UngsungBlog: A (Fantasy) Sports Blog

Quick-hitters:

- Actual conversation between myself and my mother, over the weekend:

Her:  When are you going to go to [place] to visit [unnamed individual]?

Me:  Not sure.

Her:  Let’s go there next year.

(Note #1:  Read this.

Note #2:   I don’t recall inviting my mom to come with me!  Besides, who the heck travels with their mother???)

Me:  Sure, you can go.  By the way, [unnamed individual] told me to tell you to bring your frying pan if you’re going to stay with him.

Her:  *SMACK*

- New TV, or new laptop?  New laptop, or new TV?

That is the question.  I probably “need” a new TV more than a new laptop, but I wouldn’t mind a new laptop with a much better processor than the Pentium Dual-Crap that’s sitting in my laptop right now.

Maybe I should just steal my sister’s new Vostro.

- In an UngsungBlog first, Amy requested an Ung-hex on someone (typos corrected):

even if you don’t participate you should make a fantasy, bracket thingy for the IMBC‘ers.  place that ung-hex early!

Hmmm…I don’t think I’ve ever Ung-hexed an entire group, save one.  I should check the IMBC rules to see if acts of paranormal intervention are not allowed.

In any case, here goes:

I would imagine that Hank has to be favored to win again this year.  If not Hank, I’ll predict that someone that participated last year—Amy excepted—will win this year.   After that, I’ll pick “the field”—any one of the newbie participants—and Amy has to be the long shot to win.

(Happy, Amy?

And Hank, please don’t hurt me if you go 120 days straight, only to lose because of a bad internet connection :P)

- As the title states, there may be hope yet with regards to my XGBox/MGE rebate fiasco.  A few days ago, I mentioned that an individual from a forum I frequent got this response from XG/MGE:

Both of the checks have gotten printed. We will get them mailed by next week. Thanks for waiting.

Well, this individual reported to me today that he received his checks!  Does this mean XGBox actually intends on cutting checks to people that they owe?  Or do they only plan on paying a select few at a time?

I’m still betting that XG/MGE will send me my checks after 9/1/08, if they ever get around to doing so.

- Quickly, here are my Elite Eight thoughts:

1) If I were allowed to re-do my Bracket, I’d use a Magic Marker to write UNC as the champs.  They look almost unbeatable, and if Tyler Hansborough is going to sink outside jumpers like that, then other teams don’t stand a chance.

Don’t bother asking if this is another attempted Ung-hex.

2) Memphis looked absolutely dominant against Texas; I’d like to see how they are going to handle one Kevin Love, however.  Still, I suppose we can all stop the “Memphis is overrated b/c of their weak conference” talk now.

Hey Knicks’ fans!   How would Derrick Rose look in your uniform?

3) No thanks to an unnamed individual (no, not the same one mentioned earlier), I missed the entire first half of the Davidson-Kansas game.  Watching the second half of the game, I knew I missed a gem.  Curry took some really poor shots down the stretch, but I was really surprised that he didn’t take the final shot.  If you’re going to pass the ball for a game winning trey, why not attempt to drive and kick?  Kudos to Kansas’ D, though, and I’m sure they can’t wait to face former Kansas coach, Roy Williams.

And finally,

4) what the heck took so long for the Bruins to finally play a complete NCAA tourney game???  You had a feeling that Xavier was in trouble as soon as Westbrook made the game-opening steal and dunk.  More importantly, Luc Richard finally played a solid game.  I still have my concerns about Josh Shipp, Collison or Westbrook possibly disappearing, the total lack of a bench—James Keefe can’t possibly have another double-double in him, can he?—and Kevin Love falling in love with the three.

By the way, for those that think that this Final Four won’t be that exciting because all #1 seeds advanced, I wholeheartedly disagree.  I get it that people watch the NCAA tourney for the unexpected; they love teams like Davidson or George Mason of a couple years back.  We want to see #1s get toppled, and we want to see double-digit seeds live dream seasons, because the alternative is expected, and almost boring.  If all the favorites advance, that would be comparable to the NBA playoffs, where the best-of-seven format makes having the better team more likely to advance in the tournament.

However, isn’t the fact that this is the first time ever that all #1s made it to the Final Four unexpected in its own way?   When filling out your bracket, how many times do you hear “Never pick all #1s; that has never happened before!”?

(Tangent:  My sister, who still creamed me in the UngsungBlog Bracket Challenge, chose to listen to me, and crossed Kansas out of the Final Four.  Whoops.)

Besides, wouldn’t a Final Four full of #1 seeds mean that we fans will be treated to three titanic match ups between NCAA basketball powerhouses?  Don’t you want a huge dose of star power in the biggest games of the year?  As great as a Davidson v Memphis/UCLA championship match might sound, don’t you think a UNC-UCLA championship match wouldn’t be a huge draw?

