April 2012 Reading List

For the past couple of months I have been working on a book called Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen. A co-worker lent it to me and said he learned a lot about running from it. I wouldn't exactly call myself a runner, but I am into fitness and gave it a try. 

I thought the book was going to be a chronicling of the author and his spiritual journey as he lived with this ancient Mexican tribe that was known for running. Unfortunately the book more focused on the concept of long distance running and how different people were doing it. Overall it wasn't the book for me, but there as a rather poignant moment when one of the main characters called Caballo Blanco was found dead just a few weeks ago.

I am still slowly working on The Books of Skyrim and I have also just started reading the Philip K. Dick Reader, which is a collection of short stories from none other, than Philip K. Dick. So far that is a good read so far. 

March Donation: The Water Project

This month's donation goes to The Water Project. It is an organization online that helps to bring clean water to people living in rural Africa. 

Nearly one billion people have no access to clean, safe water. The dirty water they do have makes them sick. It robs children of hope. But it doesn't have to be that way.

We know that access to clean, safe water changes lives. We know that when a well is installed for a village, girls return to school.

Women begin small businesses. Men are no longer too sick to work. Fields are watered and food supply becomes more reliable. Health returns and children grow up to be productive members of their community. The cycle of poverty is broken. Lives change. Access to clean, safe water isn't an end, it's a means.

The money  you donate can go to a couple of different projects depending upon what you chose, but it mostly goes directly to building wells in Africa to allow people access to clean water. After the donation the website will provide you a link with information and the location of the well you are heloing to build. The well that my funds were donated to was Rwanda Well #3043.

If you would like to donate, get involved in other ways or just find out more information head on over to their main site at TheWaterProject.org or over to their "Get Involved Page"

Ride Log: 03-25-12


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Took a nice trip this past Sunday up along Route 25 and the Fox River. The route had a nice mix of scenic road, downtown areas and a bit in-between. I then swung over to Big Timber Road and then on to Route 20 to head back east. Both were nice drives as well, but Route 20 became stop and go once into DuPage County. 

March 2012 Video Gaming

Just finished up playing Mass Effect 3 last night. I have to say it was a pretty good game. A very fitting ending to sequel for the most part. You can read my Giantbomb review. It does have spoilers so if that is a concern for you don't read it. Not a lot to say to the game that my review doesn't cover. On the whole the game was pretty good. Minor technical issues became frustrating and the ending does have some serious problems with it. Overall it is a well put together game though. 

The other games I played this month were a smattering of things over on Onlive. Some of them were a smattering of indie titles that they had as part of a indie game awards promotion. The two that stood out the most for me were Zombie Atom Smasher and Capsized. There was also a Dreamcast pack that they released feature Space Channel 5, Sonic, Crazy Taxi and a few others. Amazingly they were all terrible. I couldn’t even get Space Channel 5 to work properly. 

I also gave Major League 2K10 a go for about 15 minutes. Since when did baseball games become such hardcore simulators. After striking out on nine pitches while up to bat and giving up a home run on my first pitch I decided this game was not for me. 

I did check out a game called A.R.E.S. Extinction Agenda though which appears to be a nice little Metroid-like. It is by no means a perfect game, but it has some good foundations going for it.

Ridelog: 03-11-12 - First Ride of 2012


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The weather in Chicago this weekend as fantastic. Mid-fifties on Saturday and mid-sixties this Sunday. I had to bring my motorcycle into M&M Motorsports yesterday to get some new tires installed. I purchased some Metzeler Roadtec Z6 tires and ran over to the mechanic at around noon yesterday. At first I wasn't expecting to get the bike back yesterday since he seemed booked. To my surprise though they called me a couple of hours later saying they got the tires on. I have to give some big props to them and Mark over there. He commented to me that since the weather was supposed to be nice today they wanted to get me back on the road. That was really great of them to do that. 

As for the ride itself today, it was great. Just a good farm road ride. It is unfortunate how boring most of the roads are in central Illinois since everything is on a grid.