UngsungBlog: A (Fantasy) Sports Blog

As usual, I misremembered to blog in the past few days.  My apologies.

Quick-hitters:

- Retail renting should be called “short-term stealing,” says NetworkWorld’s Paul McNamara. I like that a lot more than “retail borrowing.”

(Tangent: Did Mr. McNamara really use the term “doofus?”)

- Holy crap!  Akismet caught 52 spammy comments on my blog in the past two days!

I love the attention :P.

- I ordered a Canon Imageclass D320 from Quill.com a couple days ago, and with the order, I got some freebies:  a tin of Mrs. Fields nibblers (small, chewy cookies) and a tub of Mrs. Fields Butter Toffee popcorn.  I figured that the cookies (28 half-dollar sized cookies) would last us about three days.

It’s been two, and I’m down to three…

(Make that two…)

- Quick update regarding my XG/MGE rebate fiasco:  my state Attorney Genera’s office sent me a letter, saying that they have sent a copy of my complaint to XG, and they’re awaiting communication.  The BBB also closed my complaint, citing the fact that XG offered a satisfactory resolution; apparently, promising a rebate check (even if it’s the third or fourth such promise) is satisfactory.

3/14/08 is coming up real soon…let’s see what happens.

- So I added a few toys to my video game collection this past week.  To recap:
1) I picked up Rock Band for the PS2 (game only) once I discovered that I could use my Guitar Hero guitars to play the guitar/bass portions of the game.  After a bit of research, I then discovered that the Logitech USB Microphone for PS2 worked with Rock Band as well, so I began hunting for one of those.  I figured that I could form three-fourths of my “band” for a heck of a lot less than the $159 MSRP for the entire Rock Band set.  When the Wii version of Rock Band comes out, however, I will probably pick that up; I’d much rather lay down $159 on the Wii version of Rock Band (when it’s released, that is) than $159 for the PS2 edition.

(Tangent:  I love games like Rock Band, Guitar Hero, etc., not so much for the gameplay, but the fact that I get to discover new songs as well as songs that I knew but never knew the name of!  In fact, the only reason why I started playing the Grand Theft Auto series—Vice City was the first, followed by San Andreas—was for the music, not the violence!  I never really got in to GTAIII, mostly because there was no real music on the radio stations, and I thoroughly enjoyed San Andreas, even though the plane-flying missions were a royal PITA.)

I found that no local stores around me had the microphone in stock, even though Target.com, Bestbuy.com, and Toysrus.com all had the mic available (@ $19.99) for ordering online.  I then found out that Frys.com had the item in stock for $24.99, so I called my local store to check their store inventory.

(If any of you have ever called a Fry’s B&M, you’ll know exactly how well THAT went.)

2) On Sunday morning, someone on SlickDeals reported that the Woodland Hills Best Buy had the Nyko Wii Wireless Sensor bar marked on the shelves for $6.xx, but it actually scanned at $2.49!  He said there were three left in stock after he picked one up.

Later that afternoon, I figured that the three would be gone, but I decided to take a stroll down to Best Buy anyway.I also intended on going to Target—right across the street from Best Buy—and Fry’s—a couple blocks down from there—on the hunt for the microphone and possibly some cheap Wii games.

When I got to Best Buy, I found two Wii wireless sensor bars, and I was overjoyed!  That’s when I realized that I had accidentally picked up the MadCatz version.  Somewhat dejected, I walked over to the Wii games section, and that’s when I noticed a pair of cylindrical tube-shaped packages on the shelf beneath the Wii games.  Remarkably, there were still two Nyko sensors left!  I grabbed one and then strolled over to the PS2 section, looking for the microphone.

(Don’t ask me why I didn’t pick up both of them.  I’m an idiot.)

Over at the PS2 section, I noticed several boxes of the game Boogie, and immediately noticed the words on the left side of the box:

Logitech Microphone Included!

Score!  Best of all, the sticker price was $19.99!

3) After the success at Best Buy, I went across the street to Target to pick up some cleaning supplies and to look for some Wii games.  Specifically, I heard good stuff about Rayman Raving Rabbids, and I knew that my local Target had the game for $19.99.

Knowing that I’ve seen the game before on the shelves outside of the glass cases, I browsed through that aisle.  To my dismay, I couldn’t find the game.   I then went over to the Wii games section, and I found the one and only copy of RRR locked up!  I had an employee grab the game, and it scanned at $19.99!  Yay!

(Tangent:  I have yet to successfully say “Rayman Raving Rabbids.”  In fact, when the associate asked me what game I was inquiring about, I started pointing at it.  When it was obvious that he couldn’t tell what game I wanted, I had to attempt to say the game title.  I didn’t come close.)

RRR is a heck of a lot of fun, though it can get really repetitive rather quickly.

(Yes, the alliteration was intentional :P).

The only drawback to the game is that it requires one Wii-mote + nunchuk per player; I only have a single Nunchuk.  I guess I gotta go pick up another one of those.

Whew!  That was a long post!  TTYL!

Tags: Games, Sports by Peter
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No quick-hitters tonight.  On to the topic at hand:

I really didn’t feel like blogging tonight, but after the announcement came that Kelvin Sampson was relieved of his duties as Indiana’s Men’s Basketball coach, I just had to blog about this.

(Note:  Everything I’m going to talk about below will be written under the assumption that Sampson is, indeed, guilty of recruiting violations.)

1) Can someone explain to me why Sampson was not fired?  The guy was caught cheating (and you’re going to hear that repeated often in this space), and he was allowed to resign???  Indiana might try to convince people that Sampson was bought-out, but check out his statement, paying special attention to the parts in bold:

“I have made the very difficult decision to leave my position as head coach of the men’s basketball team at Indiana University,” Sampson said in a statement. “While I’m saddened that I won’t have the opportunity to continue to coach these student-athletes, I feel that it is in the best interest of the program to step aside at this time.”

