Another Bowl, Another Loss

Purdue lost yet another bowl game today this time to the Arizona State Sun Devils, 27-23. Purdue took the lead with 1:14 to play but after playing well all game, the defense allowed the Sun Devils to march 80 yards in four plays for the TD. The drive only took 31 seconds. Purdue finishes the disappointing 2004 season with a record of 7-5.

Purdue Signee Pulls an Artest

Purdue University signee Nate Minnoy was taken to a local jail after an altercation with a fan during a game. With 1 minute 35 seconds remaining in the third quarter, Minnoy left the floor and climbed about five rows into the stands to confront a spectator who was allegedly heckling him. Minnoy was assessed a technical foul, his second of the game after an earlier technical for arguing an official's call, resulting in his ejection. After Brandon McKnight's blunder tonight against Baylor, (Brandon decided to foul a Baylor player after Purdue had just tied the time with under three seconds to go. Baylor went on to win the game by one point) I am glad to see that we will have good leaders on the team for years to come. Those Illini/Penn State fans better watch what they say when Minnoy is on the court.

Best. Movie. Ever.

I went to see The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou tonight and I have to tell you that it is the best movie I have ever seen. My only complaint was that it ended too soon. I wish it would've been longer. The Life Aquatic should easily win Picture of the Year. The dialogue is well written and the plot is engaging. Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, and Willem Dafoe kept me on the edge of my seat the whole time. I strongly urge everyone who reads this to go see The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou!

Vioxx is the new king of spam

According to AOL, online Vioxx prescription junk e-mails, ID theft scams, and stock pick information knocked porn ads down the list of top junk e-mails in 2004.

One reason for the decline of porn junk e-mail is due to filters offered by Internet service providers that can easily block lurid displays of pornography.

Vioxx has become a cash cow for shady lawyers ever since it has been linked to harmful side effects.

Law & Order Star Dies

NEW YORK (AP) -- "Law & Order" star Jerry Orbach has died of prostate cancer at 69, a representative of the show said Wednesday.

Orbach died Tuesday night in Manhattan after several weeks of treatment, Audrey Davis of the public relations agency Lippin Group said.

When his illness was diagnosed, he had begun production on NBC's upcoming spinoff "Law & Order: Trial By Jury," after 12 seasons playing Detective Lennie Briscoe in the original series. His return to the new show had been expected early next year.

Fantasy Update Week 16

X-15 did the unthinkable today, defeating the Ruminators in the Super Bowl by a score of 130.95 to 84.68. The whole team contributed to the stunning defeated of the highly-favored Ruminators. The Ruminators started Manning, Harrison, Reggie Wayne, Joe Horn, Edge, and LT but MVP-like performances from Culpepper (30.45), Reuben Droughns (24.05), and Dominic Davis (15.45) lead X-15 to victory. Both Droughns and Davis were mid-season acquisitions for X-15. The victory was especially satisfying because the Ruminators were the team that defeated X-15 in the semi-final game last year. That was the game when Joe Horn scored 4 TDs and whipped out a cell phone. The manager of the team is proud of the way they played without Priest Holmes, Terrell Owens, and Chris Brown. The league should take note that X-15 is planning to continue the winning streak next season with a healthy squad. X-15 is the first team to ever finish the season with a record of 16-0.

X-15 finished a disappointing post-season the in re-draft league by beating the Dawg Pound in the fifth place game. The fifth place finish is hard to take because the team ended the regular season in first place.

Jet Lag

jet lag also jet·lag (jtlg)
n.

A temporary disruption of bodily rhythms caused by high-speed travel across several time zones typically in a jet aircraft.

I don't think you cross too many time zones flying from Detroit to South Bend.

Fantasy Football Update Week 15

In the keeper league, X-15 defeated the Posse by a score of 84.31 to 64.40. With the win, X-15 advanced to the championship game, however, things do not look good. X-15 will be without Priest Holmes, Terrell Owens, and Chris Brown. To make matters worse, X-15 will be facing the high-powered Ruminators team. The Ruminators have Manning, Harrision, Reggie Wayne, Edge, Joe Horn, and LT. It will take huge performances from Culpepper, Moss, Walker, Pittman, and D Davis to win the championship. On paper, it appears that X-15 will finish the season 15-1. Hopefully the Chargers D can slow down the Colts offense.

Boilers beat Evansville

Carl Landry tipped in a missed shot by Brandon McKnight with 3.7 seconds to play to lift Purdue (3-5) to a 62-61 victory over Evansville on Saturday night at the Boilermaker Blockbuster.

Matt Clement joins the Red Sox

Boston and Clement agreed on a three-year contract, reportedly worth $25.5 million, that is contingent on Clement passing his physical, Clement's agent, Barry Alexrod, told MLB.com.

The dog deserved it

I know of at least one Jack Russell terrier that I would like to bite.

Linux contains fewer bugs

According to a four-year study conducted by five Stanford University computer science researchers, the Linux kernel programming code is better and more secure than the programming code of most proprietary software. The 2.6 Linux production kernel, shipped with software from Red Hat, Novell and other major Linux software vendors, contains 985 bugs in 5.7 million lines of code, well below the industry average for commercial enterprise software. Windows XP, by comparison, contains about 40 million lines of code, with new bugs found on a frequent basis. I can picture the Linux guru upstairs at work laughing to himself quietly and petting his stuffed penguin as he reads the results of this study.

Read the rest of the Wired article.

Fantasy Football Update Week 14

X-15 went 1-1 this week.

