BadAndyoftheShire's Xanga

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 21:27:43 GMT

Baby Lottery v. 1.9

The Kim and I have created a bit of a game for our family and friends to pass the time between now and when "shireling #2" arrives (due date is April 11th). You get to guess the birth stats and earn points for each category guessed closest to Baby Shire's actual birth stats. The person with the highest cumulative points will win a trans-regional gift card basket! There will be gift cards from national department stores, restaurants, online shopping, etc... If anyone wishes to donate gift cards to sweeten the pot, that is perfectly acceptable. Just let us know. This game also has a bonus round where you get to guess what our child's name will be. Listed below are the categories and their assigned point value. After that, I explain the tie breaker rules. Good luck!

Birth date (5 points):
Exact time of birth e.g. 5:43pm (12 points):
Gender (3 points):
Weight in lbs. & oz. (10 points):
Length in inches (7 points):

BONUS ROUND
You get three guesses for each gender. Even if you are predicting the baby's gender to be male, you can still guess female names too. THREE names per gender. For each guess that matches our child's first or middle names, you will receive 10 points! Choose wisely. This could be the deciding factor in your victory. It certainly was a factor last time around.

[EDIT: Can't figure why this part is so confusing (it was last time too), so I'll give an example of what I mean regarding "3 names per gender"....

Male Names: Bubba, Bart, Brody
Female Names: Betty, Eunice, Narlita

Hope that helps. :]

In the event of a tie within a category, the points for that category will be awarded to all parties who guessed alike. Thus, if 90 of you guess the gender correctly, then you all get those five points added to your score. If a tie occurs with the total cumulative points, the champion will be determined by the winner of the following categories in numerical order.

1)Weight
2)Birth date
3)Length

In the event a tie still occurs, a coin toss officiated by Marie Whittaker will be used to determine the winner.

Entries may be posted in this blog as comments, or emailed to babyshirelottery@yahoo.com with "Baby Lottery Game" as the subject/title. All entries must be received circa the passing of the vernal equinox (or March 21, 2009 for those of you who require a specific date). If for some reason the baby arrives before then, you're out of luck. Should have gotten in the game sooner. Good luck to all of you!

Monday, July 21, 2008

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 16:19:00 GMT

Kim posted pictures from our camping trip this weekend.

Four more years! Four more years! . . .

Fri, 06 Jun 2008 16:44:32 GMT

I just have to say that I awoke this morning and gave my wife a big hug and cheered for "Four more years!" Naturally, I want a heckuva lot more years with this woman than a mere four more. It just seemed like the best anniversary gag this election year... I digress.

I just wanted to tell everyone how happy I am to have found and married my Kimberly. She is an amazing woman and I am the luckiest guy on earth to have her as my wife. Ee-taow!

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 20:36:29 GMT

Still looking for work. It has been wonderful staying home with Donny. Wish I could make a career out of that....

Kim posted more Donny photos.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Tue, 15 Apr 2008 20:15:35 GMT

I am officially unemployed again. It is on account of the requirements for the job I was originally hired to do changing into something I apparently cannot do. I will be getting paid through May 16th, so that is the good news. Hopefully, I can find something else soon.

My birthday is this Saturday. Happy birthday to me....

And in case you missed it Kim posted some newer pics of our boy...

Friday, March 21, 2008

Fri, 21 Mar 2008 14:10:15 GMT

Greetings friends!

In my inaugural 2008 Xanga post, I am extending an invitation of sorts. I decided to play in two fantasy baseball leagues this year. There is the league I played in the last couple of years that rounds up the usual suspects and one that I have created on my own. This invitation is open to the first nine who express genuine interest in participating.

Before you go rushing to sign up, let me explain what can be expected if you are to take this "hobby" seriously. First, you will have to create a team name. I tend to go with names that relate to my locale, whether historic or farcical in nature, it does not matter. I just try to keep in mind that I want to upload a logo for whatever team name I create. You can change your team's name all the way up until within 24 hours of the live draft.

The league I created, Bad Andys All Stars, consists of 10 total teams that will compete to find a champion. In order to create a team, actual MLB players will be drafted from the NL and AL in a live draft. I have scheduled the live draft for Saturday March 22nd @7pm ET. While attendance is optional, I strongly recommend you attend. In order to attend you must be logged into the Internet at that time, otherwise it will "auto-pick" for you and you may end up with a row of quality players who are all battling serious injuries. Translation: You may have to go and pick through the "left overs" in order to launch your fantasy baseball season somewhat successfully.