(Never mind the fact that this decision couldn’t have been that difficult; he sullied the name of a proud university, possibly ended his coaching career [though that’s not likely; some I-AA team will probably sign him to a contract in the near future], and did I mention he was caught cheating?)

As I mentioned in a previous blog entry, Sampson should have been fired once the NCAA released their report of additional recruitment violations.

2) The guy got caught cheating, and yet he was paid $750,000 to go away???

(Tangent:  That’s three now.)

Keith Van Horn getting paid $4 million to board a plane headed for New Jersey thinks Kelvin Sampson got a ton of money.

Seriously, the guy got busted for a rules violation for which he had been reprimanded before, and yet the university thought it would be best to pay him to go away?  I understand that one motivating factor for the buyout was the agreement that Sampson could not sue the university for wrongful termination, but on what grounds would he have a case?  Was he going to convince a judge that he was wrongfully terminated for breaking the rules?  That would be the equivalent of a student suing a university for throwing him out after he got caught cheating on a midterm!  Wrongful termination?  The students should be allowed to sue Sampson for being a horrible role model.

Speaking of the students…

3) I understand that the students looked up to Sampson.  I understand that they love the guy, in part because he was a heck of a coach.  So when it was announced that Sampson resigned, I could sorta understand why the students would express their frustration by boycotting a practice (and possibly a game?).  However, the students do realize that you’re supporting a two-time cheater, right?  For two years, he was a leader of men, supposedly setting an example for them, yet knowing full well that he was breaking the rules a second time!  Despite that, the students want to support him?  He betrayed your trust and loyalty, for crying out loud!

I understand that kids 18-22 can be very impressionable (not that I’m that far out of that age range), but if my coach/leader was caught cheating, I would be extremely frustrated…at him, not the administration!  And should some of the students actually boycott a game or more, that is going to affect all of the wrong people:  the administration, the university, and most importantly, the students themselves.

What really sucks is that this entire ordeal is probably going to overshadow the huge #1 v #2 match up tomorrow between Memphis and Tennessee.

Until next time.

Tags: Sports by Peter
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Quick-hitters:

- Somebody clearly turned down the thermostat outside this morning, because it was freezing cold!

I can’t wait for Spring.

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,850.

Current unfiled-rebate-o-meter: $775. Damn I’m a lazy ass :P.

- (from Consumerist) Apparently, retail renting, where a person buys something from a store with the intent of returning the item after using it, is becoming (or already is?) a serious problem in this country (original article here). How there is any debate as to whether or not this is ethical astounds me. It’s one thing to buy a product, and then change your mind and return it. It’s a wholly different matter to buy something, with the intention of using it once, only to return it later!

(By the way, the term “retail renting” isn’t quite correct. Krunk and I have decided to name this “retail borrowing.” How is it “renting” if a person gets his money back?)

My two favorite arguments heard in favor of retail borrowing are:

1) [A store] sucks, so they deserve to be retail [borrowed]!

2) If the store didn’t have such a lax return policy, this wouldn’t happen!

Please. Stop. It’s the same customers that see nothing wrong with retail borrowing that probably ruined Costco’s awesome return policy. And I don’t want to hear that stores can charge a restocking fee, and just put the item back on the shelves. Not everything can simply be put back on the shelves; these returns have to be marked down, returned to the manufacturer, or destroyed/donated. Never mind the fact that the store has to waste their time processing returns on these borrowed items. And what if stores, in an effort to curb retail borrowing, decide to start charging restocking fees on all returns? How is that fair to those who are returning products for legitimate reasons?

Please do not confuse retail borrowing with what I call the delayed return/rebuy: a person buys a product from store A, buys the same product from store B, and then returns the item purchased from store B using the receipt from store A. I have no problem with this, as long as store A is getting the exact product back in brand new condition. In fact, I’ve done this before to get an item immediately from store A, while saving some money by buying it cheaper from store B (and usually, store B is an online outlet, requiring me to wait a few days to get the item).

Clearly “the customer is always right” has gone way too far.

- Have you ever sung a song, only to find out some time later that you were single one line (or part of one) incorrectly this whole time? Up until recently, I thought this line from the song “Hard to Handle” by the Black Crowes went:

Hey little thing let me light your candle
cause Mama I’m sure hard to handle, now,
Yes, I am

Click on that link above, and you’ll see that the line actually is:

Hey little thing let me light your candle
cause Mama I’m sure hard to handle, now,
Gets around

Several other lyrics sites confirmed the “Gets around” line, but I was 99% sure that they were all wrong. I went to YouTube, found the video of the song, and sure enough, I was wrong! That being said, “Gets around” makes no sense at all to me. I just cannot get myself to sing the line correctly, so much so that I will continue to sing the line as “Yes, I am” even though it’s wrong :P.

Loyal readers (all none of you): is there a song lyric that you continue to sing incorrectly, because it sounds better than the correct lyric?

- What a game between the Lakers and Suns last night! I think I’m going to go ahead and Ung-hex the Lakers by calling them the favorites to win the NBA Championship this year, Bynum or not (more on that another time). As long as Kobe’s finger doesn’t get worse, and Odom or Gasol don’t get hurt, who’s going to beat this team?

Shaq looked terrible for three quarters, but he looked pretty good in the 4th, so much so that I’m starting to think that the trade won’t be as awful as I first thought. As long as teams insist on doubling on Shaq, Amare and Nash are going to get great looks at the basket. It appears that the Suns’ chemistry—not something to be overlooked in the NBA—is much improved, and I previously mentioned that addition by subtraction was, perhaps, the key motivating factor for the trade:

It almost sounds like the Suns are taking the addition by subtraction approach: by dumping Marion, that frees up valuable PT for Diaw and Barbosa. Or maybe the alleged Marion-Stoudemire chemistry issues boiled over, forcing the Suns to move Marion for Shaq!

We also saw how bad the Suns’ defense was, especially against the pick-and-roll. We also saw how big losing Marion was; do you think the Suns could use his perimeter defense and three-point shooting? And I thought Shaq was supposed to clog up the paint! How many points did the Lakers score in the paint?

