McDugan

As are my music performance degrees, in spite of the fact that I'm not performing for a living and (as I've posted extensively about in my little "journal" thread) may be moving into an unrelated field. I think elementary and secondary schooling are falling hugely short compared to past standards, and college can't make up for that. College itself isn't the problem; it's the expectation that college is a ticket to every dream coming true and a lack of life skills on the part of students/young people becoming more prevalent that are really problematic.

Completely unexpected - I might have a new job soon, in a completely different field, starting at 150% of my current pay!

Well played. Hopefully there's not some team hazing ritual that your 12yo has realized she'll get to subject her sister to.

Congrats! I grew up singing in choirs and went to college and grad school studying classical voice. n fact the conflict bewtween Sunday AM choir and Sunday AM hockey (second to cost) was a huge factor in my leaving the game behind as a kid. Although I guess I made the right call - I still do some professional singing locally when I have time, and I'm close to the field working in arts-management as my full-time day job. Nobody was ever going to pay me to play hockey. It's really cool to see someone else with an appreciation for both of these things - it's a rare occurrence!

LOL, really. The world is amazing. My wife's cousin has a management-level job in the "high rollers" division of a very large bank. She just got some sort of promotion that came with a bump in salary and apparently an increased annual bonus. So now her bonus is equal to my annual salary. And while I don't make a huge amount of money by any means, I'm not flipping burgers for minimum wage either. I guess this really belongs in the moan zone.

Sure, but the pitch of the holder isn't going to have an effect on pricing. The materials used will.

i would expect that the junior skates are materially different, as they need to be less stiff than the senior model for obvious reasons.

I like them for the little stuff. Can't beat the pricing with 30% off available all the time. I try to find excuses to by right about $100 worth of stuff to get best value w/ free shipping, and I've never been disappointed. I have yet to try the sticks or shafts, but I probably will in the coming season. Ordered a pair of jock shorts, socks, and practice jersey. They called to tell me they were out of stock on the shorts in my size, and bumped me to the comparable bauer shorts for the same price.

Right, and until that happens he's got a pair of $800 skates that he can't sell because he's been forced to raid them to fill someone's (less lucrative) need for steel. Were I a business owner, I wouldn't be thrilled with that prospect.

That speaks to your character as an individual, but don't you think from a business standpoint that Easton shouldn't be putting their end users OR their dealers in those positions?

No, strictly speaking, replacement shouldn't be necessary so soon, but your customers, for instance, who mail steel for sharpenings, generally need at least one spare set of steel to swap in/out when the other needs sharpening.

Kor Shift 1 - Size 9D Time used: 2 months (coming from Shift2's that started to bother my feet) Reviewer: 6' 190-200 lbs Fit - I love it. Baked them and there was NO break-in period. 10 Blade/Holder - Can't say enough good about the Pitch 3. Great steel, fun to be able to play with the pitch, although with the boot pitch being somewhat forward on the Shift1's I just leave them neutral. Hard to find now, but can be found cheap, which I love. I've got several spare runners and holder stocked up. 9/10 (one point off just because the way the steel attaches and the "clicking" sound they sometimes make makes me nervous) Weight - Considering that before I used the Kors, my old skates were Bauer supreme 1000's (the rec skates, not Custom 1000s), and I'm not an advanced skater, weight's not much of an issue for me. I don't find them obstructive at all. Protection - They're fine. I did find the Shift2's to be much more protective though. That said, I do like the way these wrap my feet much better, so it's worth the trade-off. 8/10 Durability - So far so good, but I can't comment on it yet. They've held up just fine over the years since they were made, but since I bought NOS skates and only recently have been skating on them, I don't have much to say. Conclusion - I really like these skates. I bought two pairs for $100 a piece, no way I could get equally good skates for anywhere near that. I had Shift2's before and loved those, but I spent a little over a year not skating at all and when I got back on the ice, the Shift2's which use to feel great absolutely KILLED my feet. I was puzzled until I realized that during that time I had made significant changes in my everyday footwear - I've been wearing minimal shoes with no heel-to-toe drop pretty much exclusively. So it makes sense that my feet have actually changed over that time. I confirmed this recently by going to Dick's (didn't want to waste anyone's time at a LHS) and trying on a couple pair of skates out of the box. The Supreme line used to fit me perfectly, and the Vapors were uncomfortably tight in the forefoot. Now, the Vapors fit like my most comfortable undies. Of course, my review is only so useful now since they're not made anymore, but NOS pairs pop up on eBay every now and then, and for the money, a better skate won't be found. I just wish these could take a different holder like the Shift2's. I'll probably end up in Vapors at some point in order to take advantage of the great steel available for them, but if I could throw Tuuks on these, I'd make sure I had enough pairs to last me for life.

