Test post using Flickr, originally uploaded by EricKrassinger.

Pic of all my friends passed out in Jamaica.
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Nightlife

I went out both night this weekend. I took out a customer from New Zealand on Friday. It was a great night. We started with some good steaks at Mike Shannons. We then went to his hotel (Hilton Ballpark) to chill and have some drinks. After we decided to keep going, we went to Lucas Park and had very little success. We ended the night at The Dubliner. It was a lot better of a time as we talked with girls there all night. It was a fun night.

Saturday was a full day of drinking. We went to Side Bar for the MU game and then went to The Dubliner again after the Blues game. I was pretty exhausted so it was a short night. The funny part of the night was watching Smith try to play pool.

Sports

MU put up a good run but it finally came to an end against a great team in UConn. MU could have a good year next year but I have put some thought into it and I am not sure an Anderson team could ever win it all. As you could see in the game Saturday, any team with height can score at will and out rebound a smaller team like MU. A taller person would not  necessarily work in the Anderson scheme due to the constant pace and shifting of coverage. But we can always be competitive against smaller teams and teams with very little depth.

I went to my first Blues game with the boys. It was a great game and we had a lot of fun. I am pretty excited about the Blues possibly making the playoffs.

TV

I finally caught up on all my DVR watching. I may have a new favorite show. It is called Kings on NBC. I has Ian McShane (aka Al Swearengen). This is the perfect role for him and I thought the first two episodes were very entertaining. Allison Miller is really hot, too.

I also watched Pineaplle Express. Everyone told me this movie was very hillarious. I was not impressed. It did have Danny McBride from Eastbound & Down.

Test message from my Bold.

Basketball

I watched more basketball than I possibly could this weekend so this will be a short post. I basically watched basketball all Friday afternoon, Saturday, and Sunday. The Missouri games were very good. I was really scared in the 2nd half of the Marquette game. Marquette was beating our full court press, MU was allowing to many offensive rebounds, and our hot hand went cold. Bring on Memphis on Thursday. My bracket is also doing really well.

Nightlife

I slept and watched basketball on Friday so I did not go out. I went to F15teen on Saturday night for a Wash U graduation / moving party for a couple of the ladies in the PMB 22 class. It was a lot of fun but I did drink too much and paid the price the next day.

Spring Break Lifestyle

Dave, Steve, and I had taken a lot of crap for going on this trip because we were deemed “too old.” I personally wanted to go on a trip in May as a graduation present but this time was settled on since I had two weeks off for school. We chose Negril (the land of glass bottom boats, Gonga, and clear water) since Dave was there before and it was the cheapest deal. I was actually surprised by the crowd. I felt like we were the oldest people on the beach for the first half week. The beach was filled with mainly families and a lot of Europeans (and their topless lifestyles). The weekend started to get a steady rush of students coming in from the East Coast (Duke, Penn St, Syracuse, etc) and was the first time it felt like a Spring Break place.

We decided to buy a wristband with STS since their home hotel (Jamaica Tamboo) was right next to us. After one really bad encounter that might have put us in bad light for the whole trip by the ladies, we purchased a VIP band for $220. That got us all you can drink from 11 till 5 during the day and then cover and drinking at the “IT” place each night. In theory the bands should have only worked for 7 days. They did give us tickets for each night though. So basically, the day band let us drink all 11 days so it was worth it. We left some of our night bands on the whole week so we got to use them as reentry without a ticket (it did not work at Margaritaville or the Jungle). We did not find out till the next day that Student City and Sun Splash partnered together this year so it would have probably been better to go through them but we shared parties most of the nights. I did feel that STS was very unprofessional compared to the other two companies.

The Yellow Bird

We stayed at The Yellow Bird since it was next to Risky’s, cheap, plus Jeff and Dave had stayed there before. I was somewhat surprised. It is a setup that I am not use to. It was basically a two family flat but each side could be divided up again and they would have to share the main room. They also had other motel like rooms for only $50 a night. I actually think it was pretty expensive based on the lack of amenities but it did include a kitchen which we never used. The two problems I had with it were the very scratchy bed sheets and the zero water pressure that was absolutely freezing early in the morning. It was on the beach and the people that worked there were very friendly so I can not complain. I could see how many people would like it but I have some pretty high standards and felt like it would have been a better deal to get a place next door that included drinks and food.