We’ll see how the Suns handle the next couple of games on their schedule: v Bos, v Det, @ Mem (yawn), and @ NO. That gate at New Orleans should be especially good; I expect Chris Paul to go for 40 and 15 in that game.

Until next time.

Tags: Cust. Service, Pop Culture, Random by Peter
3 Comments »

I hate misremembering to write blog entries.

Quick-hitters:

- Has Firefox always had a “Undo Close Tab” option? Cool!

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,700. The Presidents’ Day sales weren’t as brutal on my wallet as I thought it was going to be.

- I was home yet again this past weekend (more on that later). Can you blame me? There’s no way I’m passing up free food!

My dad did another prayer on Monday, so we got to take home some of that stuff. My mom bought some clams, and sauteed me some of that as well. My aunt heard that we were back in town this past weekend, so she made us some more steamed buns (and boy, were they fluffy!).

What can I say? I’m spoiled!

- I got an email a few days ago from the BBB regarding the XG/MGE Company headache I’ve been dealing with lately. Here is the company’s response to my dispute:

The checks have been scheduled to be mailed out on 03/14/08.

Um…ok.

- Random thoughts from the sports world (since there is so much to talk about, and I really don’t want to go in depth with any topic in particular):

1) If Andy Pettitte were to run for a political office in NY, I’d give him a 50/50 chance of winning. Did you see that amazing performance he put up?

But seriously, how much better does Pettitte look than his buddy, Roger Clemens?

1a) Speaking of ‘roids, how bad did former Dodgers’ C Paul LoDuca and RP Eric Gagne look after their non-apologies? I don’t understand why baseball players either won’t vehemently deny steroid rumors, or apologize for something other than distracting their team.

I’ll say what just about anybody with half a brain might be thinking: if I were accused of taking ‘roids, and I didn’t, I would be screaming denials and threatening lawsuits on people. In that regard, I can respect Roger Clemens, but I can’t respect the guy for being willing to throw anyone and everyone under the bus to save his own ass. His own wife? Pettitte “misremembering?” What’s next? Is he going to throw his kid under the bus too?

2) Jason Kidd is finally a Mav, and Keith Van Horn got a $4 million contract to un-retire and spend 30 days in a Nets uniform. No thanks to Devean George and Jerry Stackhouse’s mouth, the Kidd deal cost the Mavs an extra $11 million, and I’m still not sold that Kidd makes the Mavs championship material. The Mavs are going to miss Devin Harris a ton—who’s gonna defend Tony Parker, Deron Williams, et al.?—and don’t overlook the loss of DeSagana Diop.

As for Van Horn, $4 million to sit on the end of the bench for 30 days? Nice!

3) Due to time constraints, I will make this thought short and sweet.

Kelvin Sampson (Indiana Men’s Basketball Coach) must go. Yesterday.

Assuming the allegations against him are true, he would have been caught committing the same infractions twice at two different institutions! For all the crap Bobby Knight did in his time at Indiana, I don’t think he ever cheated (twice!).

Way to lead from the front, (soon-to-be-former) Coach Sampson.

- As I mentioned earlier, I was back in MPK yet again for the long weekend. I brought home my Wii to let my oldest sister have a go at it. I figured she would enjoy playing Wii Tennis and Wii Bowling, but never did I expect my Wii to log about EIGHTEEN (18) hours of gameplay over the three days!

Six hours per day of Wii Sports, several switches of the Wii-motes (I really need more than two!), and plenty of pain pills and ointments later, and I finally had to pack up the Wii on Monday night. Some highlights of the Wii-part over this past weekend include the following:

1) Prior to the weekend, the Ung family Wii Bowling record stood at 188, owned by yours truly. After one game, that record was stretched out to 194. The younger, older sister then proceeded to annihilate that record, notching a 220, and it would have been a heck of a lot more had she not thrown a 6 on the first throw, frame 10 (she had thrown five consecutive strikes prior to a 6-2 in the 10th and final frame). A bit miffed, I began playing game after game after game, determined to get the record back.

(Pathetic, huh? :P)

It took a while, but I reclaimed the Ung family record, with a 252. My sister attempted to reclaim the record, and pushed her personal best to 239. My mom…thank goodness for the Wii Remote jacket.

Playing Wii Tennis was a heck of a lot more fun, though, especially watching a bunch of newbies trying to figure out how to hit the ball.

(Tangent: I may have to finally retire from Wii Tennis; at least, I’ll have to retire from playing against CPU opponents. Even the 1900- and 2000-rated CPU opponents are not much more than a distraction to me :P. Now I gotta figure out how to hit that curvy shot! We spent hours trying to hit that damn thing on demand, and all I got out of the attempt was a sore right arm.)

I think it’s time for me to buy another Wii party game. Any suggestions, other than Mario Party or whatever the latest flavor of Super Smash Bros. is?

Until next time!

Tags: Deals, Food, Sports by Peter
1 Comment »

I was supposed to post this last night, but I “misremembered”

(Misremembered is now my new favorite word in the English language, replacing “Traveshamockery.”)

Quick-hitters:

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,500 and rising, once I get my hands on the President’s Day ads.

Current injury-o-meter: three (sore shoulder, sore knee, sore right pinky). The shoulder is really bothering me; I haven’t been able to move around pain-free in the shoulder for more than a few minutes at a time.

And yes, I’m popping Tylenol like Tic-Tacs.

(Tangent: I’m dangerously close to running out of Tylenol. If I run out, I may seriously consider taking some Advil Cold and Sinus I got from CVS [free, naturally] just because it has Ibuprofen in it. Loyal readers: have you ever taken a multipurpose pill just for the relief that a single medicine in the pill may provide?)

- About a month ago, my sister decided to switch cell phone carriers, from Verizon to Sprint.  I signed her up for a Sprint SERO (employee) plan:  1250 min/mo for $49.99, and she opted to get a Palm Treo 755p.  Sweet phone, although I hate the fact that you cannot multitask on a Palm OS powered phone.

