Eric Muntz // I'm a husband and father.
I'm a computer, baseball and math nerd.
I live in Atlanta, GA, USA.
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[NOTE: Give it a few seconds for the audio to start] One thing I look forward to every morning is my call from Ona. I'm gone when she wakes up, so Katy calls me and they say good morning to me (lately Ona has been excited to tell me what she dreamed about). It's mega sweet and a great part of my day. This morning, Google Voice barfed and didn't ring my celly, so I got this voicemail instead. Insanely cute....
Ona rockin tons of pink for her bday party
What I get for sitting with Ona at dinner when she has stamps.
Just got to my hotel and was told "bad news and good news"... they are out of rooms. Their "good news" is they got me a room at another hotel. Errrrr, wha? Poor tired Eric trying to find another hotel.
this little buddy was on our window ledge tonight. wonder if it's related to the little buddy we rescued two years ago this month (it was katy's first mother's day)
I love Google Voice. I've been using it since it was "Grand Central" and although it has had problems, it's gotten a lot more reliable and added much-needed awesome features like SMS forwarding and better voicemail integration. If you aren't familiar with it, here are the quick awesomeness highlights - you get one number and then forward that number to all yer phones. You can set it to forward based on groups or individuals, so work people forward to work phone(s), etc. When you get a call, a computer says "Hello, you have a call from [name], press 1 to answer, 2 to send to voice mail, 3 to block, ...". You get to listen to the voicemail as they leave it and can interrupt and answer any time. You get emailed text translations of voicemails, you can download or stream audio files of them as well. Text messages are passed through to cell phones and the web. And so on. Very kewl.
However, the voice-to-text translations are awful (voice-to-text is hard... like, really hard... so hard that Google can't do it well) and can be pretty hilarious.... though tonight caused me a little bit of stress. I checked my phone after krav class and saw this from home:
Hey Rick, It's Kate, It's me, cos I'm afraid. Calling from. Triad at the top had. Thanks Craig. Bye.
"I'm afraid" made me a little worried (the text in black is what Google thinks it really got right). I thought I was about to race home and have to use my krav on some punk ass. So, instead of playing the message, I called home in a little panic and was laughed at. Because, the actual translation is:
Hey babe, it's Kate. Uhm, if you could bring home a sprite and french fries, that'd be awesome. Hehe. Thanks, baby. Bye.
That does it, no more relying on on the voice-to-text translation!
And yeah, in hindsight, getting called Rick and Craig is kind of funny. It reminded me of our nephew trying to say "What you talkin' bout, Willis?" and saying "Whatcha doin', Bruce?".
Chicago Cubs vs Atlanta Braves
April 5, 2010
Turner Field Atlanta, GA
I was lucky enough to go to the Braves opening game this year. First time I've been to an opener .... ever? I can't remember one, though I'd be surprised if that was my first. Anyhows, it was a great game... if you are a Braves fan and you like high-scoring games. It started out shaky with Lowe giving up a 3-run jack to new Cubby Marlon Byrd in the first inning. Though, the Braves answered back with six runs in their half of the first, highlighted by 20 year-old Jason Heyward's 3-run bomb in his first major league at-bat; and they never looked back, crushing the Cubs 16-5. People are hyping the Braves a good bit this season and they showed just about every reason for that during this game. Takashi Saito and Billy Wagner combined to throw two perfect innings with two strikeouts each; and they did it against the top six hitters in the Cubs order. Wagner was bringing the heat, but his breaking stuff was just filthy. It was nice to see. Every Brave in the lineup had a hit, except for Melky Cabrera and Nate McLouth made two really great catches including a diving catch that doubled Aramis Ramirez off at first base. And lost in the Heyward excitement and 16-run shellacking was Yunel Escobar's 5 RBI day.
The Heyward moment was really the highlight of the game, and interestingly enough it seemed to be the reason for the near sellout (unusual in these parts). The crowd was already standing and chanting "Heyward, Heyward" when he stepped up to the plate, and the place went bonkers when he hit the 2-0 fastball into the bullpen in right field. It actually isn't that rare an occurrence (another Braves outfielder did it last year), but it was still hella exciting to see. He got standing ovations in every subsequent at-bat and got one when he took his position in the top of the 2nd. People are crazy excited about him, and it seems for good reason, though I'm still a little skeptical and trying to remind myself that he's 20 years old.
Here are my score cards for the game (NOTE: I was late. :( I missed the first three Cubs hitters and didn't catch up score-card wise until the bottom half of the first).