Drinking

I drank a lot of Red Strip on this trip. I would say it is probably the only beer I will drink for the rest of the year but baseball season is right around the corner. I also tried Red Stripe Light. I think people who drink it are suckers. For one, it is a smaller bottle than Red Stripe, it cost $1 more, it has less alcohol in it, and it taste horrible. Half way through the trip I realized I could get vodka in our plan so I then merged to it. I started out drinking Vodka and Sprite then discovered Ting which taste exactly like Fresca. They call a Vodka and Ting a Ving … it just sounds right. I did not have a hang over the entire trip so my theory about getting psyched up to drink still is valid. I have never had a hang over or had any problems drinking all day on any Vegas or Spring Break trip. I also had a lot of Rum Punch during the day since that was all they served for free at times. I had very little Rum and Coke though but it was good when I did have it.

Nightlife

Margaritaville (Negril) – We went to Margaritaville several times. We went to two Friday foam parties along with the Tuesday Mardi Gras party. All the times were fun. It was really weird walking around in a bar the whole time in the sand though. The foam parties were pretty crazy and they also had wet t shirt contest there.

The Jungle – We kept going back to the Jungle even though we kept saying we did not like it. This place was the only place not on the beach and was the only place that was more like a club plus it was the only bar we went to that had a lot of locals. I would best describe this place as a Buca like place. It had a dimly lit dance floor downstairs and a large deck upstairs where people could sit. The also had a stage upstairs where they had a DJ and also had a T.O.K. concert one of the nights.

Fun Holiday – We went to Fun Holiday twice even though it was not part of our package (we did get in free both times with our “hot” wristbands). It was in the Student City and Sun Splash package instead of the STS package. This place was a hotel but it had a hot tub and a large pool. It was considered the Playboy party both times we were there. They had all kind of contests, lingerie fashion shows, and craziness in the pool. It was also the night I was with a bunch of Syracuse fans watching the game go into 6 OTs. It was dead there the first time but I remember it well because some white kid rapped the entire lyrics to Ice Ice Baby. It was pretty funny. This was also the place where Steve was so drunk that he could not pick up his head.

Risky Business – I personally did not go to Risky’s enough considering it was right next to our place and was a fun time. I missed both Wednesday parties here due to various reasons. This bar was really cool because they played Patty O’s style of music which is my favorite. They also had a ton of contest along with the wet t-shirt contest during the day.

Jamaican Strip Club – Dave and I somehow got roped into going to this Jamaican strip club after partying all night at Margaritaville. I would assume the girls were scared because I know Dave and I were. The best way to describe it as is the dome from the 2Pac video California Love. We had to enter this secured gate in our cab where we had to pay only 200 Jamaican dollar (really cheap). This club was in the outskirts of town … an area we never had been in nor would we ever go back. It was really weird. There was a bunch of girls dancing (in cloths) in a stage that at some point was a large cage. We were in the balcony and just in awe. Every guy (98% locals) were standing evenly space by about 3ft. We finally convinced the girls to leave after about 30 minutes.

Various Fun

YS Falls - We went to YS Falls for a day trip. There are several waterfalls to visit. YS is supposed to be the most popular and it was offered by STS so we chose it. It was a long ride (little less than 2 hours) since the falls are in the middle of the island. It was a pretty cool site. I know the other guys did not like the trip but I think it had more to do with the long bus ride and the fact we got screwed out of a free lunch. I enjoyed the falls even though it was very cold and none of us had water shoes which made it really hard to walk around on the rocks (especially when you have a giant cut on the bottom of your foot).

Snorkeling Booze Cruise – This was by far the best time of the trip. We paid $40 to board a large sail boat with only 2 other guys and over 30 girls to explore the coast line while drinkings and snorkeling. The trip lasted over 6 hours so it was worth 3 times the money. The only thing I question is the combination of snorkeling (without a life jacket) and booze. There is no concern for safety in Jamaica and I am surprised that more kids do not die. We had no life jackets nor were we supervised. I did have an incident where I had to pay one of the locals $5 to pee in the sink on the boat. We were on board for 3 hours and been drinking the whole time with a broken toilet. I was not going to be the first one to pee off the back of the boat with 30 girls watching. I get out of the galley to find all the guys peeing off the back. I think they did that on purpose.

