Tapout & Facebook

The Tapout crew returned for their season premiere show last night on Versus. Good to see Mask, Punkass and SkySkrape again, they always amuse me and they’re great for the world of mixed martial arts. They went from selling t-shirts out of the back of a van to one of the largest MMA sponsors and clothing distributors in the world. The success definitely didn’t go to their heads, they still love MMA and they’re always out there looking for young talent to help catch a break in the business. Last night’s show featured two rising stars from The Pit in San Luis Obispo, CA by the name of Chris Lighty (former K-1 fighter) and Glover Texeira. Both men were successful in their fights and the show was enjoyable as always!

I also managed to find a handful of people I went to high school with on Facebook and it was nice to see where they wound up in this crazy world. I was happy to see that the majority of them are married with a family. All my best to all of them.

Disability

After being out of work for a long period of time, but working from home, I was slated for an August 1st return. Looking forward to getting back to a daily routine and getting out of the house is definitely something I strongly desire. Unfortunately last weeks doctor appointment confirmed the way I’ve been feeling (like crap!). After discussing the results of the doctor with my superiors, it was decided that it would probably be best if I went onto disability to focus my full attention on recovery.

I am hoping for recovery, hoping to feel like myself again, rid myself of multiple medications and just go back to living my life. If only it was as easy as it sounds. I’m keeping my fingers crossed, listening to the doctors, getting ready for my next series of tests and hoping for good news. The doctor said I may need to go on oxygen as not enough may be reaching my heart or brain…having to walk around with an oxygen tank; that’s rather embarassing to me at such a young age, but if it solves problems, I’d rather deal with it and move on from the misery I’m currently stuck in.

I know the next couple of months will be rough with the testing and I’m sure I’ll get to try out all sorts of different medications (looking forward to those side effects..riiight!), but I have to try to stay positive.

Hell, with an oxygen tank, I’ll fit in even better at the casino, all I’ll be missing is the cigarette

Book Review: Sail by James Patterson

I figured since I read a ton but really don’t discuss it much that I may as well mention some of what I read from this point on. I tend to like biographies but the crappier I feel, the more I tend to read fiction, just for the get away from the real world feeling.

I typically read everything that James Patterson puts out, although I don’t always enjoy them as a lot of times I feel like I’ve read 400 pages and he crams the ending into a page and a half at the end…a big buildup for a quick finish. Sail is about a somewhat estranged family that tries to a last ditch effort to bond on their boat, The Family Dunne. When trouble at sea strikes, the Dunnes find themself in a position where bonding will be their only opportunity to survive. Their biggest challenge – their boat is no where to be found on radar and they’ve been deemed missing. After Coast Guard searches fail to find them, they are deemed “deceased.” There are lots and twists and turns in this one and of course, I’m not willing to give any of those away!

In my opinion, worth a read, as it is one of the better James Patterson books of late.

The race to 100…

I wasn’t feeling very well but I had some games I was able to finish quickly as they were both near the end point, so I figured what the hell and I knocked them out.  GUN, a very enjoyable western type shooter, was finished for retail title #51 and Fuzion Frenzy 2, which is a party-type game, that I dislike greatly, for retail title #52.  Why count how many titles get finished?  Six other guys I know from 360 Voice are competing to see who can finish 100 titles first…yes, we’re all a ways off.  General Tynstar leads with 60, Disbron has 56 and I’m in 3rd with 52.  I currently lead them all in gamerscore, but I am only slightly ahead of Mightymango, who will probably catch me.

EliteXC: Unfinished Business 7/26/08 (Results)

EliteXC returned to CBS for the 2nd time this year. The first was a disaster in my mind and I found it a big blow to the sport of MMA. Many things seems to be “fixed” or “scripted” and the fight of the night Lawler/Smith wound up having to be stopped because of an accidental finger to the eye. This time around was a bit better.

The main event was a rematch of Robbie Lawler vs. Scott Smith. Lawler was impressive and stopped Smith with some nice shots to the body in the 2nd round to retain his title.

In other action, Jake Shields looked great, putting Nick Thompson away very quickly. Thompson is definitely not a pushover so this was a very big victory for Shields. Nick Diaz won by 2nd round TKO in front of his hometown: Stockton, CA. I was very disappointed to see that the Antonio Silva/Justin Eilers heavyweight title fight didn’t make the CBS show, but I was happy when they announced it would be on Showtime with a few other preliminary matches later on. So when the CBS show concluded, I flipped over to Showtime and caught 3 of the prelim fights. Silva looked great and took home the heavyweight title by TKO in round 2.

