Really Random Reviews

Trivial Pursuit: America Plays

2009-09-07T21:36:00.000-05:00

I have finally seen the end of civilization as we know it.

No, it's not a financial collapse or secret government conspiracy, it's "Trivial Pursuit: America Plays."

We have finally managed to find everything that is wrong with our culture and our education and distill it into a half hour of shame.

Let's dissect the show a bit.

The people on the show are clueless

We have a number of dumb asses, picked from the LA talent pool of stand-ins get up and attempt to answer disgustingly hard questions like "name 3 of the original thirteen colonies" (answer "Philadelphia") or "name a major superpower of the east" (answer "Asia").

Yes the questions are that easy

I think most of us admire long lasting quiz shows like Jeopardy, but this show makes a mockery of that heritage. Even when the questions are about history or economics, they writers of the show usually manage to slip in a pop culture reference.

"America" is playing at home?

An interesting twist to the show is the addition of about 20 people that ask their own questions of the in studio dunces…I mean contestants via video. If the final round is lost, the 20 "at home" contestants get the money. The show plays up the fact that they are from all over the US, but it appears to me that they just set up a camera in a shopping mall and asked random people to read cue cards. I wouldn't be surprised if the people asking the questions were in the audience.

Peter Brady must want to jump across the podium and smack these poor clueless bastards.

Host Christopher Knight (aka Peter Brady) is not bad as the host. I think if I had to pick the best part of this train wreak it would be him. I'm guessing that they shackle his feet to the podium. To his credit, he doesn't even blink at the contestants when they say the stupidest answers. I want to play poker with this guy.

So in summary, skip this show. I don't believe I'm saying this but go watch "Millionaire" or something a little more stimulating. Better yet, pull out a history book and do some reading. TV really is rotting our brains.

Addendum: why the hell was I watching this?

I was watching this because I came across it on a otherwise dull Labor Day. I wanted to know what I was missing on TV during the week day. Now I know I'm not really missing anything at all. The things I put myself through for this blog.

Really Random Predictions: iPod Touch

2009-09-01T05:42:00.000-05:00

Just read an interesting article by Jordon Golson entitled "Is the iPod Touch a Bigger Game Changer than the iPhone" on the wonderful GigaOm website.

I posted my predictions for what next weeks purported release of the new iPod Touch SHOULD be. Just thought I would past my comments here since it seemed to be (somewhat) well constructed.

Let me know what you think.

I think that the killer hardware updates for the iPod Touch should be a camera and a GPS.

If Apple could do a test deal with Verizon to market the Touch with MIFI like capabilities for even $60 a month, I think that millions would flock from the iPhone to the Touch. This would allow Apple to move away from AT&T (which would make the FCC happy) while still honoring their existing contract. This would provide a rich testing ground for the rumored tablet. It would also be a win for those Apps in the store that are more "IPhone only" to be used on the touch (such as the newly released TOM TOM GPS app).

Let's face it, we deal more with emails and twitter now then phone calls. We need an internet communicator, not a phone. I'm perfectly happy to carry my slim phone in my pocket while I use my Touch for everything else.

Carvelli's Italian Buffet

2009-08-31T19:38:00.001-05:00

My wife selected WI Dells as a location for our family getaway. I will be blogging about various locals and things we do along the way.

As our vacation was winding down, we were really just looking to eat and run. As we toured downtown Wisconsin Dells, we really weren't finding much that looked good. Then we stumbled upon Carvelli's Italian Buffet.

Situated at the end of the "touristy area" of Broadway, Carvelli's looked inviting. The staff welcomed us in and explained the menu. The food is served buffet style, but is actually served by someone working behind the buffet, which I love. It's such a "first world problem," but I hate it when I pay good money to have to get my own food at a restaurant.

Carvelli's has a wide assortment of Italian/American food. They take the novel approach of providing giant trays that are about the size of standard cafeteria trays. This provides a lot of room, without the hassle of the dishes. I especially loved the tortalini and vodka sauce. They also have a lot of pizzas and other pastas. Plus....canoli's for dessert (note: not part of the buffet).

I have often commented that there is a zone somewhere down the Midwest where good Italian food just doesn't exist. The good news is that by visiting the Dells, I was able to cross the outer limit of the zone and find delectable Italian food once again.

If you just want to sample some really good Italian food, take a trip down to Carvelli's. Where you can have a lot of food for a very low price.

Pirates Cove Mini Golf and Family Fun Center

2009-08-30T07:43:00.000-05:00

My wife selected WI Dells as a location for our family getaway. I will be blogging about various locals and things we do along the way.

After hanging out in any resort, you eventually have to get out and explore your surroundings. Unfortunately, we picked a really cold and windy way in Wisconsin Dells.

This played to our favor while visiting Pirates Cove Mini Golf and Family Fun Center. I especially was excited to play some mini golf. It had been many years since I put mini putter to ball.

If you have been to any other Pirates Cove Mini Golf (there is one in Rapid City, SD) you will be surprised to know that Wisconsin Dells has the LARGEST Pirates Cove! It is indeed large. There are five different 18 hole courses ranging from very easy to extremely difficult. The beautiful landscaping and elegant (though a bit too blue) waterfalls keep you visually captivated between putts.

Since we had a four year old with us, I thought we should tackle the easy course. My daughter had never been mini golfing before and it took her a few holes to get it down, but she finally started to understand. The courses was indeed easy, but the last third of the course did a good job introducing us to some of the traditional challenges of a mini golf course. The obstacles were always natural (rocks, water, and holes) vs. the generic windmill that I have seen at way too many mini golf courses.

The best thing about this particular Pirates Cove was that after 18 holes of mini golf, you could visit the attached Family Fun Center. There wasn't a whole lot of things to do at the Fun Center, but those that were there were great for kids. The best by far was the "jumping pillow" that is like a jumper on steroids. Ever get tired of only letting your kids jump in boring jumpers? Now you can jump alongside them (see the movie from the Jumping Pillows website).

You could spend an entire day at Pirates Cove. It is truly fun for the whole family.

Buffalo Phils: Better Food In My Garbage Disposal

2009-08-29T10:30:00.000-05:00

My wife selected WI Dells as a location for our family getaway. I will be blogging about various locals and things we do along the way.

Since the buffet wasn't open in at night (see my earlier post), We decided to stick close to the lodge for supper. We drove right down the way and encountered the mammoth "Buffalo Phils".

I wasn't really in the mood for burgers and fries, especially after eating at the wonderful Cheese Factory, but it was close and we were hungry.

A lesson to the wise, don't let your stomach do the thinking. We should have figured out that this wasn't the best place in town due to the lack of cars in the parking lot around 5:00 PM.

The interior was very "country" which I don't particularly care for. When you throw in the unbearable Country music, it was a total buzzkill. The other big mistake was sitting out on the patio. My water soon tasted like cigarette smoke from the three "5 pack a dayers" that were chain smoking the whole time.

Now let's talk about the food. Or maybe I should use the phrase "pseudo" food. I'm just guessing here, but they must follow the Applebees's "nuke" methodology. Everything from the burger to the fries had NO TASTE. I could have sucked on ice cubes and got more taste (made especially true due to the cigarette smoke).

Since this was a BBQ joint, I thought that maybe the sauce would save me. That turned out not to be the case. The three sauces at our table were equally terrible. I really want to know what is in their sauces. My biggest guess is a TON of pickle juice from the bottom of a Vlassic pickle jar that has been shoved into corner and forgotten for two years.

The service was OK, but I really hate to have a waitperson come by every two minutes (probably due to the lack of people in the restaurant) and ask if "everything is OK". The nacho were the only saving grace for the whole meal. They were delicious. Even that was ruined however when our main course was presented to us FOUR MINUTES after our appitiser. It was almost like they wanted us out of there right away. The good news is that I really didn't want to waste my time there.

Buffalo Phils is located close to Interstate 90 so make sure to avoid it the next time you are passing through the Dells. There are a lot better places to experience than this.

The Cheese Factory Restaurant: A REAL taste of Wisconsin.

2009-08-29T10:01:00.000-05:00

My wife selected WI Dells as a location for our family getaway. I will be blogging about various locals and things we do along the way.

As we entered town, I started to notice a few things. There seemed to be a plethora of places to eat. What I found odd was that there seemed to be "chain" type restaurants or local eateries with a cultural bent (e.g., Italian).

I kept driving because I wanted to taste food FROM Wisconsin, not to get away from it.

My search was soon rewarded by finding what I think is a gem in the somewhat battered crown of Wisconsin Dells: The Cheese Factory.

From the lovely outside to the historic inside, The Cheese Factory was all I had hoped for in a local Wisconsin eatery. The biggest bonus for me was the SODA FOUNTAIN. I think the last time I was in a shop with a soda fountain was when I was 7 years old. The selection of flavors were a bit limited (I used to love Lime Coke), but it was certainly worth having a real Vanilla Coke again.

The friendly staff were more than willing to chat and give us a rundown of the menu. The food is very traditional Wisconsin...heavy on the cheese and meats. All of the items seemed homemade which is become more of a rarity in todays American fast food culture. My wife had the portabella mushroom sandwich which was marinated to perfection. I had the cheese and tomato sandwich which was HUGE. I also couldn't pass up the beer cheese soup which only seems to be made correctly by people of Wisconsin genetic background.

I know that I haven't explored the Dells completely yet, but this place was a winner right off the bat. I might have to run back and get that beer cheese soup recipe from their cookbook...

Wisconsin Dells Adventure: Great Wolf Lodge

2009-08-29T09:34:00.001-05:00

My wife selected WI Dells as a location for our family getaway. I will be blogging about various locals and things we do along the way.

Great Wolf Lodge

According to their website, the Great Wolf Lodge seems to be the most "child friendly" lodge. It boasts a giant indoor water park (that actually seems to be three distinct water parks) as well as an outdoor component.

I can definitely say that this is a place that tries really hard to cater to children. From the kid friendly staff, to the art center, to the 8 PM story time, the lodge manages to distract kids and allow them to do more than just swim.

The standard rooms are average and nothing to write home about. For some reason, I have an inherent bias of hotel rooms that don't have a flat panel TV (but that's just me). For considerably more money, you can get a specialty family suite that boasts its own built in log cabin sleeping area for the kids.

There are a variety of places to eat in the resort, however I find the lack of a "fine dining" restaurant a bit distressing. I have to remind myself that this is the midwest and pizza and all you can eat buffets are king. The "Camp Critter" breakfast buffet is awesome and not too expensive. The biggest drawback in my eyes is that after lunch, "Camp Critter" turns into a "Pizza Hut" for the dinner crowd.

The cost is a bit high for a comparable non-midwestern local, but with the right combination of discounts and coupons, Great Wolf Lodge is affordable and VERY kid friendly.

Audible Takes A "Snail Mail" Approach

2009-08-22T07:16:00.000-05:00

Nice Marketing Trick

Something unique was put into my mailbox the other day. I'm not talking about my email box, but my mail box.

It seems that Audible.com has come up with a unique idea. Apparently, they weren't having very good luck with the email response setting up their new email mailing list. So someone in their marketing department decided to send all current Audible customers a PHYSICAL LETTER asking them to sign up for the mailing list. They even gave us an Audible credit (good for one download) for signing up.

A lot of people would see this as an intrusion. I actually felt it was more personal and got my attention a lot faster than an email that in all likelihood would have ended up in my spam folder.

Audible has really been at the forefront of advertising by supporting podcasts and vidcasts. Now they have taken a more traditional "snail mail" approach and still made it seem fresh.

That marketing guy at Audible needs a raise.

Now if they could just work on the integration of iTunes Audible books with their Audible website. It would really be the perfect service. I just want to be able to use my subscription credits with the iTunes store.

Well, I had to complain about something.......

Got Me A Blu-ray from WALMART?

2009-08-17T20:42:00.001-05:00

Ok, ok, I gave in. I got a Blu-ray player.

For those of you that know me personally, you will realized that I have been ranting about how Blu Ray is "crap' and that downloads are the way of the future. While I still think that is true, I went out and got the damn thing. Let's examine my motivation.

$98

I happened to be watching a recent episode of the wonderful "HD Nation" on the 'Net (play the segment for the full review) and watched a review of the new $99 Magnavox Blu Ray player. What startled me the most was that they LIKED it. I didn't think I would see a good review of a sub $200 player until at least the holidays. I have to admit that planted the seed in my mind. Thanks Robert and Patrick.

Netflix

I have a Netflix account that I LOVE. I have watched more movies and have spent less money for them. I already took advantage of their streaming service, so i thought I would go for the trifecta of the Blu Ray service as well. WARNING: you will be charged a few dollars more a month for the Blu-ray service.

HD TV without true HD.

It's big, it's black, and it's sitting in my movie room. I have a high def TV that is capable of 1080p input and all I feed it is 420p DVD's. Something surely must be done.

The Magnavox Blu-ray NB530MGX

This cheap bucket of low cost Walmart parts was worth it. True, it didn't come with a way to connect the player to the internet (something that is needed for most modern Blu-rays), but I was more interested in its ability of up-converting my existing DVD's.

The Magnavox is indeed basic, but if you really just want a to get your feet wet with Blu-ray, you certainly can't beat the cost. I purchased "Iron Man" to test it out. I can safely say that by the first half hour of viewing the movie, my eyes were tired of the excessive brightness. This isn't a bad thing, I guess it just might be something that I will have to get used to. The picture is indeed stellar and while not the best picture I've seen from a Blu-ray, more than does the job for now.

My goal is to not purchase a ton on Blu-ray movies. I really am going to rely on Netflix for the bulk of my movie watching. I just really don't want to amass another collection of useless discs that will get piled in a closet somewhere.

One exception to this rule is the BBC's "Planet Earth" which I will review as soon as I have finished watching it.

If you are a dedicated videophile, this probably isn't the player for you. I think many of the Samsung models are fantastic for around $250. If you are also a gamer, the PS3 is probably your best bet. If you are just curious about the world of high def video, than the Magnavox is a good start. For the price, it can't be beat.

Be All You Can Be: In Theaters

2009-08-16T15:55:00.001-05:00

Dear local movie theater chain:

I just thought I would take this time to give you some feedback regarding the ads you are running in front of your "feature presentations".

I decided to take my daughter to your giant, mega, ultra, orgazmo palace to see the newest 3D movie. I was happy to see your theater was packed for the feature. Hundreds of kids were waiting there all in their 3D glasses ready to be amazed by words flying out of the screen.

Usually, I'm a fan of your ads that are run before the movies. I like to see local ads that give me an idea of a relator that I might use or a place to take my daughter for dinner after the movie. Even the really annoying guy that introduces us to new corporately owned bands and mega blockbusters really doesn't bother me.

The ads that were running for this particular movie didn't work for me. I question how smart it is to run ads for the US Military in a kids movie. I can see the sense of it in an action movie or a R rated movie, but a G rated movie? I know you probably have to show these ads contractually a certain number of times a month, but it just doesn't work in a kids movie.

I'm not trying to sound like a crazy pacifist here. I would be proud if my daugther grew up and served in the military. I'm just suggesting that we let our kids be kids for a little while.

The tone of the ads were a little misleading as well. I know this is beyond your control, but I don't think that targeting kids by showing them how war is fought with drones from far away ("so they stay safe") is dealing with the reality of the military? Also, comparing a career in the armed forces to a video game is about as unreal as you can get. What ever happened to the tradition of the classic US Marine Ads? Teenagers are not stupid. They would respond to an ad about the tradition of service as well the educational and personal benefits of a career in the military.

Sorry for the rant, but I would ask you to consider your audience the next time you run an ad in your theater. The ads would reach their intended targets and the advertisers would be happier.

Of course we would still be stuck with that corporate movie guy. Oh well....

G-Force

2009-08-02T19:49:00.001-05:00

G-Force is really a movie that could stand on its own, even without the gigantic colossus of Disney's branding engine behind it.

The movie's rather implausible premise is typical James Bond fodder. Interestingly enough, the supposed main villain reminds me of Apple Inc.'s Steve Jobs. Could this have been in in joke for Disney's biggest shareholder (or more realistically, my mind over thinking things again)?

Fortunately the plot is overshadowed by the animation. The live action and animation were seamless. I really think that a few years ago, this sort of live/animation mix would have seemed groundbreaking. Now it just seems "natural".

Another strength of the movie is the voice talent. The various rodent based animals are voiced by an eclectic mix of actors. Nicholas Cage, Sam Rockwell, John Favreau, Penelope Cruz, Steve Buscemi, and Tracy Morgan all lend their voices to the animated characters. They do such a good job that I had no clue who any of the voices were until the end credits.

On its own, this movie is a rental fodder or for those of us that are tired of "Potter Mania" and want an alternative to entertain the kids.

But wait....you have to see it in 3D.....or so they tell me.

What is up with 3D nowadays? Every time a kids movie comes out, it has to be in "oh so glorious" 3D. My daughter spent more time playing with her glasses then watching the movie. I have seem four 3D movies in a row and every time I believe that the movie didn't need this 3D gimmick. It just detracts from the movie.

So, my suggestion is to go out and see it in the standard non-3D format. There would be a lot less distractions and a lot more fun.

Since Disney's a wank about sharing their trailers on the web, here's a link to the official trailer.

What's this?

2009-05-06T05:35:00.002-05:00

Is it possible that I might be posting to RRR.

Take heart all 1 person still reading this blog.....a new revamp is coming soon....................ish.

Oh NBC, You Have Failed Me Once Again

2008-08-06T05:25:00.002-05:00

This is my usual disclaimer that this review was cross posted to both my blogs on Streme of Meme as well as Really Random Reviews. Yes, I'm that cheap when it comes to blog entries.

Oh NBC, you have failed me.

I know it's day "-2" of the Olympics, but your first soccer broadcast of the match between Germany and Brazil is about as useful as a slide show.