Then again, if four mid-majors were in the Final Four, I’d still watch it.

by Peter
5 Comments »

No quick hitters tonight. My head hurts.

- So I think it’s about time that I change the subtitle of my blog, which currently reads

(Fantasy) sports talk, technology, product reviews, random thoughts, and whatever else I feel like talking about.

seeing as how I haven’t talked about fantasy sports since the NFL regular season ended. Not to mention, I haven’t done a product review in forever!

It’s about time to bust out some working drafts for a new UngsungBlog subtitle. How about this?

Sports talk, customer service rants, technology , food, random thoughts, and the occasional intelligent thought.

Or maybe I should shorten the subtitle:

Sports talk, customer service rants, and more!

Or how about one of these two?

A journey of amazing experiences.

A blog by Peter.

- So as a part of my sister’s full-body nutritional makeover, her nutritionist suggested drinking a ton of water per day.

My sister hates drinking water.

Knowing this, I suggested that she pick up some Crystal Light, and her nutritionist concurred. I was aware that Amazon.com had a $25 off $59 coupon good on certain grocery items (still good until March 31; code BIGBRAND). With that, we picked up the following:

1. Crystal Light Lemonade 3-pack, 8.7oz (makes 32 qts per box)
2. Crystal Light Iced Tea 3-pack, 3.80z (32 qts per box)
3. Crystal Light Green Tea Raspberry 4-pack, 1.8oz (10 qts per canister)

Note: each item comes with a number of pre-packaged tub of drink mix; each tub makes two quarts.

I know that sugar substitutes are generally sweeter than sugar—Equal (aspartame) and Splenda sure taste sweeter than sugar, IMO—but yikes! Crystal Light is ridiculously sweet! Even though the recipe calls for two quarts of water for one tub of powder, I found myself being able to add an extra quart of water without losing a significant amount of flavor or sweetness! This was true about all three flavors, by the way. At five calories a serving (3.33… per serving further diluted), I might start drinking this stuff instead of sodas or juice!

I’m not giving up my Mexicoke, though…no way in hell THAT’S happening!

- I’m still recovering from the coma I fell under after watching the Friday night games. I thought Michigan State was supposed to push Memphis, and I thought Villanova was going to be at least somewhat competitive against Kansas.

Oh well…I got to watch the Lakers get destroyed by the Memphis freaking Grizzlies.

(And I stand by what I said yesterday :P)

More Sweet Sixteen thoughts:

1) At least I picked the right region when I made my bold Carmelo Anthony comparison a few days ago. Stephen Curry is officially a monster, and it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he led Davidson over #1 seed Kansas in the Elite Eight. One hundred and three points in three tourney games? And it wasn’t like he did this against Cal State Fullerton, Cal State LA, PCC, ELAC, DeVry, etc.; he did this against Gonzaga, Kansas State, and sleeper Final Four pick Wisconsin!

Curry might win Most Outstanding Player of the tourney, based on his first three games alone.

2) UNC looked real dominant against WSU, and Texas looked strong in crushing Stanford. Kansas looked good as well, but I just don’t see them getting past UNC in one half of the Final Four.

(Yeah, I’m giving Louisville about a 1% chance to beat UNC, despite how well they looked, in stretches, against Tennessee.)

I still don’t think Memphis is going to get past Texas in the Elite Eight. And as far as the remaining Elite Eight matchup is concerned…

3) UCLA really needs to stop giving their fans heart attacks. You guys had a 21 point first half lead, and were an in-and-out, wide open triple away from having the lead get brought down to one??? I sincerely hope John Wooden was not watching the game.

The Bruins are (deservedly so!) getting killed by the media for being freaking luckboxes and near choke artists, and they deserve all the smack they’re getting. I’ve got a strong feeling that UCLA is going to get blitzed by Xavier tomorrow.

(And if you think this is an attempt at an Ung-hex, you’re absolutely right.)

Xavier is going to combine A&M and WKU’s game plans against the Bruins: they’ll spread the floor with their bigs, attack the guards with the dribble, and front Love at all times. Only this time, I expect the plan to be executed for an entire forty minutes, and I fully expect it to work. Hopefully UCLA can answer the bell and attack with the same intensity as they did down the stretch against A&M, except for the full 40 minutes. Otherwise, that bus trip back to LA should be a VERY quiet one.

Until next time!

by Peter
1 Comment »

Crap! This was supposed to be posted last night! I guess I misremembered again

Quick-hitters:

- Did the Lakers really lose to Charlotte a couple days ago?

If they lose to Memphis tonight, they should be forced to forfeit their playoff spot, wherever that may be.

