A Rare Update

Hmmm... 1 blog over the past 2 months. I thought I would have stuck with it longer than that. So what have I been up to?

Well, since I have football on right now, I'll mention that my fantasy football season is pretty much done. My preseason prediction of mediocrity was fairly accurate, and I'll finish up under .500. Injuries and inconsistent play were a problem all year. Brian Westbrook was a waste of a first round pick. Anquan Boldin was a great 2nd rounder, but his injuries have been an issue. Big Ben was one of my keepers, and was injured/unreliable all year. Jamal Lewis was my other keeper and also had a horrible season.

I also played in my first World Series of Poker event. It was actually a low buy-in WSOP Circuit event at Harrah's in AC. It didn't go well, but I'll try again next month. Borgata has a deep-stack tourney next month that sounds decent, or I may try another Limit tourney there next month.

I haven't started Christmas shopping yet. I always leave it for the last minute. No reason this year should be any different.

Not going to Rutgers bowl game this year... too far to drive, too expensive to fly. Plus it's a shitty bowl. Hopefully we can get in gear before losing 5 games next year, though I don't know without Teel and Britt.

Theoretically I'll write up some more music and TV blogs. Saw Scott Weiland at Borgata. Chuck has been brilliant. Heroes has been a massive disappointment. Or I just won't post anything for another 2 months. Who knows?

Why I Love Vegas

I realized today just how much I've been slacking here.  I hadn't sent a Tweet in 6 days (follow me) and I haven't posted a blog here since before I went away on vacation.  I went out to Vegas for a week.  I had a lot of fun even though it wasn't particularly profitable.  I played one really good tournament, finishing 12 out of 137 at the Venetian's noon tournament one day.  BTW, the Venetian runs the best daily poker tournaments I've ever played.  They also have one of the nicest poker rooms I've ever been in.  Anyway, the rest of my poker results were pretty horrific.

This was my third time out to Vegas.  (Technically it's the fourth, but the first time was twice in a week, so I just count it as one.)  I've done a lot of the sightseeing stuff in earlier trips, so I didn't do too much this time.  Still, I always have to see the Bellagio fountains at least once.  I also rode the New York, New York rooftop roller coaster again.  

I saw Cirque du Soleil's "O" at the Bellagio.  The Cirque shows are fantastic.  "O" is the water themed show, and it was very cool.  Still I think "Love," the Beatles Cirque show was better, and I'd really like to see it again at some point.

Anytime I go on vacation to someplace new I have this stupid habit... I like to eat at the fast food chains that we don't have here in NJ.  In Toronto, it was Tim Horton's.  In Houston it was Whattaburger.  I've been to all of them before, but in Vegas I got Jack In The Box, Del Taco, and In 'N' Out Burger.  (Side note, Jack In The Box really needs to expand out here.)  Also Dunkin Donuts has finally started adding some locations in Vegas, so I finally got a decent coffee.

There is one really silly thing about Vegas that I just love, and that's the music you hear in the casinos and the parking garages.  A couple of years ago, it was "Glory of Love" the Peter Cetera song from the Karate Kid Part 2 soundtrack.  This time, I took notes on the bizzare stuff.  It took me about two minutes to realize I was singing along out loud to Cheap Trick "Surrender" in the MGM Grand parking deck.  There was Fleetwood Mac "Little Lies" in the halls of the Bellagio as I looked for the "O" Theater.  (If I remember correctly that was followed by a Roxette song, but I didn't make a note of that.)  I heard Richard Marx in the Venetian poker room.  I found that to be particularly odd after they played O.A.R.'s "Shattered."  Mr. Mister's "Kyrie" in the halls of the MGM Grand was another fun one.  The absolute strangest song though had to be in Paris in the walkway back to the parking deck at about 3 in the morning.  They were playing Letters to Cleo "Here & Now."  I seriously doubt most people have any clue who Letters to Cleo are.  I can't, for the life of me, figure out why they'd be playing such an obscure band in Paris, of all casinos.

Anyway, I've been back for a couple weeks now.  I'll start getting caught up with new posts.  I'll probably skip writing directly about the TV stuff from the past few weeks and just pick up with the new episodes.  I also have a few new CDs I've been listening to (but haven't ripped to iTunes yet) so there'll be more reviews coming there too.

TV- Monday Night Recap 10/13

The Sarah Connor Chronicles was pre-empted by baseball, which is good since the Giants were on Monday Night Football.  Of course, the Giants got whupped by the Browns which was significantly less good.  Anyway, on to scripted TV...

How I Met Your Mother

Much better episode than last week.  Not outrageously funny, but at least they weren't ragging on Jersey again.  I'm starting to think Stella's not the mother...