(I know, I know…it’s my sister’s new phone, so why am I calling it my new toy?  Probably because I’ve been playing with it while my sister has been waiting for her Verizon contract to elapse.)

My sister’s purchase of the Treo also meant that she no longer had any use for her PDA:  a Dell Axim X51.

(One might argue that she had no use for the PDA to begin with, but I digress.)

She told me to keep it or sell it, and although I have zero use for a PDA myself, I have kept it.  I can see why Dell got out of the PDA making business; the PDA drains the battery like nobody’s business, and the PDA lags even with just a single program running.  It’s like the equivalent of running Windows Vista on a computer with 512MB of RAM.

I’ll probably sell it soon, but in the meantime, anyone have any suggestions for cool apps to install on the Axim?

- Last week, I returned to MPK twice!  The prospects of tons of free food will cause me to do that.  Allow me to summarize:

I was home on Tu-W for Chinese New Year.  Each parent did their own prayer (my mom first) on a separate day, meaning double the food for me!  On Tuesday, while burning money and stuff, my genius sister threw a huge stack of paper on top of the fire.  A large piece burned off the stack, and went floating right towards me.  If not for my cat-like reflexes, I probably would have been burned in the face.

The near-death experience was worth it, though, for the banana-leaf-wrapped rice stuff my aunt made for us to take home, as well as the roast chicken, stew, steamed buns (filled with pork, egg, Chinese sausage, and shrimp), and a “cake” made out of turnip, dried shrimp, peanuts, and flour.  Good stuff.

We were summoned back to MPK this past weekend, because my aunt wanted to go to Manna Korean BBQ for her birthday.  Never one to pass up free food, we met up with the rest of the family on Saturday afternoon for lunch.  I finally met my cousin’s girlfriend awake (:P), and, as is the norm for Korean BBQ restaurants, I stuffed my face full of BBQ beef and short ribs.  After lunch, we went to my cousin’s house and Wii-ed all day.   I think that’s how I hurt my shoulder.

On Sunday, my aunt came by to make more steamed buns.  Midway through cooking the second batch of buns, I heard a loud POP eminate from my stovetop.  I went over and immediately noticed that my parents’ electric stove turned off.  I went to their circuit breaker, turned off the stove, and turned it back on a couple of minutes later.  I noticed that the lights flickered, and another loud POP came from the stove.

(I was told that, on Monday morning, the landlord turned off/on the circuit breaker switch again—apparently, my testimony was not trustworthy—and declared the stove dead after it popped again.)

I was under the impression that most of the steamed buns were made for my oldest sister to take to work.  That was not the case; my mom told me to take half of the batch home.  We were talking about fifteen buns or so!

Then again, was I going to pass up free food?  Yeah, right.

I think I need to go on a serious diet.

- Finally, how hilarious is it that the Jason Kidd to Dallas trade is being blocked by one Devean George???

(You Laker fans remember Devean George, right?  He was the “fifth Beatle” on the 03-04 team that got destroyed by Detroit in the NBA Finals that year.)

The proposed deal, where

New Jersey would have sent Kidd and forward Malik Allen to Dallas for Harris, veteran swingman Jerry Stackhouse, center DeSagana Diop, guard Maurice Ager, George, two future first-round draft picks and the maximum allowable cash inducement of $3 million,

the deal is being held up because Devean George may be losing out on a ton of money in the following off-season.  George has what are known as “Early Bird Rights,” simply meaning the Mavericks could go over the salary cap to re-sign him next year; he’s a free agent at the end of the season.  Of course, this assumes that the Mavs would consider giving George a long-term, big-money deal.  And if he puts up any more 0-for-11, 0 pt performances like he did on Wednesday, he might want to consider going under Witness Protection.

How pissed off must Mavs fans be right now?  The one guy keeping them from Jason Kidd is a guy averaging 3 ppg, and shot a pathetic 0-for-11 the day after exercising his right to reject any trade proposal!  After that game, how did George NOT catch the first flight out of town, headed for New Jersey?  Hey George, if you’re going to block a blockbuster trade, you might not want to put up and 0-fer the following night!

The funny thing is, George might actually be doing the Mavs a favor!  How is replacing incumbent PG Devin Harris with Jason Kidd going to make the Mavs championship material?  Last I checked, Kidd is 35, and he can’t shoot.  Is his defense really going to be the difference between an early playoff exit and a ring?  And don’t give me the “Kidd’s a triple-double machine” argument.  How many strong rebounders has Kidd played with in his career?  When you’re playing alongside pivot men like Jason Collins, you’re going to get a few more boards/game than you would normally expect.

In any case, Devean George might want to start looking for an apartment in a city other than Dallas.  He’s gonna need it, real soon.

Tags: Food, Sports, Technology by Peter
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Quick-hitters:

- For the love of spammy blogs! Right after I logged into Wordpress to compose this blog entry, I scrolled down a bit to the spam section under “Latest Activity” and noticed that the number of spam comments increased drastically from the last time I checked it!

(Every now and then, I like to check out the spammy comments, just to see how ridiculous they look.)

I went to the Comments section, and there were TWENTY comments awaiting moderation! Every single one of them were pushing some sort of drug, in that completely incoherent babble you might have seen before.

Does this mean my blog has “made it?”

- Call me a homer. Call me biased. Call me bitter over the fact that UCLA lost to freaking Washington. Call me whatever you want, but that inbounds “pass” that was thrown off Alfred Aboya’s face was bush league at best. How the refs didn’t call a technical foul on Washington’s Tim Morris on that play is totally incomprehensible.

If you’re going to throw the ball off the defender, throw it off his leg!

- I heard about the Florida Panthers’ Richard Zednik’s freak injury last night, but only this morning did I finally see a replay of how the injury occurred. Calling it a “freak” injury is quite the understatement; that was awfully scary stuff!

I’m glad to hear that he is now in stable condition in a Buffalo hospital.

