Two new things to the site:  1) I have received my final schedule for April and just posted the results accordingly.  (http://www.elijahnicolas.com/wp/img/08Apr.jpg) and 2) Even though I have been updating my mobile blog, I never posted a direct link to it when I migrated from Blogger to WordPress.  Why?  I left it out because I was trying to just integrate the uploading of pictures here on the main page and gave up.  So, instead of having one page, I’m forced to have two again, one with pictures from my Treo 755p which can get updated readily and one that has the rest of the story. 

I’m sitting at Barnes and Nobles in Mira Mesa studying on some Federal Aviation Regulations and reading the Aeronautical Information Manual like a good pilot should do everyone now and then when I ran into a high school friend whom I haven’t seen since.  Who would have thought?  =)  But she gave me a book entitled: The Treasure Principle by Randy Alcorn.  Summarizing it in one sentence, it describes the secret of joyful giving.  (that’s what the cover says anyways)  I just started reading it and will tell you how it goes in the next few logs. 

Onto tonight event:  A friend of mine and his girlfriend is coming to meet up with me, so in order to expand my table of 2, I asked a gentleman if I may borrow his chair and he straight-up said no.  At first I thought that he was kidding but then he went ahead and said “F88K off!”  I was a little dumbfounded and shocked by his response but then a kinder younger man immediately offered his.  He too was shocked as I found out later when he approached me and asked if what he heard was the same thing.  He’s still sitting just one table to my left diagonal with a face as red as a tomato and an empty chair across from him.  He also denied another female asking if they can use the empty chair, but he left out the obscenity.  I hope that the guy has a good rest of night and that his troubles don’t get him into any situation.  I’m just shocked at the response you know?  He’s also reading a hooters magazine and some other guys magazines perusing through the pictures.  

Here he is!  It’s the guy in the blue jacket.  Do you know him?

Surfing around the web today, I came across a couple of interesting sites. 

Health: Avoid These 9 Worst Food in America by Lifehacker

It’s always just interesting to read about the various foods that are out on the market.  One of my friends recommended that I check out the Men’s Health’s website that is dedicated to what to eat and what not to eat conveniently called, “Eat This, Not That!“  It has quite a few interesting comparisons.  One that I was a little shocked by was the listing of 15 Secret Restaurant Swaps where they compared the McDonald’s Big Mac to the Burger King Whopped with Cheese.  Guess what?  You’re better off eating at McDonald’s.  (I’m not sure if that’s with or without the secret sauce but if you are trying to lose some weight, I’m sure that you are better off without it.)  Oh yeah, Chick-fil-A was the only A+ on their list of fast food chains being that they don’t have any one sandwich cross the 500 calorie mark.  That’s of course if you don’t add on the awesome tasting special honey BBQ sauce on top of your Chargrilled Chicken Club with bacon included…my personal favorite!

Another neat thing that I found after getting annoyed by not being able to read the Wall Street Articles in their entirety was a Firefox add-on that enables you to spoof a website such as digg.com.  Directions and more details can be found at the link provided below.  Now, I’m able to peruse the WSJ without having to pay!!!   I just cut and pasted the directions here.  You could just also skip it and go directly the the link below for the full article. 

Remember that the Journal is set up to disarm its pay gate if it thinks you’re coming from Google News or Digg. In order to get free access, then, you’ve got to convince the Journal that you’ve clicked on a link on one of those sites. How to do that?

The technical name for this is “referer spoofing” (with the misspelling). Spoofing is an easy thing to pull off in Firefox — all you’ve got to do is download this add-on, refspoof.

Now follow these steps:

• Go to WSJ.com.
• In the refspoof toolbar’s “spoof:” field, type “digg.com.”
• Also in the refspoof toolbar, click the R icon, and select “static referrer.”
• That’s it. Click around the site; the WSJ thinks each click is coming from Digg. The WSJ is now yours for free!

Here’s the link that I promised if you want to read the whole article. 

The Wall Street Journal’s Web site is already (secretly) free by Machinist at Salon.com

Leave a comment below on what are some of your interesting sites for the day!

Well, I’m sitting here sore as heck still, barely able to walk after once again forgoing any form of training prior to running this past weekend’s 10K around Fiesta Island in San Diego.  It was even better this time around as I got to run it with my girlfriend and of course, she did a better job in preparing and it paid off…she beat me by 1.5 minutes and also beat my previous 10K first try by 8 seconds!!!

Here is a picture of Adelle and I before the race at 7:00AM just hanging out with our times.  I really suck but of course I just really haven’t felt like running more than I need to especially after I touchdown in some random city and am forced to run on a treadmill.

 Back up here again com mi amiga Adelle with the agenda of touring the Columbia University School of Nursing.   We opted to take the M60 Bus Line for La Guardia which was only $2 followed by the subway to 42nd and Times.  We only spent $8.00 total on transportation from the airport compared to $55 the last time we came here.  It’s just awesome once you get some confidence to roll around the public bus system. 