Late Monday night, I had a notification from my TiVo that I had magically been granted access to the NBC Olympic Soccer Channel. This would give me access to "whistle to whistle" action of every soccer match of the Olympics.

Being the devoted soccer geek that I am, I got up this morning at 4:00 AM to watch the coverage. I was greeted with a jerky, pixelated mess that was pretty much useless. Even the audio wasn't coming through. After about twenty minutes of hope that the problem would be fixed, I just grabbed my laptop and started reading RSS feeds.

Shame on NBC for promising to deliver something and then failing miserably. A lot of people might point out that this is the first televised event, but they had FOUR YEARS to work on this. I have never been satisfied with NBC's Olympic coverage. They paid almost a billion dollars for the rites to the Olympics, and they have never managed to get their coverage quite right.

General Electric (which owns NBC) is very much the Six Sigma poster child. You would think that the core focus of the televised event would be to manage down the defects in the actual broadcast to at least a five sigma level. (For those of you that know what I'm talking about, please reward yourself with a latte and a lobotomy today).

I'll be looking forward to the day when NBC's dominance of the Olympics is over. It's time for some fresh blood.

Really Random Thoughts 004

2008-08-01T19:47:00.001-05:00

X-Files: I Figured The Truth Out 30 Minutes Into The Movie

2008-07-26T18:46:00.000-05:00

I had a lot reseverations about the new X-files movie.

Realize that as the parent of a picky three year old, I'm actually prevented from seeing many movies until they reach DVD.

So I decided that my loyalty this summer would be to Chris Carter who kept me entertained for more than a decade with "The X-files."

I finally found an excuse to go the movies by taking a day off for my birthday and ran right out.

I had really tried to keep off of many of the internet sites that might have given spoilers to the movie. I was shocked that a lot of the rumor sites had nothing on the movie. Most of the plot details were kept pretty close to the vest.

Things I did know going into it.

1. The movie would not be a "mythology" movie. It would be more like one of the stand alone episodes.

2. It took place in a lot of snow.

3. It co-starred Billy Connolly last known to me as Howard Hessman's replacement on "Head of the Class."

As loyal readers to my reviews know, I never give spoilers. So I'll do my usual vague job reviewing the movie.

A lot of the plot centers around an abduction that "no longer so special agents" Fox Mulder and Dana Scully are called in to investigate. With the aid of an apparent psychic with a dark past (Connelly) our heros proceed to uncover a "shocking" truth about the abductor's motives. This truth seems something that author Thomas Harris would have thought about and rejected from "Silence of the Lambs". In fact, this movie almost tried to be a bad parody of "Lambs".

The movie tried to put Scully and Mulder's relationship under the microscope but it just left me feeling confused. I didn't get any clear indication of anything until the end (which felt contrived and -- gasp -- badly acted). To add insult to injury, stay after the credits and really get confused by something that happens in a rowboat.

Speaking of the credits, I think that they were visually the most stunning portion of the movie. I loved them!!!! If the movie would have been composed of the end title shots the movie would have rated high for me.

The return of one of the series regulars about 3/4 through the movie was the high point for me. (ok, had to throw an "almost spoiler" in there somewhere.

Maybe it's the decade since the show was last on the air, but a lot of the "shock and awe" that kept me glued to the TV has fizzled in the wake of such shows as "Lost", "Heros", and the newly resurgent (and soon once again dormant) "Doctor Who". The writers of this movie seem to have clung to a once original formula that has been copied so many times that it no longer feels "fresh".

I would have been happier of Fox would have commissioned one of these a year to be shown on TV. I think that I would have been more than happy with the movie if it had been shown on the small screen.

Despite this review, I think die hard fans will still like the movie. There was a lot of stuff (which you had to REALLY pay attention to) that set up future movies.

Maybe the next one will be better.

New Blog

2008-07-25T10:23:00.002-05:00

Hey everyone.

A little shameless plug for a new personal blog I'm setting up called "Stream of Meme".

I'm attempting to blog at least once a day for a year. I will have no clue what I'm blogging about until the minute to start to type. Expect a lot of random stuff from me.

This blog attempt is part of a new series of personal goals that I have decided to undertake this year.

I have no clue why I make resolutions on my birthday. I guess I just want to not fall into the "New Year's" camp.

For this site I'll be posting my review of a new board game and a movie that I intend to see later today. I'm also working on imporoving the social network part of the site. Feel free to go in and play around.

Be seeing you on SOM and RRR.

Jamie

Doctor Horrible's Sing Along Blog

2008-07-22T06:53:00.000-05:00

Born from the bitter ashes of the last writer's strike, "Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog" is another feather in Joss Whedon's already crowded head dress.

Whedon (best known for TV's "Buffy" and Fox cancellation blunder alum "Firefly") decided to go it alone this time, creating a show without the direct financial aid of a major studio.

The show was released to the internet in three roughly fifteen minute installments last week. I waited until all three were complete to write this review, sacrificing "freshness" for "completeness". I wanted to sit back and not get caught up in the moment.

First of all, I have to admit that I am a HUGE Joss Whedon fan. He could spit into a cup (which I could then sell on eBay) and I would call it a masterpiece. Bodily excretions aside, I am going to try and take an objective and considered tone with this review.

"Doctor Horrible" tells the story of a "not-so" supervillian (Neil Patrick Harris) who is attempting to get into the Evil League of Evil. He is constantly thwarted by his nemesis "Captain Hammer" (Nathan Fillion). When the good Doctor finally looks close to accomplishing his goal, he meets Penny (Felicia Day). I'll leave the rest of the plot up you to figure out.

The show essentially follows Buffy's "Once More With Feeling" formula of a sing-a-long. Whedon once again creates the perfect geek musical with a combination of catchy tunes that I can't get out of my head. I found myself singing "With my freeze ray I will stop....the pain" in the shower this morning (there won't be a YouTube video of that).

When I first heard that Joss had cast Neil Patrick Harris in the role of Doctor Horrible, I was pretty much against it. In the first 10 seconds of the show, my doubts were gone. His strong performance carried the show. As with a lot of Joss' characters, the combination of the writing and the performance made me instantly care about Doctor Horrible. It was pretty funny to see TV's original "blogger" (referring of course to that certain MD show that he used to be on) doing a lot more modern take on blogging.

If Harris' leading role was the strength of the show, then Felicia Day's "Penny" was the heart of the show. Her performance was the most complete of any of the big three. She brought an authenticity to her character that I have haven't seen in a long time. In a world populated by super heros and super villians, she seemed the most powerful of them all, just by being herself.

Nathan Fillion was a bit over the top in the show. I guess if I hadn't seen him in a Whedon production before I would have loved his performance. Unfortunately, I have to say that out of the three, I was most disappointed in him. I know his role as "Captain Hammer" was to be a self-absorbed jerk, but I don't know if he had to go that far. He serves as the comic foil, delivering the dry humor with his usual spot on comic timing.

While I'm inclined to put my seal of approval on anything Whedon, this new media experiment was not without its faults. the run time of the three parts is pretty much the length of one television episode. A lot of the flow of the show just didn't work for me (even after watching all three parts). There seemed like a lot of plot that was cut for the sake of brevity. I'm hoping that the release of the DVD will add any cut scenes back in.

This will be a unique media experiment. The show was only available for less than a week on the 'net, though it is still available on iTunes and it's well worth the $4.00 (think of it as a latte for the mind). The DVD release should be the next phase of the marketing campaign and will contain "extras" and a commentary track (or two).

I believe that campaigns like this are going to be the future of entertainment. I'm just glad the Joss has thrown his metaphorical hat into the ring to try and shape that future. I can thinking of no one else I'd rather see defining this new chapter in entertainment history.

Really Random Reminder

2008-07-15T21:50:00.003-05:00

I rarely do this but I urge you to check out Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog from the dangerously diseased brain of Joss Whedon. If you loved Buffy, Angel, or Firefly this is the show for you.

It will be pulled from the 'net on July 20th, so watch all three parts now. They are also available for purchase on iTunes.

I'm going to post a full review as soon as part 3 is completed.

Also, head on over to the Official Fan Site for all sorts of goodies.

Update: as of 10 PM central time it's been very difficult to get on the official site. If you want to view, try the Fan Site.

Really Random Thought #3 Where's My iPod Touch Update?

2008-07-11T21:12:00.000-05:00

TWIT LIVE iPhone Coverage Is Fantastic!!!

2008-07-11T05:36:00.000-05:00

Leo Laporte is doing a 24 hour live "iPhone-a-thon" over at TWIT Live.

So far it has been a fantastic trip into the future of live media on the net. He's using all the power of the web to create a "mobile command center" for iPhone news.

As the show began on Thursday afternoon, I had my doubts. Everything seemed to not be working. Leo was running through many hoops just to keep the show going, but he pulled it off. Once most of the kinks had been worked out, the web responded. As of 5:45 AM US Central Time on Friday, he has had over 200,000 people viewing him and has pretty much always maintained 2,000 -6,000 viewers at any one time.

Leo has an incredible Rolodex of tech people to draw from. The interviews have been fantastic, most notably with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak (who spilled the beans that he "may or may not be married").

The real star of the show seemed to be the incredible number of "average" people that Leo has talked to. From the people in line at Apple Stores all over the world, to scores of people with their new iPhones, Leo has talked to them all. The show feels like his nationally syndicated radio show, only better. Thanks to the power of the internet (and a ton of webcams) Leo can see and talk to viewers all over the world. This is a tremendously powerful tool that I believe will set the stage for the how we view live content on the web in the next 5 years.

I believe that years from now, we will all sit back and realize that this was the launch of the first great media event on the net. Who better to take us down this road that tech podcasting pioneer Leo Laporte?

If you are reading this before 3PM US Central Time on Friday July 11th, you can still view the live stream at the TWIT LIVE website.

Thanks Leo, for the tremendous coverage. Now go get some sleep.

Making my life easier with tubemogul

2008-07-03T05:37:00.002-05:00

Tubemogul is a free service that allows you to upload your video one time and they will transcode and submit your video automatically. Thanks to Tubemogul, our videos can now be submitted and shared to 10 different video hosting sites such as YouTube, Yahoo Video, Revver, AOL, Veoh, Blip, and Viddler.

I found the interface easy to use. Signing up was a snap. Actually, the hardest part was trying to remember my login and password for all the websites. Tubemogul has even thought of that. They will save your login information so you don't have to scrounge around for that elusive password for a site you haven't used in a year.

I uploaded "Really Random Thoughts #2" and within 10 minutes I was distributed out to almost all the video hosting services.

Another great feature of Tubemogul is the analytics. With their dashboard, you can track all your video views and comments all in the same place. They even allow you to export the raw data so you can impress your friends with the hard evidence that your video of Uncle Johnny getting nailed in the crotch by a baseball bat has actually been watched over 200,000 times.

If you want to get your videos out quickly and efficiently to everyone on the web, Tubemogul is the best way to do it.

Announcing Really Random Reviews FOR YOU!

2008-06-29T20:03:00.002-05:00

We are pleased to announce the launch of the BETA version of Really Random Reviews social.

Now everyone in the Really Random Review audience can submit their reviews for practically any product or service. Just click the blue "RRR Social" widget located on the right hand column to access the site.

All we ask right now is that you keep your reviews clean and informative. We are building a FAQ, but I wanted to release the BETA tonight to get everyone used to the format.

As an added incentive, we are going to post the best reviews (assuming we get some reviews) each week here on the Really Random Reviews blog.

A reminder that this is the BETA launch of the social network. We are still working to hone and improve the site. If you have any comments, please post them on the message boards on the Really Random Reviews Social Network under the "Really Random Reviews Suggestions".

Under Construction

2008-06-28T09:08:00.001-05:00

To borrow an old phrase from the 90's, we are under construction. In the next few days, you might see a random TEST post off and on. We are currently working on a number of things that require the odd test post.
1. New commenting system.
2. Social network integration.
3. New graphics and blog design.

Some interesting changes

2008-06-26T05:42:00.002-05:00

Hey everyone.

Thought I would do something in text today. You probably need a break from my "talking head" anyway.

I have a great review of the children's game "Zingo" in post production. Yep, it's going to be a video review.

We are also happy to announce that we are opening up the "Really Random" review process to YOU!! Now anyone will be able to review whatever they want in our new social network. The network should be online by the end of July. We will make a more "feature rich" announcement as soon as we can.

Until then, I hope that you keep enjoying our content.

If you have any questions or comments, please email me at randomreviewer00@gmail.com

Really Random Thought #2

2008-06-25T05:51:00.002-05:00

GO FOR IT!!!

I'm back baby! And I'm bringing the video

2008-06-24T06:40:00.002-05:00

Yes, after a long hiatus, I'm finally back with the long awaited video project "Really Random AV". This will be the first episode of a subset of the video called "Really Random Thoughts". It's my take on whatever happens to cross my mind.

There really is no set schedule (keeping to the spirit of RANDOMNESS). You never know where or when each episode is going to drop.

I will be back soon with a review of something. Until then...enjoy.

Feedback is always appreciated. Be gentle, this is my first attempt.

Link to Kenner Video (embed disabled by owner)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAYxEDE3tzU&feature=related

Have fun!

We suck

2008-06-19T09:21:00.002-05:00

We were doing well posting every week for a while, but have been lazy slackers lately. Just to let the readers know that we have kept good on our promise to donate to charity if we didn't post regularly, Jamie has donated to the March of Dimes, and I have donated to the Fox Chase Cancer Center volunteer board of associates, furthering cancer research.

Regular posting will resume after my move back to Utah.

Things I have missed about Utah, and things I will miss about Pennsylvania

2008-05-29T08:48:00.004-05:00

I don't know if I ever made this clear, but I have been living in the greater Philadelphia for the past 8 months. I took a job here after my postdoc in Salt Lake ended. The job was an incredible opportunity, and I am extremely grateful to my current boss for the chance, but the project hasn't been working well, and the funding is tenuous at best, so the boss told me to keep my options open and not stop looking for a job.

Once I got to Philadelphia, there were many things I missed about Utah. These are the top 5.

1) My house! I thought I wouldn't mind living in an apartment again, but quickly found that a 1 bedroom apartment with a den and no covered parking is far different than a 4 bedroom 2 bath house with an attached garage.

2) My yard. Especially because no fenced yard means that I have to WALK THE DOG! This is not a bad thing, necessarily. I can certainly use the exercise, and I don't mind the actual walking part, but Abby is OBSESSED with squirrels, and frequently tries to pull me off of my feet trying to catch them. Also, I have discovered that if you put a dog on a weekday schedule of walking at 7 AM so you can go to work at a reasonable time, that dog needs to go for her walk at 7 AM every day, meaning that there is no sleeping in on weekends. Third, for some reason, Abby is anti-leash pooping unless it is am absolute emergency, so I have to walk he to the dog park at least twice a day so she can run around and free poop.

3) The grocery store Harmon's, especially their registers where you do not have to unload your groceries onto a counter. You just drive your cart to the cashier, and they unload, scan and bag your purchases all at once. Also, they do not have a loyalty card. Do you know how many grocery store loyalty cards I have here in Philadelphia? 4! (Giant, Genuardi's, Acme, and Superfresh, bot to mention the ones for the two pet stores, petco and petsmart).

4) My neighbors. They are all totally awesome, and totally took care of our house in SLC over the past months. They plowed the immense amounts of snow SLC got over the winter, took care of husband when he was in town between business trips and showed him how awesome the Wii is, are taking care of our lawn and newly planted garden, and kept telling me that they missed me and wanted me to move back. Also, my friends. Even if I don't see them that often, I knew they were around and could always give them a call and do something. In Philadelphia, I lost that, and it was much lonelier, especially then my husband was traveling for work.

5)Being 10 minutes from Costco. It takes at least 30 minutes to get to the nearest Costco here.

(ok, not top 5)

6) disposable income. We did not manage to rent our house in Utah, so we are paying both rent and a mortgage, plus all utilities for both residences. We're breaking even, but not by much.

Because I was continuing my job search, I have been offered a position back in Salt Lake. I was hoping to move at the end of August, so that I wouldn't have another rushed move, and so I could finish up some stuff at work, but the new job wants me to start July 14. Which means another quick move (but thankfully I do not need to find someplace to live again).

I realize that I will miss some things about Pennsylvania.

1) Proximity to my parents. It has been nice to be able to pack up the car on a Friday afternoon and drive about 4.5 hours to their house. My cousin had a bay recently, and I have been able to see her grow up a bit. I was able to go to my aunt's and uncle's anniversary party and another cousin's baby shower this past weekend. I liked being able to do these things.

2) The grocery stores. I complained that they don't have the great cashier setup above, and that they have those stupid loyalty cards, but the stores here are great. There is awesome variety and mostly reasonable prices (everything is more expensive everywhere these days). I really liked Genuardi's (which is on the way home) when I got here, and have recently discovered the brand new Super Giant not to far from the apartment complex.

3) really good rye bread and Land-o-Lakes white american cheese. Two things that are almost impossible to get in Salt Lake.

4) The incredibly mild winter and beautiful spring we are having in Philadelphia this year. For the most part, the humidity has been perfect, and I like what it does for my skin and hair.

5) Finally, I will miss the people I have been working with here in Philadelphia. They are incredibly pleasant people, even if they are protein biochemists and we speak totally different languages.

Edited to add,

6) I totally forgot about Wawa! These little convenience stores are the bomb! (do people still say things are the bomb?). I love their fresh made to order sandwiches! I will really miss Wawa.

I am looking forward to getting back to the place that has been my home for most of the past 14 years, but I will look fondly on most of my experiences here in Pennsylvania.

Trouble and Honey

2008-05-20T13:56:00.002-05:00

The number of people who identify themselves as "Fans of Poetry" is quite small. (I'm not sure I would count myself in that number, though there are poems I love.)

Still, for those intrigued by the unusual, I wanted to pass on this collection. Jilly Dybka has made her book "Trouble and Honey" available for free download as a pdf, or in printed form through Lulu.com . But first you should read her manifesto about the whole publishing racket.