Rick’s Cafe – We went to Rick’s Cafe the last day we were there. We were hoping to go with some girls we met the night before but that fell through. This place is an over rated tourist trap. How did it ever get rated one of the top ten bars in the world? There are two things that pisted me off about this visit (1) we all got the West End Trio which is more than they advertise on their website. We did not want to pay that much but we figured it would be our one expensive meal of the trip. It was supposed to come with soup and bread so we thought it would be a filling meal. To our surprise, the meal totally sucked and they did not have any soup (which they never mentioned until we brought it up). The only thing that was edible was the fish but it was by far the worst we ate all week. The steak was not edible. It was so bad that it made me gag. I was also pisted because they had a sign advertising a $5 hamburger for Fridays even though it was Saturday. I asked if they still had that deal or even had hamburgers since they were not on the menu. The guy told me no. Not 30 minutes later, we see people eating hamburgers. (2) we found out after we got there that they offered free shuttle service. This would have saved us a $15 cab. I asked the door guy if we could get it back and he asked me how we got here. I told him we took our own cab and he replied we are not eligible. I then replied that we just dropped $125 on the crappiest lunch ever so could he help us out. He said it did not work that way. The cliff diving was entertaining and the water looked awesome but none of us went it because we were all beat.

My Feet

My feet did not like this trip at all. I had a piece of glass go through my flip flop the second night we we out. It cut a small hole in the bottom of my foot. I inspected the flip flop and did not see anything from the top so I continued to wear it for the next two days. I then looked at the bottom and noticed two pieces of glass. I pulled them out. Needless to say, I walked with a limp for over 7 days and developed a blister on my toe since I was walking so weird. I also had some weird calluses develop from walking in the sand and water for so long but so did everyone else.

Food

We did eat a lot of good food on the trip. I read before the trip that you had to eat jerk chicken and ackee and salt fish. We ate a lot of jerk chick but did not get to the other two because they are a breakfast dish and we rarely woke up for breakfast. My favorite place to eat was Alfreds. We found out about this place late in the trip from the Swedes. Not only was it the cheapest, but it was also the best. I had the blackened chicken twice and also the fish and chips. The second best place to eat was Bourbon Beach. It was advertised as the best jerk chicken and they did not let us down. We also ate at Legends, Jamaica Tamboo, and Burger King. We did also sneak into some cheap spring break buffets. I also finally ate a Jamaica patty at the last minute. They sold these things all over the beach and street but I never was able to get one. I finally ate one at the airport for a whole $1.50 which is really cheap compared to everything else we ate. It was good for the money.

I also tried curried goat which was horrible. The only thing I did not try was the $5 cooked Lobster in the shell that they were selling on the beach. Our neighbors from Halifax (you would think they would know a little something about lobsters) said they were really good and a great deal.

Various Other Items

• I almost missed my flight to Montego Bay from Miami. I was drinking in the bar listening to my iPod directly across from my gate when I get a call from AA. The gentleman said “Eric, you plan on joining us today. We are ready to take off.” I closed my tab and boarded the plane and we took off like 2 minutes later. My phone for some reason did not change times correctly so I was off by an hour. I got really lucky.
• The two ocean trampolines outside of Margaritaville were a lot of fun.
• I only saw 2 wet t shirt contest the entire time we were down there which was unexpected. The one at Risky Business was pretty raunchy. All the places had a strict no camera policy so I have no pictures. I did not was to risk losing my camera.
• You could not go 1 minute without being hassled by locals while walking the beach. They were selling gonga, coke, ecstasy, wave runner rides, tours of the gonga plantations, and glass bottom boat tours. I did even get asked if I wanted to buy steroids. I do not think I have even done so many fist pounds and yelled respect in my life. They were really friendly if you were nice to them and they tended to quit bother you after they seen you 5 other times.
• Everyone was so excited to watch the sunset. It was pretty nice.
• Here are all my pictures for the trip. I still need to get Dave’s pictures and only half of the water camera pictures turned out. I did not take as many pictures as I thought I did. Maybe they are on Dave’s camera. I had very little beach shots but again, the group was against day drinking.

Random Thoughts

• How is marijuana illegal there? Everyone was smoking it. It even came with our room.
• Not sure if I would ever go back but I would recommend the experience. I would probably recommend staying in a Sandals or Beaches resort if you are considering going. I have high taste so a 1 to 2 star place doesn’t normally suit me.
• Negril is not a place for kids nor would I ever let a daughter of mine go their for spring break.
• Panama City was a much funner place for Spring Break plus much cheaper. I can see why they are the Spring Break capital.

Crazy Moments

• Dave’s conversation with “tear drop” on the beach walk to Margaritaville
• Walking a mile on the beach (in an area with no tourist) to Burger King to find out you need a shirt to enter. We all go buy cheap “wife beaters” then go into Burger King to find out that the broilers are down along with the soda machine. I was like, “why did you not mention that to me when I was arguing with you about the shirts?” So we ate are chicken sandwhiches and OJ to only be harrassed by “tear drop” again; some two miles from where we met him the night before.
• The whole experience with the ATM machine in the city. I felt like we were sitting ducks in the old working ATM machine in Negril. —- business opurtunity …. open up an ATM machine in Risky Business or any of the hotels in the middle of the strip. You would make a killing.
• Watching Dave and Steve workout every day using bands. It was pretty funny.
• A certain night on the beach (and in the water) after going to Riskys.
• The “15 year olds”
• The Strip Club
• Running down the beach in the middle of the night in fear of talking to locals

I got the new Moxi series 2 through Charter. Supposedly St. Louis is a test market for the device. I was super psyched about getting this thing but not really impressed with it like I was expecting.