Maybe you just can't keep their ridiculous sizing nomenclature staright and are consistently ordering and paying for a size larger than you mean to.

Helmet - Itech HC-15 (soon to be replaced with a Mission Intake; I used te HC 15 to gauge how much the improved ventilation would help vs. my 6k which I promptly sold off) Cage - Bauer 9900 Elbow - CCM Dryland - all the protection I need, lightweight, cheap... Shoulder - My frankenshirt/pads posted in the lighweight/mobile shoulders thread Shin - Koho 44x0 (4440? I can't remember) Pants - Bauer One80 Gloves - Eagle X72 (I have some CCM DryLands that i bought for drland shooting practice, I like to use them sometimes when it's going to be hot and I don't need lots of protection) Skates - Kor Shift1 Sticks - A rotating cast of shafts and blades - Harrow, a couple Easton broken OPS, Tour Spoiler, an old Nike Aluminum P91a, P92, PM9, Harrow #5, P106 (or reasonable facsimiles)... want to try P14 out...

So today I was supposed to have jury duty, and I ended up not having to report. Sounds great, right? Well, my wife somehow got called for jury duty today too. She still had to go in. This morning I was planning on staying home, but my wife gets all uptight and says I should go to work. So after a sufficient amount of bitching and moaning I caved and went to the office. She called me 15 minutes ago to let me know that she had already been released. So now she gets to go home and I'm stuck at work until 5:30.

Part 1: Was supposed to have jury duty today, but called the number last night and found out I was no longer called to report. See the Venting thread for Part 2.

sure. Things can be done the old way, when done properly. But what's really driving me nuts is taking the worst aspects of the old way and the worst aspects of digital imaging and throwing them together, expecting a good result.

My 80 + year old boss gave me a project as I was on the way out the door Friday. To make a complicated story simple, he wanted me to scan a logo he'd been working on and make a digital image of it that he could work with. Today, having cltogether forgotten that he had asked me to do this, and brought me the same thing to work on, except with additional type cut and glued (!!!) underneath the logo. He apparently never checked his email today. He should be sitting at home playing checkers with his grandkids. Instead he's spinning his wheels here. But until I don't need him to sign my checks, here we are, doing this bizarre dance.

I don't have Makos, but what I've done with my Kors (similar principles at work, surely) is start with the boot off in order to point my heat gun at the inside of the boot as well as the outside, then after spot heating, put the boot on, apply a little more heat to the outside of the boot, then turn off the heat and tighten laces and use hand pressure to mold the boot around my problem ankle area.

Thanks. With regard to the weight differential, I would assum that for either machine, the motor is responsible for most of the weight. A more powerful motor will weigh more to begin with, and also a machine with a more powerful motor will NEED to weigh more in order to maintain stability during operation.

Thanks O6 - I've been reading as much of the thread as I can. For me personally, the X-01 is the only option. I defintiely don't need more. Really, in order to make a purchase like this, I need to consider how long I can reasonably expect the machine to last. I haven't seen any info on that. Obviously it's a product that is still in the first generation of tis life-cycle, but I mean, how long is a basic expectation? 7 years? 10? 15? etc. Anyone have any thoughts?

Can anyone tell me the typical lifespan of the X series sharpeners? I'm thinking in terms of a purchase to use for myself and eventually my son when he's old enough to skate, maybe a few other people sometimes, but not really heavy use.

This may be way off, but my best guess is that he used some sort of black permanent marking material.

My 6-week old son flashed a gigantic smile at me yesterday. It was the first time I could tell for sure that he was just smiling at me, not pooping or passing gas.

Try to think "outside of yourself" and look objectively at your situation. Remember that time is important in any healing process. It's easy to feel hopeless in an impulsive way, but when you give your mind a chance to rest and be still, it's easier to accept the idea that you can come through a period of desperation and your quality of life can improve. I've had my own issues (far less, it seems, than what you're going through) and what I have found most helpful is just reminding myself that there isn't really an alternative to living. Life is painful, but the only way to end that pain is to end life. That's not relief of pain, it's obliteration.