Pass the word.

IT-Adventures

2008-04-30T15:00:00.003-05:00

Making IT Fun

Iowa's first IT-Olympics were held at Hilton Colosseum last week, and the team from Hampton-Dumont, Iowa (which I helped mentor) took the bronze. Team members Tyler Miller, Quinn Wood, Austin Wilkinson, and Sean Peters competed in the Game Design division, one of three available.

In addition to bringing their game in for judging, these talented students had completed a service project for the school and had documented it with a poster display. During the two day competition, the team had to respond to eight different challenges, each with a specific time limit.

Over 200 students from 25 high schools competed in the three divisions: Game Design, Robotics, and Cyber Defence. In the Robotics Division, student teams designed, built, and programmed robots from specially selected LEGO kits. These robots were placed in a four foot circle, two at a time, and competed to push each other out of the ring. In addition to these "Sumo Wrestling" matches, the Robotics teams were given additional design problems during the two-day event. The last of these was constructing a drag racer for straight course that covered the width of the stadium.

The Cyber Defence teams were given a network of four computers to network together. They were to provide basic services like e-mail and file sharing, while protecting their network from the mistakes of users, real-world challenges (like power outages) and the deliberate attacks of hackers, brought in for the event.

It is hard to describe the tension that mounts as a team closes in on a deadline and they realize that only two of the three parts of their game challenge are finished. Let alone hearing the shouts when a mail-server crashes because a user tried to e-mail a 500 megabyte video file. Everyone cheered when the ball-throwing robot hit the center target twice in a row.

It was thrilling to see kids learning to use computers to solve problems. They learned not just about computers, but about how they face tension and deadlines as a team.

Even though this was the first time the statewide competition was held, many of the teams, including our boys from Hampton, are already planning for next year.

I've Been Enjoying TED

2008-04-28T20:40:00.005-05:00

As the most faithful readers of this website know, I'm a big fan of podcasts. I have over 75 that I'm subscribed to and am adding more and more each week.

I would have to say that (if I were actually paying for them) most of them aren't worth my money. They simply exist as time wasting devices that are more stimulating than typical boring television.

TED however, is a huge exception. The TED (Technology Entertainment Design) conference is an annual event that brings together "the big thinkers" in almost every discipline to give brief talks about their life, inspirations and dreams. The event is a celebration of the passions of these people. They serve as an inspiration for all of us.

I was always mad that you couldn't get access to these lectures. Last year, I was fortunate enough to discover the TED YouTube site. When I discovered that random TED conferences were in iTunes, I jumped at the chance.

It's strange that of the three or four talks that seem to find their way into my iPod each week, it's always the one person that I have never heard of before that really fascinates me. Maybe it's because it gives me the hope that someday I could have just such an inspirational story to share with everyone.

TED is pretty exclusive. It costs anywhere from $4,000 to $6,000 to attend and the guest list is rather selective. These podcasts are probably the closest that we mortals are ever going to get to the actual event.

Try this simple exercise. Download a few episodes and watch them when you are feeling down about yourself or the world. I guarantee that you will feel better almost immediately after watching any one of these talks. They are my current drug of choice that I hope to push on you as well.

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

2008-04-23T15:02:00.003-05:00

I've enjoyed quite a few of Cory Doctorow's short stories, so I decided to give his new YA novel a try. While this story is set a bit in the future (after a supposed further terrorist attack in California) almost all of the tech is real. That makes it a treat to read. This book will be available 29 April 2008.

A fascinating study in the relationship between freedom and privacy in today's electronic age. Big Brother is watching you. Who's watching back?

Listen to a sample chapter read by the author.

Today's "What the hell?" moment

2008-04-21T21:36:00.007-05:00

Ok, I just clicked over to CNN.com before bedtime, to see if any news happened while I was watching DVR'd Doctor Who/Torchwood (still one episode behind on this one), and noticed something. Along side the usual little video camera icon next to the "latest news" titles, I spied what looked like a little T-shirt icon. Curious, I clicked on the icon and lo and behold it took me to a page where I could BUY A T-SHIRT with the story title on it.

Does anyone else think this is totally ridiculous? Personally, I can't remember a time when I looked at a caption title on CNN and thought "gee, that would look great on a T-shirt! I wish CNN would start selling them." Especially the 3 titles highlighted today;

Hips Don't Lie' singer pushes education
Law would penalize homewreckers
Weird fish leave sea, spawn on beach

then "I just saw it on CNN.com, with the time it posted.

(seriously, go over and look at them, they are ugly as sin!)

I suppose I should be relieved that they are not offering every title on a shirt since another title in between 2 of these 3 was

Dad mistakes young son for prey, shoots.

Seriously, I think that whatever marketing genius thought this would be a good idea should be fired. Does CNN really think that people these days have $15.00 (plus $4.99 shipping) to blow on a T-Shirt with a CNN.com title and big honking advertisement on it? Seriously bad taste, in my opinion. Gas is nearly $4 a gallon in some places, the cost of food is rising dramatically, in fact CNN did a story today about how people are cutting back on grocery expenses and even making their own laundry detergent because money is so tight. AND there is a little mini survey right on the home page asking if gas prices are cutting into food budgets and 75% of respondents say YES (I know it isn't a scientific poll, but still). Did someone really think that people are going to log in to CNN.com, see a title for a news story and think "I really want that on a shirt!"? Crazy.

I think that I will continue to list the titles CNN deems appropriate to put on a T-shirt until the idea dies. (I seriously hope that people really aren't in the market for this kind of thing. It would really cause me to lose all faith in humanity).

The Hollows series by Kim Harrison

2008-04-20T16:18:00.003-05:00

(Note: I have discovered that I am not very good at writing succinct reviews of books, video games, or movies. I keep wanting to add far to much back story, and explain too many nuances. This isn't going to stop me from trying, however, and this is my next attempt).

Anyone who knew me growing up knows that I read a lot as a child and teenager. I read a variety of genres, mostly brain candy. A lot of mysteries, teen fiction, the occasional piece of "real" literature (my parents were amazed then I decided to read "1984" on my own), and my secret shame, romance novels (which I don't read anymore, thank goodness). One genre that I didn't get into however, was ScFi/Fantasy. I am not sure why I didn't read any, probably put off by the silly covers they all seemed to have.

Then, about 8 years ago, I discovered the world of fantasy novels via the incredibly brilliant Terry Pratchett. He is not the topic of this review, however, but I feel that his wonderful novels deserve mention in this review since they started me on my search for new fantasy fiction. I do intend to do a thorough review of the Pratchett universe one day. Suffice it to say that I am continually on the hunt for good fantasy fiction. I have decided that I like the escapism it allows me.

I recently discovered Kim Harrison and her Hollows series. The protagonist is a female witch named Rachel Morgan (witches are both male and female in the Hollows universe, and are a different species than humans). Rachel lives in a parallel reality to ours, in Cincinnati, Ohio. In her universe, witches, werewolves, fairies, pixies, elves, and vampires (the inderlanders) came out of hiding during the "Turn", a time when genetic engineering killed off about 25% of the human population from a killer virus attached to tomatoes (a result of which is that most humans have an irrational fear or tomatoes, even if the virus is long gone).

Rachel is introduced in Dead Witch Walking, as a Runner for the Inderland Security, (think FBI for the supernatural), bringing in inderlander lawbreakers. After an encounter with a leprechaun, she leaves the IS along with a living vampire named Ivy, another runner, and her pixy backup Jenks, and the three of them set up an independent runner service called Vampiric Charms.

There are six novels to date, all of the titles are spoofs on movie titles (mostly Clint Eastwood movies). They deal with various situations Rachel gets herself into, involving demons, living and dead vampires, werewolves, death threats, and dating. I find the novels very clever ad interesting. The characters are complex and flawed. Rachel insists she is a "white" witch, yet keeps getting more deeply involved in demon magic, the blackest magic there is, for "good" reasons. Ivy, a "living" vampire, has a hard time separating her blood lust from sex, and since she wants to bite Rachel, there are some interesting scenes involving same sex attraction.

These are not kids books, and if you are squeamish about sex in books, either same sex or opposite sex, these aren't for you (although the amount of sex is not gratuitous by any means). There is some swearing, although Rachel seems to have an aversion to it herself, and uses one of my favorite non swearing swear phrases, "crap on toast". While the main storyline is tied up be the end of each novel, there are always threads left hanging that may or may not be tied up in later books, which is great storytelling, but makes it a little harder to pick up the series in the middle. I definitely recommend reading them in order.

If you like fantasy, I highly recommend these novels. Harrison does a good job of blurring the lines of morality. Is it wrong to do a bad thing for the greater good? She has created some great adversaries for Rachel, Piscary the undead vampire, and Trent Kalamack, a mysterious City Councilman and billionaire businessman, who alternates between trying to kill Rachel and hire her to work for him are two who figure into most storylines. Trent is an especially complex character, one who does seemingly unforgivable things, but still seems like a sympathetic character.

To close, read these books!

In chronological order they are:

Dead Witch Walking
The Good, the Bad and the Undead
Every Which Way But Dead
A Fistful of Charms
For a Few Demons More
The Outlaw Demon Wails

www.kimharrison.net

(2nd Note: I listened to all of these instead of reading them. I liked the narrator for the first 5 books, but they changed her for the 6th, and obviously she did not ask how any names were pronounced. I did not like the narrator for the 6th book at all and hearing her mispronounce ley line, Piscary, Algaliarept, and worst of all Takata, was like nails on a chalkboard. If any of you do decide to listen to any of the first 5, I recommend actually reading the 6th book instead).

Flickr Video: The Good, The Bad, and The UGLY

2008-04-12T20:56:00.006-05:00

I have patiently waited a week to review the newest addition to Flickr: video.

It seems that deep in the bowels of Yahoo HQ, the Flickr people were actually doing something these last few years. They have cooked up a fair (if not way too late) video sharing service to complement their outstanding photo service.

THE GOOD
1. Videos are easily uploaded the same way you do with pictures. There is no extra downloader or installed application to use.

2. The videos look great as long as they are shot with a "decent" camera. Most cell phone cameras will only produce a barely watchable video.

3. The video uploads are limited to 90 seconds (see below), but this doesn't seem to be a problem to me because it forces me to think about what I'm shooting and uploading. There won't be a 10 minute video of my daughter singing, only a tight 90 seconds of the highlights. I actually like that.

4. If you use Flickr regularly, you will find the format exactly the same. Videos fall in effortlessly with your photos and can be viewed in the same photostream. I love this idea. For people like my parents (who follow my Flickr feed for the latest on their granddaughter) they are going to get a big surprise the next time they check their RSS feed.

5. Mobile video upload is a snap as well. I was able to email a rather boring video of my lunch to Flickr quickly and easily. This will be great for quick "only the fly" events where you may have nothing else but your cellphone with you.

THE BAD
1. Being a large Flickr fan myself, I was excited by the notion that I could share my videos on the same site. I was a bit disappointed that I could only upload 90 seconds of video at a time. YouTube allows a maximum of 10 minutes. Why is Flickr so limiting? The answer seems to be in the details. Flickr is not trying to be YouTube. They don't want videos of people being kicked in the crotch or the latest thing that Colbert said. They want YOUR videos. The videos that you should be out making instead of sitting around watching other people's stuff on the web. Limiting the videos to 90 seconds is a bit constraining, but it actually gives a kind of boundary, by getting people to think of what is the most crucial thing about the video they want to submit. Everyone is forced to be a video editor on Flickr.

2. Unfortunately you have to have a paid "Pro" account to upload video. In the future I would love to see the 90 second rule apply to non-paying customers and maybe a 5 minute limit be given to the "Pro" account owners.

3. The service feels rushed. It makes me wonder if Yahoo's recent takeover bids were a catlylist for the release of this service. While the truth of that may never be known, I guess I am trying to view this as a "1.0" version of the service. It was badly needed as well as a little late to the party.

THE UGLY
1. There has been a lot of controversy from Flickr fantatics over the release of the video portion of the site. Those against the service point out that Flickr is a PHOTO site that should only be for PHOTOS. They want the site to stick to the model that has served it well for so long. The other side of the debate realizes that to survive the coming consolidation, Flickr has to evolve. They have to draw a bigger share of people that are slowly being taken away by services such as Shutterfly and Picasa.

2. NOTE TO THE DEVELOPERS: you are not Google. You don't have to make butt-ugly sites that should be beaten with a internet ugly stick. Flickr needs to be redesigned. It's just not functional any more. I have wander aimlessly all over the place to go for one page to the next. The silly drop down boxes at the top drive me nuts. It's the only website where I can't remember how to navigate from one section to the next.

So that's my take on Flickr. I think in any case you should give the new service a try. Even if you don't have a "Pro" account, you can still view the videos. The best thing is it will only take up to 90 seconds to try...

Underground Excitement

2008-04-11T13:00:00.004-05:00

Tunnels
by Roderick Gordon

This adventure tale reads like a movie, with each chapter unveiling new twists of the plot. Most boys have felt the urge to "dig for China" at some time in their lives. Uncovering a secret underground civilization is a dream come true. But as the dream turns into a nightmare, only the courage of the main characters can bring them through.

Great fun for the 9-12 year old looking for an adventure with a touch of Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth.

Making a Name for Itself

2008-04-10T11:24:00.002-05:00

As a new voice on Really Random Reviews, I thought I'd share my favorite new fantasy novel, which has just been released in paperback.

Name of the Wind
by Patrick Rothfuss

This is a high-action story written with a poet's hand, "The Name of the Wind" is a masterpiece that will transport readers into the body and mind of a wizard.

This is the tale of the magically gifted young man who grows to be the most notorious wizard his world has ever seen. The intimate narrative of his childhood in a troupe of traveling players, his years spent as a near-feral orphan in a crime-ridden city, his daringly brazen yet successful bid to enter a legendary school of magic, and his life as a fugitive after the murder of a king form a gripping coming-of-age story unrivaled in recent literature.

If you've begun to feel like all the fantasy books you read are rehashes of "Lord of the Rings" or "Harry Potter", this is the book for you. It has the depth of a classic and storytelling that won't let you go.

Really Random Thoughts

2008-04-07T21:42:00.002-05:00

I was at the store tonight with my daughter and we were looking at the fruit snacks. Marketing people have done a great job of putting every kids brand known to mankind on the front of the fruit snack boxes.

I was reaching for my daughters requested "Nemo" snacks when I came across this diamond in the rough.

Yes, it's LEGO FRUIT SNACKS.

WTF? Do we really want kids thinking "Wow, these are great."? When they finish the box won't they just run over and devour their Lego sets next? Each "Fruit filled" piece actually LOOKS like a LEGO. Just think of the millions of dollars that were spent on the R&D alone.

I think I'm going to add this to my marketing hall of shame.

Maybe Legos should be made out of fruit snacks. Think of it. You could charge $20 for a single package that contained 10 bricks that when assembled vaguely look like a pirate and a parrot. After you are done with your little construction you could eat them. I wonder what the pirate would taste like. Probably a little salty.

"Battlestar" Comes Back and Reminds Us Why We Still Watch

2008-04-06T08:33:00.003-05:00

I have to admit that I was skeptical about the premiere of the final season of "Battlestar". I just kept thinking that the show's year long hiatus had soured the show. For such a fast-paced show, the gaps between the show seem to slow it down to a crawl.

All my skepticism dissapread within the first five minutes of the new episode on Friday night. Unfortunately, due to the "non spoiler clause" I subject myself to, I can't go into huge detail of the episode (I mean come on you should have seen it already), but I will try.

Symbolism is so important to this show. The Christ-like development of Gaiuss Baltar (James Callis) was a particularly strong force in the episode. I thought that the cinematography relating to this was first rate. This show just looks more lovely season after season. I get the same feeling watching the show that I get when I go to an art museum.

I thought that the story would be hard to get back into, but it took only a few minutes. There are a lot of interesting questions to be answered this season.
1. What really happend to Kara?
2. Will Baltar become a religious figure?
3. Now that the majority of the other Cylon models have been revealed, what will they do?
4. Who is the last Cylon?
5. What will Earth be like once the fleet gets there?

There are a lot of questions to answer in a relatively short time.

I will try and revisit this blog post after the series has been concluded to summarize the series.

Have some speculation on what we will see this season? Be sure to post it in the comments section.

Go Out An Buy 100 Copies of "Infected" Today

2008-04-01T05:54:00.002-05:00

Just wanted to take a moment for a "Really Random Commercial" for Scott Sigler's new novel "Infected" which should be hitting store shelves as we speak. I loved this podcast novel and am stoked to see it in "dead tree" form.

A special bonus from Scott and Earl Newton of "Stranger Things". They created probably the best video promo for a novel in the history of mankind. Check this out...

Go buy a copy TODAY!

The "Semi" Official Launch of RRR AV!

2008-04-01T05:26:00.005-05:00

OK, so Friday turned into Tuesday (big damn surprise).

I'm happy to announce the beginning of a new section of Really Random Reviews...our AV section. I hope to be able to post many different types of reviews and give you a little more to look at than just text. I'm also hoping that this will increase the readership of RRR as well as give myself another outlet to showcase my (questionable) creative talents.

I was working on a really awesome video that would have explained the launch, but unfortunately the audio track was eaten by a crashing Garage Band as I was getting it ready to upload last night. So what you see here is my (terrible) intro for the AV section of RRR. Can you tell that I was pissed when I shot this desperate video?

Note: This video is permanently taken down because it's not working well with Firefox. (you aren't missing anything).

Don't worry, this isn't the type of video I'm hoping to post regularly. I will be experimenting will all sorts of fun ways to bring you great reviews.

We will still provide you with great reviews of "mainstream" products, but I really want to showcase the talents of everyone out there on the web. I am going to try and incorporate as much Creative Commons works as I can into my reviews. I will also be diving deep into the web to bring you exclusive stuff that you may not already know about.