- Back in January, I whined about $38 in rebates that I have been owed since May:

I’m still waiting on 2 $19 rebates [being handled by MGE Company] for a supposedly FAR CPU heatsink/fan from back in May [from parent company XG]. I’ve emailed these clowns several times, and have heard nothing but “please allow x weeks for processing.” The latest reply, which came on 12/17, said to allow an extra month for processing. I’m about ready to go down the state AG/BBB route.

This past Friday, I sent these clowns yet another email, asking about the status of my rebate. Should I have been shocked that they requested even more time for the processing of my rebates? Clearly XGBox/MGE Company hired a bunch of monkeys to process their rebates.

I filed my BBB/state Attorney General claims yesterday.

Here is a PDF of the email exchange between myself and these clowns. Enjoy!

- Spurs coach Gregg Popovich is a funny guy. At least, he better have been trying to be funny when he unleashed this criticism of the Lakers’ acquisition of Pau Gasol for a sack of potatoes:

“What they did in Memphis is beyond comprehension,” Popovich told SI.com. “There should be a trade committee that can scratch all trades that make no sense. I just wish I had been on a trade committee that oversees NBA trades. I would have voted no to the LA trade.”

Gregg “I won four championships because I shelved David Robinson early to earn ping-pong balls towards winning the 1997 NBA Lottery so that I can draft Tim Duncan” Popovich, please quit your whining. As J.A. Adande said a few days ago on Around The Horn, nobody whined when the Lakers traded Shaq for Lamar Odom, Caron Butler, and Brian Grant (anyone who argues that that was NOT an unfair trade is, at the very least, smoking something awfully strong). I’ll take Adande’s point one step further: I didn’t hear Popovich complain when the Lakers traded Caron Butler for Kwame freaking Brown! Where was he when the T-Wolves traded away KG for Al Jefferson and junk?

(Might the fact that KG was shipped out of the Western Conference, and a Western Conference power got Gasol for absolutely nothing?)

Poor Popovich. He must be steaming now that the Lakers added Gasol, the Suns added Shaq, and all he was able to add was Damon Stoudamire. Can you blame him? His core players—Timmy, Tony Parker-Longoria, Bruce “Clutch n’ Grab” Bowen, Billy Ocean, Will Smith, etc.—are getting way up there in years! Maybe Popovich is seeing his dynasty crumbling all around him.

As a non-”Spurs in the Finals” fan, I sure hope so.

Until next time!

Tags: Blog, Cust. Service, Sports by Peter
3 Comments »

Lots of stuff happened this past weekend, but I have a few other things I want to talk about first.

I’ll try to keep this entry as short as possible.

Quick-hitters:

- On Friday night, my meteorologist of choice—in other words, the the weatherperson I happened to be watching at the time—said that warm weather was “coming.”

She didn’t mention that Saturday was going to be 10-20 degrees hotter than Friday.

(It’s not as if I didn’t appreciate the warmer weather.  I just like my temperature changes to be gradual, not immediate.)

- Happy (way overdue, I know) Chinese New Year!

- One more issue I have with my DIY iPod mini project:  it seems to be leaking juice at an abnormally high rate.  I had the iPod locked and sitting in my pocket all day on Saturday, and when I got home that night, the battery meter appeared to decrease by 2-3 “ticks.”  Hopefully, I was just imagining things, or the problem goes away after a few recharging cycles.

- While cleaning up my desk on Friday night—that was seriously long overdue—I heard a loud *POP* (think glass shattering) followed by a sizzling sound coming from the kitchen.  I ran there, thinking I had left the stove on, but I found nothing out of the ordinary.  Strange, I thought to myself, as I walked back into my office.

About an hour later, I went back into the kitchen to grab a drink, and I happened to glance at a set of AAA batteries that were sitting on my kitchen counter.  For reasons unknown to me, I decided to inspect the batteries, and when I picked them up, I noticed a tiny brown puddle where the batteries used to be.

Apparently, one or more of the batteries popped and leaked acid, while sitting on my kitchen counter.

I’ve seen batteries leak acid before, but usually this occurs inside a device, and I’ve never had quality (Duracell, in this case) batteries leak acid before.

- Yet another update regarding my ZoneAlarm rebate fiasco:  a check for $40 from Fry’s Corporate Office showed up in my mailbox on Saturday!  Thanks Fry’s!

I’ll be especially happy if the $25 for my American Telecom Systems phone shows up in the next couple of weeks.

- So awhile back, I mentioned that my credit score took a murderous fall, and it was partly due to Citibank no longer reporting the credit limit on two of my cards, totaling over $15,000 in “lost” credit:

According to my credit report, Citibank only is reporting the limit on one of my cards, and the limit on that card [(a Diamond Preferred Rewards card)] is a paltry $1,000.  So, I have devised a plan:  I’m going to re-allocate most of my total Citibank credit limit on to this one card, and hope that Citibank reports the new limit to the three bureaus.

One thing I forgot to mention about that incident was the fact that, months prior, I had shoved most of the credit limit from the card that now has a $1,000 limit on to the PremierPass card.  I don’t recall exactly why I did this; I might have taken out a balance transfer.  Anyway, my lazy ass decided that now was the time to call Citibank and request a reallocation of credit.  Unfortunately for me, the rep I spoke to could not help me out.

The rep explained that even though my PremierPass card has a $16,000 limit on it, the line of credit is what’s called a “revolving” line of credit aka a “no pre-set spending limit.”   She then explained that the Diamond Preferred Rewards card had a fixed line of credit, and since the two lines of credit were different, I could not reallocate any part of my credit from one card to the other.

Fan-freaking-tastic!

After the thorough explanation, the rep then tried to sell me a personal loan (it might have been called a personal line of credit; I honestly don’t remember) at a fixed rate of 9.9%.  I quickly refused, and the rep continued to push the loan on me.  I explained that I had no need for a personal loan, and the rep all but insisted that I was passing up on the opportunity of a lifetime.

(It’s not as if I was going to tell the rep “If I needed a loan, I’d take out a 0% balance transfer, not a 10% personal loan!”  Maybe I should have said that…)

This wasn’t the first time Citibank tried to sell me this personal loan; I miss the days where they would just try to sell me their Credit Protector service.

