The odds of me winning an NCAA pool are poor. And yet they’re so much lower yet when my team is THE OVERALL #1 SEED and therefore everyone and their mother’s brother’s monkey will be picking them. But really, this is the sort of problem we should all have. Anyway, join our pool, fill out a bracket. But please, be the least bit contrarian and leave the Jayhawks to me ok*?

For sake of historical amusement, let’s remember that the unlikeliest possible person won our pool last year.

*If you don’t believe me, believe Wilbon.

As for those who got in, the fun is going to be in figuring out which high seeds are going out of the tournament first, because they’re not all going to make a run, not this year. Northern Iowa, which won 28 games, will be a threat to Kansas in the second round. Maryland, with seniors Greivis Vasquez and Eric Hayes, would be a serious threat to Kansas . . . if the Terrapins can get past Houston and Michigan State, which would be a serious threat to Kansas. Georgetown would be a serious threat to Kansas, and certainly Ohio State would be, seeing as Evan Turner of the Buckeyes is the most versatile, most highly skilled player in college basketball this season. I can’t see Kansas, which I think is the best team in the field, going through all four of those teams in the Midwest Region. This, without question, is the Group of Death.

Not a good week for training. It’s been (understatement) raining, and I’ve been unpleasantly sick. So instead, I made cookies with a recipe I stole from Jenny at Snackreligious.

Nutella Cranberry Crisps (hazelnut) — I don’t do a lot of recipe development, but I did create these cookies based on a simpler chocolate cookie recipe. I wanted something with Nutella and something using dried cranberries. After a little internet searching, I decided to combine the two, base it all on a recipe that called for melted chocolate (but substitute Nutella) and see how things tasted. I made a couple of test cookies before I stirred in the entire amount of dried cranberries, and found that I was willing to take the plunge. (adapted from this recipe)

10 oz. Nutella brand chocolate hazelnut spread
6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped, or chocolate chips?
1 cup all purpose flour
?3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
?1 teaspoon baking powder
?1/2 teaspoon salt
?4 oz unsalted butter, room temperature
?3/4 cup granulated sugar?
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
?2 large eggs?
1 teaspoon vanilla?
1/2 cup dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Whisk together the flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt.

In another bowl, cream the butter and sugars. Beat in eggs, then vanilla. Beat in the Nutella. By hand or with lowest speed of a mixer, stir in the flour mixture. Add cranberries and chopped chocolate or chocolate chips. Stir to combine.

Scoop the dough up by teaspoons and space mounds of dough 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake one sheet at a time on center rack for 10-12 minutes or until edges are dry. Tops should crack and cookies should spread out quite a bit Let cool on cookie sheets for about 1-2 minutes, then transfer to wire racks to cool.

Enough stalling, on to the bad news.

I’m sick and it sucks.

Given my predilection for complaining, a secondary suck is that it’s overly easy to exhaust the available sympathetic ear. My friends transition from the nominal sorries! to a more accusatory you still aren’t coming out?! Um, no, dying here. Commiserate you ingrate bitches.

So, to recap why you, harsh cruel internet, should pity me, actual flesh and blood and virus-ridden person.

1) Am sick, quite possibly unto death.
2) Car’s still broke, got no ride.
3) Camera’s still broke, POTDs have been beyond terrible for weeks now.
4) Yarrr it’s too icky cold outside to run.
5) Only sucky netflix vids are here right now.

The only thing that could possibly make this better is KU vs K-State in the Big 12 championship tonight.

I’m rather enjoying a little controversy that’s brewing within my running circle as to whether our real Ragnar team name is Sole Survivors or Funkstrong. I’m hoping the latter wins. I had originally registered us as Funkstrong before we settled on the consensus alternative but apparently the waivers going out are still saying the old name.

Either way, we’ve got a website now. Eighty percent of success is showing up, and the other twenty is having a dope website*.

*not that our POS blog thing is dope, but it’s better than nothing.

I’m in New York for the weekend, ostensibly to see Péter Esterházy speak tomorrow. The snow here isn’t nearly as bad as the news made it out to be – it’s been rather nice weather actually. I went to see Billy Elliot today, which made me notice we’ve covered this ground before

Mileage this week was not impressive. None of the last few weeks has been actually, and I may need to reassess the feasibility of the 1000 mile goal. Extrapolating my current three week average forward for the next ten months leaves me several hundred miles short of the goal. Changes need to be made, somewhere.

(Happy almost birthday Z-san…)

The Italians deemed gnocchi night to be an abject failure, and given their overall more refined sense of taste, it’s hard for me to disagree (but I will). The making of the gnocchi, from mashing the potatoes into dough, to spinning out ropes to cut into little cubes to flicking them off a fork to give them a fancy little pattern, all great fun. So whether or not they turned out to be too large, too gooey and potato-y is a side issue of less importance than the overall process.

Anyway, next time we’ll do better, whatever it was that was done wrong. And next time I’ll have a real camara, and we’ll deconstruct.

After a fine day out and about yesterday I arrived home safe and sound, only to have my SLR fly out of my camera bag and bang along down the hill by my house a good distance. My prime lens took one for the team, breaking clean in half. The camera body suffered some damage as well – the contacts that communicate with the lens are not connecting properly anymore. Poor camera barely made it past it’s first birthday (and it’s not like there wasn’t foreshadowing).

Anyway, this is not good stuff. Bad fiscally, worse for me mentally. It’s made my life feel even more disjointed and aimless than usual.

Fortunately, some of quasify’s (semi-anonymous?) benefactors recently gave me a somewhat uncomfortably large small business grant towards resolution #4, wide angle lens acquisition. I have been debating between two options (the Sigma 10-20 or the Canon 10-22), both of which will require a functioning body to be useful.

So here’s my plan, barring a better suggestion. I’m shipping this guy back to Canon for a repair quote. If that comes back prohibitively high (say, more than $200) I’m going to bite the bullet and get one of the new T2i bodies, three generations up from my XSi. And once that spending seal is broke, I’ll get a replacement 50mm and whichever of the wides looks better after checking them out in person.

The lesson learned here is to securely clip the camera bag shut. And be more careful. And buy the extended warranty. And have exceptionally kind & generous friends.

Just FYI, we still have a single solitary open slot on our 12 person Ragnar roster. Email or comment below if you’re interested. The race itself is May 21st-22nd, and the fee is $155 (which will cover our entry fee and van rental).

So I’ve got this new nephew. This is the first male born into our family in quite some time (and first new kid in almost three years). Historically my extended family has trended towards an abundance of girls (I have only nieces, sisters & blood aunts, and very few male first or second cousins). So this little guy is more than welcome to help reset the ratio. As he’s only a small number of hours old, he’s a bit of a blank slate right now, perfectly inable to refuse our various projections on what kind of future he’ll end up having. In reality we really have no friggin clue about what kind of kid he is or will want to grow up to be. Knowing his parents though, I’m guessing he’ll end up making upright choices more often than not, be more capable then me, ably skilled in the practical and yet well aware of the range of big possibilities an aware life offers. Is it possible that I can contribute some small random influence into his life that might lead him in interesting directions? I hope so. The electric guitar awaits.

Anyways, there is he, Eben Samuel. Mad props on making it safely thusfar little dude.