Give me a few weeks to complete the site redesign as well as get a few test videos out there. Then let me know what you think.

OK, I suck

2008-03-31T22:17:00.006-05:00

I admit it. I promised the review for Stargate: The Ark of Truth 2 weeks ago, and it didn't get posted. I thought it was going to be easier than it was. I found that I could not give the succinct backstory I wanted to, because I kept adding in "just one more vital fact" until it would be about 3 pages long.

The long and the short of it is, I liked it. I thought it was a fitting end to a great storyline that unfortunately got cut short by the SciFi channel's abrupt cancellation of the series (they thought Battlestar Galactica did not need the Stargate lead in, only to see ratings drop substantially when it didn't have it anymore).

I think that they glossed over the moral dilemma initially presented in the film (If a bunch of people believe something that is truly wrong, is it ok to brainwash them?), and I found it distracting that the white streak of Teal'c's hair kept changing sides of his head (especially during the long mountain trek). I mean really, can't CGI take care of stuff like that now?

Anyway, if I ever get the original review into any semblance of order, I will post it, but all in all, I thought Ark of Truth was great, and look forward to the next installment movie, Stargate: Continuum. (I think that is what it is called)

Future Upgrades

2008-03-24T21:01:00.001-05:00

Attention RRR people.

I am going to be trying a new format in the next few days. It will be in addition to our regular weekly reviews. Just something I'm playing around with.

I hope you like it. I hope to have it up by Wed, but let's just say that it will most likely be done by Friday.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Horton Hears A ROAR!!!!

2008-03-24T20:57:00.001-05:00

Last weekend was a special weekend. One that I thought would serve as a right of passage for my three year old daughter. Going to her first movie!

She had been excited about it all day. She was practically straining to get out of her car seat as we went in to the movie theater. She started wide-eyed at all the video games, concessions, and movie posters. I was a proud parent. Being the entertainment geek that I am, I was so excited.

My first movie was "The Legend of the Lone Ranger". I can still remember when the lights went down and the movie started how fascinated I was. I was hoping that Lilly would feel that as well.

The movie started out great. I thought the story was engaging (even though I just can't physically stand Jim Carrey). I'm sure most of you have read the Dr. Seuss book, so I won't even pretend to give you the plot.

The animation was very good. Sometimes, however, I felt that the movie was trying really hard to be LIKE a Pixar movie and not trying to stay true to the Dr. Seuss vision. A lot of the visuals were nicely done and brought a lot of the original illustrations to life.

The voice tallent was the part of the movie that just kept pulling me out of the flow of the movie. Save for Steve Carell's great job as the "Mayor", the rest of the voices seemed to just be recycled from the last twelve animated kinds movies. I think they could have been a little more creative in their voice choices.

That was my impression. Of course I was the only one of the three of us to actually see the whole movie. I hadn't counted on the fact that Lilly had never seen a gigantic screen before. I think that Horton was way too huge for her. She was scared almost from the start. I don't think she was used to the booming sound either. I felt bad for her. I guess that mega giant screens are just too much for three year olds.

So I guess it will be a while until we go back to the theaters. Either that or I will have to start playing my home theater a bit louder.

So I guess I would give "Horton" four stars out of five, but I think Lilly would have to give it one star out of five.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

1 day delay

2008-03-17T18:42:00.001-05:00

My normal Monday review will be 1 day late because the netflix movie I wanted to review did not arrive until after I left for the weekend to visit my dad, who had triple bypass surgery a couple of weeks ago.

Look here tomorrow for a review of Stargate: Ark of Truth.

Some Really Excellent Spam

2008-03-14T05:50:00.002-05:00

From time to time, I look through my junk folder to see the state of spam.

I get (on average) about 800 pieces of spam a day. Most are filtered out through a triple layer of spam filtration, but a few still get in my inbox.

Now I know that I have found the poet laureate of all spams. I know that this was probably lifted from a book, but if it wasn't, I want to hire the person that wrote this. The amazing thing was that I feel like emailing the person back and asking for MORE! I want to know what happens.

***SPAM EXERPT FOLLOWS ***** (in original formatting)

g coffee; then, seating her in the ladies' room charged her on no account to stir from that point while he was gone--he had just time to run around to the post-office, and mail a forgotten letter; then he vanished, and in the confusion and the crowd Ester was alone She did not feel, in the least, flurried or nervous; on the contrary, she liked it, this first experience of hers in a city depot; she would not have had it made known to one of the groups of fashionably-attired and very-much-at-ease travelers who thronged past her for the world--but the truth was, Ester had been having her very first ride in the cars! Sadie had made various little trips in company with school friends to adjoining towns, after school books, or music, or to attend a concert, or for pure fun; but, though Ester had spent her eighteen years of life in a town which had long been an "Express Station," yet want of time, or of money, or of inclination to take the bits of journeys which alone were within her reach, had kept her at home Now she glanced at herself, at her faultlessly neat and ladylike traveling suit She could get a full view of it in an opposite mirror, and it was becoming, from the dainty vail which fluttered over her hat, to the shining tip of her walking boots; and she gave a complacent little sigh, as she said to herself "I don't see but I look as much like a traveler as any of them I'm sure I don't feel in the least confused I'm glad I'm not as ridiculously dressed as that pert-looking girl in brown I should call it in very bad taste to wear such a rich silk as that for traveling She doesn't look as though she had a single idea beyond dress; probably that is what is occupying her thoughts at this very moment;" and Ester's speaking face betrayed contempt and conscious superiority, as she watched the fluttering bit of silk and ribbons opposite Ester had a very mistaken opinion of herself in this respect; probably she would have been startled and indignant had any one told her that her supposed contempt for the rich and elegant attire displayed all around her, was really the outgrowth of envy; that, when she told herself _she_ wouldn't lavish so much time and thought, and, above all, _money_, on mere outside show, it was mere nonsense--that she already spent all the time at her disposal, and all the money she could possibly spare, on the very things which she was condemning The truth was, Ester had a perfectly royal taste in all these matters Give her but the wherewithal, and she would speedily have glistened in silk, and sparkled with jewels; yet she honestly thought that her bitter denunciation of fashion and folly in this form was outward evidence of a mind elevated far above such trivial subjects, and looked down, accordingly, with cool contempt on those whom she was pleased to denominate "butterflies of fashion" And, in her flights into a "higher sphere of thought," this absurdly inconsistent Ester never once remembered how, just exactly a week ago that day, she had gone around like a storm king, in her own otherwise peaceful home, almost wearing out the long-suffering patience of her weary mother, rendered the house intolerable to Sadie, and actually boxed Julia's ears; and all because she saw with her own common-sense eyes that she really _could_ not have her blue silk, or rather Sadie's blue silk, trimmed with netted fringe at twelve shillings a yard, but must do with simple folds and a seventy-five-cent heading! Such a two weeks as the last had been in the Ried family! The entire household had joined in the commotion produced by Ester's projected visit It was marvelous how much there was to do Mrs Ried toiled early and late, and made many quiet little sacrifices, in order that her daughter might not feel too keenly the difference between her own and her cousin's wardrobe Sadie emptied what she denominated her finery box, and donated every article in it, delivering comic little lectures to each bit of lace and ribbon, as she smoothed them and patted them, and told them they were going to New York Julia hemmed pocket handkerchiefs, and pricked her poor little fingers unmercifully and uncomplainingly Alfred ran of errands with remarkable promptness, but confessed to Julia privately that it was because he was in such a hurry to have Ester gone, so he could see how it would seem for everybody to be good natured Little Minie got in everybody's way as much as such a tiny creature could, and finally brought the tears to Ester's eyes, and set every one else into bursts of laughter, by bringing a very smooth little handkerchief about six inches square, and offering it as her contribution toward the traveler's outfit As for Ester, she was hurried and nervous, and almost unendurably cross, through the whole of it, wanting a hundred things which it was impossible for her to have, and scorning not a few little trifles that had been prepared for her by patient, toil-worn fingers "Ester, I _do_ hope New York, or Cousin Abbie, or somebody, will have a soothing and improving effect upon you," Sadie had said, with a sort of good-humored impatience, only the night before her departure "Now that you have reached the summit of your hopes, you seem more uncomfortable about it than you were even to stay at home Do let us see you look pleasant for just five minutes, that we may have something good to remember you by" "My dear," Mrs Ried had interposed, rebukingly, "Ester is hurried and tired, remember, and has had a great many things to try her to-day I don't think it is a good plan, just as a family are about to separate, to say any careless or foolish words that we don't mean Mother has a great many hard days of toil, which Ester has given, to remember her by" Oh, the patient, tender, forgiving mother! Ester, being asleep to her own faults, never once thought of the sharp, fretful, half disgusted way in which much of her work had b

***AND IT JUST ENDS*****

Pretty damn smart. I paid attention to the viagra ad just so I could read what was going on.

Journeyman

2008-03-10T19:57:00.003-05:00

This (brief) last season of television was a milestone for science fiction. Thanks to the success of “Heros”, “Lost”, and “Battlestar Galactica” network television executives were nearly tripping over themselves to get any sort of sci-fi content on TV.

A lot of these shows were clearly not going to make it after just a few episodes. There were a couple, however, that really stood out for me. These shows deserved to stay on the air, but faced with the writer’s strike, they ended up canceled and relegated to the $25.00 bin of your local Best Buy.

Journeyman by far the best of these “died too young” shows. The show was intelligent, well thought out, and well acted. It’s rare that a show grips me as much as this one did (the last was Joss Wheadon’s: “Firefly”).

The show centers around reporter Dan Vasser (played smartly by Kevin McKidd). Vasser suddenly finds his perfect life torn apart when he starts mysteriously traveling through time for brief periods of time. During his travels through time, he finds that he is drawn to play a role in the lives of certain people that he encounters. By doing this he changes their lives as well as the future.

His travels are rooted in the present by his wife Katie (Gretchen Egolf). In a first for a series of this type, Katie knows about Dan’s travels and actively helps him. It would have been outrageously simple to have Dan do all this “traveling” while sneaking around and not telling his wife. By having Katie be a complete person, the show adds more layers of complexity.

The funny thing about “Journeyman” is that there really is no “bad guy” in the show. Everyone is viewed as a complete person with both good and bad sides.

I will be the first to admit that the premise of the show is very much like “Quantum Leap”. However, unlike “Quantum Leap” this show doesn’t pretend to explain what is going on with Dan’s “travels” right away. The trips back and forth through time almost seem to fade into the background as the strong writing and acting prominently stand out. The story is what draws you in, but the great cast is what seals the deal.

I’m not going to give away a lot of the numerous surprises that are in store for you if you haven’t seen “Journeyman” yet, but I will warn you that this show falls into the “TV 2.0” model of complex storytelling. Like its brothers “Heros” and “Lost” the show almost serves as a mini movie. It’s easier to watch an entire season in a month of viewing vs. watching it as it airs. If you watch it weekly (with commercials) a lot of the foreshadowing is missed.

The show is still available on NBC.com to view online or you can support the show by purchasing all 13 episodes on iTunes.

Give it a shot, you won’t be disappointed.

Wiialerts.com, the best way to find a Wii online

2008-03-03T13:45:00.005-06:00

(Note: I am covering for Jamie this week because he has a very sick child who needed tons of attention this weekend, he does not have to give a charitable donation at this time)

About six weeks ago, my husband was over at our neighbor's house in a Salt Lake suburb, and was introduced to Guitar Hero on the Wii. He called me up and said "We need to get a Wii". I have been debating on whether or not we actually wanted any game console, and my husband previously stated he wanted an X-Box, but I had decided that if we were to get a console, I would prefer the Wii. I was therefore pleased that he also now wanted one.

Since Christmas was over, I figured there would be little problem getting my hands on one. Boy was I naive! They were nearly impossible to find in retail stores either here in Philadelphia or in Utah and most of my favorite online stores were continually out of stock. Some stores had the consoles "bundled" with a bunch of games that I wouldn't want, and for a very high price, and I didn't want to pay $700 for a $250 console with a bunch of games I would never play. I was also wary of going the eBay route with something like this, mostly because I resent people who are buying the limited number of consoles available only to make a profit.

My goal was to find a console at as close to list price as possible, or at least a bundle that contained accessories or games that were useful. The problem was how to find one when it became available. Most people I know who have obtained their Wiis at brick and mortar stores were at the store when a shipment arrived. Sharking at the nearest KMart wasn't a option, so I wanted a safe and reliable way to find out when one of my preferred online stores had some available for purchase.

I don't remember how I discovered the web page Wiialerts.com, but it was exactly what I was looking for. They have some way of determining when certain web vendors have Wiis (or certain games, DS units of specific color combinations, other consoles, etc), and they send you an e-mail, or text or send a voice alert to your cell phone. They recommend the text message, as it is consistently faster than the e-mail (if you are not logged in to that e-mail account, for example). I didn't want to give them my cell phone number, so I only signed up for the e-mail alerts, figuring I would get it in time. I signed up for Circuit City, Sears.com, Costco.com and Amazon.com alerts.

I received my first e-mail a day or so later. I read it about 8 minutes after it was sent, and I missed the opportunity to buy one by about 6 minutes. I realized that they were correct about the text messages, and so I signed up my cell phone number.

Over the next few weeks, I received an occasional text message, but failed to obtain a Wii. The Sears ones tended to show up in the middle of the night when I didn't hear the text alert, one of the Amazon alerts arrived when I was in a meeting and didn't have my phone with me, and the one last Friday was unsuccessful because I didn't have an account set up on Costco.com, even though they recommend you get all of your info and CC information in before hand to make it easier. (To my credit, my husband had already set up a costco.com account, but didn't remember the username/password combo when I needed it). I set up my own account last Friday when the alert came through, but I wasn't fast enough to get the Wii (they sold out in about 3 minutes).

Today was my lucky day! I was just sitting down at my desk to do a calculation, and my cell phone beeped. It was wiialerts! I went to their web page, clicked on the Costco.com link since it was flashing the green In Stock sign, logged in, and bought my Wii bundle! It is a good bundle, containing the Wii console, the Wii Play game set with additional controller/nunchuk, and the game Super Mario Galaxy, both of which I intended to buy anyway (I love the Mario games!), for $350.00.

Wiialerts.com is great. They promised no spam or unsolicited e-mail, and they have been good to their word. I'm not sure how they get the revenue to support themselves but I imagine clicking on their links to the vendors generates some revenue, and they have a voluntary donation program via Google checkout or Paypal. If you are in the market for a Nintendo Wii, I highly recommend them. Notice however, that I did not post this until I had my Wii safely ordered, they do randomize their mailing and cell alert lists so that everyone gets a fair chance, and I didn't want anyone getting my Wii before me ;-).

Chips Ahoy Cookies

2008-02-25T18:36:00.003-06:00

I don't like to keep a lot of junk food in the house. If it isn't there, I obviously won't eat it. If I have chips in the kitchen, they are usually BBQ, because I don't like them and my husband does. On the other hand, I really like to have a little something sweet at about 8:30PM or so, and sometime I just want a cookie. I like to bake, but freshly made baked goods only last a couple of days and then you have to eat it before it goes bad, which defeats the purpose of not keeping junk food in the house. So I like to keep some store bought cookies in the cupboard for my evening craving.

My husband likes Oreos, and I like them okay, but sometimes the cream filling is too much for me. My favorite cookie is Chips Ahoy cookies. There are just the right number of chocolate chips, they dip well in milk or tea, and 2 or 3 can satisfy my sweets craving. They also come in whole grain and low fat variety. I don't like the whole grain version, but the low fat version isn't bad.

The best thing is that when I was visiting my parents a couple of weeks ago, my mom and I found them at the local warehouse store (BJ's), 4 packages for ~$6. Since my husband is out of town a lot, I can keep them around for a while, since I have a little more self restraint than he does when it comes to cookies.

They are really the perfect cookie. They are not to sweet, their packaging keeps them fresh, and there are a reasonable number of them in each package. One package lasts me about 2 weeks, at least when my husband doesn't get his hands on them (hee). As an added bonus, I always have a glass of milk with my cookies, so I get my calcium as well as my goodies.

What are your favorite treats?

Apple TV: Take 2

2008-02-18T09:24:00.001-06:00

I was both excited and discouraged to hear Steve Jobs talk about the new Apple TV Take 2 at Macworld. As an early Apple TV (Take 1?) adopter, I thought I would be left out in the cold like so many other Apple products. This was not to be the case. Apple announced a firmware upgrade for the old Apple TV that would give it basically THE SAME CAPABILITIES as the new "Take 2". This was the move that once again endeared Apple to my already Mac lusting heart. Even more importantly it proved that they can admit when things are wrong.

I'll break this review down into five sections and let you know what's up with the "Take 2" and why I see this as the future of media at home.

It's a wifi "collector" for all your media
Updating the software was a breeze. It took about ten minutes and suddenly I had an all new device. The first thing I noticed was that all my media (no matter what the computer) showed up on the Apple TV. I was able to see and stream video effortlessly. A previous problem that I had hated with the Apple TV was that if you streamed content, it did not remember where you left off the next time you started the stream. This effectively forced you to put your content on the Apple TV's relatively small hard drive. With the new update, that has been fixed. Now I really don't have to rely on my hard drive at all. All my music, movies, podcasts, and TV shows have streamed effortlessly.

The interface just rocks!
The "Take 2" interface has changed to actually use the screen real estate that comes with your wide screen TV. The main menu flies into any screen that you are looking at by just hitting the "menu" button on your remote (a topic for a later rant). Accessing your personal content (Movies, Podcasts, TV Shows, and Pictures) appears almost exactly the same as the original software. Your content sails by as you navigate through the menus. The most impressive new addition the ability to directly link to the iTunes music store. Best of all, my non-techie wife can use it effortlessly (a feat only matched by the Tivo interface).