- My sister’s laptop has been posted on Craigslist four days ago, and I’ve only received a single inquiry on it. And it was NOT a 419 scam attempt! Amazing!

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1700, and that includes the $100 I received today.

- Screw you, Amazon.com.

I won’t go into too many details, but let’s just say that Amazon.com will gladly remove my items for sale because of “misrepresentation” (missing UPC or missing original packaging, and I wasn’t even aware of the rules violation), while many other sellers get to keep their rule-breaking listings active.

After a bit of back-and-forth with Amazon Seller support, they decided it would be fun to simply send me form letters, completely ignoring my grievances. At least they didn’t use the ever-popular “we’ll take your concerns seriously” line.

*shudder* I might have to start selling on eBay again.

- So I went grocery shopping yesterday with my sister, who, incidentally, is starting a “full-body nutritional makeover.”

(For you that have an aversion to euphemisms, that’s what I call a diet.)

Long story short, yesterday was NOT the day for her to go grocery shopping with me. Having little to no will power, it was awfully difficult of me to pass up on Triscuit crackers (w/cheddar!), Cheez-Its, Fudge Shoppe cookies, Golden Grahams, and Cookie Crisp. If Vons or Ralphs sold Mexicoke, my sister would have been in real trouble.

After adding each item to my cart, I felt a death stare from my sister. She eventually accused me of intentionally buying junk food, knowing full well that she can’t have anything I was purchasing.

I will neither confirm nor deny that :P.

- (from Consumerist) Finally, this article absolutely made me LOL. Apparently, Wrigley’s Gum is going to introduce a new, slimmer packaging for their gum, and by “slimmer,” I mean “fewer pieces for the same price.” The quotes from Wrigley execs are simply priceless, including this gem:

“To them the value goes up because they’re getting a better tasting product in a better package. Price is not the way the consumer is looking at this,” he said.

Um, when I go shopping, price is usually a BIG factor in what I buy! Better package? Two sticks of gum weigh that much, eh? As far as the better taste is concerned, I guess I can buy that. Tell me, though; where on the packaging does it allege that the gum is better tasting than before?

This phenomenon, known as “package shrink,” has been around for years. Just think about how small a Pizza Hut medium pizza has shrunk over the years.

(Tangent: “Package shrink”…what a horrible euphemism! And yes, I have a sick mind.)

Regarding package shrink, I loved this quote:

Brian Morgan, senior research analyst at Euromonitor, Chicago, concurred: “[Package shrink] is the strategy that has been used in many categories to accomplish a price increase without consumers really noticing or to smooth over the negative reaction.”

Go to any grocery store forum (BargainShare or Slickdeals, e.g.) and tell me that people either don’t notice these shrinkages, or don’t exactly get “smoothed” over once they find out that they’re getting less for their money.

Mr. Morgan added,

Morgan added that, in the gum category more so than in other categories, consumers would likely respond positively to slimmer packaging: “Packaging innovations like that do make a difference, independent of what that does to the price.”

Sure, and pricing increases make a HUGE difference, independent of the packaging innovations. By the way… “packaging innovations”? Since when has removing two sticks of gum from a pack of 17 an “innovation?” Short of the pack actually popping out a stick of gum on demand, I can’t understand how “less product” = “packaging innovation.”

Seriously, is a 17-stick pack of gum creating that much drag in your pocket/purse/etc., or do the extra two sticks cause an exponential increase in the gravitational pull on your body? By the way, doesn’t Wrigley’s also offer five-stick packs of gum?

Finally,

Though the new packaging is, in effect, a price increase, Wrigley is hailing it as a packaging breakthrough. “Consumers like the fact that [the envelope] is slim, sleek; it feels very contemporary,” said Chibe.

AHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA. Contemporary? Are we talking about a pack of gum, or an MP3 player?

This is just my opinion, but I’d be much happier with the extra two sticks of gum. Why can’t these companies just state the obvious: costs of manufacturing have gone up, and therefore, the company needs to either raise their prices, or offer less product? I’d almost respect a company more if they were willing to state these facts! Then again, would you buy a bottle of Tide detergent if it had a sticker on it that said “Now with LESS product!”?

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to have a bowl of Golden Grahams. Wait a second…this box has only 12 oz. of product! I love it! It’s much more aerodynamic than before, which is really important when you’re in a rush, and have to quickly pour yourself a bowl of cereal!

by Peter
1 Comment »

Short blog entry today…here goes!

Quick-hitters:

- I put up my sister’s old laptop on Craigslist a few hours ago.

Anyone wanna bet on the over/under for the number of 419 scams I get between today and the end of the week?

I’ll set the O/U at 5.5, and I’ll gladly take the over.

- Current rebate-o-meter:  ~ $1550, including the $38 I’m still being scammed out of by XGBox/MGE.