With a modestly priced hotel room, for NYC standards won on Priceline.com and tactics from BiddingForTravel.com, we had a great one night stay that the Millennium Broadway Hotel.   It was prime location for the Time Square night life being located on 145 West 44th Street.   We even got upgraded to a superior room on the 50th floor which was pretty nice.  It had a flat screen and everything but of course, we only were there to sleep.  Just like all the other hotels that I’ve been staying at really without the luxury tag; same bed, shower, bathroom kits but of course I had Adelle with me. 

We ventured around the city quite a bit first heading off to the reservation that I had made at the Rock Center Cafe coupled with the Skate-A-Date Promotion.  Basically for $75, a couple is entitled to two skate rentals and a two course meal.  We even met a nice filipina who waited on us and offered her assistance to Adelle in trying to find a place.  We had a good time ice skating as it was only my second time on ice and just enjoyed the ambiance.  I fell once being really aggressive and trying to skate as fast as I can.  It was a bad fall either, but I fell.  Good times here in NYC when the weather is cooperating.  Here are some pix from the night.  

Oh yeah, the meal at the Rock Center Cafe on a scale of 1-10 are as follows:  Appetizer - 6 [Humus and Pita with Lamb was just too salty and didn't taste that great really.  It wasn't like you could keep eating it.  Not recommend / I had the soup and it was pretty good, but not anything that I don't think I couldn't make.  That's saying a lot]  Main Course - 8 [Here is where the restaurant revitalized itself.  The Sirloin that Adelle had was great along with some steak fries.  I had a Salmon and that was just alright really.]  Bottled Water - 10 [AWESOME]  The service was great though which made up for a lot.  But, the fact that the whole package including skating which was a retailed at $18.00 per person –>  $36 for the both of us, the whole “experience” was just worth while. 

Now back to Atlanta this evening for some exciting times!

I really got to enjoy driving the machine all over Atlanta with one of my good friends from San Diego, Greg.  I finished a trip on Wednesday and I picked him at the airport once I landed from finishing up a four day.  At first, we were planning to head out to either Cancun, Belize, or somewhere random, but after deciding that it would be much more economical to just hang out in Atlanta, we did just that. 

The following morning, we woke up rather late, but planned to just roam around Atlanta.  Had some breakfast, hung out till lunch and just discussed our alternative Atlanta vacation.  Nothing really too much besides go out and hit the local bars, eat at different Atlanta restaurants, hit up the sights and that’s about it.  We ate at Five Guys which proved to have some great tasting hamburgers and fries seasoned with Cajun spices.  Definitely a little more on the expensive side of things but if you consider that their patties are almost a 1/4 pound each and that the regular hamburger has two of these, its not that bad.  We roamed around a little more until it was time to watch the Atlanta Thrashers play against the New York Islanders (NHL). The game was pretty exciting as both teams scored a lot of points (8 total + one in overtime) and then hit up Buckhead.  To make that long story even shorter, we went to one bar where I was going to meet up with a friend but he wasn’t there, so after a while we went to Moondogs where we met some random Filipinos who ended up having ties to some of our friends from high school!  Small world, but it was cool to see some friends with connections as it always proves that it really is a small world.  That was Thursday. 

Friday included us waking up late again, hitting up Shane’s Ribshack and then hiking up Stone Mountain.  That was the highlight there really as we just burnt the time at Barnes and Nobles and driving around even more.  Saturday was a chill day trying to eat at the The Flying Biscuit Cafe.  We had to go to 2 of them finally reaching the second and still having to wait about 20 minutes in line.  Still good times though. 

We played a little bit of some Pixel Junk Monsters on PS3 and called it night.  Oh yeah, I also forgot to mention that I leveled up a female Blood Elf Paladin to level 3 almost reaching to 4 on World of Warcraft and that’s when I threw in the towel. 

Now I’m on a 4 day trip just wondering what the heck I’m going to do with my car and everything else in the next few days.  Oh the joys. 

i was driving around Atlanta today on my way to downtown when I felt the need to turn on the air conditioner for the first time in 2 months.  Everything was going all good (so I thought) until my “CHECK” light came on, I looked up and low and behold, it said “COOLANT.” 

I watched the temperature gauge start to increase a little bit so I instantly shut down the A/C, stopped the fan, turned off the radio and just tried to do what I could.  I was driving on backroads for a little bit but I reached my destination and hung out for an hour or two.  When I got out of the car though, my car was leaking coolant explosively.  It was just all over the parking spot. 

To make a long story short, I then again headed off to work, but stopped as a gas station along the way, bought some 50/50 mix (2 bottles just in case), poured one of the bottles in the reservoir, took off and a little while later, my temp gauge spiked to red, then passed red. 

I couldn’t wait any longer, and just continued to drive to work so that I wouldn’t be late.  By the time I got to the parking lot, I had been running with the temp needle past the red (I mean like at the 3:00 position) an the car started making funny noises like clicking by the time I reached the employee lot.  Now, its just sitting there as I’m away for 4 days, and I plan on having it towed somewhere –> maybe the stealership because I don’t know of any good mechs in the ATL area.  (Any help there anyone?) 

So, what damage could I have done driving for 20 miles with the temp gauge pinged at 3:00 and what else should I look for?  These pictures and the engine itself I could not really take a close look because of the time constraint, but to tell you the truth, I’m afraid.  It seems like it’s going to cost a pretty penny.