Category: Site Info

It’s (Almost) Official

There’s still one more game in the tournament pick ’em, but Brad is going to win the t-shirt. Below are the final scores. These shouldn’t change, as while a few people picked UCLA to make the final four and/or final game (which certainly shot their scores up), nobody picked them to win it all:

1) homersolo BHSSN: 81 points

2) Josh Ausborne’s Picks: 71 points

2) Lazykosse: 71 points

4) severe anxiety attack: 70 points

5) Hoffmann: 68 points

6) Hoosier Daddy: 65 points

7) Chris’ For Utterly Boring: 57 points

7) Jo-Anne: 57 points

9) Jen’s Picks: 56 points

10) Let It Rain: 53 points

11) TTU Golden Eagles: 52 points

12) Crunk Time: 51 points

12) Jake’s No Strategy Picks: 51 points

14) monkeyinabox.net: 49 points

15) incontrovertible evidence: 46 points

16) LukaPuka: 44 points

17) Ty’s Tops: 37 points

18) Shannon: 25 points

All in all, it looks like I got pretty well creamed, despite leading after the first day.

So Brad, go pick your shirt, and e-mail me with your desired size, design, etc… and I’ll put you in touch with the store’s manager so you can make your claim.

Thanks again for everybody joining in and thanks to the Ruthless Bastard for putting up prizes for the competition, and let’s do it again next year (and maybe if I plan ahead a bit more I can get a few more prizes on top of the t-shirt).

April 2, 2006

You Know What’s Sad?

Over the years, this site has had 8683 published comments. The thing that’s sad? The automatically incremented comment ID number in the database for this site is 22887. Which means I’ve had 14,204 spam, duplicate, or otherwise deleted comments (and I generally pretty much let anything get published, unless it’s spam or a duplicate). That means for every 1.6 spam comments, I get a regular comment.

Luckily, MovableType 3.2’s spam blocking settings sends the bulk majority of the comments either to the junk folder or sets them to unpublished status, so they’re not appearing on my site and they’re not sapping server resources on rebuilds, but it’s still annoying (and I can’t install mod_sec or other things like that, as they’ve caused some issues in the past and have slowed things down too much).

Update on 4/9: 8780 comments published, 26,630 total, so 17,850 spam (big attack last night — all dumped into the junk folder, as they were all that Mike Furir spam and I had that stuff blocked a long time ago during the first wave of attacks.

March 30, 2006

Well That Sucked

If you’re wondering where I’ve been the last several days, I’ve been sick as a dog. Between my lingering cold that never went a way, and a stomach bug that was kicking my butt yesterday, it’s been a crummy week. I basically was in bed all day while my chances of finishing well in the tournament pick ’em went down the toilet (none of my final four teams made it). Just the same, I’m feeling better, and trying to catch up on the boatload of work I’ve missed the last few days.

As for the tournament pick ’em, at least according to the comments on this entry, it comes down to LSU vs. UCLA next weekend for the final point total (as a lot of people picked one of those two teams to make the final four). It doesn’t look like that as of right now, Yahoo has filled out some of the brackets quite yet, but here are the point totals as of this morning:

1 Josh Ausborne’s Picks: 71

2 severe anxiety attack: 70

3 Hoffmann: 68

4 homersolo BHSSN: 65

4 Hoosier Daddy: 65

6 Chris’ For Utterly Boring: 57

7 Jen’s Picks: 56

8 Lazykosse: 55

9 Let It Rain: 53

10 TTU Golden Eagles: 52

11 Crunk Time: 51

11 Jake’s No Strategy Picks: 51

13 monkeyinabox.net: 49

14 incontrovertible evidence: 46

15 LukaPuka: 44

16 Jo-Anne: 41

17 Ty’s Tops: 37

18 Shannon: 25

Those of you at the top, start shopping for your shirt.

