Christmas time....

Well tomorrow is Christmas eve and my company is closing down at 5pm, so I get to work an early shift. Today was the company Christmas luncheon and damn it was hella good. All sorts of good stuff, plus the usual christmas dessert goodies, and the best part it was free. I just came from a company that the employees basically had to pay for everything themselves, so it is nice to be with a company which shows some appreciation once in awhile.

Two days after Christmas is the big UFC Show of the year, which features three fights that could be main events of their own cards. It's gonna be huge. Lots of people coming over, a couple folks I haven't seen in a long time that used to be part of the regular group. The booze is definately going to be flowing.......and then.....

The Day after is the Redskins game, which I am prepping for either tomorrow or on Christmas day. Instead of doing fajitas, I am going to use the flank steak for steak sandwiches on hoagie rolls. I am going to use the marinade everyone loves. It looks like we have a pretty big tailgate group again, maybe on my next blog entry I will post a pic or two if they are uploaded by then. It kinda sucks that the Redskins got eliminated from playoff contention the week right before this game, but since I live on the west coast I have to take every oppurtunity I have to see them. Next season they come out to Oakland(*gulp*) and San Diego. So that will be two times I get to see them, hell yeah!!!

So All in all I have a huge holiday weekend in store...and I can't freakin' wait.

Happy Holidays, fooz!!

DVD/Blu-Ray marketing practices......

I dunno who else is paying attention but the retail marketing practices are pretty disgusting these days.

Standard DVD prices are being slashed like crazy lately(not just for Christmas but in general too). Now, this may seem like a great thing, but here is the bigger picture. Blu Ray players are also coming way down in price. So basically what is happening is, these companies want people to buy up as many standard DVDs as possible, and then go out and buy a new affordable blu-ray player, so they can go ahead and re-buy everything on blu-ray, partaking in what many refer to as "double-dipping"

On top of that, it seems like most movies being released on blu-ray(besides new releases) are being released in bare-bones fashion.(No extra features, no special edition, just the theatrical cut) For example, I own the Terminator 2 Ultimate edition on standard dvd. This same version is not on blu-ray yet, however the bare-bones edition of T2 is on blu-ray. So what these companies want me to do, is go run out and buy the bare bone version on blu-ray NOW, and then six months from now, they will transfer the Ultimate edition to blu-ray. I am sorry but all these special/limited/collectors/directors cuts should get automatic transfers. There is no reason other then corporate greed to be releasing bare bone version of movies on blu-ray when we all know it is quite easy to transfer any version that is currently out on standard dvd, into high def.

My advice to anyone looking to upgrade to blu-ray, is to stop buying DVDs altogether until you either:

A) Upgrade to HD

B) Never plan on upgrading until that is all that is available

Otherwise you are going to fall into the trap of buying all these DVDs at a cheap price, and then want to buy the blu ray versions later.

Christmas comes early....sort of.

Well, it seems like every Christmas season there are one or two things that come out right early enough before Christmas that I just can't wait and end up buying.

This year it was.............

"The Dark Knight" blu-ray dvd. It would have made an easy gift for anyone to get me, but there is no way I could have walked the aisles of stores seeing it sitting there, wanting to watch it so badly, and not pick it up. So I just made it easy on everyone and bought it myself. I am about to watch it for the first time since seeing it in the theater, and whats cool is the blu-ray edition is basically the IMAX version(which I didn't get a chance to see). So it has all the enhanced wide angle shots which is going to be cool.

I might actually have time to watch it a 2nd time on DVD this saturday with some friends because it is supposed to rain for four days straight starting tomorrow which would keep me from discgolfing this weekend.

Well....enough of this, it's movie time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Podcasts

So since getting decent enough at my job to where I am not asking questions and/or for help every five mintues, the days have started to slow down a bit. I am not into listening to the radio for very long because the same songs tend to repeat ad naseum regardless of what station i flip to, and most of the AM radio programs I used to listen to back in the day either end before I start work, or are now longer aired in the Sacramento market. :(

The solution: PODCASTS!!!!

Pretty much any genre or discussion theme you are looking for is out there. Some are better then others, but if you get a hold of a good one, it makes the day fly extremely fast.

Right now I am listenting to some SHOOT interviews by various wrestlers. If you are one of my "wrestling-geek" friends, you know what I am talking about, if yer not, then explaining it will be a waste of time. I just downloaded Raven's Secrerts of the Ring part 1. Since I am leeching, I can download a limited amount per 24 cycle, so I will just get 1 part a day until I have all four parts. I also downloaded his 2000 WOL appearance.

Since I am also into film/movies like crazy, I downloaded a show from CHUD.com, it was hilarious and had me literally LOL'ing at my desk. I think I am going to suscribe even though they don't put out new content very often.

Podcastalley.com is a huge database that will surely have what anyone interested is looking for.

Here's to another day of work flying by(FRIDAY Whoo Hoo), and another weekend on the horizon!!!