I bought some Haribo gummi bears

So the sugarless version of Haribo gummi bears has been in the spotlight lately. I got some of the kind with sugar which are nowhere near as notorious, but I guess that doesn't matter.

Speedweeks at Daytona is over

The period known as "Speedweeks" that opens all of NASCAR's series at Daytona has ended. In the three major series, Kyle Busch won the truck race, Regan Smith won the Nationwide Series race and Dale Earnhardt Jr. won the Daytona 500. Also, earlier this week, Denny Hamlin won both the Sprint Unlimited exhibition race and the second Budweiser Duel qualifying race, and Matt Kenseth won the first qualifying race. It was all pretty exciting, to say the least.

My power went out yesterday

Yesterday the weather here was sunny with almost no clouds. So we were surprised when the power went out just before four o'clock in the afternoon. It turned out a car hit a pole a couple of miles down the road. That's the cause of almost all of our power outages in our neighborhood. And yet when we have a strong thunderstorm or ice storm or hurricane, we almost never lose our power, and if we do it's just for a couple of minutes. Yesterday's outage was just under seven hours.

We were first told that our power would come back on no earlier than 6:45. I left to go to a meeting at 5:30 and I expected our power to be back on when I got home. I arrived back at about 8:30 and the neighborhood was still dark. We finally got our power back at 10:30, just as I was going to bed. It wasn't the first time this had happened, and it probably won't be the last.

Some NASCAR Daytona stuff

NASCAR is currently in their week leading up to the Daytona 500, their biggest race. So I've been doing some testing sessions at Daytona on the game NASCAR Racing 2003 Season, or NR2003 for short, with several cars.

Today is also the 13th anniversary of the death of Dale Earnhardt at the track, which I still remember clearly. Fittingly, rookie Austin Dillon started the return of Dale's #3 car by taking it to the Daytona 500 pole on Sunday.

That's it for now!

Another Valentine's Day not celebrated by me

Today was Valentine's Day and I look forward to it every year only because I always get candy. But I never actually celebrate it because it's just not my kind of thing. The candy is really all I like about this day. I probably won't celebrate Valentine's Day for the next several years either. So that's my blurb for today.

Unusual snowstorm

So it started snowing just over 24 hours ago and we got just about a foot of snow overnight. Then it was sleeting in the late morning and early afternoon. But at about a quarter of eight this morning when I had just woken up (but was still in bed and still sleepy) and it was windy and the gusts of wind kept brushing ice crystals against my window.

Also later this morning, there was just plain rain less than 20 miles from my house but here it was still plain snow. It never got warm enough for normal rain here but we did get some freezing rain.

So before lunch I shoveled my front walk and at the same time my street got shoveled and one of our neighbors was plowing everyone's driveways. Then in the afternoon no precipitation was falling. But just before four o'clock the bottom end of the system started coming in. We got some wintry mix and then by about 6:30 it was back to plain snow. That means another snowy night and more shoveling tomorrow. I'm calling this a "mini-blizzard" because it has some characteristics of a blizzard but not all of them.

Just some various things

So I worked 11 hours this weekend, 5 yesterday and 6 today. I don't usually work six-hour shifts and I was supposed to work five today too but some called out and I got their shift instead.

We got a little more snow today. We've had snow on the ground here for two weeks now from several systems that have come through here. This one wasn't nearly as bad as others we've had this winter.

Lately I've been busy with things like college and other work so I'm trying to concentrate mostly on that but of course I'm always making plenty of free time!

I really can't think of anything else to say. This is more or less a filler update post so there's no real point to it. And I guess I'll end it there.

I've had it with winter

We got our first major snow of the season two months ago, on December 8. That was the start of what has become a very snowy, icy, cold winter. I live in Maryland and lately I've been feeling like I live in upstate New York or Michigan or any other place that sees snow on an almost daily basis in winter.

On Monday we had another round of snow. I don't know what number we're up to with that now because I've lost count. Then, last night into about noon today, we had a small ice storm that downed some tree branches and caused several car accidents. My power was knocked out for just 15 minutes this afternoon. Other people around us weren't so lucky; they're still without power as I type this.

We have even more snow in the forecast for Saturday. I don't know how I'll deal with it, but I'm going to have to at this point.

Seattle Seahawks Super Bowl XLVIII champions

The 2013 NFC champion Seattle Seahawks have defeated the 2013 AFC champion Denver Broncos‎ to win Super Bowl XLVIII (48) at MetLife Stadium in the New York City suburb of East Rutherford, New Jersey. This is the Seahawks' first championship in their 38-year history. The Seahawks previously went to Super Bowl XL (40) in 2006 (2005 season) but fell to the Pittsburgh Steelers. The final score was 43-8.

The Seahawks, led by Russell Wilson, dominated the entire game. They scored a safety less than two minutes in, and led 22-0 at the end of the first half. The Broncos' only score came at the very end of the third quarter with a touchdown followed by a two-point conversion, giving them eight points. The fourth quarter was somewhat marred by an ankle injury suffered by the Seahawks' Richard Sherman. That was the game's only real significant incident, however, and only slightly dampened the rest of the team's excitement about winning the Super Bowl. Linebacker Malcolm Smith was named the game's MVP.

The Broncos never contended for the win. Peyton Manning especially had a bad game. This is their fifth Super Bowl loss, giving them more losses in the game than any other NFL team. They previously shared this record with the Minnesota Vikings, Buffalo Bills and New England Patriots with four losses apiece. The Broncos now have a 2-5 Super Bowl record, their two wins coming consecutively in 1998 and 1999 (1997 and 1998 seasons) in Super Bowls XXXII (32) and XXXIII (33) against the Patriots and Atlanta Falcons‎ respectively. I should note that one of the Broncos' five losses came against my favorite team, the Washington Redskins, in Super Bowl XXII (22) in 1988 (1987 season). Also, the Seahawks have defeated the Redskins in all three of the Redskins' most recent playoff games (2006, 2008 and 2013/2005, 2007 and 2012 seasons).

Congratulations to the Seahawks on their first Super Bowl win! They've been headed toward this victory for a few years, and they finally reached it tonight.