1 Drew Montgomery def. Brandon Tarns TKO (Doctor’s Stoppage- Cut) Round 3 4:23
2 Carl Seumanutafa def. Mike Cook KO (Slam) Round 1 1:21
3 Wilson Reis def. Bryan Caraway Decision (Unanimous) Round 3 5:00
4 Rafael Cavalcante def. Travis Galbraith TKO (Strikes) Round 1 3:01
5 Antonio Silva def. Justin Eilers TKO (Knees and Punches) Round 2 0:19
6 Cristiane Santos def. Shayna Baszler TKO (Punches) Round 2 2:48
7 Jake Shields def. Nick Thompson Submission (Guillotine Choke) Round 1 1:03
8 Nick Diaz def. Thomas Denny TKO (Punches) Round 2 0:30
9 Robbie Lawler def. Scott Smith TKO (Kicks and Punches) Round 2 2:35
10 David Douglas def. Marlon Matias TKO (Punches) Round 1 0:12
11 Anthony Ruiz def. Jeremy Freitag Decision (Unanimous) Round 3 5:00

Saturday Relaxation

Didn’t really feel well today, but it was somewhat eventful in that I was able to catch the backend of the Yankees/Red Sox game. Yankees won 10-3, their 8th straight win, which puts them 1 game back in the wild card race. Since moving from New York, I don’t get to see them play very much, so it’s nice when they actually make west coast TV.

Our fantasy football draft started in the SFL – this is year 7. Hard to believe. Of course there was arguing and bickering, but the draft is always too many weeks of drama. It takes a while to complete, as we have 32 teams, split into the AFC & NFC, with separate drafts. So, 16 teams in the AFC, 20+ rounds with a 6 hour limit to pick and the clock shutting off for 6 hours each evening makes it a little bit dragged out.

I finished Cabela’s Trophy Bucks on XBox 360 for my 50th retail title completed. I really didn’t like the game so it’s something I’ve been chipping away at little by little for a while now…most people would probably sit down and try and do it in one or two sit downs, but I couldn’t really deal with it so I did it when I could. Glad to have it done and gone!

Tonight I look forward to some MMA action, EliteXC on CBS. Looking forward to the Robbie Lawler/Scott Smith fight, Nick Diaz & the Antonio Silva/Justin Eilers fight.

Doctors Appointment

Well, a good part of Friday was spent in a very hot, non air-conditioned doctor’s office. Not exactly much fun when it’s over 100 degrees outside. Sitting around sick people and then having to be miserable with the added heat is not my idea of a good time.

I got a referral to a new specialist and I will call to make the appointment on Monday. I was warned that it could take up to a month to get an appointment with this doctor, but if he has answers, then worth the wait. I also have to have a test where I wear some type of monitor, which monitors oxygen levels. It will measure if I have enough oxygen to the heart/brain, etc. At this point, I’m willing to try anything to feel some relief.

Other than a bunch of prescription refills, that was it…it was nice to go and not add a new medication!

Sick..

Haven’t felt well the past 2 days, so the blog got no attention.  Off to the doctor on Friday to get more test results, take more tests, etc…I’m sure it’ll be an all day affair.

Renal Failure?

I have been having big issues with my kidneys and the fact that they cannot filter protein. I read an article this morning that kidney damage can be done by taking a prescription medication like Naproxen. Granted I already had some type of issue going on, but Naproxen happens to be one of the prescriptions drugs that I was taking and I have to wonder if this contributed to it.

It bothers me that this wasn’t flagged by the doctor or even by the pharmacy. It was flagged by the insurance company – but about 2 months after I had been taking it, I got a letter in the mail from them stating that it could be causing damage and it conflicted with existing issues/prescriptions. I wish some of these things would have been flagged more quickly.

I think it’s definitely time to get out of Vegas for a second opinion.

GSL Elimination

Well unfortunately Team AMP was eliminated on Sunday evening, but not without drama. Everyone was under the impression that the week ended at Midnight EST. We were under that impression because the commish had actually posted it. Other teams were all of this belief as well. The question was asked numerous times and all answers pointed to Midnight EST.

We as a team planned out to play a certain amount of quick score games about an hour or so before the close, but we came to find out that the league ended at Midnight GMT (which was actually 5 hours earlier than we thought.) We wound up eliminated by only a couple of hundred points. All the commish could say was “well, I live in GMT, it’s all I deal with, but sometimes I confuse it with EST.” Really? That’s probably the poorest lie I’ve ever heard…I guess after so many fly by the seat of your pants rule changes, I’m sort of glad to be gone.

My hat goes off to Team Amp:

x Chandman x (our captain)
gotwald (our co-captain)
DomeJohnny
gottimafia
OLDWIKI TIK
Painkiller4500

and two of our original members who had to quit for personal reasons:
andybhoy92
x monkfish69 x

Thanks guys, you’ve all been great and I’m glad to have made new friendships and I look forward to seeing you all on XBox Live!

For the record, I scored 13,130 points during the 6 weeks of competition (although week 5 was a non-elimination week and we all took it easy). I’m very happy with that number as my original goal was to average 2000 points per week.