I've been a bit busy lately, so haven't posted in a while. What have i been busy with?
My son, Ian Patrick Nicholson was born 3/27/09 at 12:29pm. Weighed in at 9 lbs, 8 oz - 20.5" long.
Hopefully i'll start getting more posting in soon. In the mean time, check cute pictures here, here, and here. You can also follow Ian on Twitter here, and his blog here.
Real quick post here...
A while back the Predators asked a bunch of season ticket holders to come in and participate in recording clips for some new radio ads. They said they would post them online, but i haven't seen them yet...
Well, i finally caught a few fast enough to record (though only one from start to finish).
Christy and I are featured pretty prominently in a few of them, so i decided to take what clips i'd been able to grab so far, chop them up, and make a version with just Christy and I :-)
Oh, and here's the one complete original i've been able to grab so far for anyone else that wanted to hear the commercials.
It's a boy! He'll be making his first appearance in public on March 24th (give or take a bit)It's a boy! He'll be making his first appearance in public on March 24th (give or take a bit)
"Breaking News" - not only did the Preds win game 3 tonight, but the Metro Council finally has the new lease out of committee and looks ready to vote on it today (tomorrow...er...Tuesday the 15th). Good timing!
I'll leave it to those smarter than me to dissect the game fully (or you can just watch highlights below). Sufficed to say, Trotz made adjustments, something he hasn't done well in the past. The adjustments in lines and match-ups freed our players to do what they needed to do, and they got the job done.
You will also hear much regarding the crowd tonight. Once again, there were several long standing ovations, and the final 3-4 minutes was probably the loudest i've ever experienced at a sporting event of any kind (and i've been to San Antonio Spurs games in the NBA Finals, etc). I'm not going to say it was the loudest ever in history...but it was pretty nuts. To put it in perspective, i'm a drummer, and i was afraid of having some serious hearing damage.
Major kudos to the arena crew once again for knowing when to let the crowd go. There was more than one time that the crowd started a "Lets Go Predators" or other chant and the arena crew quickly muted the techno or whatever music they were playing in favor of letting the crowd feed off the natural hype. They also finally traded the commonly used red lights during pre-game for blue and yellow (gold) ones. You'd think this was a no-brainer, but it hasn't always been. These 'little things' did not go unappreciated!
I'm also uploading all the pictures that Christy took at tonights game. She's been grabbing better shots than me lately, so i'm letting her have the camera from here on out i think (besides, we win when she's shooting).
They always show the pretty girls in the crowd ya know :-)
I also have to apologize to David Legwand. During warm-ups i took this picture of his skates (right), which to me showed he was clearly a decoy and not going to actually play. Thank you for proving me very wrong, Leggy.
Dead Things Red Wings.
The Preds will be the 8th seed against the first seeded Wings which, for the uninitiated, means we will start this series on the road. The NHL just released the schedule for the playoffs last night, and the Preds/Wings series is as follows:
2008 WESTERN CONFERENCE QUARTER-FINALI already have my playoff tickets, and for anyone who'd like to try to grab the (very) few that are left for games 3 or 4, direct message me on Twitter (pwnicholson) or call my Grand Central number (615-823-1734) and i will gladly hook you up with a referral to my rep (Tiffany Vanek - 770-2338) and let you buy off my account (i get referral credit - thank you new ownership!)
SERIES E TIME (Central) #1 Detroit vs. #8 Nashville Network
Thur, April 10 6:00 pm Nashville at Detroit VERSUS
Sat, April 12 1:00 pm Nashville at Detroit NBC
Mon, April 14 TBD (6pm?) Detroit at Nashville VERSUS
Wed, April 16 TBD (8pm?) Detroit at Nashville VERSUS
Fri, April 18 6:30 pm Nashville at Detroit VERSUS
Sun, April 20 2:00 pm Detroit at Nashville NBC
Tues, April 22 TBD Nashville at Detroit
(UPDATE: Confirmed- Game 3 starts at 6:30, game 4 starts at 8:00pm)
First game is of course this Thurs night. Haven't decided yet where i'll be watching it, but rest assured i will.People seem a bit confused about new Predator Brandon Bochenski…or at least what number he will wear while on the Preds roster.