You can buy stuff without getting off your lazy ass
I was ok with the original concept of buying stuff from you computer and then transfering it to the Apple TV, but I had been waiting for the direct link to iTunes that the "Take 2" update finally gave us. In the first two hours of testing it out, I found myself wandering in the iTunes store right there on my TV. All of the products in the store have short previews, just like iTunes on your computer. I found myself checking out old episodes of "The A Team" and "Scooby-Doo" (hey, don't judge) and my finger was lingering over the "buy" button each time. Just to test out the interface, I purchased an episode of "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" for my daughter. The download began right away and the show was available to view withing the first 20 seconds. After it fully downloaded, it synced with my iMac and showed up in the "TV Shows" section of iTunes. This is a very dangerous concept. It was so cheap and easy to access the content on the Apple TV, that for a brief time, I actually found myself considering giving up cable and just relying on the content from iTunes. If you are not a big sports fan, having a Netflix and Apple TV would be a cost savings over the huge cable bill that we all seem to have to pay. Did I mention that you can buy music like this as well? Truly addicting.

You can share and view photos with ease
I have been thinking about getting my parents a Mac Mini for Christmas next year. Now I think I'm just going to save some money and get them an Apple TV instead. Let's face it, my whole goal with buying my parents a computer was to get them easily view photos of their granddaughter . "Take 2" now supports Flickr accounts as well as .Mac. This will allow my parents to just turn on the TV and view up to date photos and movies of everything we are doing. Flickr integration also means that you can now access your friends' accounts as well. "Take 2" also lets you use any of you or your friends accounts for screen savers. This would be a nice bragging piece for my Mom when her friends come over for coffee.

Welcome to surround sound
Suddenly, my personal DVD's that I had ripped were booming at me in 5.1 surround sound. It shocked me at first because I didn't know that surround sound was part of the update. Finally, some of the TV shows that I had purchased from iTunes sounded good on my home theater.

Ok, there are a few drawbacks.
1. The system seems more sluggish than it did before.
2. That damn little remote control is starting to get on my nerves. At first I was excited about how small it was, but after loosing it for the 100th time in the couch, I'm hoping that Apple will release a remote with GPS. That way, I can navigate directly to it.
3. You need a big hard drive SOMEWHERE in your house. Your content has to live somewhere. If you are serious about the Apple TV and want to transfer a bunch of your content from DVD as well as purchasing new stuff from the iTunes music store, you are going to need a pretty big hard drive. I would recommend at least 500GB to start with.

If you are contemplating making the move to a media center, think about the Apple TV. The combination of your personal content, iTunes movies, TV shows, podcasts, and music will keep you entertained for years to come.

Whiskas Temptations, the ultimate kitty treat

2008-02-11T18:53:00.000-06:00

For those of us whose pets are our children, finding treats that they like is important. Both of our animals get Science Diet dry food, and Dippy gets wet food once a week as a treat (Abby doesn't need a wet food treat because she occasionally gets table scraps in her bowl (from me) or from the plate (from my husband). Abby also gets rawhide bones and hard biscuits as incentive to go into her kennel. he has a favorite treat that is none of the above that I will review at a later time.

I have tried a variety of treats on Dipstick with mixed results. In contrast to my mother's cat, Midnight, she doesn't seem to like catnip very much. I have bought almost every pouch, canister, or bag of cat treats and the hands down, ultimate favorite is Whiskas Temptations, creamy dairy flavor (in the purple bag), although the other flavors of Temptations are also acceptable. They are crunchy on the inside and soft on the inside.

All I have to do is shake the bag and she comes running from wherever she is to get her little pile of treats. I used to keep them on a low bookshelf next to her kitty house, and have had to move them to the top of the fridge because she jumps up at night or while I am at work, gets the bag by either knocking it off of the shelf or picking it up in her teeth, and claws it open to get at the creamy, crunchy goodness inside. I swear they are like kitty crack.

I was a little afraid that she was eating too many in a day so I cut back to about 10 each, 2 times a day. Whiskas recently changed the package slightly to indicate that there are only 2 calories per treat, so I feel ok with giving her that many.

They aren't really expensive. In Salt Lake they were about $1.50 a bag. Here in Philadelphia, they are more expensive in the grocery store, but actually cheaper ar PetSmart, so I get them there.

If you have cats in your life, get them Whiskas Temptations in whatever flavor they like, but I have it from multiple sources that the Purple bag is the bomb with many cats. It is Dipstick approved!

Revision3 Is The Future Of Online Media

2008-02-03T23:24:00.001-06:00

Note: I have reviewed Revision3 in the past, but the new shows and updates to Rev3 has inspired me to once again give it a look.

Last year, I spent some time reviewing Revision3, the emerging online giant that I believe will be the next big thing.

For those of you not familiar with Revision3, it's a great place for tech geeks like myself to find tech related video shows (let's call it "geekertainment"). With the demise of Tech TV a few years ago, most of the tech related celebrities vanished. Two years ago, they started popping up all over the internet. They started net videos, podcasts, and even companies. Then suddenly, they all seemed to show up on Revision3.

There are a lot of positives to this company. If you head over to the Revision3 website, you will see one of the best designed sites anywhere on the net. The experience allows you to enjoy their shows anywhere you want to.

Rev3 has recently built a state of the art production facility in San Fransisco to produce its shows. They can produce shows cheaply and way under the budget of any Hollywood studio. The shows are paid for by ads that run on the shows terms, not the advertiser.

Their distribution method is purely over the net. Shows arrive via RSS podcast feeds, or just a simple download from their website. Downloads can range from low quality portable video files to high def files.

While still heavily tech focused, Rev3 shows are branching out into other topics including comedy, entertainment, and music (all still with a slightly geeky bent). This doesn't take away from my enjoyment of almost every show that they produce.

Their new shows are simple spot on.
1. The Digg Reel: It's "America's Funniest Home Videos" for the web or at least the most popular videos on Rev3's sister site Digg.
2. Tekzilla: For those of you "Screen Savers" fans, this show is the rebirth of that show. It highlights tech news, demos, and questions.
3. Internet Superstar: The next iteration of Martin Sargent. The only think I can compare it to is the "anti" Diggnation.
4. Giga Om Show: Tech startup journalist Om Malik hosts probably one of the most informative weekly shows out there about startup companies and their founders.

Watching "The Revision3 Gazette" is my favorite show. It gives you a behind the scenes look at what is going on in the company. You almost feel like you are there and have a stake in the companies success or failure. Plus working there looks like it would be so damn much fun.

There are a few drawbacks (hey, it couldn't be a 100% positive review). Right now, they have at least one show for each "geeky" tech demographic. I think as the online media world expands, they are going to have to branch out into more "traditional" areas of entertainment. They should be looking for sports, business, and news based shows. The trick will be to give them a special formula that will draw views to them for being fresh and exciting.

Revision3 has it close to being right. Their most popular show "Diggnation" draws more viewers per week than most medium ranked cable shows. This is a model that is going to work. Hopefully, we can look back in a few years and appreciate what Revision3 did for the future of media on the web.

Blogged with Flock

Welcome back to the point and click adventure game

2008-01-28T14:16:00.000-06:00

I have been a BIG fan of the adventure game for about 15 years now, back when there was EGA (or even CGA) graphics (look it up if you are under 30 and don't know what these are), Soundblaster cards were just coming out (you mostly had to rely on an internal speaker), and you actually had to TYPE IN commands for your character to perform. I spent many hours, and many dollars, playing the Leisure Suit Larry games (The second one was my favorite, so many ways to die!), the Quest for Glory games, the Space Quest games, the King's Quest games, and the Gabriel Knight games, to name a few (Sierra On-line was my favorite company to get games from). LucasArts also had some great games, The Monkey Island Series, Grim Fandango, and Day of the Tentacle, to name some of my favorites from that studio. My favorite game of all time is The Longest Journey by Funcom.

Unfortunately, my love of these action-adventure games wasn't to last. Not because I became tired of them, but because companies stopped making them, instead concentrating on the horrible first person shooter genre, sports franchise games, and other games that cater to the non thinking lowest common demoninator of 14 year old boy (I'm not bitter). Sierra On-line was sold to Vivendi Universal, which gutted the company and stopped making the classic adventure games. LucasArts also abandoned their wonderful adventure series, and instead now focuses on endless Star Wars games. Funcom recently came out with a sequel to The Longest Journey called Dreamfall, which was good, but it added some clunky combat sequences, it was quite a bit shorter, and they left a cliffhanger ending with no indication when the next installment will come out. LucasArts produced two additional games that I did not play (and still haven't, actually), based on a 6 foot anthropomorphic dog named Sam, and a clearly disturbed 3 foot rabbit named Max. They were quite popular, but the series was stopped at 2 games by 1995 (Sam and Max Hit the Road, and Sam And Max: Freelance Police).

Fast Forward to 2005. A company named Telltale Games (comprised of some ex-LucasArts employees, according to Wikipedia) released a new Sam and Max point and click game. The most interesting thing about this new game was that it was released in 6 "episodes" over the course of 6 months. The episodes were available for download from the Telltale site on the day of its release. Each episode was avilable individually for about $9 each, or the entire season for about $35.00. I played the game last year and totally loved it! As an added bonus, anyone who purchased the entire season could get the season on CD for the cost of shipping.

Each episode was a self contained adventure, with them all leading to a concluding episode that brought them all together. The different characters were very quirky and interesting, my favorite is Bosco, the "inconvenience" store down the street from Sam and Max. The situations are silly, and the solutions frequently bizarre, but those are hallmarks of a great adventure game.

The series was so successful that Telltale is producing a second series. There are currently two episodes available for a 5 episode series. I highly recommend both series, but must point out that despite the fact that Sam and Max are cartoon characters, these are NOT kids games. There isn't anything dirty or profane, but te humor would definitely be more appreciated by a mature audience.

So there is still hope for the classic point and click adventure game. At some point later this year, another ex LucasArts employee is releasing another game called "A Vampyre Story". In addition, Telltale has another classic point and click game available for sale. It is by a company called Himalaya Studios called Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman Mine. At first you may find the "hero" Al Emmo, a annoying little pipsqueak, but by the end of the game, you will totally love him, I promise! This game also has great puzzles, many different locations, and great characters. (if the game is not currently available on the Telltale site, check back occasionally ,they were revamping the site to make the authentication easier for games they didn't actually produce).

All in all, I am quite optimistic about the future of the classic computer adventure game. I should mention that one additional feature that is important to me is that the game is playable on a PC, since I don't have a gaming console (only a Gameboy DS Lite).

Go play the Sam and Max games and Al Emmo! The more people who buy these games, the more likely even more will be made.

Let me know if you knw of any other games that I may have missed in this much loved (by me) genre.

American Gladiators: Welcoming Back An Old Friend

2008-01-21T19:56:00.000-06:00

Let’s take a second to remember what the late ’80’s were like. George Bush was in the White House, the economy was going in the crapper and the quality shows that us 30 somethings watched as kids were starting to go away. “Knight Rider” had driven into the sunset, The “A-Team” had pitied their last fool, and “Battlestar Galactica” had (gulp) produced Galactica 1980.

In 1989, I was desperate to watch something different. In North Dakota, we used to watch “Star Trek: The Next Generation” on Saturday nights. Right before ST:TNG started was a show that was near and dear to my heart; “American Gladiators”.

The show proved to be one of the first “reality” shows. This was an actual event that pitted contestants against larger than life “gladiators” in tests of strength and endurance.

Fast forward to the present. George Bush is in the White House again (in a much scarier form), the economy is slowly sliding into the crapper and our beloved kids shows are being re-imagined. Now was the right time to bring back American Gladiators. I’m sure that the writers strike helped to bring the show back (I mean come on, it writes itself) and I’m glad it did.

NBC has done a good job modernizing the show. A lot of the old events are back (as well as the spandex), but there is something more exciting about this show than the original. Unfortunately, I can’t seem to totally isolate the reason I like to watch it. Sometimes I think it’s the nostalgia of being a kid again, cheering for the underdogs to beat the always arrogant (or just plain creepy) Gladiators.

The first two episodes of the show were shown back to back. This was a great idea because not only did it really get you into the show, but it reintroduced us to the games and the concepts behind “Gladiators”. In those first two episodes alone, we saw busted knees and bloody faces...two things you are never going to see on “American Idol”.

The Gladiators are top notch and in many ways better than the original. They seem to be just the right amount of “Mortal Combat” without actually ripping the spinal column out of the contestants. They are good at what they do and very impressive physically. It will be interesting to see how they change as new gladiators are added in the future.

Hopefully the show can inspire kids to get out and get some exercise perhaps inspired by the contestants and the gladiators. That is until the “American Gladiators” X-box game is released.

Overall, I think the show is great. There are (of course) a few bad points to the show.

The choice of Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali was just terrible. I see what they are doing trying to appeal the the wrestling and boxing crowd, but I always thought the show appealed to the football crowd more. I just can’t stand Hulk throwing out a “brother” every two minutes. This show as well as his reality show really “dropped the leg” on his career. I think the show would be better served to just get a couple of busty interviewers to appeal to the mostly male demographic.

The show also focuses on the “Olympic Story” model way too much. I really don’t care the contestant’s mother’s dog had cancer. I’m sorry if that makes me a bad person, but I really don’t care. I just want to see them get out there and kick some gladiator ass.

The nicknaming of contestants has to stop as well. I sure hope that when “The Hebrew Hammer” and “The Spider Monkey” are back working nights at McDonalds, they won’t think their names are so funny.

I believe that the show fills a niche that I didn’t even know I was missing in my life. It’s fun, exciting, and most importantly, IT’S THE ONLY THING ON. That is until “Battlestar” starts again, “Knight Rider” premiers and the “A-Team” movie is released.

Check out the promo for the show. I think the Announcer is the creepiest one of all.

The best way to watch a movie trilogy

2008-01-13T15:40:00.000-06:00

I have always been a big fan of the movie trilogy. They are like a miniseries on the big screen. You get to know the characters better, and have something to look forward to in waiting for the next installment. Among my favorites have been the original Star Wars trilogy, the Indiana Jones trilogy of the 80s, and the more recent Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean trilogies (I was not a fan of the episodes I-III of Star Wars, or of the Matrix movies).

One downside of the trilogy used to be that you could forget subtle plot points while waiting for the next installment. This could be especially vexing if that point became important in the next installment, but it also could lead to missing the subtleties of a small internal joke. This is not such an issue anymore with the development of VCRs and DVDs, where you can rent or buy the movie and refresh your memory before the next comes out in theaters.

This past holiday season, my husband received the 3rd Pirates of the Caribbean movie (Dead Man's Chest) on DVD. He actually missed the theater release, while I saw it when it came out. I remember thinking that I should have re-watched the first 2 before seeing the third, because I was sure I was missing something, so I suggested we watch them in order. He was agreeable to this, so in the days after Christmas, we watched all 3. We did it over 2 days.

It was totally fantastic! It did help on some minor plot points, but where it really shone through was with the subtle jokes. For example, I had totally forgotten Barbosa's obsession with apples from the first movie, so totally missed the relevance of him having apples all of the time. Additionally, it made the second movie much stronger when you looked at it as simply the middle of a longer movie.

The same thing holds true for The Lord of the Rings trilogy. We watched the extended versions of all 3 on New Year's eve and New Year's Day (quite the marathon session, but really fun). The second movies of trilogies seem to hold up much better that way.

I remember about 10-15 years ago, the USA network used to show all 3 Star Wars (Eps 4-6) in a row on Christmas day. My dad and I used to watch them, and I looked forward to it every year. I now know that watching trilogies as if they were actually one long film is actually the best way to view them, especially if you have already enjoyed them in the theater.

(as an aside, I would recommend listening to the director's and writers' comments for the Lord for the Rings movies. It was very interesting to hear the logic in why they changed things from the books, and how some of the special effects were done.)

National Treasure: Book of Secrets

2007-12-30T17:51:00.000-06:00

Warning: Two things may have influenced my opinion of this film
1. This was my first time in an all digital theater watching images projected against a screen that didn't come from film.
2. This was the first movie I have seen in a theater in five months.

I remember going to the theater as a kid and seeing a movie that was just pure fun. They were movies that you don't expect any major dramatic or cinematic contribution. You demanded entertainment and it would always deliver. I remember staring wide-eyed at "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" and wanting to understand all about it. What was the history behind it? The strange locations and exotic peoples always fueled my young imagination.

Where have those movies gone?

It is a rare treat when a movie like "National Treasure" can inspire that feeling in me again. More often than not, the movies seem to be produced by one person, serial action junkie/producer Jerry Bruckheimer.

Warning: It might be best to watch the first "National Treasure" before you see the second one.

In "Book of Secrets" the second installment of the "National Treasure" franchise, we see Bruckheimer alums Nicolas Cage and Ed Harris back together on the screen. Cage does his usual stick as Ben Gates the now "successful" treasure hunter and Harris is just plain evil/good/evil/?.

Without spoiling the plot (think a lot of treasure) we see our intrepid team from the first movie find yet another hidden treasure from a bunch of cryptic clues left by our forefathers. While the premise is very far fetched, every step of this movie seemed to flow and make some weird form of sense while I was watching it. It was a movie that was fun as well as historically interesting. It made me want to go to wikipedia and learn a thing or two about the ciphers, places, documents, and historical figures that were mentioned in the movie (the bulk of which did exist). I hope that the imaginations of more than a few teens were jump started and that they went out and wanted to learn about these topics as well. If even a few of them do that, this movie will have served its purpose.

To me, the overriding theme in my mind is that a movie set in America (though we do jet off briefly to England and France) can seem as exciting than the more "exotic" locations that show up in "Indiana Jones" or "James Bond" movies. America is so rich with history that I take my hat off to Director Jon Turteltaub and Jerry Bruckheimer for helping us to rediscover it.

The breakthrough performances in my mind goes to both Jon Voight and Helen Mirren as Ben Gate's parents. Not since Sean Connery went with Harrison Ford on his "Last Crusade" has integrating parents into a story "worked" for me. Finally we see accomplished older actors doing something other than cameos as the "wise teacher/clue provider".