March 27, 2006

What A Difference 48 Hours Makes

Two days ago, I was in first place in our pick ’em. Now at the end of round two, I’m tied for seventh, seven points behind the leader (and Josh, you and I are tied). Here’s how things stand right now and point totals of all 18 folks:

severe anxiety attack: 46

Chris’ For Utterly Boring: 45

homersolo BHSSNL: 41

Hoosier Daddy: 41

LukaPuka: 40

Hoffmann: 40

Crunk Time: 39

Jake’s No Strategy Picks: 39

Josh Ausborne’s Picks: 39

incontrovertible evidence: 38

Let It Rain: 37

monkeyinabox.net: 37

TTU Golden Eagles: 36

Lazykosse: 35

Jen’s Picks: 32

Jo-Anne: 29

Ty’s Tops: 25

Shannon: 21

So I’m still within shooting distance, though I did lose some folks today.

As for me, not much blogging tomorrow, as I have one more band concert (today’s was great!) plus a full day of work tomorrow since I took today off because of the afternoon concert. That, and I’m nursing a cold, so I’m trying to just do the bare minimum so I can actually play tomorrow.

March 19, 2006

Round One Is Over

And as it stands right now, after the first full round of the tournament (round two starts tomorrow), I’m have a small lead in our tournament pick ’em (some of my picks barely won their games today, so I was VERY lucky). As of right now, and things could get messy tomrrow, I have 25 points, but Chris and Scott are just two points behind at 23, and there are 3 others at 22 and then seven more at 21. More points are given for each correct pick in later rounds, so things will start to separate a bit starting tomorrow.

If you’re a member of the group, you can keep an eye on the stats on the group’s page.

March 17, 2006

Was Anybody At AdFed’s AdBite Today?

According to a comment, UtterlyBoring.com was mentioned at an AdBite luncheon today. Since I don’t get out of the office much, let alone be able to make it to Bend during my lunch hour for a fancy lunch, can anybody other than Jen, who I’m convinced is stalking me (joking, Jen), confirm this?

If you are coming here because of that mention, welcome! Feel free to comment here.

March 16, 2006

24 Hours Left To Make Your Picks

If you haven’t made your NCAA tournament picks where you can compete for a fabulous prize, you have approximately 24 hours to do so (sign ups close at 9:10 PST on Thursday). As it stands right now, we have 12 people competing for the T-Shirt, and would love to have you on that list. Sign up today before the games start tomorrow.

March 15, 2006

Update On NCAA Tournament Pick ’em: Now With Prizes!

Yesterday I mentioned that I was starting a Yahoo! tournament pick ’em for the readers of this site. So far, it’s only Shannon and I who have signed up and joined the group, but here’s something to entice you: Winner of the tournament pick ’em I mentioned before will get a free t-shirt from Bend’s Best T-Shirt Shop — you pick the design and size. The problem is that it won’t be any fun if it’s just Shannon and I, as Shannon’s married to the guy who runs the site.

So follow the directions here to sign up, and only folks who join that group will be able to compete for the shirt — so if you don’t sign up, you can’t win.

Disclaimers: Some restrictions may apply, this is a totally informal contest so if something blows up, doesn’t work, totally breaks, or screws you in any way, shape, or form, you cannot and will not hold anybody responsible — including this site, Bend Tees, or anything else on the web — other than yourself. Do not taunt happy fun ball. Not for off road use.

March 14, 2006

How Much Is Your Blog Worth?

I remember seeing this making the rounds a long time ago, but was reminded that I’d never posted an entry about it until somebody made a comment about it. But as of this writing, this blog is worth $63,228.48 How much is yours worth?

March 13, 2006

Join The UtterlyBoring.com NCAA Tournament Pick ’em

Last year, I wasn’t really on the ball and didn’t get my picks in very early, but this year, I’m all over it. Go over and make your NCAA March Madness predictions over at Yahoo Sports. Once you’ve sign up and made your picks, feel free to join my private group using the following information:

Group ID: 68993

Password: jake

My picks probably don’t make any sense, but I’m not an expert at this.

There are no prizes for beating all the utterlyboring.com folks (unless somebody wants to foot the bill for a cheesy prize), but there will be bragging rights, which is as good as anything, right?

Update: There are now prizes! Sign up today!

March 13, 2006