Married In Ohio

Here is our sixth photograph for Half-Nekkid Thursday. We went shopping for some fall clothes on Monday and thought that we would take a picture of us in our new jeans. This picture is definitely PG-13. We took some other pictures during or photo session but they didn’t quite fit the theme (new fall clothes).

We’ve decided to start a new Tuesday tradition. Much like the Bored housewife has Braless Tuesday. Every Tuesday night (or Wednesday morning if we don’t get to it) we’re going to post two outtakes from our HNT photo session. Her is our first edition.

This photograph was taken while we were “thinking” about what to do for our HNT photo.

This photograph was taken while we were resting our brains after “thinking” for a long time.

Note: I’m still tweaking the modifications I made to the word verification plugin so I haven’t had time to synopsize our HNT “thought process”.

I modified the word verification plugin that I installed yesterday so that only first time commenters are presented with the verification code. This is not as secure as having it appear every time but it should keep the bots at bay for now. The problem is once you implement a convenience for humans the bots get smarter and circumvent the requirement too. Hopefully, whatever bot has been spamming us won’t get updated for a while. Especially since it would have to get updated just for me and I’m not telling what I changed.

The scary part about this whole word verification thing is that I could write a program that can read the image. Blogger images with the twisted letters are harder but there are programs that can read those too. And since they’re a computer programs, they can quickly try again if they happen to get it wrong. I don’t know what the ultimate solution is but entering codes from graphic images isn’t it.

Please let me know if you have any problems with word verification. If, for some reason you can’t post, my e-mail address is to the right.

And, if you’re a spammer who happens to be reading this, go eat some poo.

You probably have noticed that I have added word verification to the comment screen. I don’t usually add third-party plugins without modification but the spam in the moderation queue was flooding my inbox. When I get home from work today, I will customize the plugin so that it only asks for word verification from new commenters. If you are a frequent visitor/commenter, the word verification feature will be going away for you. I would have done it last night but Tuesday is HNT photo session day which also makes it HNT sex day. I’ll post about our photo session and the fun we had afterwards this evening too.

Have a great hump day.

I am drowning in comment spam. The comments go directly to the moderation queue so nobody else ever sees them but it must be reviewed and purged regularly. So if you are a new poster, it may take a bit longer than usual for your comments to appear. Please be patient. I am looking for a better way to separate the wheat from the chaff.

The Girl wore out her soccer shoes and needs another pair. One look at them and you can tell that she is a player. They are only worn in the places where you are supposed to make contact with the ball. (No toe kicks for her.)

Her team had twelve players on Sunday and the Girl played an outstanding game. In fact, the best player for the other team came up to her afterwards and told her “you played an awesome game”. She is really good. Her team has yet to play against anyone who has her combination of skill and athletic ability. Other parents come up to be on the sidelines during the game and ask where she is going to high school. They are usually either disappointed or happy when I tell them that she is going to attend the local parochial high school.

She knows that she is good. That is one of the things that I struggle with. I want for her to be confident in her abilities but I don’t want for her to get a big head. I’m not sure what I should tell the Girl about her talent as a soccer player. How much should I compliment her? Should I tell her that other parents with kids playing varsity think she is good enough to play at that level now? I’m curious what others out there have said to their athletically gifted children. And what is a good balance between confidence and arrogance.

Accessing the web without virus protection is like unprotected sex with a complete stranger. You might be OK but then again, you might catch something very nasty. So all of the computer in the house have a copy of Norton AntiVirus installed. It’s not the best; it’s not the worst. It’s just what we use. Unfortunately, the subscription for virus signatures is about to run out. For about the past month or so, it’s been acting like an unregistered shareware application, prompting me to update my subscription. If it wasn’t so expensive to buy another year of virus signatures online ($24.95), I would have done that instead of purchasing the most recent version of the product in the store ($9.99 after rebates).

On the way home from The Girls soccer game, I stopped by my local big box consumer electronics store and picked up a copy of Norton AntiVirus 2005. It’ a big pain to perform a complete uninstall. I had to reboot five times. I know that technically I don’t have to completely uninstall the old version before installing the new one but as many who use of Norton AntiVirus will tell you, it’s a pay me now/pay me later sort of a thing. And I had to reboot three more times during the install. It’s all done now; but I would have rather watched some NFL football versus spending what little unscheduled time I had on a Sunday doing software upgrades.

In the “Ask MCB/CG Day - 3″ post, I said that I was always in the stands at high school football games on Friday and didn’t have much time for myself. To be clear, California Girl and I really enjoy the Friday nights that we spend with the kids. It’s become somewhat of a Friday tradition to all pile into the car and drive down to the stadium. I don’t care if the team wins or loses as long as they play hard and treat their opponents with respect. I love the Ohio State Buckeyes and the atmosphere at Ohio Stadium. But high school football games are neat too. They’re part athletic contest and part social event. And it’s really neat to see the class of 2010 who aren’t even I high school yet dressed up in school colors.

We almost never do anything as a threesome. We do most things as a foursome. Usually, if three of us are doing something, the other person will come too just because the rest of family is doing it. I almost always get four tickets to everything. It might be something big like a site package to the preliminary rounds of the Women’s World Cup which was held in Columbus back in 2003 or something small like a high school football or basketball game. I am very proud that our family is so close. I am sure that someday, the kids will start doing their own thing but, until then, I am going to enjoy the family time that we have.

Here is our fifth photograph for Half-Nekkid Thursday. We took this picture as part of our leisurely Tuesday night. Taking pictures for HNT is a great way to start a leisurely weekday evening. If you look closely, you can see part of my left hand. Since my hand is obviously busy, doing things you can’t see I’m not sure what the “rating” would be for the photograph. What do you think? PG-13? R? NC-17?

I got this quiz from can you keep a secret. The questions answered are hers. Feel free to play if you want. You can find all of the rules at her site.

If you were stuck on an island one book to read, which book would you choose? The Bible. I’m sure that I would need some inspiration. What better place to find it than the in The Bible.

How did your meet your spouse? In college, she and I were both interested in the same video game. She was just learning and I was the best on the planet. (Or at least on campus.) She started watching me to figure out how to play and the rest is history.

How many times in the last year have you cried? Zero. And I hope to keep it that way. Very little can make me cry and I want to avoid the things that do. I only cry when I’m sad and I want to avoid those days as much as possible. Unfortunately, I’m old enough to have reached the point where I go to more funerals than weddings.

What is the single greatest thing you have ever had to give up? My relationship with my father. He made me choose between him and California Girl. (She won.) It was his choice, not mine, to put me in the situation but I still miss doing things together.

Is there a moment in your life that you would like to re-live? Yes. When my dad threw my older brother out of the house and he had to get by on his on devices. That was years ago and he has never fully recovered from the bad choices he made as an outgrowth of unexpectedly being on his own. It seemed like a bad idea to me at the time but I just thought that I didn’t have all of the facts.