This movie is rated PG and it should be ok for kids. It might help to spark a belief that American History can be fun and exciting.

Oh, and a big hat off to Disney for doing a "Goofy" short at the beginning of the movie. That really worked for me. It got me in the right mindset to enjoy the main attraction.

Before the Music Dies

2007-12-28T20:54:00.000-06:00

Just got a great link from Adam Curry. It's a preview for a very interesting indie film called "Before the Music Dies". It appears to chronicle the systematic destruction of the music industry. I don't see it on Netflix yet, but it's worth a rental when and if it does appear.

I think we are losing a lot in America right now. I believe that we are starting to lose a sense of ourselves that the wonderful music of the 50's through the early 80's reflected so well. Popular music today is more about computer algorithms than appreciation.

We need to take that back AND SOON.

Take a look at the preview and decide for yourself.

The Really Random Reviews Challenge

2007-12-27T11:51:00.000-06:00

Hi there, loyal readers of the RRR blog......hello? Anyone there?

Jamie and I know we have been very bad bloggers this year. We started out well, but petered off during the middle of the year, without any really good excuses, but plenty of bad ones. We both like doing really random reviews a lot, but they do take time to do properly.

Jamie and I have been discussing the fate of the Really Random Reviews blog, and have decided to get serious this year. We are promising ourselves, and any readers we may have (hi Mom!) that we will produce at least one review a week. I think that we have decided to make our publication date on Mondays, with us alternating weeks for writing up the reviews. We can write a review anytime we like, but we will always have the Monday deadline to meet. I think we are both hoping that we will post more than one a week, but given our track record last year, I feel baby steps are the best way to go.

You may be wondering how we will enforce this pledge, since deadlines without consequences rarely mean anything. Well, we have decided that if one of us does not either write the review for the week or trade off weeks, that person has to donate $10 to the charity of their choice. We have yet to decide if it will always be the same charity, or several different charities. This way either the readers of this blog get a review that is hopefully informative and entertaining or a deserving charity gets a little bit of money.

I already beat the Monday deadline for the first week with my Diet Pepsi Vanilla post, so the next deadline is Jan 7th for Jamie.

Happy New Year Everyone!

Diet Pepsi Vanilla, an acceptable alternative

2007-12-26T21:00:00.000-06:00

I am a Mountain Dew girl, and have been since I was a child. I used to drink quite a lot of it in the past, until one day I looked at the sugar content of one can of soda, weighed out that amount in the lab, and was horrified at how much sugar one actually contained. Forty-seven grams of sugar is A LOT. One teaspoon of sugar is 4.2 grams, so each can of soda contains more than 11 teaspoons of sugar! Imagine putting that much sugar in your coffee or tea. I cut back on my soda consumption drastically after that realization, but every once in a while I would enjoy a Mountain Dew, and feel guilty.

I have managed to switch to water most of the time, and I like it. I like hot tea, and iced tea without sugar, but every once in a while I need a caffeine boost that a cup of hot tea won't satisfy, and I want a cold soda. This means to avoid the sugar, I need to drink diet soda. The problem is, I hate the aspartame aftertaste. Diet Mountain Dew is just plain gross.

I usually don't like colas, but I find Pepsi acceptable in a pinch. Diet Pepsi didn't work for me, but I wondered if one of the flavored Pepsi products would hide the taste of the aspartame enough for me. I have always like vanilla colas, so I tried diet Pepsi Vanilla.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that I liked diet Pepsi Vanilla. There is a slight aftertaste, but nothing like that compared to a plain diet soda. It also doesn't leave my mouth feeling like it is coated in sugar syrup after I drink one, which is nice.

I now keep a 12 pack of diet Pepsi Vanilla in my home, and will drink 2 or 3 a week, relatively guilt free (because I should really just be drinking water). I also occasionally get a full sugar Mountain Dew, because I just like the taste. I don't keep any at home, however, I actually have to make an effort to get it. It is nice to have a lower calorie option, however, for the occasional soda/caffeine craving. If you are also looking for such an option, give it a try!

Petmate Purrforma Litter box, an update.

2007-09-25T21:33:00.000-05:00

Well, the stupid machine made it about 9 months before the motor burned out or something, all I know is the rake will not move anymore. I tried calling Petmate several times, and had to leave messages because nobody ever ANSWERS the customer service line at the company, and still have not received a response. I can’t believe that they have the bald faced nerve to charge so much for a product that is loud, expensive to maintain and breaks down so quickly after purchasing it. I ended up purchasing a simple covered box with a little door flap so that the dog can’t get in and eat Kitty Rocha (TM my friend Brad), and it seems to be working ok. I have to scoop more often, but it is s small price to pay so I don’t have to hear the forlorn grinding of a motor that is trying to move a jammed rake.

If you are in any doubt as to my opinion of this product, NEVER BUY A PETMATE PURRFORMA XL SELF CLEANING LITTER BOX, EVER.

Back after a long break

2007-09-25T21:31:00.000-05:00

(written on Monday, September 24th)

Today I sit on an airplane to Philadelphia, and while I am captive in hollow metal tube, I thought I would catch up on some random reviews. I all of you who have been patiently waiting for new reviews, I do apologize. Things have gotten a little stressful in the the Dr. Sue household. I am currently trying to find a new job because my grant funding has run out, and it looks like I am either terribly overqualified for some positions, or lack the requisite specialized knowledge for other jobs. Apparently now that I have a Ph.D., my brain is full and I can no longer learn anything else (according to the biotech industry, anyway).

(on a side note, do interviewers really learn anything from questions like “why do you want to work here? Because I need a job, don’t really want to relocate if it can be avoided and you have great benefits? Also, I do know that clinical research and biotech research are very different from what I have been doing, but NOBODY WILL HIRE ME because I have been a postdoc for so long and am too “expensive”. The only career path where someone with 11 years of post high school education is too expensive at $50,000 a year. Everyone out there considering graduate school in the biosciences take note. Try to get a position in industry or in a clinical lab (especially for microbiology related careers) as a tech or something for a couple of years first. After you get a Ph.D., it is much harder to get your foot in the door, because, as I mentioned before, your brain is full and can’t learn any more).

But that is neither here nor there, my trip today is an interview for a position, so I am at least getting some interviews. I’ll let everyone know what is going on once I know what is going on. Truth be told, it would probably be ok to have a brief bout with unemployment, I may even be able to get some things done around the house for a change. The closets are calling to me to be cleaned and organized, any maybe I can do some (simple) home improvements, (or, I can sleep till noon, play with the pets and the neighbor kids, play games on my computer, and write more really random reviews).

On another front, Mr. Dr. Sue injured himself doing something stupid on Labor day and is still suffering. Unfortunately, there were no witnesses in our group , so I can’t go into the gory details, but in entailed a jetski, something called a ‘standing donut’ on said jetski, impact with a right hip and probably a head, falling off of the jetski, and 3 hours in the emergency room. Why do men do stupid things? Am I really supposed to feel sorry for someone who acts like a 14 year old when he is 36? Because I don’t.

Anyway, no excuses, but them’s the reasons I have been absent from the blog these days. Since I will be unemployed soon, perhaps I will update a little more regularly. One can hope.

Shooter: A Head Shot of A Conspiracy Film

2007-08-25T18:15:00.000-05:00

Just got done with "Shooter" staring Mark Wahlberg.

I still don't know how I feel about this movie. The best I can compare it to is "The Manchurian Chandidate" mixed with "The Fugitive".

The film has its good points and its bad points. I think that as a "non-think" piece, it's a good movie. As a thought provoking movie...not so much.

I think i would have enjoyed the movie better if most of the actors had been replaced (except for Wahlberg, who really holds the film together).

The message of the movie is one that I am starting to agree with. You will have to see it to find out....

I'd give it a look if you have nothing better to do. I got it on Amazon Unboxed for 99 cents, so I don't feel I was out any money.

(photo imdb)

iPhone hysteria?

2007-06-29T05:25:00.000-05:00

Just thought I would add to the media coverage and check out the ATT store here in Rochester. If there is even one person in line, I'll be impressed. This is hardly the cradle of technology. Maybe that will be an early indication of the success of the phone outside the "tech" centers of New York and San Francisco.

I'll let you know.

iPhone Rate Plans: Not bad!

2007-06-26T11:04:00.000-05:00

Apple and AT&T released their rate plans today for the iPhone. All plans include unlimited data (which is nice). I pay about $10 more a month for unlimited data on my Verizon Blackberry.

I think that those that have the money to spend on the iPhone were actually treated right by this announcement. While the iPhone isn't for everyone, those early adopters will be treated to a decent rate that is comparable to most other plans I've seen recently.

The thing that no one is really talking about is the fact that YOU choose your service, not the AT&T reps. You purchase the phone and choose the plan that best fits you the first time you sync your phone with iTunes. This makes the phone more attractive to me because I hate dealing with cell reps. This totally blocks that process. One could order from the Apple store, receive it at home, and hook it up without the up-selling pressure of a 18 year old who knows next to nothing about your needs (not to mention the "real" world).

This also makes sense for the adoption of the (fairly buggy) Safari browser on Windows. We all know that it will be the only browser that the iPhone can sync with. This could put yet another piece of Apple software on Windows machines.

It will be interesting to see if the hype pans out. At the end of the day, I would just be happy with a funtional phone that works great.

Plus we need to get this out of the way so the new iPods can be announced in the fall.

UPDATE: Forgot to add the rate plan link. Ooops!

Now Twitter Extends All The Way To Atlantis

2007-06-23T05:54:00.000-05:00

Actor David Hewlett is now Twittering. A lot of you know David from his role as Dr. Rodney McKay on Stargate Atlantis.

You can see what David is up to here. Make sure to snag his RSS feed so you don't have to check back all the time.

I'm starting to see more and more famous people using Twitter. To me, it's starting to seem like reverse paparazzi. Who cares what some photographer in the bushes can take a picture of. I just want to know what's going on directly from the lives of some of the net's (and increasingly Hollywood and Washington D.C.) biggest stars.

Look for more people to start taking advantage of this as well. Since Twitter was integrated into Facebook as an app, its popularity has exploded even more.

My lunch

2007-06-22T11:16:00.000-05:00

Holy crap!

I just realized that after trying to eat healthy for two weeks that I needed a little "pick me up".

So I ran to the underground convenience store here at my workplace and bought a Mountain Dew amp and Gardetto's Roasted Garlic Rye Chips.

Both are really not good for you, but like manna from Heaven for a guy who was swearing off bad food.

I am now suffering from what can only be described as "calorie contentness" that strange nirvana like feeling of loading up on stuff that is really bad for you.

Mountain Dew Amp is about the only energy drink that doesn't taste like strained potpourri to me. The only problem with it (and most energy drinks for me) is that I can't seem to feel any "boost" or rush of energy.

The Rye Chips are cool! I've never seen them before. I have always loved the rye chips mixed together with Gardetto's other products, but by putting them by themselves in a product was pure genius.

Now if I can only survive this afternoon without my arteries clogging....

Buffy Season Eight: Thanks Joss!

2007-06-19T17:48:00.000-05:00

Are you still bummed like I am that “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” was taken off the air in the seventh season? Did you ever wonder what happened to the Scoobies?

Well, never say that Joss Whedon doesn’t have your best interests in mind. Joss and Dark Horse Comics recently released a “Buffy Season Eight” series.

SPOILER WARNING

This story picks up a year or two after we last saw our friends. The slayers have turned into a kind of international military force to eradicate demons around the world. Buffy does a great job as their leader (as we saw in Season 7), but gives up her personal life in the process.

The main characters have all grown a lot. They seem like confident adults now, not the kids of seasons past. Their trials have hardened their outlook on life, but from time to time, we see glimpses of their old selves. Old friends and enemies return, and the greatest challenge the gang has ever faced my come from the human race itself.

I think we are going to see all sorts of new directions for the “Buffyverse”. From new characters to stuff we could have never seen on a TV budget, this new incarnation of Buffy looks to be really good.

The covers are beautiful. I was shocked when I saw them. It made me want to watch my Buffy DVD’s all over again.

Now if we could just get Seasons 2-8 of “Firefly” released as well (hint, hint Joss) I’d be happy.

Fast Food Nation

2007-06-18T18:10:00.000-05:00

Note: this movie was one of the first movies that I downloaded to my TiVo using the new Amazon Unbox service. It worked pretty well. I’m going to wait with a full review of the service until I download a few more movies.

Fast Food Nation is a so so movie. What do I mean? Am I just copping out? Not really.

FFN is an eye opening movie that once again shows that the “comedy-documentaries” (eg "Borat", any Michael Moore movie, even "Supersize Me") don’t hold water to a good Hollywood fictionalized account of reality. I feel more for these characters than most of the people I encounter in the above mentioned comedy-docs.

The story centers around the “unseen” world of fast food. A majority of the audience will finally understand questions like; where does fast food hamburger meat come from, who works in those meat production plants, and what people are REALLY like behind the counters?

Bashed by a lot of critics, this movie feels personal and does a great job of relating the trials and tribulations fast food. Lengendary indie director Richard Linkletter once again brings the “ever evolving conversation” into his movies. This is very much a dialog movie. If you are in the mood for an action flick, this one is not for you.

At the end of the movie I felt as if I wasn’t watching a propaganda piece (like I did with the majority of Michael Moore’s movies) and was actually presented a (dear god I shouldn’t say it) “Fair and balanced” look at the industry.

I would recommend this to anyone who really wants to get a glimpse of life “between the bun”.

Safari Beta -- Google works great!

2007-06-13T05:38:00.000-05:00

In a nice addition to the new Safari Beta released by Apple on Monday, it seems that all the problems that drove me away from using Safari with anything Google has now been fixed. I must say that I did forget how fast Safari moves vs. Firefox.

I'm rediscovering browser simplicity. Sure I don't have all the cool Firefox plugins, but I never really used them. Safari 3.0 beta takes me back to just tabs and speed. Isn't that what the net is all about?

I haven't had a chance to do anything with the Safari Beta on Windows yet. I would love to hear from anyone that has given it a go.

Really Random Absence

2007-06-13T05:30:00.000-05:00

Where the heck did I go?

Hmm, good question.

Things should be revving up again for the site. I'm happy to announce that life is a lot less stressful right now and I should be back to getting some great reviews out on both Really Random Reviews and Podcast Wasteland.

Don't forget, if I ever drop off the map again, you can read my instant updates on my tumblr at www.sliceoflife.tumblr.com.

Also, if you are a Facebook user, I'm happy to add you as a friend. Just search for "Jamie Sundsbak".

Second Life - I just don't get it

2007-06-04T11:43:00.001-05:00

Last year, I read an article on the first person to become a "Second Life" millionaire. This person had accumulated enough virtual wealth to become the equivalent of a millionaire in real life. At the time I had no idea what Second Life even was, so I looked into it a little.

What is Second Life, you may ask? The description from Linden Lab, the creators of the phenomenon, say "Second Life is a 3D online digital world imagined, created and owned by its residents". Residents are represented by online avatars, that they can modify to look like whatever they want, and interact with each other in the virtual world.

Second Life has its own economy, and subscribing residents are alloted a certain amount of Linden Dollars a week, based on their level of subscription. Older free accounts get a monthly allotment, but newer free accounts do not, after their initial signup. Subscribing residents can also purchase additional Linden dollars using real currency (the going rate is US$10 will buy you L$2580). These $L can be used to purchase things within the Second Life environment, like clothing, cars, even rent on housing for your avatar (I am pretty sure about this one). L$ can be converted back to real currency, although that rate isn't nearly as good (L$2580 gets you US$8.99 back). Linden Labs takes a cut of every transaction that occurs (a flat US$0.30 for buying L$ and 3.5% of the transaction for the sale of L$).

Where the real money appears to come in, however, is in the purchase of "land" in the virtual 3D world. Every paying subscriber can "own" 512 square meters of land, free of any maintenance fees (these monthly fees can get to be quite steep). Land first needs to be purchased. This is where the money comes in. More Residents want land than there is land available, so the price of land within Second Life has risen dramatically (also, you must be a premium member, at $9.95/month).

There apparently is tons of stuff to do in Second Life, social interactions, games, "creating" objects to sell to other residents, making, in fact a "second life" for yourself. It sounded terribly time consuming and actually pretty dull to me at the time, so I thought, "huh, that's interesting, but not for me", and promptly forgot about it.

Every so often in the next few months, I would see a reference to Second Life somewhere, and thought, " I should really take a look at it", but didn't. About a month ago, I changed my mind and signed myself up for a free basic account (My name is Angua Villota), just to check out the basics.

Well, I was not impressed. Your avatar starts out in a basic tutorial site, where you are supposed to learn the basics, like how to move around, how to buy things, how to change the physical appearance of your avatar, etc. There is a tutorial window that is supposed to help you through the 4 sections that teach you things, but I accidentally closed it and couldn't figure out how to reopen it, even after extensive searches in the Knowledge base.

After the basic tutorials, you go onto Help Island, where you are supposed to figure out how to do more complicated things, like build items. This was very frustrating for me, because the instructions are displayed on these huge billboards, which in a word, Suck. Most of the time, when I tried to advance to the next screen of text, it came out really blurry and completely unreadable. I would have to reload it multiple times to get to view it.

I really didn't find Help Island all that helpful.

The other annoyance was the other newbies that either kept bumping into me all of the time, or just walking right in front of me when I was trying to learn something and blocking my view.

I stayed on Help Island as long as I could stand it (because once you leave it you can never go back), not really learning very much, getting pushed around, and being invited to join several "harems" of mostly Greek men for some reason. I decided to take the plunge into the "real" second life.

I teleported in. I now am in some random place with little understanding where I am and what to do. I may go back sometime and try and figure this out, but most likely I will not. I did not find any of the experience fun or remotely interesting.

