The Last Ride

Today I told my team that this will be my last ride.” - Ray Lewis on January 2nd, 2013.

So much determination.

Ray Lewis is one of my favorite athletes of all time. The news of his retirement REALLY sucks for me. Instead of a feeble attempt on my part to articulate his amazing career with words, I recommend you instead watch the video embedded below. It does a FAR superior job of honoring this man's 17 years of greatness than I ever could.

Felix Baumgartner: A Man Amongst Boys

via Wired.com:

Baumgartner expects to exceed the speed of sound – about 700 mph at that altitude – during a free fall that will last about five minutes, something no one has ever done. For all our knowledge about high-altitude flight and space travel, there’s still a lot we don’t know about what would happen if a pilot aborts a mission and ejects at the edge of the atmosphere. The air is so thin at such heights that it is easy to tumble out of control, a situation that can lead to unconsciousness and even death."

Felix Baumgartner, stepping into the void from 71,580 feet during a test jump in March. The Austrian adventurer plans a record-setting jump from 120,000 feet on Tuesday. 

Tuesday, October 9th, 2012: The world will realize just how huge Felix Baumgartner’s balls actually are.

— Jesse Zakshesky (@zaksheskyman) October 8, 2012

Update on Tuesday, October 9, 2012 at 9:28PM by Jesse Zakshesky

via The Washington Post:

1:58 p.m.: The live feed has cut out, following the “abort” call on Baumgartner’s flight due to gusty winds. An announcement posted to the Red Bull Stratos YouTube channel notes that the weather “may not be favourable for a launch [Wednesday].” So, we’ll be keeping an eye out for further updates. But for now, we, like Felix and his team, are shutting down the live blog for today."

Fret not, y'all. Soon, Felix Baumgartner's testicular fortitude will be on display once again.

Update on Sunday, October 14, 2012 at 11:12PM by Jesse Zakshesky

Sunday, October 14th, 2012: The world REALIZED just how huge Felix Baumgartner’s balls actually are.

— Jesse Zakshesky (@zaksheskyman) October 15, 2012

Remembering Neil Armstrong

Obviously, being the first person to ever walk on the Moon is an impressive achievement, and upon your death you are bound (and deservedly so) to be remembered greatly for your amazing and historic adventure. However, nothing sums up how truly perilous and daunting a task that the commander of Apollo 11 faced quite like this quote:

via badassoftheweek.com:

So here was Neil Armstrong, harnessed into a cramped little aluminum coffin packed with all the technological computing power of a TI-85 solar-powered calculator, fighting the controls trying to manually place a two-passenger missile packed with jet fuel on the surface of an interstellar object nobody has ever attempted to land on before, and to do it delicately enough that it doesn't crash, fall over, explode, or otherwise bring about the brutally-violent deaths of everyone inside."

Godspeed, Neil.

Dear Future Wife

DISCLAIMER: THIS ARTICLE IS DEDICATED TO THE WOMAN WHO DECIDES TO BEAR MY CHILD(REN).

I'm going to keep this short and concise. If we have a son, you might as well stop thinking up names right now. His name is GOING to be Ezekiel Zakshesky...Zeke for short. This is not negotiable.

You may be wondering to yourself, why? 

via Wikipedia: 

In Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Ezekiel is acknowledged as a Hebrew prophet. In Judaism and Christianity, he is also viewed as the author of the Book of Ezekiel that reveals prophecies regarding the destruction of Jerusalem and the Millennia Temple visions, or the Third Temple."

Badassery.

Furthermore, in case you didn't realize by now, I'm slightly in love with the Green Bay Packers. During the Lombardi Dynasty, there was a respected quarterback who isn't as well known simply because of the fact that he had the unfortunate position of playing behind Bart Starr...which ultimately meant he never played. However, during the few occasions (garbage time, or when Starr was hurt) in which Zeke Bratkowsi was given the chance to prove himself, he did so with honor.

FYI: If our son even contemplates being anything but a Packer fan, I'm going to beat him.So there you have it. As a token of my appreciation to you for your understanding and commitment, I'll relent and allow you some creative control over the middle name.

Also, please don't divorce me.

A New Partnership

Taken directly from the website MoveinMadison.com:

Alec is the CEO and a Co-Founder of MoveinMadison.com. He works with almost every aspect of the start-up, including design, sales, customer support, marketing and business strategy.

Originally from the same small-town as Chad and Adam (no he does not like country music), he made the best decision of his life and chose to come to Madison for his undergrad. Four years later he graduated with distinction from UW, earning degrees in Philosophy and Legal Studies. He decided to stay in Madison following graduation and still resides in the downtown area.

When not working on the site, Alec can be found at Genna’s happy hour, Badger Basketball games, reading TechCrunch, or making the case that no modern television series could possibly top Season 3 of “LOST.”

I first met Alec a few years ago when we both had temp jobs. We became pretty good buddies then, and it's been an honor to see his business take shape. Not only because of the fact that he's a good dude, but more importantly, MoveinMadison.com is literally the finest apartment search engine I've ever used.

Alec and I have been discussing the idea over the past few months of allowing him to guest post on my site. His track record speaks for itself, and I have the utmost confidence in his ability to post content that will be an ample addition to this three-year-old website.

CEO | Co-Founder - MoveinMadison.com

And no, I'm not retiring. As long as the URL says zakshesky.com, Jesse Zakshesky will forever be overlord of this domain. However, it'll be good to see content posted on this site during the periods in which I'm too busy (lazy) to take the time.