- On the heels of the latest Citibank saga, I think it’s about time for me to update “The List:”

1) Bank of F’n America (still in a class by itself)

2) AllRebates/Ohana Companies (and yet I still insist on doing business with them; at least I now know that I have backing from Fry’s)

3) Citibank (thank you, Citibank)

4) Time Warner

5) (tie) Parago/USPS/Buy.com

Yes, CompUSA has been removed from the list, due to their closing.

Tags: Blog, Cust. Service, Deals, Random by Peter
3 Comments »

Quick-hitters, a non-sports variety:

- File this under the “moms-will-be-moms” category: a while back, I overheard my sister saying that my mom couldn’t go on a trip anywhere for an entire year. Knowing of my mom’s various ailments, I began worrying: did she need some medical procedure soon?

So you could imagine my horror (and eventual frustration) when I found out that she couldn’t take a trip this year because her fortune teller/purveyor of woo-woo told her not to.

Grrrrrrrrr.

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,700 and rising, and that factors in the $70 in rebates I got this past week.

- Twice this week, I have completely drained a set of AAA batteries in my LED flashlight because I left the damn thing on overnight! Thank goodness Costco now sells Kirkland Signature AAA batteries (thanks Krunk for the info). For the record, this is the flashlight I own.

And no, please don’t suggest that I buy one of those flashlights that work by shaking the flashlight first.

Now, some quick-hitters from the sports world:

- The whole Brian McNamee-Roger Clemens saga has been nothing short of an incredible side show. First, there was the steroids versus B-12/lidocaine debate, followed by the taped phone call between the two, and now there’s a report that McNamee injected Clemens’ wife with HGH??? I didn’t even mention the fact that McNamee allegedly kept evidence of Clemens’ ‘roid use since 2000, in the form ofneedles and photographs of bloody gauzes! Seriously, what’s next? A fuzzy video of the injections themselves?

By the way, tell me that Clemens’ lawyer, Rusty Hardin, did not just compare Clemens’ situation with the Duke rape case. A disgraced DA ruining the lives of three college students by blowing up a flimsy rape accusation is the same thing as an ex-trainer injecting a guy with steroids? Sure it is. And I don’t remember the three Duke students secretly recording a conversation with the alleged victim, with the victim constantly asking “What do you want me to do?”

(OK, the latter point was an obvious reach. But if this entire situation doesn’t scream “three ring circus,” nothing will.)

- One point I missed about the Shaq to Phoenix deal, as mentioned by a reader of a sports web site (where I read the comment from, I don’t remember at this moment):

(paraphrasing) Now that Shaq has been traded to Phoenix, does he have to return to Miami when Miami and Atlanta face each other in March to finish up that game?

(You may recall that the NBA ordered the Hawks and the Heat to replay the final minute or so of a game where Shaq was incorrectly disqualified after picking up a foul late in the fourth quarter. I mentioned this exact possibility in an earlier blog entry.

I’d love to see David Stern force Shaq to suit up with Miami for that one-minute replay, while forcing Miami to bench Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks.)

- Was it just me, or did I hear Jay Bilas give love to UCLA, calling them the best team in the nation? Granted, he added a “when healthy” disclaimer, but I’m sure the Bruins would take the love any way they can get it.

I can’t wait for the NCAA Tournament.

- About a week ago, my sister’s iPod mini decided to stop working; the hard drive decided to go click-click-click.  I knew that it was possible to open up the iPod to replace the battery, and I was aware that iPod minis use a Microdrive (basically, a hard-disk based CompactFlash card) as its storage device.  After doing a bit of research, I found out that one could replace the Microdrive with a flash-based CF card.  This serves two purposes:  1) you could replace the Microdrive with a CF card and turn your iPod mini into a flash-based MP3 player, and 2) a CF card probably uses less energy than a Microdrive, thereby increasing battery life.

Armed with a Kingston Elite 4GB CF card, a generic iPod mini battery pack I got off eBay—I figured, if I was going to replace the Microdrive, why not replace the battery (which was giving me ~2 hours of play on a full charge) as well?—a pair of tiny screwdrivers, a blade, and these instructions, I went to work on the iPod’s casing.  I found that using a tiny flat-head screwdriver was not a good idea; I scratched up the top of the iPod really good.  That’s when I made the switch to my trusty blade, which made the removal of the top and bottom much easier.

After gutting the iPod and removing the motherboard from the casing—be careful when removing the ribbon cable that connects to the wheel—I was able to remove the battery fairly easily.  The Microdrive was a bit harder to remove, only because the black electrical tape and rubber feet around the sides of the drive were hard to remove.  Once I got all the stuff off, removing the Microdrive was easy.  I couldn’t properly attach the tape + rubber feet on to the replacement CF card, but the drive was sitting snug on top of the motherboard, and I thought nothing of it (besides, with no moving parts, the flash drive should be a bit more tolerant to movement, right?).

It took a firm shove to get the motherboard/battery/drive back into the casing, and I slightly damaged the rubber ring that protects the perimeter of the screen from the inside of the case.  I had to remove the innards again, delicately readjust the rubber ring, and more deliberately slid everything back in to the casing, but everything eventually went in just fine.  The metal clip, described in step 4 of the instructions, was an absolute PITA to get back in, though.  I had to force the metal clip back in, and it’s a darn good thing I didn’t ruin the ribbon cable!

Once everything was put back together, I crossed my fingers, connected the iPod to my computer, and was very happy to see the “Do Not Disconnect” message on the screen!  I had to “restore” the iPod via iTunes before use, but once that was done, I was able to start loading MP3s onto the iPod.  After fully charging the new battery, I ran a simple battery test; I left the iPod to play music nonstop, and got about four hours of play before the battery died.