The Predators website says he will wear #12 (the number he wore in Anaheim), however it also still lists Scott Nichol as continuing to wear #12, and Bochenski has been in the league a shorter time than Nichol, so I don’t see him bumping Scooter of his number. Yahoo sports page lists him as wearing #13, which seems logical given his previous wearing #12…but I seriously doubt a hockey player would wear #13. (by the way, Sports Illustrated's site still says he's on the Duck's roster)
Let's just hope he can help out the team that needs...something.
We'll find out Sat night as the Preds take on Dallas (will be in HD on Fox Sports South).
(For the record: the other new Pred, Jan Hlavich, is wearing Scott Hartnell's old #17. While Scott was well liked while here, i think it is safe to say that he was not as universally loved and appreciated the same way Scott Walker was/is.)
Christy and her business, ghia, had a great writeup in All The Rage here in Nashville today.
Local Spotlight: Christy Nicholson (ghia)
Everyone go check it out!
Well, finally back to posting. The holidays were great and i pretty much totally took time away from the PC for a while (though i did get a new Blackberry so i can't exactly claim to be totally unplugged)... and then of course i was out of town and then on a cruise for quite a while. Internet on the cruise was slow and $0.75 per minute - so you didn't get updates. Yeah. Sorry about that. Or not.
Anyway. Pictures from the cruise are starting to go up!
I took a lot of pictures. A whole lot. Like...around 400 i think. While not all of them are keepers (bless you digital camera technology), i still have a lot to sort through, crop, stitch panoramas, etc. So slowly but surely i've been uploading them, one "day" of the trip at a time.
First 3 days of the trip are now up - New Orleans (where my sister Amy was helpful in tagging and mapping pictures after showing us the town), boarding the ship, and the first day at sea. Go check them out!
Here are a few of my favorites for those of you too lazy to actually visit my Flickr site to see ALL 112 PICTURES i've uploaded so far:
We own lots of DVDs. Not nearly as many as some people i'm sure, but we have quite a bit. Not just movies, but a lot of TV shows too. We also subscribe to Netflix, which in addition to the DVD's through the mail we get, allows us to instantly stream movies over the web (from a rather limited selection). We also frequent Hulu and other online content sources. In light of all of this, we do not have cable. No need. More than enough entertainment and not enough time in the day as it is. The only TV show we’re huge fans of and “have” to watch is Stargate and we just go over to a friend’s house every Friday for that (which is more fun anyway)… So, that's your background.
I want to continue my process of ripping content from DVDs on to our big network drive. Have any and all of our media instantly accessible. Then my goal is to get a PC hooked up to the HDTV upstairs (already have one driving the projector-home theater downstairs) and just be in media heaven. Never have to watch “TV” again outside of live sporting events.
I love all this. My wife however, does not love it as much.
She’s fine with me ripping the content, and fine with watching shows occasionally and we watch movies frequently. But she still insists on occasionally watching TV. We have a good ‘ol set of rabbit ears and she’ll end up watching re-runs of sitcoms on fuzzy broadcast TV with…with… commercials included. I don’t understand this. She tries to explain it as wanting a “communal viewing experience”. She likes knowing that there are thousands (if not hundreds) of other people watching the same thing she is at the same time. I comprehend the facts of that statement, but it isn’t something I’ve ever felt compelled to partake in myself. What I really don’t get is how she’d often rather watch the fuzzy, broadcast, commercial filled version of Scrubs than just boot up the PC and watch the near-commercial-free version that is much higher quality on Hulu. I would way rather have a nice, clear, perfect version of my entertainment, starting and stopping when I darn well please, than have to be on someone else’s schedule for an inferior product. (wow, that sounded more harsh than I meant…)
But now it looks like there is something for both of us.
According to Cinematical, the new Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix HD-DVD allows for "Live Community Screening". Basically if you have a web-connected HD-DVD drive (which most allow for), when you hit play under this feature the movie doesn’t start immediately. Playback is controlled by a single "host" user, who initiates the invitation-only viewing, and can control the film by pausing and playing the feature on everyone else's machines. Participants can also text between their remote devices, creating a virtual "live chat" environment while they watch. High quality, great presentation, but the knowledge that someone else in who-knows-where is laughing at Harry and Ron at exactly the same time you are is still present.
Kinda cool...I guess. This is a strange, strange world we live in.
Oh - and in related news: Warner Brothers is backing off HD-DVD and it looks like the Blu-Ray/HD-DVD lines are going in favor of Blu-Ray. The HD-DVD version of Order of the Phoenix also comes bundled with a standard DVD, and for the first time Harry Potter movies (or any Warner Brohters movie as far as i know) is being pressed to Blu-Ray as well (I don't know of Blu-Ray'ers get the above mentioned "communal experience" though). Actually, it looks like they are Blu-Raying all the Harry Potters.
