"
7) "These 'Lord of the Ring' films are getting odder and odder"
6) "Was this really based on a book?"
5) "Twelve dollars for a movie ticket? Now that's a sin, am I right, people?"
4) "The Pope loved it almost as much as "Barber Shop 2'"
3) "Uh...I don't feel like dinner right now."
2) "That was awesome when Trump fired Pontius Pilate"
1) "Don't tell me the ending"

Haha... Stanford finally ran out of magical, late-comeback pixie dust...

26-1 doesn't sound as good as 27-0, does it?

Here's what I typically do from 12-9 AM on weekdays:

12 AM- Get ready to go to sleep. This sometimes includes doing pull-ups and sit-ups, but it always includes putting on my sweater and a pair of socks (but only one pair nowadays).
12:30- Sleep.
7:45- Wake up, re-set my alarm to 7:55, and go back to sleep. (I realize I could just hit the snooze, but that's a habit I never developed. I'm strangely alert enough to re-set the alarm.)
7:55- Wake up, turn off my alarm. Continue to lie in bed.
8:00- Take a shower. While I'm in the shower, I'll usually just stand there for 10 minutes doing nothing.
8:20- Lie on my bed for another 10 minutes.
8:30- Brush my teeth, shave, put on deodorant, put on my contacts, put on my acne medication, put gel in my hair, comb my hair, get dressed.
8:45- Eat breakfast. Lately it's been cereal with lactose-free milk.
8:55- Wash the dishes. I almost always wash my dishes right after I've eaten.
9:00- Leave for work.

As you can see, I'm extremely slow in the morning. It usually takes people 30 minutes to get ready for the day, but it takes me an hour and 15 minutes. Since it really doesn't matter when I get into work, I don't feel rushed when I wake up in the morning.

I guess you're wondering why I just don't wake up at 8:30 and rush everything in the morning (so that I get 45 more minutes of real sleep.) Trust me, I'd rather be sleeping, but I've taken this long in the morning since high school. I'm too used to it. If I were to wake up at 8:30 I'd probably leave for work at 9:45.

Oh, and I hate having conversations while I'm getting ready for the day. I'm just not ready for social interaction when I wake up. And I can't stand Korean food in the morning. I don't know why, but I'm not ready to eat it.

Today's top 5 Yahoo! music searches:

1) Britney Spears
2) Usher
3) William Hung
4) Christina Aguilera
5) Beyonce Knowles

#1)

Saturday, March 15, 2003
Posted 1:21 AM by Tommy

It's time for sentence completions... POTCH-style!

1. By the end of Andy Chon's POTCH video, ____________ showed us that you don't need _____________ in order to serve.

(A) Roy... sympathy from all the girls
(B) Eugene... to be "heuge"
(C) Paul... a title
(D) Fred... to eat insects
(E) Jim Carrey... to be dumb and dumber

2. ___________ performed as an actor and a(n) __________; the latter helped us realize that "it feels good to be a Christian."

(A) Christine... bottle blower
(B) Janice... acapella singer
(C) Esther... body worshipper
(D) Billy Ku... rapper
(E) Kwan... dancer in a musical

3. The performance by _________ was hilarious; Pastor Eugene mentioned __________ .

(A) Kyu... his moves on Janet
(B) Dennis... how he looked into the camera and said, "You are beautiful, no matter what they say" after getting punched
(C) Carroll... that he said, "I'd like to break me off a piece of that"
(D) Chris Son... her gangsta-style bumpin' to "Do you want a revolution?"
(E) Kevin Chiang... his rapping skills

4. _____________ put in so much time and energy into POTCH; the _____________ has been getting better every year.

(A) The acapella group... singing
(B) The freshman class... skit and body worship finale
(C) Katie's small group... musical bottle performance
(D) The sophomore class... dramatic skit
(E) Everyone... combination of performances