Tennis Weekend

I spent last weekend in Cincinnati with my friend Tomato, shopping and watching some great tennis at the Western and Southern Financial Group Masters tournament.


The tournament is part of the US Open Series, which is a series of summer hardcourt tournaments that leads up to the US Open. It's also an ATP 1000 event, just a step below the grand slams in terms of ranking points, which means all the top players in the world attend.

We got to see Novak Djokovic


and Rafael Nadal


and my favorite doubles team, Bob and Mike Bryan.


We also saw John Isner (an up-and-coming US player) in the lobby of our hotel, which was pretty cool. It was a lot of fun. Tomato and I have been going for 3 years now, and we've got the good restaurants, shopping, parking, etc. all scoped out. We seem to keep missing Andy Roddick and Roger Federer, but maybe next year!

Quick Baby Sweater

I spent the past week cranking this out.


It's for my friend Sinkerbeam's new baby, due in about a week. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. The pattern uses mock cables, not traditional cable-needle cables, so it knit up pleasingly quickly.

This also clears up the disposition of the mystery afghan, since this is the baby I was also considering that project as a gift for.

Steeler Football Tonight!

Yes, the countdown clock says there's still 28 days until the season opener. That's correct. Tonight is the first preseason game, against Arizona.

I know it's just an exhibition game. I know most of the starters will only play a series or two at most. I know this is mostly about seeing what the rookies can do and trying out new offensive/defensive schemes. I know it doesn't really matter.

Don't care. Still excited! After all, I'm pretty sure both teams still want to win. Go Steelers!!

Potter Post

I've been lax in sharing my thoughts on Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which I saw almost two weeks ago. Loved it! I think my favorite bits were little throwaway things that had nothing to do with the plot...Harry & Ron fighting over the good copy of their Potions textbook, the return of Quidditch to the films, Fred & George's new shop in Diagon Alley, etc.

And now, of course, I can't wait until the final (two-part) film comes out. And it's going to be a long wait. Part I is tentatively scheduled for November 2010 and Part II in July 2011. In the meantime, I'll enjoy re-reading the books from the very beginning and wasting time with stuff like this excellent Harry Potter quiz from Parade magazine. It's pretty challenging - I got 29/50, which is characterized as "Not bad. You've definitely got a little magic up your sleeve!"