Many of you may not have seen this yet. It is amazing. It is cute. It is amazingly cute.
Its name is Keepon. It is a very simple robot, but with cameras for eyes, a microphone in its nose, and programming to react to its environment and dance. It is currently being used to study non-verbal play/dance behavior in children. As my wife said, it should be used to study the ability of cute japanese products to suck money out of people's wallets. $30 on ThinkGeek.com and we'd have placed an order already.
This video was put together by Wired, as a promotion for Nextfest, a Wired-sponsored technology fair that has a big robotics push this year. From what i understand, the vast majority (if not all) of Keepon's reactions to the music and people around it are genuine and a result of programming, not pre-scripted.
See the first test/dance video that was posted here.
Christy had some time this morning and swung by the open, informal practice session today. Mason, Fiddler, Gelinas, Erat, Hordichuck, Legwand, and Dumont were there today. They played light 3-on-3 most of the day, and Christy took a lot of pictures. Also some new news about the practice facility and what they are doing for the fans during open training camp session... go read about it at Christy's "Hockey Wife" blog.
Only thing she told me that she didn't put in the blog was the Hordichuck and Gelinas were hanging out talking together most of the time she was there. Makes sense to me. From what i understand they are both fitness nuts and seem to be cut from the same cloth.
Oh - and it looks like Mason does indeed have a new mask design and new pads for this season. I think it is interesting that Mason, who has been very pro-Nashville through the ownership mess, chose not to go with a mascot theme, but rather plaster "NASHVILLE" and the old Nashville Arena symbol on his mask.
Christy also shot a TON of pictures and some good video.
Video below. Pictures are here.
Oh - and if you watch closely, and about 2:06 into the video, someone actually gets checked lightly into the boards behind the net :-)
Nashville Predators Informal Practice.
I feel like i've been so poor in blogging lately. Not that i'm one of those people that feels i have to blog everyday. I know the masses of you that hang on my every word can live without hearing from me for a few days. No - i'm missing blogging because i have so much i wanted to blog about but have been to busy with all of said things to actually get around to doing it.
So...let's play a little catch-up:
Coming out of Barcamp, Christy and i talked a lot about what she/we're doing with Ghia. Among other things, i'm going to start blogging on the Ghia corporate blog. First entry: here!
Well, last Friday i got an email from Blockbuster titled something along the lines of "Changes to your Blockbuster Account". I was excited. I was ready to open it up and find out that they were going to give us the option to do downloadable movies instead of in-store exchanges, or better yet both. Um....no. Nothing about downloadable movies was mentioned, but they did explain that my previous plan of 7 movies (4 in store, 3 in the mail) per month for $7.99 was being discontinued (in reality they stopped offering this to new subscribers months ago) and i would have to choose another plan. The offer they made instead was 4 movies (2 in-store, 2 in the mail) for $7.99 - what a deal! Same price, 40% fewer movies!
Essentially the local ownership group is asking the Metro government for $3 million more per year (according to them this is being required by their creditors) and a guarantee of 14,000 in paid attendance (so the team doesn't lose on league revenue sharing). In exchange they are offering to donate the first $3 million in profits every year (if/when there are any) to local charities and groups, and are promising to take fuller advantage of the Sommet Center as a facility and increase the number of events (tax generating events) held there. Sounds fair enough to me. Much ado made out of very little last week, i think.
First: My wife is awesome.
She just started a hockey blog on HockeyBuzz.com: http://my.hockeybuzz.com/hockeywife
By the way, i am surprised myself at just how sexy i find this.
Christy and i signed up for a Blockbuster online account a while back (for now it really is a better deal than Netflix) and have enjoyed being able to watch all sorts of movies we had passed up in theaters but wanted to get around to, etc.
We found out that many of those movies were great - like Mirrormask, Unbreakable, The Prestige, and Good Night and Good Luck (some we ended up buying).
But we've also seen a whole lot of real stinkers. Die Another Day, The Last Mimzy, Men in Black II, The Fantastic Four, etc.
I'm beginning to wonder if we should re-think our list and take off movies that we didn't see because they didn't look that great, and start going for more movies that we don't know much about or couldn't get around to. For instance, Christy and i (yes, her too) have really gotten in to Jackie Chan movies (plus some Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon). I think we may explore more movies in those genres, or more artsy films like Mirrormask (City of Lost Children is on the list already).