Advantages

• It has the ability to add an external HD but it has to be an eSATA drive so that means my current external will not work. I will get one at some point but will probably wait.
• Th online scheduling for the DVR is pretty easy. You basically just log into your charter.net account and select record on the guide. You can choose a new recording and review what you have scheduled to record.
• It is more ascetically pleasing. The silver on black finish makes it look  more high end.

Disadvantages

• It is much slower than the Motorola device I previously had. The guide is at least twice as slow as my old DVR.
• I miss my “list” button that automatically took me to my recordings.
• There is no way to put a shortcut in my fancy Harmony 890 remote to go straight to the HD guide.
• It does not show the %full in the main DVR screen. You have to go into the About Moxi screen to look at how full you are.

All in all, I am sorta regretting making the change all though the bigger DVR space is a huge plus. I guess I was expecting a different interface from the original Moxi box I had. Digeo’s website shows a different interface so I guess Charter does not have that update. I am also disappointed that I can not use my USB 2.0 external HD that worked perfectly on my old Moxi and was purchased specifically for it. I did like having a bunch of saved HD movies on my external so I am sure this will make the difference once I splurge on a new HD. I guess it would be a lot different if my old HD worked. It is hard to say old since I bought it less than 6 months ago solely for my Moxi box.

Below are a list of technologies and services that I love. They are not in any order. On a side note, I wrote this in early November but never posted it for some reason.

• DVR – This a big one. It has changed how I watched TV in the past 5 years. I use to plan my schedule around TV shows that I liked (which was very few since I did not have the time to dedicate to them and I am rarely home during prime time hours). Now, I can record whatever I watch and view them in my spare time. The addition of a 500 GB harddrive to my DVR made even more difference. Now I can record whatever I want in HD without worrying about filling my recorder. (Note: I lost this function but will be getting it back)
• HD – I use to laugh at my friends when they told me they only watched HD programming. I now do the same. The picture is amazing and it is impossible for me to go back. If only I could have some other service than Charter.
• Flickr – Not only can I share my photos with my friends but it also serves as a backup storage device for all my photos. It also allows me to post pictures on my blog without using a lot of download capacity.
• Netflix – I have been using this for the past 5 years. It is so convenient. I am not too impressed with the streaming ability with the 360 though.
• My Blackberry – All I know is that I rarely go to my PC at my house anymore so it has made a major change in my life.
• My car – I love to go fast and ride in style. It will be very hard for me to get something that does not have the performance my current car has. I am a person that can never downgrade.
• Ipod – I never thought I would say this but I love the thing. I like it even more now that I figured out how to put my mass collection of DIVX on it. I loved watching my collection of Ducktales on the plane ride home from Vegas.
• Internet – I get everything from it. News, emails, storage. Not sure how life would be without it.
• My blog – I love being able to put down what ever I am feeling. It is like my own personal diary.
• PC – I couldn’t do most of the things above without it.
• Planes – I love to travel and wouldn’t be able to quickly go overseas without them. Maybe one day we will have teleporting technology so I could go to the beach for the day without any trouble.

• I will post my blog entry on my trip to Negril this weekend. The entry is done but I do not get my pictures from the water camera developed until tomorrow so I wanted to wait.
• I am surprised I do not have warrant for my arrest. I just got notified by a law firm that I have an outstanding red light camera ticket from 2 years ago. I got it right next to my work which has cameras at each stop light. They said they sent the ticket to my Brentwood address since that’s where the car was registered to at the time. Luckily it is only a $100 fine and a non moving violation.
• Lost was decent last night. I feel like it has more of a season 1 flow now. I totally missed the image of girl in the background with Sun and Jack’s dad at the end of the show. I like how Sawyer is now the man instead of Jack.
• It is March Madness time. I am somewhat excited and basically only because MU is in it. I had a hard time filling out my brackets. All the good teams have really not been tested or they have hurt players so I think there will be all kinds of upsets even though I did not pick any. I expect the Big 12 to do well in the tournament. I will be taking a half day on Friday to watch the MU game. I feel sorta bad since I have taken so much time off in the past two weeks.
• My brother is selling a car alarm and two graphic cards on Craigslist if anyone is interested.
• I am so looking forward to sleeping this weekend even though I am going to F15teen on Saturday for a Wash U grad party/going away party for 3 of the girls from PMBA 22.
• My fast food binge is about to come to an end. I think I got it all out of my system. I also made some really good beef stew last night. I will go back to eating healthy in preparation for swim suit season after it is all gone.
• I am not sure I am going to get through all my DVR shows before I get my new one on Saturday. I have knocked out about half of the 19 hours I had on there. Luckily, I have been saving all the Showtime and HBO shows for last since I knew I could get them OnDemand even though it would not be in HD. I am super excited about my Moxi 2 coming this weekend. I feel like I am special for getting it.
• I got 4 tickets (thanks to Luke H.) to the Blues game vs the Blue Jackets on the 28th if anyone is interested in going with me. They are really good seats.