Why I still count those rebates as pending, when it’s obvious that they are scamming me, is beyond me.

- I am happy to announce that I am no longer a Woot! virgin!

Over the weekend, I placed my first ever order at Woot.com, if you can believe that.  I picked up a Soyo Bluetooth headset + Bluetooth adapter for $15 shipped.  My sister needed a BT headset anyway—her Motorola HS820 is still acting up—and I always wanted a Bluetooth adapter.

- The UngsungBlog hit a pair of milestones recently!

My blog entry on March 20 was my 250th entry ever!  W00t!

Also, yesterday, Akismet caught its 1,000th spammy comment!  One thousand spam comments?  Does this mean my blog has finally “made it”?

Coincidentally, yesterday was the exact day that my 1&1 hosting account was renewed.  Let’s go for 3,000 spammy comments by this time next year!

- I made a huge batch of tuna fish salad today (the recipe can be found here), and it took a higher power to keep me from plowing through an entire box of Wheat Thins with the salad.

(And yes, Hank, I threw chopped Roma tomatoes in to the salad, and it was awesome.)

If I weren’t already stuffed, I would make myself a tuna salad sandwich with a third slice of bread.  I think I’ll just enjoy my chilled bottle of Mexicoke instead.

(A tuna salad melt sounds awfully good, though!)

- While watching the Lakers-Warriors game (gee, Lakers, that was an awesome last 90 seconds of regulation!), I determined that high definition TV is just not that enjoyable on a 32″ TV.

Methinks I need a bigger TV.  Where the hell is that damn IRS rebate?

(I might be the only person I know that might actually plan on spending that rebate check; everyone I’ve asked so far plans on depositing the rebate check in his bank account, or using it to pay off credit card bills.)

I’d love to get a 42″ LCD HDTV, but 37″ is probably all I can afford right now.  I’m wondering…is the 5″ increase really worth spending more money on?  I still have a $300 Circuit City GC burning a hole in my pocket, and I’d like to spend it sometime soon.  Maybe I should just pick up a cheap 37″ LCD (Olevia?) the next time one goes on sale there.

Then again, with March Madness ending soon, I’ll only have the NBA Finals to look forward to in HD.  And when the hell is The Office coming back?

Until next time!

by Peter
5 Comments »

Quick-hitters:

- Further proof that I am impossible to please:  it was freaking hot today!  89F in late March???  I had to take out my tower fan out of storage today!

(How do I know that it is officially warm?  I’ve found mosquitoes in my house, dammit.)

- Props to Dell!  I received my restore disks from them on Friday, via DHL Next Day!  Awesome!

- So, as scheduled, the first UngsungBBQ of the season occurred on Saturday.  Beef spare ribs, chicken wings and drummettes, grilled Italian squash (I had tomatoes, but we were already full before I got a chance to cook them), and potato salad, oh my!  My sister and mom came by and stayed for the entire weekend, and although the BBQ was clearly the highlight, that wasn’t the only thing that went on:

1) We spent Friday and Saturday nights playing various flavors of Karaoke Revolution for the PS2 as well as some Rock Band.  My Wii was just collecting dust.  We had to respond to our upstairs neighbors with their darn kids pounding on the floor above us all night, so what better way to retaliate than with horrible singing and loud music?  My mom, who owns a karaoke machine, wanted in on the gameplay, but I didn’t think she would have fared too well on Here I Go Again or Against All Odds.

2) My local Costco never stocks Mexicoke, so I asked my sister to pick me up a case earlier in the week; she was already planning on going to Costco, and I knew that the Alhambra Costco stocked Mexicoke.

Sure enough, on Friday, she brought me my case!  In exchange, I offered to file her taxes via some Taxcut software I picked up earlier in the year.  Definitely a fair deal, IMO, considering that I only had to file a single W-2 and a single 1099-INT.

3) Right before it was time for me to light the grill, I grabbed the bag of charcoal, opened it, and noticed something strange about the briquets in the bag.  Apparently, I did not buy charcoal briquets; I bought a bag of actual charcoal!  One piece was about a foot long!

(For the uninitiated, charcoal briquets are usually formed from wood burned at extreme temperatures in the absence of oxygen, and then the resulting product is shaped into the briquets we know today.)

I decided to try lighting the pile of charcoal anyway, and I noticed that it took a heck of a lot harder to fully light the charcoal than typical briquets.  The charcoal also shot off sparks every now and then, which was, admittedly, kinda cool.  Unfortunately, the charcoal eventually burned too quickly, and I was only able to cook off it for a few minutes.  A quick run to VONS to get some Match Light solved that problem, however.

Note to self:  Never, EVER, buy charcoal non-briquets again!