We'll also leave on many classics that we haven't seen (or haven't seen in a long time) like The Godfather (i've seen it, Christy hasn't) and Terminator, etc. Those will stay on the list.
But i think Firewall, Jurassic Park III, and Daredevil are gonna get taken off. Or at least bumped waaaay down the list. If we see much more junk like we've been seeing - i agree with Christy - we'll go nuts.
She's been taking a class at the Nashville Jazz Workshop for the past 5-6 weeks. She wanted to do it and really has enjoyed it. Tonight, they had a concert with each of the students performing 2-3 songs. All from the Rogers and Hart songbook.
She was great.
For those that don't know, my wife was actually a vocal major (classical/soprano) in college, so it isn't like i didn't know she could sing. She sings around the house frequently and..well, yeah. She's good. But she also has a fairly soft, small voice. She worked through much of college to counter that while singing classically (arias, no mics, etc). Worked a lot on technique and how to sing as big and strong and exaggerated as possible. She was good at it...but tonight, she was singing jazz. In my opinion, this is what she was made to sing.
Thanks to the mic, and the fact that she was singing a ballad (one of the songs anyway) really let her shine. She was able to drop all the exaggerated stuff she had been forced to do singing classically and just allow her voice to be natural. It was really beautiful. She did well on the up-tempo tune too, no question. Good energy, but not crazy, etc. But the ballad...this woman was made to sing lullabies and torch songs.
There was video shot, and i'm hoping we get a copy soon. I'll try to convince her to let me post it. I tried to record it using her Sansa, but it just didn't turn out too well. The band over balanced her in the recording (it was fine live) and i'm not sure if i am going to post it or not.
Anyway, i thought she was great, and really look forward to making her forget everything she learned in college and sing more pretty, jazzy stuff.
Check this out:
I have watched maybe 10-12 episodes of the X-Files in my life. I have seen the movie, thought it was cool, and moved on.
But i had an X-files dream last night. I was Mulder, Christy was Scully. I don't remember much more than that.
Then i find this news story published this morning. New X-Files movie being planned.
Cue the creepy music.
Well, my wife is pretty into Harry Potter. I have to admit i've gotten into it a bit too. Some friends let us borrow the movies and i caught up last spring. Then we just went to see the latest movie. Very very good. (My review: Good special effects in the beginning, bad effects in the middle, great effects at the end...the plot roughly follows).
Now i am going to start listening through the unabridged audio books (so i can more intelligently argue some points of debate with my wife) thanks to the Nashville Public Library system, and just pre-ordered the new book for Christy.
I said it'd never happen, but i guess we're fans.
But now i wish i had ordered Christy's copy to be shipped from the UK. Apparently they get a better version there. First, their version has the original UK English intact (the US version is re-edited for US kids vocabulary), but mostly, they have a way cooler cover. I'm sorry, there is just no comparison. What's up with that?
I know the US versions have had this same cover style for a while, but it...well...stinks. I just think it looks dumb. It doesn't match the feel of the stories that they hold inside. Looks more like a dark Dr. Seuss or something. Too melodramatic and stylized without being fun looking. It either needs to be creepy or fun. This fails at both.
Happy anniversary my beloved Christy.
Our licenses tells us this is 5 years, but we know its really more like our 12th wonderful year together. The best part is, we both know they have improved year after year. Which by this point means it's pretty dang awesome.
I am happy to announce the opening of my wife's online retail store:The mission of ghia is to provide socially responsible shopping at an affordable price. Many of their products are made by independent artisans located in the Middle Tennessee area, while other products are fair trade imports from Asia.
Go check it out!
I really am very proud of her and this store. Though in my former life i was a web designer, she did this almost entirely on her own. Its a killer site from top to bottom, and she tackled the full intricacies of secure e-commerce, which i never did.
I love that her goal here really is to be socially conscious (fair trade, supportive industries, local artisans, etc) but affordable. And with lots of research and hunting, she found suppliers that let her pull it off.
I also can't wait until more of her own designs get to be put on the site. She's still wrestling with some printers for getting those made and on her site, but they will be coming soon.
Now seriously, everybody go buy something.
Katherine's right. I do dig it...
The new initiative rolled out (they rolled initiative...ha!) by the Nashville Chamber of Commerce to keep the Preds:
Digg This!