Chuck

Well, at least something Giants related was good.  Michael Strahan as a bully from the sporting goods store tormenting Morgan and Lester was pretty funny.  Anna beating him with a tripod was also funny.  And Casey calling for a background because he has a candidate for a field agent was perfect. Captain Awesome running interference between Bryce and Sarah was also good.

What's  weird is that I usually don't like the side stories as much as the main one, but I could have done without another Chuck "I'm not as good as Bryce" episode.  It wasn't horrible, but I liked the bully story better.

Heroes

I'm really starting to like how Sylar is developing.  Seeing him play Claire and HRG off each other was pretty good.  I still haven't seen a reason why Peter needed Sylar's power.  And I'm just not buying Mohinder's actions.  Or Hiro's for that matter, but I suspect that stabbing Ando was a trick.  HRG also took a step backwards, lying to Claire and trying to use the vortex guy to kill Sylar.  Again decent action this episode, but stupid characterization, except Sylar.  

Music Reviews- Low Vs Diamond, Oasis, Buckcherry

Low Vs. Diamond - "Low Vs. Diamond"

iPod: 11/11

iPhone: Don't Forget Sister

This Is Your Life

Cinema Tonight

Heart Attack

Wasted

Save Yourself

Annie

I'll Be

These things tend to come in pairs for me.  Last week I wrote about Kings of Leon "Only By the Night."  This disc is just as solid.  Start to finish, there isn't a single bad song.  None of the songs needed a "grow on me" bump to get ripped to the iPod, but a couple are edging their way onto the iPhone.  I also mentioned my disappointment with the new Killers' song.  This band is very reminiscent of early (i.e. "good") Killers, so if you like them, you'll love Low vs. Diamond.

Oasis - "Dig Out Your Soul"

iPod: 6/11

iPhone: Bag It Up

The Shock Of The Lightning

For me, this album is a bit front loaded.  The early songs rock.  The later songs have more of a Beatle-esque wanna be feel, but they aren't quite strong enough compared to the early tracks.  With more listens, one or two of them may grow on me a little bit, but overall this is an average album.

Buckcherry- "Black Butterfly"

iPod: 0/12

Oh, this is a tough one.  Maybe I like "15" more than it deserved, and I want to like this follow up.  The songs on "Black Butterfly" aren't that bad.  The problem is that there's nothing new.  Every track has a very similar song on the previous album, but in every case, the old version is the better one.  There's also nothing that's quite as fun or catchy as "Crazy Bitch."  I'll probably come around a rip a couple songs later, but when I do, it will be because of how much I liked their last album.

TV- Monday Night Recap 10/6

Warning: Spoilers Ahead- Particularly Heroes and Terminator

How I Met Your Mother

Not my favorite episode of all time.  Ragging on my home state of New Jersey is never cool.  The running joke about no one responding to Barney's fist pump was kind of amusing, but the set up was that no one would respond to his lame jokes.  Usually his one-liners are some of the best laughs, so that hurt this episode.  Marshall's rant about being too big for New York was pretty funny, though.

Chuck

Decent episode.  It looks like they've gotten the formula to balance the action and comedy just about right, and they're not going to veer away from that too much.  John Laroquette and Melinda Clarke were both fine in guest roles, but I don't think either was stronger than Michael Clarke Duncan last week.  My one problem with the episode was that it would have been nice if they didn't spoil the surprise at the end by putting the actor's name in the guest credits at the start of the episode. 

Heroes

Good episode.  Time travel episodes have always been solid, and it's good to see them using it quite a bit within episodes this season.  I'm still not 100% sold on Sylar being Peter's brother (it feels like a "jump the shark" move) but it was interesting to see how different he is in the future.  I'm not quite clear on why it was necessary for Peter to take Sylar's power- they essentially already have the same power, except Peter doesn't need to tear someone's head open to gain their ability.  Unless maybe Peter can only do this for people with natural abilities, and Sylar is capable of getting them from people who got abilities by injection.  I also don't understand why Hiro would dig up Adam... one, it doesn't make sense for him to do it based on their history together, and  two, he can teleport.  The pacing and action have definitely been better this season than they were last year, but they still need to tighten up the characters.

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

This is quickly becoming my favorite show on TV.  Last week's episode was a little strange.  Being so heavily focused on Cameron didn't quite fit with the rest of the season so far, and seeing her malfunctioning again was not great.  This week was back to form, and was another excellent episode.  Seeing John begin to mature while at the same time rebel has been the highlight of this season.  Thematically, his frustration with accepting fate and the predetermination of events makes this show much closer in tone to the first two movies. (Thankfully the show ignores the crapfest that was Terminator 3.  T2 ends on "No fate but what we make for ourselves.  T3 ends with Skynet launching it's attack because the future is predetermined.  Did the people responsible for T3 even watch James Cameron's movies?)  