4) Oh yeah…there was also a lot of basketball on.  In fact, most of Saturday was spent watching tournament action, especially the UCLA near-disaster (more on that later).

Did I mention that the food was damn good?

- My NCAA tourney thoughts, Days 2-3:

1) #1 seed recap:  UNC looks unbeatable; Memphis might get upset by Michigan St.; I would love to see Davidson upset Kansas, and UCLA…

2) I hope the Bruins learn to never relax against a second round opponent again?  Look at their recent history:  a furious rally against Gonzaga in 06, a near-collapse against Indiana in 07, and now a near-upset against Texas A&M?

They better not be resting on their laurels against W. Kentucky.  To say that Mbah a Moute was rusty would be the understatement of the century.  Talk about a horrible game!  Eight TOs?  Good thing Collison’s 3-point barrage in the first half, Love’s fadeaways down the stretch, and Collison’s layups late saved the Bruins’ butts.

BTW, who saw the parallels between this game and the game against Gonzaga?  Think about it; we had a furious rally, a late lead, and a key forced TO.

(Tangent:  I know this is coming, but after yet another favorable call for UCLA—Shipp clearly fouled the A&M player on the Aggies’ last shot—I’m worried that people are going to start slapping asterisks on the Bruins, should they finish this and win the title.  The last thing I need is some New England Patriots’ comparisons.)

Does this spell a third straight Final Four?  Well, with Duke and UConn out of the tourney, I’m only worried about Xavier.  Am I looking past W. Kentucky?  Yes I am :P.

By the way, I guess we can officially start the “Goodbye Collison” and “Goodbye Love” clocks.

3) Two 12 seeds in the Sweet 16?  Duke and G’town out, beaten by WVU and Davidson (???) respectively?  League parity, or overall weakness at the top?

I’m tired, so I’ll finish up with this:

4) After day 3 of the UngsungBlog bracket contest, my sister is up (32/48 correct picks for me, 34/48 for her, and she has a three point lead on me.

I forgot to mention this last time, but here is the scoring system we’re using this year:

Correct picks in the first round:  1 pt

Correct picks in the second round:  2 pts

Correct picks in the Sweet 16:  4 pts

Correct picks in the Elite 8:  8 pts

Correct picks in the Final Four:  16 pts

Correct championship pick:  32 pts

Until next time!

by Peter
1 Comment »

Four straight days of blogging? What’s going on???

Quick-hitter:

- My sister asked me to look for some supplements for her. I looked up the active ingredients in one of her requested supplements, and one particular ingredient made me do a double take.

The ingredient? EPO.

“Listen…who is this guy who suggested these supplements to you?” I asked. Was my sister training with Floyd Landis?

I quickly pulled up the nutrition facts of this supplement, and was very relieved to find out that EPO stood for Evening Primrose Oil :P.

- My sister, after acquiring a new laptop, asked me to format hers and help her with the sale of it. Yesterday, I finally got around to formatting it (shocker, I know).

I went through the original shipping box of the laptop, looking for the restore CD. That’s when I found this square of paper with a picture of a CD on it, saying that no restore CDs were necessary to restore the laptop back to its original configuration; I would have to access a recovery partition on the system’s HDD to perform the restore.

No problem, I thought. I fired up the laptop, and pounded Ctrl+F11 as instructed. The next thing I knew, I saw the Windows XP logo. I guess I must have missed the prompt, I thought to myself.

Lather, rinse, repeat…and nothing. I used Windows Disk Management to verify that a recovery partition did exist, and of course it did. I tried Ctrl+F11 once more, and nothing happened.

I contacted Dell Support via email and explained that I needed the restore disks, as I could not access the restore partition. Dell replied, saying that they would have the restore CDs out in the next few days.

Today, I checked my Dell account to see if the CDs were en route, when I noticed an order created March 20, for the amount of ~$37. Looking at the order status, I noticed that Dell was trying to charge me $10 each for some Roxio software and some other non-essential software. What the hell? If I had to pay for the disks, shouldn’t I have been notified of this before creating an order? And all I really wanted was the Windows restore disk; I could care less about the other software!

I fired off an email to Support and asked why an order was created before notifying me of the necessary charges. The Dell rep quickly responded, letting me know that I would not actually be charged for the disks. Whew!

- My sister and I had plans to join her friends at Pineapple Hill—a “saloon and grill” on Van Nuys Blvd.—to watch the UCLA v Mississippi Valley State game. The food was great: fresh guacamole, buffalo wings, and burgers all around. Too bad the game was utterly unwatchable; I got bored of the game after five minutes.

(I know…what was I supposed to expect from a 1-16 matchup?)

Well, at least I got to watch the first part of the Lakers-Jazz game. Oh wait; that was pretty unwatchable too, at least in the early going. Did I mention that the food was good?