Doing a little research, it seems that Second Life and Linden Labs are having several issues. They have been going through explosive growth the past 6-8 months, and their servers can't keep up. Members are worried about losing their inventories. I won't go into details here, but several high profile members have published an open letter to Linden Labs asking them to address major concerns. I think they are being responsive, but time will tell.

This review is NOT a knock on the scores of people who have figured out the fun and interesting parts of Second Life. I am glad that they can enjoy it. I certainly spend my fair share of time on my computer, working, playing games, and reading the news. I just don't see the point of spending so much time, and money on a virtual life. I would rather deal with the issues and relationships of my "first" life.

Webnation: The Next Evolution of Tech News (from www.podcastwasteland.com)

2007-05-22T20:04:00.000-05:00

Webnation is a new show (yes, it’s on TV too) in Canada that features “commandN” and former TechTV-Canada host Amber Macarther. The show is very TV “overproduced”, but the spirit of a podcast is still in the show.

The show feels a bit like “Entertainment Tonight” for the Web 2.0 generation. You can usually see a few YouTube clips and at least one interview (done expertly with a chat client) with a notable web celebrity.

The length of the show is just right. Too much more and the average web user’s ADD would kick in.

Amber does a great job with the show. My only complaint is the studio is a bit geeky. I love what she does with the look and feel of commandN. Web 2.0 almost seems to have an “urban” vibe for me, not the techie geeky background that looks like a NASA control center.

Thankfully, that is a very minor complaint. I recommend Webnation to anyone who wants to get a weekly fix of their tech headlines. This show is definitely THE blueprint for what new media will look like in the future.

CarTech from CNET: A Great Ride

2007-05-21T20:00:00.001-05:00

Note: This post originally appeared on our sister site Podcast Wasteland.

Hosted by one of the best voices in podcasting, Brian Cooley, Car Tech gives a great roundup of the newest technology for your car. From navigation to sound systems, Car Tech has it all.

The pacing is fast and really well done. The show primarily consists of the latest car tech news, interviews with industry experts, and then we ride along on an audio test drive of a brand new car.

Now if I could just figure out how to get that job.........

Car Tech is one of the most original podcasts that internet powerhouse CNET puts out. It’s nice to finally see CNET not replicating the same tech show over and over (ala Crave, Que, and Buzz Out Loud).

If you are interested in cars and/or technology, this is a great podcast for you.

Really Random Hmmmm.

2007-05-21T14:44:00.000-05:00

Seems like my electric motorcycle thought the other day has actually been done.

Thanks to George for pointing this out.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/blogs/automotive_news/4216271.html

Dell makes inroads to design

2007-05-18T09:58:00.001-05:00

Looks like Dell might be doing something a little different.

Check out the new monitors via the Crave Blog.

I have long felt that Dell was falling way behind. This might give them some actual legitimacy again.

The Prestige: Pres-sucks

2007-05-18T05:38:00.000-05:00

I’m going to offer up my most mini review ever.

I hated this movie with a passion. Everything about that movie was wrong. I would have rather seen a movie about the business competition between Tesla and Edison. That was the only saving grace of the movie. When I'm saying that a performance by David Bowie was better than most of the acting...that should tell you something.

CRAP CRAP CRAP.

'Nuf Said

Really Random Predictions: Tesla Motor--bike?

2007-05-18T05:02:00.000-05:00

For the last few weeks, I’ve been seeing more and more press about the Tesla motors car. After seeing tons of test drives and drooling over it (at $100,000 this website better take off a little faster in order for me to order one) I had an interesting thought.

Maybe Tesla motors could get a lot more early adopters if they produced a high performance motorcycle?

Seeing the interesting design of the car, I think making a really efficient, cool bike would be a great boon for the company.

Dr. Sue and Jamie, bad bloggers

2007-05-17T13:45:00.000-05:00

Sorry everyone.

I can't speak for Jamie, but I think he will agree that sometimes life just gets in the way of fun. We both enjoy writing up Really Random Reviews, but other pressing needs, like experiments, children, spouses, in-laws, puppies and kittens, etc., just get in the way.

I have been trying to write up a review of Second Life for about a week and a half now, and just can't get it to come together to my satisfaction. I also want to do one about the insane experience I had with eBay customer service last week, which started with them sending me an e-mail - IN GERMAN. When I e-mailed them back and said I couldn't read it because I didn't speak or read German, they replied that it was my job to go to babelfish and translate it. As you can imagine, it deteriorated from there. No apology or explanation or anything.

I can't make any promises, but every effort will be made to post to this page more often, and I think I speak for Jamie too.

Joost a Little More Content

2007-05-07T05:20:00.000-05:00

I was lucky enough to get an invite to the Joost Beta. For those of you not 100% connected with the web world, Joost bills itself as the “next generation” of video on the web.

Since I had seen a ton of reviews already, I was not really expecting to like Joost much. I think response has been more “good not great”.

Setup
I was not very happy to see that there wasn’t a Joost client availible for Power PC Macs. Since I have both a PPC and an Intel Mac it wasn’t a big deal, just very annoying. Otherwise the setup was clean and very easy (what setup isn’t on a mac?).

Initial Impression
After I launched the Joost application, my computer was suddenly turned into an immersive theater experience. The opening animation was very good and gave a pretty good overview to the Joost experience. The controls felt a lot like watching a movie full screen on a mac, except the menu option did not take you back to another screen or iTunes. The content menu is superimposed over the video you are watching which makes it very convenient.

Quality
The video quality was first rate, comparable to watching a DVD on my Mac screen. The video did pause and seem to rebuffer at points, but I think this was probably due to my aging Wifi setup than anything on the Joost servers. I thought the audio was the best part of the experience. It sounded really good on my Mac speakers.

Content
Content for right now sucks. There is a lot of stuff on Joost, but none of it really appeals to me. I really don’t think that the Joost people thought a lot about the type of content they should have for early adopters. I entered a chat with a few people during a P.Diddy video and found that they were all talking about Joost going live an not the actual video. For now, content seems to be Joost’s biggest problem. I’m sure that when content provoiders see the quality, they will sign up.

I don’t really know what the future holds for Joost. I could actually see them doing something a little bit different and offering their player as a distribution platform. I think bigger players like the major networks and cable companies could easily adapt this technology to a sort of “on demand” service online. This would offer one unifying technology instead of the myriad technologies that are being used right now.

Hey, it’s a thought.

Anyway, Joost is off to a very good start. I’m going to turn on “Chains of Love” now and let my brian rot.

Testing

2007-05-04T09:57:00.001-05:00

Testing my www.sliceoflife.tumblr.com feed

Geoff and Cali Digg on! (from www.podcastwasteland.com)

2007-05-03T19:25:00.001-05:00

Most of you in the blogosphere know about the Digg vs HD-DVD situation.

Here is Geoff Smith and Cali Lewis' response.

Great job!!!

Links
Geoff Smith
GeekBrief

Tumblr

2007-05-02T21:11:00.000-05:00

(Thanks to mrbiotech for reminding me to review this site)

I know, you are probably not ready for more Web 2.0 sites. You can barely keep up with your Blogger, Flickr, Digg, Photobucket etc. Somedays you probably spend more time with your net accounts than you do with your family.

Enter Tumblr. Tumblr is a great way to post your various net musings all in one place. If the site you use has an RSS feed, you can link it in your Tumblr page.

Tumblr is a great use of Ruby on Rails technology. I have to admit that I have a fondness for the simplicity that ROR seems to bring to web design. The chunky buttons and large text boxes are just too cool.

You can also post from Tumblr itself. You can add text, links, photos, and movies. Unfortunately you can’t add just voice. I’m going to have to look for an app that does online voice recording and publishes that out via an RSS feed. It would be cool to have that on a mobile device. If a site like that doesn’t exist, then there would be a huge market for it.

Tumblr makes it easy to share all your net activities all in one place with family, friends, and associates.

Check out my Tumblr at www.sliceoflife.tumblr.com

Two Very Different Will Ferrell Movies

2007-05-01T14:52:00.000-05:00

(I started this post before Jamie posted the Funny or Die video, which I thought was great)

There are some members of my family that are HUGE Will Ferrell fans. My sister named her feral kitten Willy (feral-ferrell, get it?), and one of my husband's favorite movies is Elf. I have been forced to sit through several bad Ferrell movies such as Anchorman, The Legend of Ron Burgandy, (although that did have its moments. I LOVED the "Afternoon Delight" scene and video) and Bewitched (a thoroughly wretched movie). I thought Elf was tolerable, and liked his role in The Producers (although I didn't like that move as much as I thought I would). Surprisingly, I have actually wanted to see two recent Will Ferrell movies, and so we queued up Stranger than Fiction from Netflix, and went to see Blades of Glory in the movie theater. Even more surprisingly, I really liked both of these movies.

For those of you who haven't seen it, Stranger than Fiction is the movie where Ferrell steps out of the larger-than-life role he usually plays, such as Buddy in Elf or Ricky Bobby in Talledaga Nights (which I haven't seen, but can pretty much imagine from the descriptions I have seen). Some people can try to say that he tried a role like this before when he was in that movie about the kid's soccer team, but that movie was so horrible I didn't even finish it, and can't even remember the name of it. (I just looked it up and it was called "Kicking and Screaming").

The premise of Stranger than Fiction is a novel (hee) one. Novelist Karen Eiffel (played wonderfully be Emma Thompson), has been suffering from writer's block these past 10 years, while trying to write her latest book. It is a story about IRS agent Harold Crick, and his sad, lonely life. It is a story about how he meets a sweet young baker who only pays the part of her taxes that goes to the parts of the government she actually supports, falls in love, and then dies in a tragic accident. This isn't spoilery since it was in all of the promos. All of Eiffel's books end with the hero dying tragically.

The catch this time is that Harold Crick is a real man, who can hear Karen narrating his life in his head. When he hears he will die, he of course tries to figure out who the narrator, so goes and sees a professor of literature at the local University, played by Dustin Hoffman. The cast is rounded out with Queen Latifah as Karen's assistant Penny Escher, and Maggie Gyllenhaal as Ana Pascal, Harold's bakery owning love interest.

I won't go into any more detail, but go and rent this movie. Ferrell proved that he can act, not just play an over-the-top character. It is brilliant!

My husband was surprised that I wanted to see Blades of Glory. I don't usually go for that type of movie, but I have a soft spot for Jon Heder, of Napoleon Dynamite fame. What a fun movie! The premise, such as it is, is that Heder and Ferrell play Men's solo skaters Jimmy MacElroy and Chazz Michael Michaels, fierce competitors who tie for the gold medal in a world level competition. The end up getting into a fight on the podium and are banned from competitive skating. A loophole only bans them from singles skating, so MacElroy's old coach (fantastically played by Craig T. Nelson) decides that he should pair up with Michaels to compete.

Silly? Ridiculous? Insane? Yes. Funny? YES! The rest of the movie follows the training of the new pair, the tricky move they need to learn to win, and the weak point, the evil reigning couples pair, that will stop at nothing to win the title, and enlist their indentured-servant younger sister to sabotage the fragile friendship being forged by Michaels and MacElroy.

I laughed a lot, however, and Ferrell's adlib moments are extremely funny. While Heder may not have a lot of range, he is a good actor with the physical comedy, and is also pretty cute and funny in his own way.

Go see these movies!

dotBoom: Puppets with attitude (from Podcast Wasteland)

2007-04-30T05:00:00.001-05:00

If you like your puppetry a little “saucy” then dotBoom is for you.

Created by Brian Hogg, dotBoom is a funny take on life inside a web development company. Though it is about a web company, this show will appeal to anyone who spends their day crammed inside a cubicle.

It is by no means a “polished’ production. Many of the episodes feel like they were improvised on the spot. However, the creatively made sets and puppets are very well done. dotBoom draws you in with its hilarious plots and strong characters.

The show continues a trend that I’m seeing more and more on the net. Independently produced shows seem to have way too many characters at first. It’s almost like they are shotgunning the characters in the hope that a larger group of characters will appeal to a larger audience.

dotBoom is defiantly worth a look. The first 10 episodes are a bit rough, but the show is rapidly settling down into an instant internet classic.

Really Random Update

2007-04-25T05:16:00.000-05:00

Hi all you folks in "bloggerland".

Just a quick update to let you know that the reviews will start up again a little more frequently.

Life Science Nexus (the parent company of this blog) is busy promoting it's newest venture Rochester UNclassified so my time is usually spent in the promotional process.

Never fear, I have been keeping a very good (and long) list of random stuff to review. Look for it in the next few days.

Will Ferrell Steps Onto the Net

2007-04-18T05:43:00.000-05:00

Looks like I just found the next big thing (thanks to Valleywag).

Looks like a certain Will Ferrell has put up a video with a promise of more to come. I welcome this "Hollywood" intrusion, it will draw more people to the promise of entertainment on the web.

Something To Be Desired Season 3: Lovin' It More Than Ever

2007-04-18T05:27:00.000-05:00

I know, I should have had this up a long time ago, but I just finished Season 3 of “Something to Be Desired”. From my earlier post you will know all about it and hopefully have been watching it.

Season 3 pretty much begins where season 2 left off. Caroline and Dean’s relationship is explored (from beginning to end) and really weaves constant thread as we move through the season.

The most humorous story I feel revolves around WANT hiring new DJ’s. These roles are masterfully played by Kerri Morrison, Dan Hinder, and Kellee Maize. I found their stories a lot more interesting than a lot of the other stuff going on with already established characters.

Another character who really started to stand out this season was Leo (Will Guffey). I think in the first two seasons, Leo was essentially the comic relief, the annoying guy that you always find at parties. This season, he is allowed to mature a bit. I think that by thinning a lot of the story arcs, we really get to see Guffey’s acting talent shine.

I’m looking forward to season 4. If the quality of the program keeps increasing, I think this show is going to be very popular indeed. I’m advising everyone to check it out.

Note: This story originally appeared on PodcastWasteland.

Quiznos Charges Way Too Much

2007-04-12T21:43:00.000-05:00

I just ate at a Quiznos this afternoon. I think my wallet still is hurting.

I thought I would take the wife out and get something to eat. Our usual turkey sandwich was getting a bit old. For some reason (probably me) I suggested Quiznos.

The sandwich shop has never been a favorite of mine. I think that they tend to toast the bread so much that I can't taste anything.

To keep the long story short, I dropped $17.00 for lunch for the both of us.

Did I mention the Mesquite Chicken sucks? The chicken tasted like it was marinated in pond scum and the cheese was yellow mush. I have had better sandwiches that have sat out in the hot sun all day.

To borrow from my idol Merlin Mann "net net" it was a bad experience. Next time I will spend the same amount at the wonderful City Market in downtown Rochester.

Battlestar Galactica Season 3

2007-04-12T05:24:00.000-05:00

Battlestar season 3.0 can best be described as the beginning of the end. For two full years we have watched the story build, the end of each season more exciting than the next. Until this season.

This was the season that the show went sideways. I could have watched the first two episodes of the season followed by the last two and never really have missed anything.

The stories got more personal this season (which always kills a show in my opinion). Most of the cast ended up switching places this season. They managed to do a personal story on virtually every minor character. This left many of the major characters out in the cold. They just weren’t there.

The beginning of the season looks promising on Cylon occupied New Caprica. We get a revealing look at what life is like in a resistance (including the horrible things that have to be done to keep it going). The liberation of the humans on New Caprica comes at the expense of the Pegasus and many of the former New Caprican’s lives.

Towards the middle of the season we see life trying to return to normal. Unfortunately, life at the hands of the Cylons has changed a lot of the former residents of New Caprica. The reintegration of the former colonists with the officers who remained with the fleet provides most of the remainder of the season’s plot points. This is where I feel that the series started to loose my interest. There are too many individual stories that all lead to something at the end of the season, but it was really too slow for me to even remember most of the main points.

The “death” of Starbuck near the end of the season jump started the show again. We finally see the trial of Baltar that seems to be referred to the whole season, a possible revelation of the remaining Cylons, and Bob Dylan? Then we get the big season finale (which I won’t spoil because I pretty much spoiled everything else).

I think that the show will officially be over next season. There was too much hinted at in the last episode to not put the show to rest. In my opinion, it needs it. This show is rapidly getting tired. End it now while it’s still original and fresh so it will remain in the lexicon of best SciFi shows ever.

Dresden Files Going Downhill

2007-04-10T21:01:00.000-05:00

The SciFi Channel has finally messed up. By running the “Dreseden Files” out of order, they have ruined a very good show for me. As I watched “Stormfront” (the pilot, which ran in the middle of the season) a few weeks ago, I glimpsed what the show could have been, not the watered down crap of the first few episodes.

They have made it virtually impossible to understand or follow the show. They tried to market it to a mass audience instead of embracing the long tail and appealing to a select group of SciFi junkies.

When will the networks learn, you don’t have to be everything to everyone?

I’ll keep watching, but don’t expect “Dresden” to survive.

Kill The Alarm: Fire Away

2007-04-10T20:14:00.000-05:00

Kill The Alarm, formerly known as Granian, released their new album titled "Fire Away" on February 21, 2007. You want to know how well this album is doing? Well, let me put it this way:

IT SOLD OUT AT THE CD RELEASE PARTY.

Not only did it sell out at the release party but it is doing amazingly well on the indie cd service, cdbaby.com, as well as iTunes with 5 star ratings on both. I got the CD as soon as I heard it when it was made available on alternativeaddiction.com and I was blown away. Here's the bio that's on KTA's website:

"Fronted by New Jersey native, Garen Gueyikian, Kill The Alarm (KTA) is a band with deep rock roots. Their debut album, “Fire Away,” is filled with tracks that land under your skin and scratch their way out. The edgy stepchild of Green Day and Matchbox 20, KTA is already being called part of the new wave of rock to come out of Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Kill the Alarm is already causing a stir, debuting at a string of New York City clubs, giving the city’s rock scene a shot in the arm.