Back to this episode, it was a perfect example of what this show does so right.  Introducing a character like Bidell, mirroring John's frustration as another person who's "destined" to become a great man.  It maturely looks at the question of destiny, as John and Derek talk about Bidell's desire to run away. "He has a choice.  We just have to help him make the right one."  Through his actions, we again see John becoming a man who could lead a resistance against the machines, and he inspires Bidell to become someone who would die to protect John in the future.

The only thing I would have liked to have seen that this episode didn't have, is more information about Weaver's daughter.  Is she human and just doesn't know that her mother has been replaced, or is it a child terminator?

TV- Entourage 10/5

Why can't the Emmy's ever get it right?  Yes, everybody likes Jeremy Piven, but he was nominated a year too late, and started winning well after he stopped being the funniest part of this show.  Kevin Dillon's Johnny Drama has been the highlight for years.  At least he was finally nominated this year.  Hopefully he wins for this season.

There hasn't been a character with this many hysterical, bizarre quirks since Jerry Seinfeld.  And the random outbursts just can't be topped.  I literally sprayed water over half the room when, tripping on mushrooms he blurted out "I thought I pulled my cock off... OK, it's still there."  

What started out as an inside joke, the lesser known brother of a famous actor playing the washed up brother of a famous actor, has become the best character on the show and one of the funniest on TV.    

Music Reviews- Kings of Leon, Plain White T's,

I have a 60GB iPod photo.  It's like a big white brick.  When I stood on line for an iPhone, people actually laughed because it's so big and old.  But it's nowhere near full.  I've only got 23GB of music on it.  Now I also have a 16GB iPhone 3G.  Why is this important?  Well, 16 is less than 23.

Basically, what happens when I get a new CD is I'll listen to it a few times.  I'll decide what tracks I like, and I'll rip them into iTunes for the iPod.  But only my absolute favorites make it onto the iPhone.  So that's how I'm going to rate music.  I'm going to score it as such: # of iPod tracks out of the total # of tracks.  Some CDs may have a 2nd score in parenthesis.  That's b/c if I like most of the stuff on a disc, I may rip a track or two that I don't love right away with the expectation that they'll grow on me.  So a 2nd score in parenthesis is the number of tracks that made it without the "grow on me" factor.  After scoring an overall disc, I'll also list the tracks that I liked enough to add to the iPhone.

So away we go:

Plain White T's- "Big Bad World" 

iPod: 5/10

iPhone: Big Bad World

Natural Disaster

I haven't listened to a lot of Plain White T's before.  Honestly, I hate "Hey There Delilah."  But I liked some of their other songs like "Hate" and "Our Time Now."  And I really like the first song from this CD, "Natural Disaster," so I decided to try the album.  Some of it is catchy, but I don't think they're very strong songwriters overall.  There are a couple tracks that feel forced, like they were trying to duplicate their "Delilah" success.  Even worse, "Someday" sounds like a crappy emo re-write of John Lennon's "Imagine."  They're just not good enough to make it work.

Kings of Leon- "Only By the Night"

iPod: 11/11 (10/11)

iPhone: Crawl

Sex on Fire

Use Somebody

Manhattan

Notion

I Want You

I've been hearing the hype on Kings of Leon for years, and while every album has had one or two good tracks, I've never thought all the praise was justified.  So when I started listening to "Only By the Night," my jaw hit the floor.  This is a really solid album start to finish.  They've built on the best elements of their older songs, and have finally released a full set that justifies the hype they've gotten.

A couple other things:

I wanted to include Low Vs Diamond here too, but I forgot it at work.  So that will be included the next time I do a music review, but don't wait.  Just go get it.  I'll probably also write up the new Oasis, Buckcherry, and Rise Against next time, too.

Is it just me, or does the new Killers song "Human" really suck? Sam's Town was nowhere near as good as Hot Fuss, and I had no interest in their B-sides.  If "Human" is any indication, I may be just about done with the Killers.

What Is Rob's Randomosity?

I've been writing blogs somewhat regularly for work.  For some reason, I've decided to also start running a personal blog, and that's what this is.  My work blogs are pretty well thought out, reviewed and edited before they get posted.  This won't be.  

This blog will be about whatever I feel like writing about, hence the "randomosity."  I'm sure there will be recurring topics- music, TV, movies, sports (both real and fantasy), and more.  

It will pretty much be written on-the-fly, stream of conscious style, and I may jump from topic to topic and back within the same post.  It will usually not happen on any kind of a set schedule, but I'll probably make my first real post over this weekend b/c I really feel like talking about some of the CDs I've been listening to recently.

I'm going to warn you now: From time to time, I will have some bad language.  After all, my cousin-in-law(?) once told my siblings and I that "Y'all cuss a lot." 

If you want to, feel free to comment on what I say.  If you like my posts, follow me on Twitter too.

So that's the intro.

I'm Rob.  This is my blog.