I want to give my feelings on my blog. As you may or may not know, I started this thing a couple months ago. It was the first blog I ever created. I felt like I had a lot to say so this seemed like a good avenue to do so. Overall the experience has been good. I have been keeping up with it fairly well which was my goal. I would like to write more and have several drafts saved but never submitted but my crazy problem with my hands the past month and limited my typing. I still would like more hits. I have realized that it is all about the titles of your entries. I have noticed that I get a lot more hits when I talk about fast food restaurants or issues about Sirius satellite stock. I guess it all comes down to what people are searching for. I have also realized that about 75% of my friends have never even been to my blog and another 10% or 15% have only been a couple times. This makes me wonder who is actually going to my site.

On one side note, one of the other reasons I started this blog was to give my reviews, thoughts, and theories on TV shows. I have really failed to do this but I definitely will once Lost comes back in January. I have a lot to say about Lost so I think this will be a good avenue to express my theories while also knocking up my visits.

This weekend was pretty fun. I decided to not work on any homework since I did not have school the following week even though I have 4 papers that I need to do in very limited time.

Friday night was the usual Rue 13 then Maurizio’s evening. It seems like we always do this but it is always a good time so why try something new? I was super tired though after a long week so I could barely stay awake while eating my pizza.

Saturday was the day for the touch football game that I threw together. The turn out was great. We had up to 14 people playing at times. It was the first time I ever played touch football where we used blockers. It was quite interesting. I didn’t run as much as I probably should have but at least I am not sore as other people I know. I do really need to get into better shape. My athletic skills these days are pathetic. We ended the night watching Texas Tech get blown out then went to Mandarin. I hadn’t been in a while. It was okay. Chris Duncan was there. That is definitely the place to see athletes at.

Sunday was going to be a day to watch football but the Rams are pathetic so I decided to watch some movies. My DVR hard drive was full of HD movies so I had a bunch to choose from. I chose Before the Devil Knows Your Dead. A guy from work recommended me to it because of the Marisa Tomei scenes. The movie was awesome. I thought it was really entertaining. I also would not have realized that was Marisa Tomei if the guy from work did not tell me ahead of time. She looked better and younger than she did in My Cousin Vinny which came out in 1992. I would definitely recommend checking out this movie if you have not. The story behind the movie is that two brother (Ethan Hawke and Philip Seymour Hoffman) come up with a plan to rob their family jewelry store. Of course it doesn’t turn out good and the movie goes through flack backs and flash forwards to tell the entire story … very Lost like. The second movie I watched was Boiler Room. A classic of mine that I hadn’t seen in a while. It reminded me that I needed to watch Wall Street since they talk about it along with all my MBA friends. I concluded the night by sitting down to watch the best night for TV. All the shows were good. You can see my previous entry for my comments on the season finale for True Blood and Entourage. I am glad to see Big Love is coming back in January. That show hasn’t been on the air in forever. I am going to have to look up to remember what is going on.

I was a little surprised this weekend because I had no clue it was the season finale of Entourage. I have been a little disappointed with the season so far but I could never quite figure out why. It finally came to me as Vinny landed a huge role at the end of the show. The reason is that the show to me is based on a lavish Hollywood lifestyle. I didn’t really put it together until they went back to their roots in this episode that the season didn’t have this since Vince was in the poor house. With that said, the show was entertaining so it was a success. Jermey Piven will hopefully win some awards from this season because he really was amazing. He has a certain flare that makes the show funny and entertaining. The new season should be good since they will be back on the money train.

True Blood’s season finale was great. In my eyes, the writers did not leave any huge cliffhangers so most of the questions raised from this season were answered. It was almost like they were ending the show but I did read that it was picked up for a second season. I at first did not like this show but grew to love it. I still don’t know why there is so much hype about vampires right now. South Park did it best last week in making fun of Twilight. The only new question is what is going on with Tara and the lady that has taken her under her wing. After last weeks episode, I thought she ran a brothel but I doubt that is the case now. She somehow knows Sam and the fact that he is shape shifter. She was also doing something really weird out in the lawn. I didn’t know at the time but I am wondering if she was trying to shift into that pig since she has some connection with Sam. The other thing that was brought up was that Lafayette was probably killed. I would hope it was by a vampire due to the killing of the vamp by Jason and his girlfriend. The writers really seemed to stress mid-season that a vampire could detect when someone did wrong to another vampire. I thought it was too big of a deal to let the issue slide under the table. I guess we will have to wait to see next summer (which is a pleasant surprise that it returns so fast).