I have been a Charter customer ever since I moved back to St Louis since 2004. I have experienced more problems than I ever imagined I would have experienced. I can only imagine why the company continually loses money and it’s customer base hand over fist.

Below is condensed list of some of my problems

1. Could not get Digital Cable to work for over 4 months in a new residence while they continued to bill me. They explained that the condo building was using older MediaComm lines that were smaller than the normal Charter lines so it was not providing enough signal boost to work the DVR. They finally resolved the problem and I had to fight extremely hard to get reimbursed for my lost time.
2. Got continually billed for two locations after I moved from my last apartment to my condo. They would fix the problem and then it would come back the next month compounded. I was getting bills for over $500. This went on for over 4 months until I finally wrote them a letter in which I had someone call me and get it resolved.
3. Various outages all the time at all 4 of my residences.
4. Their pricing is all over the board. My internet and cable bill was $200 last month. I just stripped it down to the lowest internet and got rid of a bunch of channels and it is still $165 even though I priced in online for $125. They said I am not eligible for promotions not will I ever be anymore.

I seriously think that I have spent over 100 hours on the phone with Charter in the past 4 years which is purely ridiculous. Why are they still in business? I am not sure why people use their crappy services when they have other options.

I really want to leave but have little options. I can not get U-Verse which is the option I want. I can not get Direct TV or Dish since my building does not have a HD Satellite on it nor can I run multiple lines into my place to have a fully functional dual tuner. Maybe I just need to move.

Update #1 – I had a Eric Ketzer from the Charter’s UMatter2Charter team. He was able to get me in at a lower rate which was very helpful through a 2 year high speed internet contract (as long as I live in St Louis), removing a $10 music service which I did not even know I had, and signing me up for a new 1 year promotion package. The best thing about the deal is that I am getting a new series 2 Moxi box on Saturday that Charter has been beta testing here in St Louis. I am not getting my hopes up but it looks to have a much bigger HD (not sure if it is 160 of 500GB), can add an external HD (which is huge), and can do online scheduling (which is something I have never tried but seems like a pretty big feature to me). I will let you know how I like it once I get it this weekend. I am still not satisfied with Charter’s pricing on cable. It seems to me that they have a $20 to $25 premium on their pricing compared to Dish on the same services and channels but I do appreciate Eric’s teams initiative to seek me out and try to make me a happier customer.

Matt’s B-Day

I made my bi-annual trip out to St Charles for Matt’s birthday. It was a lot of fun. We pre-partied at Matt’s house then went to a bowling alley for a couple hours. We concluded the night with some Rock Band. My favorite moment of the night is when Matt and Jenni’s brother downed that pitcher of beer. I told Ted that I could get Matt to drink it and he did not think I could.

Shopping

I went on a huge shopping spree on Saturday. I am pretty set on summer clothes. I bought a bunch of shorts, swimsuits, and flip flops. I also bought a fancy new pair of running shoes. I bought these at the New Balance store.

Saturday Night

Saturday night was a lot of fun. The whole group went out. We started at Tin Can and then went to Pepper Lounge. Everyone brought their wives/girlfriends on the boys side and then all the Wash U girls were out having a “singles” night. We concluded the night at Maurizo’s. I got a good action picture of Ann posing in front of the buffet.

Sports

I was so looking forward to a good Sunday of watching basketball. The games I was looking forward to the most were both disappointments. The MU game was an utter disaster. All I can say is that you need to make layups to even compete. They are going to have a hard time stopping Blake Griffin on Wednesday. The other disappointing game was the Lakers game. The Sun’s new but old offense seems to be a lot better for them. Shaq’s play this year has been amazing.

Various

I also worked out a little, cleaned my floors and the rest of the house, and started to pack for my trip. It only 2 days away. I can not wait to get out of this cold.