- And finally, some NCAA Day 1 thoughts:

1) Even though it would have wrecked by bracket, I was rooting for Belmont to beat Duke.

Too bad I was on the road during the last 2 minutes or so of the game.

2) USC v Kansas State held up to its billing…for about 35 minutes. What the heck happened to USC down the stretch?

Kansas State:Michael Beasley::Syracuse:Carmelo Anthony? Quite a reach, I know.

3) Thanks for showing up, MVSU. Twenty-nine points? Same to you, George Mason.

4) After Day 1 of the UngsungBlog Bracket Challenge (UBC), I’m trailing 13-12. Shocking, I know.

Until next time!

by Peter
No Comments »

Blog entries in three consecutive days (and five of six)???

It’s as if I were in training for the IMBC!

Quick-hitters:

- Yay! The weather looks good this weekend! It better be, because this weekend will be the first UngsungBBQ of the year!

Hopefully I’ll be able to squeeze in a few minutes—between March Madness, naturally—to actually cook :P.

(Then again, that’s why I invited my mom over!)

- So I finally decided to start using my CVS dryer sheets today.

(In other words, my sister told me to stay away from her Bounce sheets.)

I’m glad to report that they didn’t make my clothes smell too offensive. Unfortunately, my hands—several hours later, mind you!—still smell of the sheets.

Maybe I should go rub my hands in some mud or something.

- If you’ll recall, D-Day for my XGBox/MGE Company rebate fiasco was this past Friday. On Monday, I sent these clowns this email:

I was told that my rebate checks were going to be mailed out on 3/14. Have the checks been mailed out yet?

Here was their reply:

Unfortunately, we were unable to get the checks mailed out within the timeframe offered in the previous email. They won’t be sent out until the end of this month. Sorry about this unexpected delay.

Shocker!

But wait! An individual from a forum I frequent got this reply from XGBox, dated March 13th, regarding his rebate status:

Both of the checks have gotten printed. We will get them mailed by next week. Thanks for waiting.

I guess they were able to print out the checks, but they could not get them out in the mail! How long does it take to print an envelope, insert a check, lick the seal, stamp the envelope, and drop off the rebates in a mail box?

I’ll set the over/under on the date of the actual mailing of the check to be 9/1/08 and I’ll gladly take the over (later than 9/1/08).

(On a positive note, I got this email from rebatestatus.com regarding my invalid Acronis True Image 11 Home rebate:

Thank you for your inquiry regarding your rebate. Your rebate was resubmitted on 03/13/08 and is currently being reviewed. Your new submission number is xxxxxxxxx. Please allow 6-8 weeks for processing.

Hopefully this means my rebate will be validated.)

- I got two packages from Staples today.

Package #1 was a box about twice the size of its contents. Package #2 was a box that barely fit its contents.

Package #1 had its contents surrounded by those cushioning air bags (for the most part). Package #2 had no cushioning, unless you count the little plastic bag containing one pack of pen refills or the packing slip itself.

The contents of package #1 were packed snugly—a feat not to be overlooked with regards to Staples packages! The contents of package #2 were rattling around the box.

One package contained a CD case, a small software box, and a pack of pen refills. One box contained a Seagate 500GB SATA/300 Hard Drive and the same pack of pen refills. Care to guess which package is which?

I know that retail-boxed HDDs are already well-packed, but couldn’t Staples spare a slightly larger box and an air bag or three? They’ll tightly pack a box of software, but not a hard drive?

Well done, Staples.

- As promised, here is my completed bracket. A summary:

Sweet 16: UNC v WSU, L’ville v Tenn, Kansas v Vandy, USC v G’town, Memphis v Pitt, Stan v Texas, UCLA v UConn, Xavier v Duke.

Elite 8: UNC v Tenn, Kansas v G’town, Pitt v Texas, UCLA v Xavier

Final Four: UNC v G’town, Texas v UCLA

Championship: G’town v UCLA

Winner: UCLA 74, G’town 67.

(Tangent: This might smell of a classic example of the Ung-hex. However, I didn’t pick UCLA to win last year or the year before, so I decided to try something different this year :P).

And just for kicks, here is my sister’s completed bracket. Anyone wanna wager on who will do better this year? I’ll set the odds accordingly:

Odds on who scores more points in this year’s pick’em:

Me +200

My sister -220

Happy March Madness!

by Peter
2 Comments »

Quick-hitters (possibly the longest in UngsungBlog history :P):

- Eliot Spitzer. Elliot Stabler. Anyone could mistaken those two names…right?

*sigh*

- I was going to complain about how cold it has been here lately (especially at night!), but I’m afraid of getting berated by at least one person who shall remain nameless.

