Archive for September, 2009

Go to NASCAR or Stay in IndyCar?

A published today leaked information that Danica Patrick, the Queen of IndyCar Racing, has supposedly agreed to a three-year extension to her current Andretti Green Racing contract which was set to expire at the end of this year’s racing season.

So far Ms. Patrick has been staying silent about the details and not answering any questions as to whether or not this is true.  About a month ago it was widely reported that Ms. Patrick had been speaking with and seeking guidance from NASCAR driver Tony Stewart about making the long rumored jump to the stock cars.

If this rumor about the contract extension is true, then what does that mean for Danica Patrick and her interest in making the switch to NASCAR?

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Six Flags over Georgia – After the Flood

This past Sunday my family and I made a visit to just outside of downtown Atlanta.

Last week the amusement park as well as the entire metro Atlanta area had national attention as 12-18 inches of rain fell and caused massive flooding.  The entire main parking lot and parts of the park were underwater as the Chattahoochee River and Sweetwater Creek overflowed their banks.

The waters did recede and a massive cleaning operation began.  By the end of the week the park’s officials declared that the park was going to be open for the weekend including all of the major rides.  The AJC carried the story.

My brother and I both have season’s passes, and this past Sunday was the last day for us to use our bring-a-friend-for-free coupons, so we brought our parents for a visit to the park.  They aren’t into the coasters and thrill rides, but they both haven’t been inside of the place for several years now and wanted to visit it again.

Six Flags over Georgia - entrance

On Sunday the weather was partly cloudy and nearly perfect.

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Book Review – Stephen King’s “Cell”

How often do you use your cell phone?

You may have a different mind (in more ways than one) about the annoying but yet so popular little devices used by so many people today.  Let’s face it, for a lot of people the cell phone isn’t just a luxury item but rather a necessity for instant information and communication.  Just how much has daily life changed through the last ten to fifteen years of advancements in cell phone technology?

For the setting of one of his more recent novels, Stephen King, the master of horror stories, uses the cell phone as the weapon to destroy most of humanity nearly instantly as a pulse of energy (known as “the Pulse”) changes regular people into creatures similar to zombies.  These “zombies” (known as “phoners”) are at first mentally reduced to their most primate form and ruthlessly attack each other and any other living thing within sight, tearing and biting their victims and killing them brutally.

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“Destination Truth” – King Tut’s Tomb and Swamp Ape

Last night’s new episode of Destination Truth took a look at recent paranormal activity in the tomb of Egypt’s famous pharaoh, King Tutankhamun (King Tut) and then searched part of the Florida Everglades for the famous swamp ape.

Overall, the search for unknown activity in the Valley of the Kings wasn’t as exciting as originally perceived by last week’s preview of the episode.  Doing an investigation into such an old and historic area must have been awesome for the investigation crew, but as we’ve recently seen with the new episodes of Ghost Hunters, searching for paranormal activity just isn’t very exciting when the events don’t materialize for the cameras or audio equipment.

But does that mean that some kind of unknown or paranormal activity didn’t take place in the tomb of King Tut?  Certainly not.

Part of the Destination Truth investigation was still rather interesting.

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“Destination Truth” – Island of the Dolls and Lusca

This past episode of Destination Truth was certainly interesting, but both the first and second parts of the episode had some issues of concern.

The first half of the episode had the Destination Truth team checking out paranormal activity on Doll’s Island, an island just south of Mexico City, Mexico.  The story was that a little girl drowned in the canal surrounding the island a long time ago, and that the island’s caretaker hung up hundreds of dolls to ward off her spirit.  The dolls themselves became charged with the girl’s paranormal energy, and visitors claimed that the dolls would seemingly move on their own.  The island’s caretaker later died and supposedly his spirit can also be found in the dolls.

Needless to say, the place was certainly freaky with all of the decaying dolls hanging on trees, on fences, and throughout the small buildings on the island.  This was a perfect setup for a haunted story like this one.  The locals claimed that the dolls would move and whisper to them at night, calling out and beckoning for them to cross the canal and come to the shore.

So did the team actually capture or confirm that any paranormal activity existed on the small island?

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Sometimes Our 15 Minutes of Fame Comes Later in Life

You know the saying:  Everybody’s famous for fifteen minutes.

Sometimes people’s moments of fame come early when they play high school sports.  Others achieve academic success and gain small amounts of fame when they win prizes and achieve honors in events such as the traditional science and engineering fair.