Known for his deep, soulful voice, and powerful lyrics, Garen describes his sound as “intense and real.” With this debut album, he focused on bringing the live concert experience into the studio and has recorded tracks that tap the sound he has been seeking since he began songwriting."

I can honestly say this is one of my all-time favorite albums. Do yourselves a favor and check these guys out.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: Burton's Brain Candy

2007-04-06T20:27:00.000-05:00

The new version of “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” ended up in my mailbox the other night. Truth be told, I have to clean out my Netflix Queue soon. I had forgotten that this movie was at the top. I tend to have a ton of movies I want to see, but most of the time I end up pushing movies I “sorta” want to see to the bottom. This was one of those movies.

I guess I really liked the original, heck I grew up watching it. I didn’t want my notions of the new version screwing up my fond memories. I kept this attitude up until I started to hear the Danny Elfman score at the beginning. Then something strange happened. I realized that this was a different movie. This wasn’t a fun romp, this was a dark Tim Burton comedy. The characters weren’t childlike and fun, they were dark and depressing (what else do you expect from a Tim Burton film?).

Johnny Depp was his usual bizarre self playing a very messed up Willy Wonka. His creepy style and off color humor made the movie a lot easier to take.

I am getting a bit tired of the “strange character” Depp in his recent movies. It seems that once he puts on a costume, he becomes that character to the bone. Where is the Depp that I loved in Chocolate or Gilbert Grape?

I enjoyed this movie a lot because it felt as if we were seeing what was going on in Tim Burton’s head as he read the book as a (really messed up) child. The slanted houses and gloomy buildings are signature Burton. The characters all seem to be people you would encounter in a very strange dream and the actors all do a great job of reinforcing that fact.

This movie isn’t as good as it could have been, but it’s good enough for me to recommend.

Going on vacation

2007-04-04T05:24:00.000-05:00

I’m going to be on the road for a few days so the posts might be few and far between. I’ve toiled this past weekend to get ahead of myself and should be able to post each day.

The problem is that I’m on my way to Minot, ND where robust WiFi is bit “needle in a haystack”.

Until next Tuesday....courage.

Walmart.com purchasing experience from hell

2007-04-03T11:15:00.000-05:00

I usually avoid Walmart at all costs. I don't like what they stand for. I don't believe in the "cheapest thing possible" mentality, I don't like how they force their suppliers to manufacture lower quality goods with the same brand name in order to sell it at a cheaper price, I don't like how they force their suppliers to move their manufacturing plants to China in order to cut costs, and I especially don't like they way they essentially force small independent businesses to fail by swooping into cities and towns and undercutting their prices, thinking that cheap products can replace knowledge and customer service. Personally, at this point in my life, I prefer to pay more for a higher quality product, but I realize that this is not an option for everyone, especially those on limited incomes.

My youngest cousin recently had a baby, and I wanted to do something nice for her. She lives in Florida, so I can't just bring something over, and she had a shower and has most of the big ticket essentials, so I asked her mother what I could do. She doesn't have a lot of money, so my aunt suggested a Walmart gift card so she could but diapers and similar things. I held back a shudder, bit my tongue, and agreed.

Thus began my odyssey into Walmart.com hell. Notice I am not hyperlinking to Walmart.com; it's intentional. This purchasing experience was the single worst online purchasing experience of my life, and I buy a lot of things online.

I went to the page, set up an account (this was easy), and picked the items I wanted, a gift card and a pooh mobile, because I wanted to get something personal as well. So far so good. I went to complete my purchase using my debit card. Oh, wait, there is an added security feature called "verisign" for my debit card, that wants to verify my address and last 4 digits of my SSN. OK. Hmm, it says my address isn't correct. Let's try again. Still not working. Let's try Husband's SSN, since he is the primary on the account. Nope, no good, and now it won't let me use my debit card and is telling me to call my bank.

Call to the bank. As far as they can tell, I do know my own address. They aren't sure what the problem is, but it isn't at their end. Nevermind, I'll just use a different card. Go back to Walmart.com and put in second card info. This was on Tuesday March 27.

On Wednesday March 28, I get an e-mail from Walmart.com saying that the phone number I put in doesn't match the one with the credit card account. The e-mail directs me to reply to the e-mail with the correct billing phone number. Hmm. I already put in the card number, the 3 digit number on the back and my home address. Even if I transposed a number accidentally or something, shouldn't that be enough to get my order processed? I go to the credit card web page and discover that that card has my cell phone number and not my home phone number. OK. I reply to the e-mail as directed with the correct billing phone number AND go to the Walmart.com account page and change the phone number there. That should fix it.

Monday April 2, I get ANOTHER e-mail, same as the one I received on the previous Wednesday, saying that I needed to send them the correct billing phone number. Now I am angry. It took them 5 days to resend this e-mail. I call their "help" line. The associate who answers first tells me that the "billing" phone number that they require is actually the number for the credit card company. I express my doubts about this and she puts me on hold. She comes back and says everything looks ok from her end and that she needs to talk to billing, more hold time. She comes back again and tells me that everything should be ok and that the order should be processed within the hour. I ask why it wasn't processed last Wednesday when I sent the correct info, but she didn't have an answer for me. I told her that this was the works online shopping experience of my life. I forgot to ask about the verisign problem.

Tuesday, April 3. My within the hour processing still has not happened. I received an e-mail this morning saying that they have finally "received" my order and have "begun" processing it, but it certainly hasn't shipped yet. I just really wish I knew if there was a Target or something near where my cousin lives so that I could send her something from there instead.

All in all, it was a highly frustrating and unsatisfying online shopping experience. I have found that shopping at Walmart.com is as unpleasant as shopping at an actual Walmart big box store.

UPDATE 4/3/07 10:00 AM Order still has not shipped. I am going to call my aunt and see if there is a Target in the vicinity of my cousin.

FINAL UPDATE 3:15 PM. I called Walmart.com to cancel the order and instead order from Target. I hadn't gotten a shipping confirmation e-mail, so I figured it wouldn't be a problem to cancel the order, since the order confirmation e-mail said I could cancel until the order was shipped. The agent told me that I couldn't cancel the order because it had shipped. I said I hadn't gotten an e-mail confirmation that it had shipped, and their website said it was still processing, but he insisted that it had. Since there wasn't anything I could do, I had to leave it at that. Fifteen minutes after I hung up with the agent, I got a shipment confirmation e-mail. Heh. The best (worst) part is the fact that they are estimating arrival of the gift card to be April 10th, a full two weeks after I placed the order and the mobile even later than that. I could have gone to a local Walmart, bought the card and the mobile, and mailed them myself in less time, and with MUCH less hassle. NEVER AGAIN.

Not another Apple TV review (repost from Podcast Wasteland)

2007-04-02T05:18:00.000-05:00

Unlike most bloggers, I waited a week to review the new Apple TV. I thought I would give it some time before I made a snap judgment.

I’m not going to draw out this post by going into an in-depth analysis of it, but I will summarize the pros and cons (because I know that you are all bored of reading Apple TV reviews).

Summary: If you watch a lot of video podcasts, Apple TV is for you. If you watch a lot of iTunes purchased video content, I wouldn’t waste my time.

Pros
1. Easy to set up.
2. Clean interface and easy to use.
3. Can stream quickly from a computer or store locally on the Apple TV’s hard drive.
4. Decent resolution as long as you play around with the settings (trust me folks, it depends more on your TV’s ability to decode the info sent to it vs. the Apple TV).
5. Ripped DVD’s (that I own BTW) look REALLY GOOD. Thank you iSquint.
6. Ability to sync my audio and video podcasts to iTunes on my Mac and then to my iPod without loosing where i left off.

Cons:
1. Resolution is OK, for purchased iTunes content, but lack of true widescreen and HD formats really suck.
2. Have to convert to specified iTunes H.264 or MP4 formats (easily done with iSquint, but Apple should assist with that).
3. Quirky screen saver sometimes doesn’t work (I have scoured the web and apparently mine is the only one with this problem).
4. Hot as hell! Why are 1.0 products from Apple always wanting to take the place of my furnace?
5. I’ll admit, lack of a proper connection cord has to be included as a con, but FREEKIN’ READ THE WEBSITE YOU WHINY BASTARDS, it clearly indicates that you have to order the cord separately. Most of you would have bought the HDMI cable separately anyway. Thank Apple for at least keeping the cord price to a reasonable level (unlike my local Best Buy).
6. Really should have let us control the volume...and 5.1 surround wouldn’t have been too much to ask (though on my own ripped movies, I swear I have surround).

So if you are a podcast junkie like me, this is a great product. It gets you away from squinting at your computer screen and watching shows as they were intended to be seen. If you plan to use it as your primary TV viewing unit (via content on iTunes), I’d wait until version 2.0, or at least until Apple releases content in “near HD” quality.

That being said, this is a tremendous opportunity for podcasters to put out shows that are BETTER in resolution than mainstream shows that are purchased on iTunes. Please listen to TWIT 92 for a really good discussion of the subject.

Speaking of that, I have more podcasts to watch....please excuse me.

Really Random Reminder: Scott Siglar's "Ancestor"

2007-04-01T13:47:00.000-05:00

Note: This reminder was orginally published on PodCast WasteLand (www.podcastwasteland.com)

Just a reminder that "Ancestor" by Scott Siglar comes out in paperback! Order one or two or three.

Scott is the pioneering author who continues to release his stories as free podcasts first and then publish the print version shortly after. This pioneering method has created a whole new way for people to market their creative works.

Recently, one of his short stories has been turned into the first episode of "Stranger Things" entitled "Sacred Cow."

Check out Scott on net@nite tonight as well, or wait a day or so for the podcast to be released.

Now the podosphere is starting to act like Leno....strange huh?

Book Review: The Inheritance Trilogy Books Eragon and Eldest

2007-03-30T09:40:00.000-05:00

I have blogged earlier of my love for Audible.com. I used some of my credits to listen to the first two books of the Inheritance Trilogy by Christopher Paolini, Eragon and Eldest. (I actually got Eragon and a coworker that I swap audible books with got the second because I rebelled against paying 2 credits for one book). For those of you that haven't heard of the Inheritance Trilogy or Paolini, I'll supply a little background.

Paolini was a home-schooled teenager living in Montana when he wrote Eragon, his first novel. His family decided to publish the book themselves and it was eventually brought to the attention of the publisher Alfred A. Knopf by Carl Hiaasen, whose stepson acquired the book on a vacation in Montana. (I obtained all of this info from Paolini's official web page Alagaesia.com). It was published by Knopf in 2003. He has subsequently written the second book in the planned trilogy, Eldest, published in 2005, and is currently working on the as yet untitled third volume to be published sometime in the future. The first novel has been made into a feature film of the same name and was released in late 2006. For gobs of more detailed information see Paolini's official website or one of the many fansites out there, my personal favorite being Shur'tugal.com.

Now onto the random review. Remember that I haven't actually READ these books, I have listened to them. I have discovered that there are definite differences between reading and listening to novels. Some novels are definitely better read, some are better listened to, and some are good either way, and I have found books that fit into all three categories. The quality of the narrator makes a HUGE difference. One day I will do a review on this topic alone.

Now REALLY onto the random review. I liked both of these books a great deal. Yes, the story is not entirely original. It is a bit of a cross between Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and your favorite dragon story, but it is entertaining. It is really hard these days to find a truly original story.

In the first novel, Eragon, I found myself engrossed in the tale of Eragon, the young man from the Palancar Valley of Alagaesia who happens upon a strange stone in an eerie mountain range called the Spine. The story of his adventures once the "stone" hatches into a sapphire blue dragon, who he names Saphira, is interesting, fun and sad.

Eragon the novel begins to tell the tale of the Dragon Riders, a group of Elves and Humans bound to the magical creatures that are Dragons. The riders were originally formed to keep the peace between elves and dragons after a very long war, but they eventually became so powerful and respected that they had more influence than kings and other rulers of Alagaesia. One day, a rider named Galbatorix lost his dragon, and since the pairing of dragon and rider was a very rare occurrence, he was denied a second dragon. This pushed him over the edge and he turned evil, killing another rider and stealing his dragon. He convinces a group of other riders (the Foresworn) to join him in eliminating the rest of the riders, and together they do that, and take power to rule over the majority of Alagaesia, with an iron fist.

As you can guess, it is the destiny of Eragon to meet and most likely defeat Galbatorix. Along the way he meets some very interesting characters, from Brom and Murtag, to Angela, Nasuada, and Arya while he travels to the Varden, the rebel group committed to seeing Galbatorix overthrown (although I feel that Eragon was capruted far too many times to be credible)

The way is never easy, but the first book ends with an epic battle (#1), leading into the second book Eldest.

Eldest was a more difficult book to listen to, and I think that it would have been even harder to read. It is almost twice of Eragon and clocked in at a whopping 26 hours, while Eragon was a relatively modest 16 hours. The story is still good, if a little predictable, what made it difficult was the tortured romantic intent of Eragon for one of the female characters, and the incredibly long and surprisingly dull explanations of Eragon's and Saphira's training to become Rider and Dragon. Fortunately, Paolini intersperses Eragon's and Saphira's story with tales from two other characters' viewpoints, breaking up some of the monotony.

This book also ends in an epic battle (#2), during which there is a plot twist which I had predicted after reading book 1. The ending in this book sets up the third book nicely, and we'll see what happens in book 3.

Like I said, the story is not completely original, but it is entertaining. If I had been reading Eldest, I probably would have skimmed/skipped a lot of the training stuff and moved along to the more interesting stories. What totally made Eldest bearable in its entirety was the quality of the narrator, Gerard Doyle. Like I said, a good narrator can make or break the listenability (a word I just made up) of any book.

I am looking forward to the third book whenever it comes out, and I hope that reading or listening experience is as good as the previous two.

Note: I have been told that the motion picture Eragon is TERRIBLE. People who have read the book complain that it leave too many things out,and people who haven't read it don't understand it because so much was left out. I haven't seen it myself, so I can't comment on this, but rarely, in my opinion, does a motion picture turn out as well as the novel it came from. If you saw the movie and hated it, you still may want to give the novels a try.

Twitter: It's a waste of time, but liberating as hell

2007-03-29T21:05:00.000-05:00

Twitter

Ok, ok, I know that everyone in the technorati is on Twitter. I have resisted it for a long time (kind of like I do with video games), but finally I had heard enough about it that I had to try it out.

For those of you not “in the know”, Twitter is basically a huge waste of time. You answer one simple question “What are you doing now?”. That’s it. There is no complex technical crap needed, just register and let people know what you are doing.

I know a lot of you are scratching your heads wondering “why would I ever do this?”. Well, it’s entirely liberating to let people know what you are doing. This sounds strange but it’s true. It’s like getting something off your chest by speaking about it in public. Of course you have to have people actively subscribed to you (or added as a friend or follower), but after you do, life can get really interesting.

I was listening to the “Daily Source Code” the other day and Adam Curry was saying that Twitter was not for him. He just shelved the idea of Twitter as “Americans finally learning about SMS.” Adam obviously hangs out with the wrong crowd when he is in the US. I think a large majority of kids under the age of 25 text as their primary means of communication in the US right now.

Twitter takes texting a to a social dimension. You can let your friends subscribe not only on their cell phones, but on their computers as well. Actually, that is the primary way I use Twitter, on my Mac.

I think the best thing about Twitter is the fact that you can “follow” other people. I have about five or six people I follow on Twitter like Leo Laporte and Merlin Mann. What do I get out of “following” these people? I think the answer to that the “voyeur factor”. You want to know what these people are doing. The fact that they selflessly let us peons know is even better. It’s a way to microblog without getting overly wordy.

If you are curious about Twitter, click here to find out more.

And keep looking at my Twitter badge located on Really Random Reviews and Podcast Wasteland to see what I’m up to. If you get interested in Twitter, please look me up and add me as a friend.

Textra: Good Start...Not Great

2007-03-29T05:36:00.001-05:00

Textra is a new video podcast that is hosted by Natali Del Conte. It unfortunately enters an already over saturated market for tech news. This “late to the game” aspect is quickly made up by the “class” the show seems to have. While I love “GeekBrief” and “Diggnation”, they are a bit “blue collar” (does that term make sense on the web?). Textra is more of a “white collar” podcast that strives to be more mainstream. Gone is the independent feel of podcasting in someone’s house, and is replaced by a set.

Natali obviously has great stage presence, but sometimes you can tell that she is still trying to come into her own with the show. I do like the news/opinion format. I think that giving everyone the chance to respond back on her forum is a great idea. Maybe she could also play some audio or video feedback in special editions of Textra (just a suggestion). Probably the thing that bugs me the most is the “two shot” switch, which strives to feel like a MTV, but ends up looking more like cable access (I have the same complaint with “Indigital”.

While I can’t seem to give Textra my full support (I’ll wait a few more episodes for that), I think it’s off to a good start. Natali just has to find her niche. I think episode 6 was her strongest so far where she expressed an opinion about female tech journalists. You could really see how her passion was reflected in her presentation. I went from "kinda" paying attention to totally engaged in what she was saying.

I'll stay subscribed, and you should try it out as well.

Breaking News: Yahoo Mail now has unlimited storage!!!

2007-03-28T05:21:00.000-05:00

Yep, good news for us Yahoo people that have hung in there for a long while.

According to this story by TechCrunch's tech "guru" Michael Arrington, Yahoo will have free unlimited email storage which beats out Gmail. Those of you that currently subscribe to Yahoo to get 2 gigs of storage (like me), can contact Yahoo and ask for a refund.

Am I the only one that likes Yahoo's new beta interface? I know it's a lot like Outlook, but it's functional and works great. To borrow from a great man "it just works".

I only use Gmail because I liked the storage and I pretty much have to since most of the apps I love are Google based. Now, Yahoo rules the day. Great job Yahoo.

This will be an interesting in light of the fact that Yahoo is going to be the push email of choice for the new iPhone. Maybe we haven't seen the last Yahoo's "improvements"....