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1600, after receiving about $150 in rebates over the last three days.

- On Saturday, Fedex left a door tag on my door. For some weird reason, when I punched the Door Tag # into Fedex.com, it said that the next delivery attempt would be made on Tuesday.

I guess my local Fedex hub got to the green beer a bit early

- Does anyone own, or knows anyone that owns, a Motorola HS820 Bluetooth headset? My sister’s headset will charge for about five minutes, and then shut off, and yet the headset won’t turn on at all.

*EDIT*: The headset now turns on, but it works for about a few minutes at most. I’m guessing the battery is cooked, which is awfully strange, considering that the headset is only a couple of months old.

- Prior to this story, “The List” looked like this (quoted from here):

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

(Tangent: I should follow Krunk’s lead and post an updated List every week, with up and down arrows :P).

At the end of February, I ordered some FAR software and had it shipped to my parents’ house. Three days later, I got a delivery notification, and I asked my sister to be on the lookout for the package.

Five days later, still no package. I checked the status of the package, and USPS reported:

Your shipment was accepted/picked up at 2:45 PM on February 28, 2008 in CITY OF INDUSTRY, CA 91715 .

Background: Two weeks prior to this order, I had a package held up in my local USPS hub for about a week as well. Eventually, the package made it to my local Post Office, and was delivered to me. I figured that this package was just being delayed as well.

A week later, the package was still stuck in CoI. I sent Buy.com an email, and they replied the next day:

As the claim was for replacement and you are in immediate need of the missing items from the order, we suggest that you place a new order for the items on the Buy.com website and change the claim to refund. If you would like us to make the change from replacement to refund, then please email us and we will gladly do so for you.

Please provide us a valid phone number to investigate lost item claim on your order.

So far so good. In my reply, I explained that I wanted a refund if the package wasn’t going to come in a timely manner. I sent Buy.com the information they requested, and got another response a day later:

Our records show that your claim request was submitted on 3/12/2008. The claim process may take up to 5 business days from the date the claim was submitted. This claim processing time may take longer depending on some factors i.e. type of shipping method used, the carrier, weight of the package, etc. This time is necessary to investigate every aspect of your claim to reach an accurate resolution.

If you are in immediate need of the missing item from your order, we suggest that you place a new order for the item on the Buy.com website and change your claim to refund. If you would like us to change the claim from replacement to refund, then please email us and let us know.

Further, we would like to inform you that we will not be able to honor the rebate that was available at the time of your original purchase on the replacement order. Therefore, please let us know if you would like a replacement of the same item with its full price or refund for full amount.

(*EDIT*: Upon further review, I guess this email wasn’t as bad as I first thought it was. My original response, below, has not been edited.)

I was a bit peeved at the tone of the text. I understood that a claim—issued a day after Buy.com sent me the first response, which I give them credit for—takes 3-5 days to complete, but didn’t Buy.com tell me to respond to the first email? Secondly, Buy.com wouldn’t be able to honor the rebates on the replacement order? I never requested a replacement! I wanted Buy.com to either get USPS to locate and release the package, or refund my money if the package could not be found. And I don’t recall asking Buy.com to honor the rebates; I expect the rebate processors in question to do so, so as long as I got my order in time to submit the rebates in question.

I sent Buy.com a terse reply, requesting a refund, and got this reply:

We really apologize for the inconvenience you have experienced with this order. We understand that it could be upsetting to wait for the shipment. We also understand that the processing of the claim is taking longer time. As you would like to get the refund, we have updated the lost shipment claim to reflect a refund instead of a replacement. We assure you that we are working diligently to resolve this issue.

As of today, I have yet to hear from Buy.com about my claim.

*EDIT*: Apparently Buy.com approved my claim, and they are applying a refund to my credit card. I guess I should really be directing my hatred towards USPS.

So the List, as of March 17, 2008, looks like this:

1) Bank of F’n America. One of the main reasons why Consumerist.com exists, I bet.

2) AllRebates/Ohana Companies, on the strength of the CompUSA rebate fiasco, where CompUSA rebates were issued as bank cards for the “convenience” of the buyer.

3) Citibank, where you can earn up to 1% in Screw You points on every $1 in purchases.

4) Time Warner (and they just jacked up my Road Runner rates by $5/mo…I thought cable companies don’t nickel and dime their customers).

5) USPS. My carrier probably thinks I like my mail—packages, too!—bent three ways.

6) Buy.com.

- Upon first glance of the NCAA Tournament Bracket, here’s what immediately jumped off the page:

1) USC v Kansas St. in the first round??? What a shame that Mayo and Beasley don’t play the same positions. What I’d give to see a USC v Kansas Midwest Final!

2) Every year, a 12 beats a 5…or so people say.