During the season, team owners (that's you) set the line up for that week of play. Typically this runs from Monday-Sunday. You are not required to set your lineup on Sunday nights; you just need to have your changes made before the first MLB game on Monday. Thus, you could set up for the next week on Friday, but miss out on adjustments you'd rather have made due to a Sunday injury. Happens all the time... Your roster will consist of both MLB players as well as reserves from both leagues at various positions. Throughout the season you can drop poor performers for new talent at any given time, but they may not be able to go into your lineup until the next game.

Your MLB players score points for hits (1B, 2B, 3B, HR, etc...) and pitching (Wins, Ks, Saves, Losses, Earned runs, etc...). Each week players from your team compete with players from another. That one week is essentially one game. The total points at the end of the week determine who wins that game. The person with essentially the best record at the end of the season is the league champion. (I've never won a championship, but I have placed 2nd on two occasions. I've lost miserably on twice as many occasions.)

So...

If you want to participate and can commit to do so from the end of March through September, then let me know you are interested. I will give you all the information you need to get signed up. I'm even willing to answer every question you have until the competition begins, when I'll have to be a bit more selective in the quality of answers I can give. ;)
Remember, I've only got nine spots available and I'm expecting them to fill up fast. Looking forward to hearing from y'all!

To sign up go to cbssportsline.com and create an account if you do not already have one (it's free). Once there, join up to play free fantasy baseball. You will be asked to type in the name of your team. This can be changed up until 24hours before the live draft. The next screen has all the leagues listed. Search the "private leagues" for "Bad Andys All Stars" and click to join. I believe the password is "theshire". If that doesn't work let me know and I'll try and remember what I put. lol You've signed up. Now rank your players if you can't make the live draft, or log in at the appointed time on Saturday March 22nd.

Oh yeah. Invite your friends if you want.

*EDIT Not enough people signed up in time, so let me know if you're still interested and I'll set us up with a new league & password.

Saturday, November 03, 2007

Sat, 03 Nov 2007 01:14:07 GMT

In case you haven't heard. The Kim and I are over on Facebook.com now. We will also be hanging in here with the xanga crowd too. Anyway, thought y'all would like to know that....

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Tue, 16 Oct 2007 15:32:10 GMT

Kim posted more pictures of Donald.

help!!

Sat, 13 Oct 2007 15:08:28 GMT

My dad sent out this e-mail and I am posting it here to get the word out. Think of the people you know. Ask around. Help is very much needed. Thanks!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Friends,

As you may or may not know, I sit on the board for an orphanage located on the island of Roatan, Honduras. Our volunteers in Roatan at the orphanage have just asked for someone to come and replace them. WE CURRENTLY HAVE NO FULL TIME STAFF AT THE ORPHANAGE! We really need good Christian people to go to Roatan and take care of the children. People willing to commit a week, 2 weeks, preferably a month or more. Married couples and single adults are needed. I am sending this email to ask for 2 things:

1) That you please pray that the Lord will send the help we need.
2) I am asking that you either consider going yourself or help recruit volunteers to go and care for the children. There are 14 children. We need both married and single volunteers. Ideally we want a married couple to oversee things and the singles can be caregivers to the children. Would your church be willing to send someone down for a month or so?

As you can imagine, it is very difficult for us to find help that can go immediately. We are in a tough position, but we do know that our Lord is able to provide. The best we can do right now is pray and also get the word out that help is needed. We need help after the first of the year as well. Of course we also need financial gifts to see us through this transitional time of the ministry. Lots to pray about! Possibly you can’t go but would help to send someone? It all helps!

If you will, pass this email around to your contacts and let them know of this need. Let’s use the internet for something positive. I have attached an application for those that are interested.

Thank you so much!

My contact information is:

Don Shire

don@donshire.com

715-484-2017

The orphanage address for sending donations is:

Child Sponsorship International
P.O. Box 1404
Lockport, NY 14094

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Thu, 27 Sep 2007 16:45:00 GMT

Kim posted new pictures of our boy child.