Many people will have their 15 minutes of fame on their wedding day and for the birth of their children.  Those are certainly special events for most people, and without a doubt they deserve their own moments in the spotlight of today’s society.

My great uncle on my father’s side recently made the news in the Detroit metro area.  Marvin Wesch (Uncle Marv to us) was the winner of a baseball pitching contest amongst Detroit veterans who served during World War 2, and as a winner he was honored in throwing out the ceremonial pitch for yesterday’s Tigers home game against the Kansas City Royals.

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Book Review – Tom Clancy / David Michaels’ “EndWar”

It’s not very often when I come across not just a bad novel, but a poorly written story with no character development, laughable scenarios, and absolutely no back story to a major event.

This book isn’t just bad, it’s horrible!

For the record, Tom Clancy’s EndWar was not written by the legend himself, but rather David Michaels.  Mr. Michaels is certainly no Tom Clancy when it comes to authoring and telling a story.  I don’t know anything about the details for creating the story, but I can only assume that the general plot was created by Clancy and he left it up to Michaels to fill in the details and write the sub-plots in the general story.

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Return of “Destination Truth”

Last night was the season premier of season three for the SyFy Network show, Destination Truth.

I’m a huge fan of this show and it’s been a long enough of a wait to finally see some new episodes of investigations into cryptozoology and the paranormal.  Not only is the show about investigating the unknown, but it’s also about exploring new areas and meeting the different people who live in the regions and seeing their customs.  Each half episode is an adventure into a remote and foreign part of the world.

In a way, this is almost like a real life Indiana Jones adventure.

I’m a huge fan of studying geography, anthropology and the unexplained mysteries of the universe (a bunch of my electives in college were in geography and history related classes).  Some of my other favorite TV shows right now are Ghost Hunters, Ghost Hunters International, The Amazing Race and Special Ops Mission.  Some of those other shows will receive individual attention on this website.  Unfortunately, at this time of year a lot of TV time is spent watching the news (aren’t politics fun?) and college football / NFL.

Getting back to the main point of this posting, it was great to watch Destination Truth again last night.  The first half of the episode in Romania’s Hoia Baciu Forest was simply outstanding.  That alone was worthy of a full episode of the show and should have been fully investigated instead of cramming it into a twenty or so minute segment.

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Alarming Rumours!

No, this isn’t the start of the classic novel 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, nor is this post about giant sea monsters taking down ships in the Pacific Ocean.

This is about the rumored transition of Danica Patrick, the queen of IndyCar racing, to the NASCAR circuits.

An article published yesterday indicates that this rumored transition may start taking place as early as next year’s 2010 racing season.

This is looking like a perfect setup for Danica Patrick to be the third car on Stewart-Haas Racing starting in the 2011 season.

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Book Review – “Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America’s Race to the Moon”

It’s been . . . ummm, let’s see . . . . nearly nine months since my last book review, and I’ve read plenty of books since then, so it’s time I started doing more of the reviews.

Who knows, this may turn into a new website project in the future ;).

A few weeks ago I finished reading the historical book “Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America’s Race to the Moon” by Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton.

As a whole, this was an excellent, fast paced book that took a look into the thrilling and exciting lives of the Mercury Seven, Gemini Nine and Apollo astronauts as they and the entire NASA team worked towards the national goal of beating the Russians and sending a man to the Moon and back before the end of the decade (1960s).

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Everything Else – Day 7 of 7

PIZZA – LOTTO – BEER – WINE – DELI

Those are the words that seem to grace at least one store on most street corners and blocks in the Detroit metro area, especially in the Roseville and Warren areas.

This is one of the more amusing aspects of Detroit (well, at least more amusing for my family and I, and I’m sure other visitors get a kick out of it as well) as you can see how dependent the city’s residents are upon alcohol as well as a unique part of the Detroit dining experience — lots of different independent dining options.

Detroit, Michigan is a solid blue collar town.  There’s no doubt about that.

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Michigan State Fair – Day 6 of 7

The 2009 running of the Michigan State Fair.

Where does one begin?

Well, today was fair day as originally planned, and for the most part the weather was outstanding for our visit.  It’s a shame that the opening day of the Michigan State Fair was drowned out with a nearly all-day rain event, but today we had partly cloudy skies, periods of bright sunshine, and daytime temperatures that seemed to reach into the mid to upper 70’s.

The great weather was about the only highlight of the day at the fair (except for a freak occurrence of running into some relatives on the other side of the family just before we left — they didn’t know that we were even in town let alone at the Michigan State Fair the same exact day as them.)

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