A couple other notes of the newly “refurbished” iPod mini:

1) When removing the plastic top and bottom, try not to handle each piece too much.  I made the mistake of doing so—remember, I had a hard time with the metal clip that attaches to the bottom—and now, the plastic ends barely stick on to the top and bottom of the iPod.  I may try to apply some glue to each cap later on, but since the iPod spends most of its time in a leather case, I might not bother.

2) Every time I connect the iPod to my computer, I get an error message from iTunes, saying that it cannot read the iPod.  iTunes then asks me to restore the iPod again.  This isn’t that big of a deal for me, though, since I use WinAmp to transfer my MP3s to the iPod.  One of these days, I might try to figure out what is causing this problem.

Tags: Deals, Sports, Technology by Peter
4 Comments »

Quick-hitters:

- Answer:  24 and 12.

Question:  How many points and rebounds did the Lakers’ newly acquired superstar collect in his Lakers debut?

So far so good!

- Current rebate-o-meter:  nearly $1700, no thanks to more tax software deals.

Not to mention, I’m really asking for trouble by doing more shady rebates on software purchased from Fry’s.

- That was one heck of a game on Sunday, eh?  Here’s what I thought about it:

1) HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

18-1!  18-1!  18-1!  18-1!!!!!!!!

Now that I got that out of the way…

2) We knew that the Giants’ D-Line had to play out of their minds.

Honestly, who expected them to play THAT well?  Forget Eli Manning as the MVP; the entire D-Line should have shared the MVP award.

And yes, I thoroughly enjoyed the final sack on Brady.

3) Manning to Tyree might go down in history as THE greatest play in Super Bowl history.  In fact, it was so unbelievable, you could separate the play into its respective parts—Manning’s escape from a sure sack by Richard Seymour, and Tyree’s ball-on-helmet one-handed catch—and call both the TWO greatest plays in Super Bowl history.

Think about the situation:  third and a mile, two minutes left in the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl, and if Manning gets sacked, the Giants probably have to punt.   Ditto if Tyree drops the ball or has it knocked away.

(BTW, why wasn’t Rodney Harrison trying to knock Tyree down, rather than trying to play the ball?)

How ridiculous was that catch???  Not to take away from Manning’s scramble—which reminded me a lot of Steve McNair’s scramble away from Rams’ defenders prior to the “One Yard Short” play—but that catch was light years better than the scramble.  Not only did Tyree catch the ball at the peak of his jump, but he also had to pin the ball on his helmet, while preventing Harrison from knocking the ball away, but did anyone notice that he landed on top of Harrison?  Once that happened, he had to prevent the ball, which was stretched over his head, from touching the ground as well (remember:  in order for a receiver to be down by contact, he must first be down; since he landed on Harrison, he was not immediately down!).

By the way, who is David Tyree?

4) For all the praise that the Giants are getting, did anyone notice how pedestrian the Patriots’ offense looked?  For about three quarters, I saw little variation from a standard three-wideout set!  What happened to the triple-TE, power run sets that they used against SD so effectively?  How come we didn’t see much five-WR sets?  Was Bill Belicheck coaching, or Herm Edwards?

(Tangent:  You’ll notice that I am no longer using those pesky asterisks.  I feel that there is no need to anymore, since this team will now be in the record books for one reason:  18-1.)

5) Greatest Super Bowl ever? Not really.  Greatest Super Bowl fourth quarter ever?  Close.  Greatest upset in history?  Nope (SB III).

(Tangent:  I’m really happy that this win will knock the Pats-Rams SB off people’s radar as the greatest upset in recent history.  Honestly, I didn’t think that the Pats win was as big of an upset as people were saying it was; I was almost certain that the Rams were not going to be able to cover the 14-point spread.)

6) The Ung-hex lives!!!

(I had wagered $25 on the Pats to win outright.  Pats fans, you may blame me for their loss.)

And as a last, painful barb to all Pats fans out there…

7) Yes, this season was a failure.  You can’t be considered the Greatest of All Time and NOT win the Super Bowl.  You can’t set records left and right in the regular season and flop in the Super Bowl the way the Pats did.

BTW, I hope some team (not named the Pats) plans on going 19-0 next year.  Mercury Morris:  please get off my television!

- So I fired up my laptop earlier tonight, and saw this little blurb on ESPN:

If Miami rumors are true, a 35-year-old Shaq will end up with the Suns.

Huh?  Well, I was pretty sleepy at the time, so certainly I was imagining things, right?  Then I saw a similar blurb on Yahoo! Sports.

(EDIT:  According to Yahoo! Sports, this deal is DONE pending a physical on Shaq.  Holy crap!  Note that the rest of this blog entry was written prior to knowledge that the deal was done.)

If the rumors are true, the Miami Heat will trade Shaquille O’Neal to the Phoenix Suns for Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks.  I’ll ask again:  HUH?  How does an overpaid, overweight, oft-injured center way on the downside of his career, who’s making $40 million in the next two years (what would you rather have:  two more years of Shaq at $20 million, or one more year of Marion—or perhaps he opts out, and then you get cap space!—at $18 million?), fit onto a run-and-gun team like the Suns?  How does moving one of your key wing players like Marion going to make this team better?  Is Shaq going to magically turn Phoenix into a half-court team?  Sure, Shaq is a good passer from the high post, but so is Chris Webber…
And I thought the Suns were trying to avoid taking on salaries!  Now they’re going to pay a 34-year-old Shaq $20 million a year until 2010?  It almost sounds like the Suns are taking the addition by subtraction approach:  by dumping Marion, that frees up valuable PT for Diaw and Barbosa.  Or maybe the alleged Marion-Stoudemire chemistry issues boiled over, forcing the Suns to move Marion for Shaq!  Sure, the Suns get to dump an awful contract in Marcus Banks, but is that really worth trading Marion and getting Shaq in return?

As for the Heat, does a Wade-Marion-high draft pick core get the Heat back into championship contention next year?  Probably not.  However, if Marion opts out, the Heat are looking at tons of cap space (only Wade, Haslem, and Mark Blount are under contract next year, although Smush Parker and Dorell Wright may accept their options).