I woke up a little early to get a quick view of the new xbox dashboard. I felt like I was a kid waking up Christmas morning. I booted up the 360 and it had the old update box popup. It download a 30 second update and restarted. I then had a new update screen that was doing the main update. This only took a 1 minute or so. I was surprised by that. Maybe its my 10MB connection.

The first thing it had me do was pick an avatar. Once I picked one, I got to edit him like I wanted. Mine is pretty cool. He is sporting a sweet mustache, a faux hawk, and a white suit. I wanted white shoes but unfortunately it only offered two shoe. This is a cooler feature than I expected but I hope they incorporate cloths and accessories from other games. I am specifically thinking about your closet from Rock Band.

I did some more exploring but I kept getting “can not connect to xbox.com.” I assume this is because the tens of thousands people are doing the same thing. I next tried to activate my Neflix device. I went to the Netflix page and it said the add a new device feature was temporarily disabled … try back in two hours. I guess they got a little overloaded.

I do like the blades features. I do have some questions though:

1. Why can you not preview the Rock Band downloadable tracks before you buy one?
2. All of my friends had some random object in the background of their blade. Can you change these? My brother had guitars and a drum set. He does not have Rock Band or Guitar Hero so I thought that was weird.
3. Will the streaming music and video feature work correctly on this version? I had to use Tiversity because I could never get it to work.

I have class the next two nights so I expect to give a full review over the weekend.

UPDATE #1 – Read this on Engadget. I think Sony is taking a sad route. I would have thought that Netflix would have protected this from happening but maybe not.

• Jamie-Lynn Sigler is really invading my TV viewing. She first showed up on Entourage as Turtle’s girlfriend (in which Superficial is reporting that they are dating in real life). She then made an appearance on How I Met Your Mother on last nights episode. It looks like she is going to have a recurring role as Ted’s girlfriend along with a recurring role as Turtle’s girlfriend … she is really getting around.
• Let me know if anyone is interested in getting a football game together this weekend. The only thing I want to plan around is the Texas Tech vs Oklahoma game.
• Next Wednesday is a big night to go out next week so keep your schedule open. Might have something big to celebrate about.
• I am looking to buy/build a new computer. My 4 year old P4 is just not cutting it for me anymore. Any suggestions? I built one on newegg.com for $700. I thought it was pretty good. I am considering jumping up to the new Intel Core i7. It is getting great benchmarks.
• Booked my train ticket for the Big 12 Championship in KC. I am really pumped up about the whole weekend.
• Only 2 weeks left in school this year plus we have next week off. If only I did not have to do four 4 to 5 page papers and a 1 page paper by the end of the semester.
• I have a slim chance to make the fantasy football playoffs. I have two hard matchups and my team is clinging to the last playoff spot. There would have to be a miracle for me to win even if I did make it in. My fantasy basketball team on the other hand has no chance. I am not a good fantasy basketball owner.

UPDATE – One more thing. What is going on in True Blood? Is Rene the killer? The picture that was faxed to the police station looked something like him plus the previews hinted at it. Rene also found out in that episode that Jason’s girlfriend was into vampire blood so it is a pretty big coincidence that she died. They have way too much to go over with one episode left in the series. I hope the show does not get canceled like Carnivale thus leaving all kinds of questions unanswered at the end.

UPDATE #2 – I saw a commercial last night for a double cheeseburger at McDonalds. They were advertising the new price which I believed was around $1.29. The thing that pisted me off was that they made it seem like this was the new low price. Now I know that a lot of locations were not selling it for $.99 but McDonalds was still advertising it at $.99 so how can they claim that $1.29 is a better price. Lies I tell you … Lies.

UPDATE #3 – The new XBOX Experience is coming out tomorrow. The Netflix viewer is going to have 300 HD movies on it which is pretty cool since not even Netflix’s own online viewer offers this capability. I might have to wake up early to check it out before work.

I wanted this weekend to be low key for several reasons. The reasons were mostly monetary but I also needed to catch up on sleep, homework, and my TV shows on the DVR. I did two of the three so I guess you could call that successful.

I decided not to go out on Friday since I was exhausted beyond belief. In the end, I could have because I hit my second wind around 10 PM. I ended up watching the Lakers game which was good since I have only seen 1 of their games. They ended up losing against my fantasy basketball team (the Detroit Pistons). I partly caught up on my tv shows.

I woke up somewhat early Saturday so I went to the gym in the hopes of starting up my new workout regiment. It must have been a good workout because I am pretty sore today. I tried to watch some college football but there was only boring games on so I switched over to the DVR to finish my marathon of TV series.

