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We’re spending this week at the beach with two other families in one house. A total of 16 people, ten kids and six adults, in one house sounds like a recipe for disaster but it actually works out quite nicely. The kids entertain each other while the adults sit around and complain about the kids while drinking foo-foo drinks and beer. I can think of a lot worse ways to do a beach trip.

BTW, some lessons learned this week:

Sunburn hurts more the older you get.

Letting 13 and 14 year old kids jump waves off of your shoulders hurts like hell.

I need to buy stock in whoever manufactures Aleve. Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

**Update** I’m an idiot.  As you’ll see from my post below, made from my smartphone during the game between Georgetown and Belmont, I thought those folks in red were Texas Tech fans.  It was in fact the Belmont contingent.  During the game I was so impressed that the Texas Tech fans would be so enthusiastic in their support of the underdog Belmont team.  It wasn’t until leaving that I saw that their shirts all said Belmont on them.  The sad part is I wasn’t even drinking!

Best part of the game came towards the end.  The Georgetown fans, who would like to think of themselves as Dookie-like, started chanting "Where is Belmont?" and a heartbeat later the Belmont fans started chanting "What’s a Hoya?"

Last note about the game.  How cool is it that Belmont, with an enrollment of 4,500 students, easily had the largest and loudest contingent of the four schools playing in the day session in Winston-Salem.  They dwarfed the Boston College, Texas Tech and Georgetown crowds.  Actually the largest contingent after the Belmont crowd were the UNC fans who were waiting for the night session.  You could recognize them in their varied array of powder blue shirts and hats, khaki shorts and slacks, and the remnants of cheap wine and Velveeta crusted to their lips from their tailgating soirees.

Original post made from my smartphone: The Texas Tech crowd is cheering very loudly for Belmont, as are all the UNC fans who are at the day session.  That whole section of red you see to the right has yet to sit down.
As I thumb-type this the Belmont kids are up 9-4 with only 35:51 left in the game!

At the NCAA Regionals for the opening day session in Winston-Salem. This is Texas Tech warming up for their game with BC.

If I get very lucky George Mason will continue its improbable run through the CAA tournament and beat VCU in the finals Monday night. Then if I get very, very lucky they’ll draw Winston-Salem for the first round of the NCAAs. (I think W-S is hosting this year). Since I didn’t get to see my alma mater last year when they won their region at the Verizon Center in DC to go to the Final Four it would be nice to see them just 15 minutes from my house at the LJVM Coliseum.

I still find it a cruel irony that I could live in DC from 1972 to 2004, the exact years that DC did not have pro baseball and within two years the Nats come to town and my school goes to the Final Four by winning their regional semi-final and final just blocks from where I worked for years. Maybe this year I’ll get my make up by getting to see Mason in the early rounds and then a couple of weeks later seeing the US in the Davis Cup against Spain. I’ve already got the second half of that equation covered so here’s hoping GMU comes through.

Cambodia has an interesting rail system that is entrepreneurial to say
the least.  The official rail service is old and decrepit and service
from Battambang (Cambodia’s second city) to Phnom Penh departs just once a week, so entrepreneurs have filled
the gap with homemade bamboo cars propelled by electric motors.  You can read about it here on BBC and here’s an excerpt:

They have created their own rail service using little
more than pieces of bamboo. The locals call the vehicles "noris", or
"lorries", but overseas visitors know them as "bamboo trains".

A tiny electric generator engine provides the power, and
the passenger accommodation is a bamboo platform that rests on top of
two sets of wheels. A dried-grass mat to sit on counts as a luxury.

It would be a white-knuckle ride – if there were actually anything to hold on to.

The bamboo trains reach about 40km/h (25mph), with the
track just a couple of inches below the passengers. Warped and broken
rails make for a bone-shaking journey…

Low fares add to the appeal, but the service is not
without its quirks. There is only one track – so if two trains meet,
the one with the lightest load has to be taken off the rails so the
other can pass.

Here’s a bad self portrait taken with my new PDA the Verizon VX6700. More moblogging to come!