In the keeper league, X-15 survived a scare against the feisty Seven's Splash squad. The final score was 81.05 to 77.61. X-15 faces a red hot Posse this week in the semi-final round. Several players on the team are either injured or facing a demotion. Derrick Blaylock is likely to be replaced by Larry Johnson this week and Reuben Droughns fumbled twice and was replaced by Tatum Bell. Luckily, Bell ended up with a third degree separation of his shoulder and will most likely miss some time. Priest Holmes was placed on IR last week, ending his season and Chris Brown is still battling turf toe. Brown rushed for 91 yards and a touch against the Chiefs on Monday, but also fumbled twice. He did not come out of the locker room after the half.

In the re-draft league, the 1st place X-15 squad was spanked by the eighth seeded Huh What? squad by a score of 85.82 to 52.16. Poor managerial decisions (i.e. starting Plummer instead of Trent Green, starting Nate Burleson instead of Eddie Kennison) lead to the lopsided score. I can find some solace in the fact that even with Green and Kennison in my lineup I still would have lost by two points. The main downfall of the team was having only LT and the Pats D score over ten points. Plummer, Burleson, C-Mart, TO, and Gates all share the blame of this painful loss.

Deadliest Day of the Year Coming

According to an article on cnn.com, Christmas is the deadliest day of the year for Americans. More Americans die from heart attacks and other natural causes on Christmas, the day after and on New Year's Day than on any other days of the year, the researchers reported. They did not count deaths from suicide, murder, or accidents. I would assume that the risk of suicide would go up, depending on your family.

Boilers win second game of the season

Purdue defeated Colorado State today at Mackey Arena by a score of 69-68. David Teague lead the way with 23 points and 6 rebounds. Purdue lead most of the way but fell behind by one point with just 26 seconds left. Xavier Price was fouled while shooting with 11 seconds to go. Price nailed both free throws to give Purdue a 69-68 lead. Carl Landry then stole the ball at the other end of the court to seal the Purdue victory. Purdue is now 2-5.

Laptops are hazardous to nads

Read this CNN article if you care about Santa's little helpers.

Nomar and Walker coming back

The Cubs agreed to one-year deals with both Nomar and Todd Walker today. Normar's deal is worth $8 million and could rise to as much as $11 million. Walker gets $2.5 million for next year with an option for 2006. The Cubs said goodbye today to Moises Alou. He lead the Cubs in home runs and RBIs last year, but the Cubs do not think they will be able to unload Sosa and they cannot afford to have both of them around.

Fantasy Football Update Week 13

X-15 won in both leagues this week. My team became the first to win the regular season title in both leagues.

In the keeper league, X-15 finished the regular season with a record of 13-0 (also a first in the league). X-15 will face Seven's Splash in the first round of the playoffs. Splash is the eighth seed but is coming off a stunning upset over the South Park Cows.

In the re-draft league, X-15 finished the regular season with a 9-4 record. X-15 will face Huh What?, also the eighth seed. X-15's players face some tough matchups but should still advance to the semi-finals.

Titans win third straight

The IUSB Titans won their third straight game on Saturday afternoon, defeating Taylor University Fort Wayne 94-81. Five Titans scored in double figures. Leading the way for the Titans was Jeremy Herring who added another double-double to his resume; he scored 13 points and grabbed 10 rebounds. Larry Pridgen and Todd Dermody both added 12 points, Pridgen pulled down 6 rebounds and Dermody grabbed 11 rebounds giving the freshman a double-double. Will Bolden and Scott McNeil chipped in with 11 points each. Scott McNeil and Jeremy Herring were selected to the IU South Bend Titan All Classic Team. On Friday night the Titans defeated IU East 82-54. (Borrowed from the Titan Athletic Site). Click here to view the Men's Basketball Schedule.

Bears Beat Vikings

Chad Hutchinson lead the Bears (5-7) to a 24-14 victory today over the Minnesota Vikings. Hutchinson was 18-of-30 for 213 yards and 3 TDs. Jerry Azumah had 2 INTs and Urlacher had one.

Who's left?

Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz, whose name has been linked with every open job save one in President Bush's cabinet, said Saturday that he is not interested in replacing Tyrone Willingham at Notre Dame (AP). Bob Davie is still available.

Irish down to third option...

Lions coach Steve Mariucci said Saturday he was contacted by Notre Dame about its coaching vacancy but decided to stay with Detroit.

Irish don't get their man

Urban Meyer rejected the Fighting Irish and decided to coach the Florida Gators instead. Gary DiNardo was just let go by the Hoosiers, maybe if Notre Dame is lucky they can talk him into coaching the team.

Qui Tam

The False Claims Act (31 U.S.C. Sections 3729-33) allows a private individual or "whistleblower", with knowledge of past or present fraud on the federal government, to sue on behalf of the government to recover stiff civil penalties and triple damages.

The person bringing the suit is formally known as the "Relator."

If the suit is successful, it not only stops the dishonest conduct, but also deters similar conduct by others and may result in the Relator's receipt of a substantial share of the government's ultimate recovery as much as 30 percent of the total.

The False Claims Act, also called the "Lincoln Act," "Informer's Act," or the "Qui Tam statute," was enacted during the Civil War. Qui Tam is shorthand for the Latin phrase "qui tam pro domino rege quam pro seipse", meaning "he who sues for the king as for himself." The law was targeted at stopping dishonest suppliers to the Union military at a time when the war effort made it all but impossible for the government to investigate and prosecute the fraud itself. Today it serves a similar purpose because of the enormous size of the federal government and the variety or programs under which it expends taxpayer funds.

More than 4,000 Qui Tam suits have been filed since 1986, when the statute was strengthened to make it easier and more rewarding for private citizens to sue. The government has recovered over $6 billion as a result of the lawsuits, of which over $960 million has been paid to Relators/whistleblowers.


http://www.quitamonline.com/whatis.html