I don’t see how this trade works out well for Phoenix at all.  Then again, maybe Shaq will prove me wrong.

TTYL.

Tags: Sports by Peter
1 Comment »

I would have blogged last night, but my head hurt.

Quick-hitter:

- I scored an Antec Earthwatts 380W Power Supply from Newegg a couple of days ago ($34.99 - $30 MIR), and coupled that with the $20 Antec Solo case I bought a few weeks ago, I can finally hook up the CPU/mobo combo Krunk gave me back in December.

(Well, technically, I traded a 6′ HDMI to DVI cable for the combo.)

Whether or not I actually do it is a different story :P.

- I have an update regarding my $25 American Telecom Systems rebate.  As with my ZoneAlarm rebate fiasco, I decided to email Fry’s directly to see if they would help me obtain my money.  I faxed in my supporting documents on Thursday, and got a reply from Fry’s yesterday:

Thank you for contacting Frys.com.

Hello Peter, in regards to your Pay N Talk rebate in the amount of
$25.00. We have since gotten in contact with the rebate manufacturer in
regards to your denial. Unfortunately after talking with them it seems
as though they are unwilling to help there customers. What we are going
to do for you in this matter is go ahead and give all of your rebate
submission to our home office. They will be issuing you a check shortly.
Please note that this may take up to 2 months. Please feel free to get
back with us in regards to this status. Thank you.

If that doesn’t spell “SCAM,” I don’t know what does.

Props again to Fry’s for bailing me out!

(Then again, I better not count my chickens before they hatch.)

- When I first went to Yahoo! Sports, I saw a little blurb mentioning that former Memphis Grizzlies’ F/C Pau Gasol had been traded.  The first thing that came to my head was “So soon?  The trading deadline is weeks away!”  So you could imagine my immediate shock when I heard that Gasol was traded to the Lakers.

(For those of you hiding under a rock the size of an Egyptian Pyramid, the Lakers traded BS (that’s Big Stiff) Kwame Brown, G Javaris Crittenton, formerly retired G Aaron McKie, first-round picks in 2008 and 2010, and the rights to Marc Gasol (yes, relation; they are brothers).  The Lakers got back Gasol and the Grizzlies’ second-round pick in 2010.)

Did the Lakers just trade Kwame Brown for Pau Gasol?  Talk about highway robbery!  Former Lakers’ GM Jerry West had a hand in the deal, right?  What the hell were the Grizzlies thinking?  Those were just some of the thoughts that came to me in the five minutes after I heard about the deal.  But before my rational self decides to chime in, here is what I love about the deal:

1) The Lakers got a near 20-10 player (20 points + 10 rebounds/game) for the cost of Kwame Brown and essentially first round picks, if you count Crittendon.  How often do 20-10 guys get dealt, much less midseason?

(Don’t answer that, Minnesota fans.)

Gotta love it.

2) A year ago, Kobe blasted the Lakers for not being willing to include Andrew Bynum in a deal for Jason Kidd.  Some Laker fans blasted the organization for not trading Lamar Odom and Bynum for Jermaine O’Neal.  Now we were able to score Pau Gasol without losing either one?

Gotta [expletive] love it!

3) You’d have to assume that those two picks the Lakers will be giving away are going to be in the early-to-mid 20s, at best.  More often than not, you get glue guys—solid bench players, marginal starters, etc.—in the mid-20s, not potential superstars.  The Lakers’ are already rife with such players:  Farmer, Ariza (injured ATM), Vujacic, and Turiaf.  Even if Crittenton turns out to be a star, and Marc Gasol becomes a solid role player, you have to like the risk the Lakers are taking.

By the way, where is Crittenton going to play?  Don’t the Griz already enough PGs?

I’m definitely loving it.

4) Odom at SF, Gasol at PF, Bynum at C.  That’s six very long arms.

Love it!

5) The Lakers have ONE rotation player over the age of 30 (Fisher).  ONE!!!

Love it!

Now, please allow my rational side to chime in.

6) Gasol’s owed $50 million through 2010-11.  Kobe’s owed $21 million next year.  Odom’s owed $14.5 million next year.  Andrew Bynum is due for a huge extension after next year.  Welcome to salary cap (and luxury tax) hell!  And the Lakers could easily compound the problem by dealing Odom in a package for Jason Kidd.

Gotta hate that.

7) Gasol’s not exactly a defensive stalwart, and for all the talk that Lamar Odom is a “natural 3,” I have to cringe at the thought of him guarding quicker, smaller 3s.

Hurry back, Bynum!

Does adding Gasol really push the Lakers past San Antonio, Dallas, and Phoenix?  Fans have to be cautiously optimistic.

One other note:  what did the Bulls offer Memphis last year that caused Memphis to say no to a Gasol deal?  Are you telling me that the Bulls offered less than Kwame, Crittenton, a prospect, and two #1s?  Tyrus Thomas, the Bulls’ #9 last year (Joakim Noah), PJ Brown, and a future pick was a less attractive package than what the Lakers offered?  Seriously?

- First, there was the original Spygate.   A few days ago, we had Sen. Arlen Specter openly question why the NFL was so quick to destroy all Spygate-related tapes (and for the record, why did the NFL do this?).  Then we had former Patriots employee Matt Walsh saying that he has tapes that could be “damaging” to the Patriots.  Now, there are reports that someone videotaped the St. Louis Rams before Super Bowl in 2002.

The timing for all of this couldn’t be any better…for the Patriots, that is.  As if Brady*, Belicheck*, et al.*******, need any more motivation to wax the floor with the New York Giants.  Heck, maybe the Pats* paid Walsh to speak out now for the extra motivation.  For all we know, maybe they paid off Sen. Specter to do the same!

Do I expect the league to fully investigate the latest accusations against the Pats?  Yeah, about as “fully” as they investigated the original Spygate.

By the way, Pats 31, Giants 17.  My original prediction was Pats 24, Giants 17, but these latest spying allegations have to be worth, at the very least, an extra touchdown.

Tags: Cust. Service, Sports by Peter
2 Comments »