I had a bunch of the guys over for the MU game. Like expected, Mizzou easily won. We rocked out on some Rock Band 2 then headed over to Flannery’s to watch the UFC match. Flannery’s was packed by 12 and it was unlike anything I had ever seen there before. It turns out that Lucas Park had a gas leak so a flock of hot girls migrated over to Flannery’s. We decided to head to Lure in what we thought would round out the night. It was a lot of fun and it was packed … probably because of Lucas Park’s closure. I think Lure might be my new Saturday night destination or at least until I try London Calling. The group was not ready to go home at 2:30 so we decided to go to Pops. It was okay so we decided to go somewhere else. I’ll let you make the call where we went.

I somewhat slept in on Sunday to awaken to the start of the NFL games. The first game was boring me so I watched some more DVR then went to the gym. I got home in time to see the Lams getting killed so I didn’t even bother to watch it. I don’t know if it is Bulgers fault but Haslett really needs to give Green another try. We didn’t pay a ton for a high priced back up not to use him. Haslett never should have said that Bulger was the QB for the rest of the year when he was hired on as head coach. My fantasy team had a big week for me. I pulled off an upset against the #1 team to keep my playoff dreams alive. My defense was stellar again setting a record in our league for the most points from a defense. I still am having issues at tight end since my new guy got me zero points again but at least I won.

It seems to me that I a growing more and more frustrated with fast food places; evidence that I continue to blog about them. Not sure why but I think it has to do with a combination of having less money, eating more fast food, and the industry as a whole is hurting.

I got all excited yesterday when I found out that Taco Bell had introduce a “new” nacho dish. I use to love the Mucho Grande Nacho in college. It was over a pound of about everything you could put on nachos. Not sure why they got rid of it but I was hoping this new nacho dish called the fully loaded nachos would do the trick.

Unfortunately, I was greatly disappointed. For one, TB got me again on the price. I was going to get just the dish but the girl talked me into the combo which I agreed because I did need some Dew because I was tired. I looked at the advertised price on the board and it was only a $1 more to get the combo which included a large soda that normally cost $1.50. I thought that was a pretty good deal and was actually a true combo meal. Unfortunately I looked at my receipt and I was charged a different price than advertised so I got no deal. But back to the meal … it also sucked. For one, it was in a taco shell. I don’t go to a fast food restaurant to work to break apart a shell. I guess call me lazy. It also didn’t seem to me to be worth twice the amount of a nacho bel grande.  So basically it was a rip off. It only added guacamole so not much different. They charged extra for jalapenos which was included originally in the Mucho Grande Nachos.

On a side note, I noticed the McDonald’s by my work that has always had $.99 double cheeseburgers is now pricing them at $1.29. Still a great price but not $.99.

• Love to see the fact that Lost is actually coming back earlier than expected. It now has a late January premier instead of a February. My two favorite lost bloggers finally made post after a long hiatus.
• Rumors are circulating that McDonald’s is going to get rid of the double cheeseburger. Read this blog post for more info. Mike Hoff should like the McDouble since he hates cheese. I am confused about the price comment. When is the double cheeseburger less than $.99? It rarely is at $.99. It is one of my favorite burgers. It is good and cheap.
• I really like the Google Flu trends website. I am glad to see that they are doing something productive with their keyword search data. I also found it interesting that St Louis was #4 on sun burn searches. I am one of those people so I wonder why. Do St Louisians travel more to tropical places or is it the fact that we have cold winters and hot summers which do not prepare people for that first couple months of high UV? It also could be our love affair with the water (i.e. lakes and rivers).
• What is up with True Blood? Is it a show about all freaks? Its turning out to be a very Carnivale like show. It also seems to introduce more questions than it answers. I am glad that they finally made at least a reference to the fact that there is a certain procedure to turn someone into a vampire besides just biting them. I only wish they would have gone into more details because it just looked like a bite to me in the last episode.
• Should I buy Gears of War 2 this weekend? I have some Best Buy gift cards burning a hole in my pocket.
• I am loving the idea that I do not have to run my heat in my building. I didn’t last year but I didn’t move into early March so I wasn’t sure. The place stays at 72 without any heat. I do think I need to get some kind of air purifier since I have no circulation of air in my house. Do these things actually work? The reviews on websites make them sound great but they do not get very good consumer reports.
• Why are there not many NBA games on tv this year? I would have really like to see the Dallad – Lakers game last night. It seemed like TNT or ESPN had games on almost every night last year. Did they all switch to NBA tv?

What a week. To quote DeMarco Farr, “I just get a great feeling the second the plane touches down in Vegas … it is the best city in the world.” I too get that same feeling. It is like a boost of adrenaline. I assume it is because all the potential the city offers. This Vegas trip was like none other but still a good time but let me start from the beginning.

