Author Archives: scottsoapbox

Calories Per Hour

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Since it’s been raining a lot the last two days, I’ve been using the old Elipse instead of the standard run or bike. But how much is that accomplishing? The built-in counter in the Elipse rolled over 1000 calories before I hit an hour… doubtful. If you want more weight loss tips, visit Cleve Scene.

So I set out to find an approximation on the web. Calorie calculators abound but some are hard to use and all of them have different numbers. For instance running a 10min/mile pace for 6 miles (1 hour) will burn 793, 684, 680, or 900 calories depending on whom you ask. (I used a 150lb male as a nice round number)

I personally liked this calorie calculator the best. It was simple to use and had some fun activites. Did you know you burn 90 calories an hour watching TV? That’s a full 9 more calories than sleeping! Vaccuming, ironing and general cleaning are a much better way to keep that girlish figure. So remember that the next time you’re eating bon bons and watching Oprah – your man is being messy to help you lose that weight. ;)

Blogger Scares Senator

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So a little know political blog called the Strata Sphere has caused Senator Harry Reid a great deal of trouble. Apparently the Strata posted some info on some shady land deals by the Senator. Then one of the site’s visitors (someone familar with Nevada’s court documentation of land titles) posted pages and pages of Reid’s deals. We’re not talking speculation here – actually court documentation of land transfers. A bit hard to refute.

Well then old Rush Limbaugh caught wind of it and brought it to national attention on his radio show. With that, the cat was officially out of the bag and Reid is now busy ammending his ethics disclosure to Congress regarding the land deal to "ensur[e] all facts come to light."

Reid decides to amend ethics reports

…The deal began in 1998 when Reid bought undeveloped residential property on Las Vegas’ booming outskirts for about $400,000. Reid bought one lot outright, and a second parcel jointly with Brown. One of the sellers was a developer who was benefiting from a government land swap that Reid supported. The seller never talked to Reid.

In 2001, Reid sold the land for the same price to a limited liability corporation created by Brown. The senator didn’t disclose the sale on his annual public ethics report or tell Congress he had any stake in Brown’s company. He continued to report to Congress that he personally owned the land.

After getting local officials to rezone the property for a shopping center, Brown’s company sold the land in 2004 to other developers and Reid took $1.1 million of the proceeds, nearly tripling the senator’s investment. Reid reported it to Congress as a personal land sale.

The complex dealings allowed Reid to transfer ownership, legal liability and some tax consequences to Brown’s company without public knowledge, but still collect the payoff three years later.

Hey, isn’t this the guy that’s always complaining about a "culture of corruption"? Seems like he would feel right at home in such a culture…
UPDATE: Now Reid has added to his disclosure update. Apparently he used campaign money for christmas gifts/tips.? The "oversight" is being corrected by paying back the campaign with his personal money.? I wonder what corrects will occur next week?

Cross Country Road Trip

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Finally made it home! Our last hotel’s wifi was down, so here’s the last of the trip… We woke to find our hotel surrounded by a parade for the Pino Bean Festival (you can’t make this stuff up).

When we finally made it back to the Volunteer State it was finally starting to feel like we were on the home stretch. In Memphis we didn’t have time to take in Graceland, but we did see the Pyramid & St. Jude’s

Cross Country Road Trip

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This morning I found my hotel’s continental breakfast lacking. No joke, they had cereal but no milk, sausage but no eggs, and muffins but no butter. Luckily there was a Denny’s next door – there seemed to be a lot of Denny’s in the West.

Speaking of the West, apparently it hasn’t been completely tamed. I snapped a pic of an actual dino attack right by the road!

Grand Canyon

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The Grand Canyon can be summed up in just two words: it’s BIG. Seriously. The Canyon is astonishingly large. I had seen it previously from a plane an it didn’t seem that cool. But in person, in real life, it’s sooo big that I fear that words or pictures will never capture it. Never adequately describe it. You must go see the canyon that is grand to truely appreciate it.

Nevertheless I have tried to capture a small bit of the spectacle in images below.


The following two panos have been created using about 20 pics each from a single point and the program Auto Stitch (its free and its awesome). The second pano looks a little weird because it wrapping so far around a single point that the perspective seems odd (since we normally can’t see 250 degrees of a landscape at once – at least without turning our head).


These last pics are from the spot I chose to stop and enjoy a stogey. Smoking a cigar and watching the Sun set over the Grand Canyon – it doesn’t get much better than this!