The plane ride got the trip off to a good start. I upgraded to first class since I know I would need a little sleep. I had Demarco Farr sit next to me. He was studying SEC “inside” info sheets for a FSN show he was doing in LA on Saturday so I tried not to bother him until late in the plane ride. I also had Christian Cantwell sit behind me. We really had an interesting conversation in the last 20 minutes as we were really early so we had to site on the plane on the tarmac while they readied our gate. We discussed how both Christian’s agent and Justin Smith (high school friend) both thought he should try out for a NFL team but he said he hated to run so he wasn’t considering it. He said he can now bench over 650lbs. He actually maxes out the bar with plates … pretty impressive. He instead was thinking about being a pro wrestler. We then brainstormed on persona for him. An Olympic themed one with a shot put was the final decision but I wasn’t on board.

The SEMA show was awesome as ever. The show had more people than I was expecting but overall there was a lot less people in Vegas. As you can see from my pictures, I am obsessed with the new Nissan GTR. I really wish they would have badged this car as an Infiniti. It has a back seat so obviously it is not a Z. The $70k price tag is out of my range so I don’t expect this to be my next car. I sat in the car at the Nissan booth. It was awesome. I love the paddle shifters. I also liked the little details like the reverse resessed door handles. It made the car look ultra smooth.

Thursday night was actually pretty fun. We hung out in the casino bar all night and then had a very late dinner at the new pizzeria in TI. It was very good.

Ted got in late Friday. Josh did not show up at all …. somehow about he booked his flight for the wrong weekend and he had no clue that the trip was this week. We ended up drinking at the hotel for a while then checking out Audigier. It was pretty good. I danced my heart out. I did not see any pictures of me on their website from that night though. We concluded the night with the usual late night trip to Dennys.

We ended up spending about 10 hours in Casino Royale on multiple occasion on Saturday. The $1 beers and $1.50 wells made it hard to leave when every over place was charging $7+ for a drink. The pure ambiance was surreal. Ted did have a great quote about the 24 hour 80s music. He said, “this casino is so outdated that the music they are playing is the last music they probably bought thus why they keep playing it.” We ended up watching MU, Texas Tech, Florida, etc games at the Caesars Palace sports book. We actually scored some seats in the front row somehow when the place was packed. Ted also sweet talked one of the bet takers so he gave us some drink tickets so we got to drink premium drink for free. I did have Kid Rock walk right past me when I was ordering pizza at halftime at Wolfgang Puck. He really looks like a bum. As for Saturday night (when we were not at Casino Royale) we wandered around the strip. We thought we were going to go to Pure but never made it. We also thought the same thing for Friday. Linday Lohan was hosting a party along with her girlfriend being one of the DJ. I wouldn’t mind going just to see if she actually gets on the dance floor.

It was a weird time since we did not go to any real Vegas clubs plus we did not do anything that was planned like go to the pool or Freemont Street. It was also weird that I lost a lot of money gambling but did not play a single Roulette game which is my game of choice. I did learn a couple lesson: (1) do not go to Vegas when you are short on money. It is just not as fun. (2) insist on cabs no matter how much people say they would rather walk. I recorded over 100,000 steps on  my pedemoter in only 3 days. That was even with me not wearing it all the time. My legs and back sure do hurt. (3) I really think you need a group in Vegas. Luckily we had my friends group from work but it is not the same. On One last note, I do not think I get psyched up for Vegas as much as I use to. I thought about this after last years trip too when I spent a lot more money even with being there on the work’s dime. Almost everything you can do in Vegas you can do in St Louis. Now even more with the no loss limits at the St Louis Casinos. I feel like I have an equally good time at the St Louis bars without having to wait in line nor pay high drink prices. I would rather put that money into a trip to somewhere tropical.

Here are my pictures for the week. They are mainly SEMA pics. I probably would not have taken any Vegas pictures but I felt like I needed something so I took some at the last minute.

I wrote a while back about my distaste in Taco Bell and McDonald’s for advertising prices excessively but the stores that I go to do not honor them. I again want to express my anger with Taco Bell with something I didn’t think was a big deal but I now do after pondering with it over my tacos. The last two times I have gone to the same location they have charged me $.25 for water. I have always wondered why more stores do not charge for water more since that cup and water does cost them something. I thought it was okay until I realized today that it doesn’t state anywhere on the menu or in the store that they charge for a cup of water. Nor did the counter person indicate that she was going to charge me for water. I think they are really sneaking in a water charge because a majority of the places give it away for free. In conclusion, I have no problem with them charge me but they at least need to let me know.