Dare I go out on a limb and pick George Mason over Notre Dame? No thanks; Villanova over Clemson or W. Kentucky over Drake seem safer.

3) I’m sure 100,000,000 junior Bracketologists have already said this, but what did Tennessee do to end up in the same bracket as North Carolina? Also, look at who Memphis (South) might have to beat to make the Final Four: Oregon/Miss. State in round 2, MSU/Pitt in the Sweet 16, and Marquette/Stanford/Texas in the Elite Eight. Yikes!

4) Some potential early- to mid-round games I’d like to see: UNC v Indiana (East, Round of 32), Louisville v Tennessee (East, Sweet 16), USC v Georgetown (Midwest, Sweet 16), Texas v Stanford (South, Sweet 16), and UCLA v UConn (West, Sweet 16).

5) And finally, I just don’t see how people are saying that, among the #1 seeds, UCLA has the easiest road to the Final Four. Who does Kansas (Rock Chalk Jayhawk!) have to deal with until the Elite Eight? UCLA might have to go through BYU, UConn, and Duke/Xavier just to make the Final Four. As strong as Vandy has been this year, and as hot as Clemson currently is, I don’t see Kansas having any trouble until Georgetown.

The only argument I buy with regards to the Bruins having an easy road to the Final Four is their huge home court advantage. But that’s about it.

More thoughts, and my full bracket, to come later.

by Peter
1 Comment »

One quick-hitter:

- For (quite possibly) the first time in the history of my residence here in this condo, a non-UPS delivery person did not leave a package on my front door on Saturday!

Thank goodness the shipper required a signature on delivery on the package. Otherwise, a $100+ webcam would probably have joined the ranks of my 19″ LCD, my welcome mat, and the damaged tuba that was being sent away for repairs by a neighbor of mine on behalf of his/her kid.

I love this place, about as much as I love Buy.com (more on that another time).

- Saturday was my oldest sister’s birthday!

(Happy Birthday, Nancy!)

My sister and I had planned to give Nancy a birthday dinner at Saladang, a somewhat high-scale Thai restaurant in (South?) Pasadena. I’d like to once again thank my mom for ruining the surprise…

The food at Saladang was a heck of a lot better than any Thai restaurant I’ve ever tried. For starters, we had an appetizer plate full of various fare: egg rolls, fried won ton, shrimp on skewers, etc.. We also had this very interesting green apple salad with chicken and a peanut dressing. Good stuff! We also had a hot and spicy seafood soup, which was only pretty good.

The main course consisted of a bunch of typical Thai restaurant dishes: Pad Thai, Pad See Ew, two different curries, and a typical fried rice. Everything was ordered with chicken, even though I wanted the Pad See Ew with beef. Oh well.

(Note to self: Never, EVER, order yellow curry again. Saladang’s yellow curry was ridiculously sweet; I wasn’t sure if I was eating a soup or a dessert.)

All in all, the food was quite excellent, and the bill was quite reasonable.

- After dinner, my cousins came up with the great idea of playing pool. After a bit of deliberation, and a trip back home to drop off the *ahem* baggage, we went to Cue Ball(’s?) on Valley Blvd. I thoroughly dominated; granted, I played my sister three times, and a pairing of my sister and a cousin (clearly, the pro of the group) once.

(I’ll admit it; I got damn lucky on a couple of matches, including a late scratch by my cousin, and a fluke shot that led to a perfect shot on the 8-ball).

I can’t believe that it had been over a year since the last time I played pool, until Saturday.

- After a couple hours of pool, we came home, and the birthday girl found a cake dropped off by her friend last night.

I never knew sugar-free (Splenda) cakes were so damn good! The cake had sugar-free icing topped with shredded coconut, and the cake itself was a yellow cake with pineapple. Honestly, I couldn’t taste the difference between that cake and a regular birthday cake.

I wish I had some of that cake right now.

Next time: my first thoughts regarding the Dance, as well as how Buy.com nearly shot up “The List.”

Happy blogging!

by Peter
3 Comments »

Quick-hitters:

- Current rebate-o-meter: $1,540, but still expected to rise, even though my entire Fry’s order from two days ago (save a bunch of batteries I bought) is on backorder.

- Raise your hand if you have yet to file your taxes yet.

Shame on you all. Don’t you want your rebate checks?

- That OJ Mayo is gonna be a pretty good NBA player, eh? I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one that was surprised that Mayo’s last second trey didn’t drop, giving the UCLA Bruins a three point victory over the USC Trojans. Good thing Kevin Love also had a big game, scoring nine straight points in a key second-half run.

I just hope Luc Richard Mbah a Moute’s ankle sprain is nothing serious.

(Yes, Bruin fan, you may direct your frustration towards me. Laker fan, you may do the same for the Gasol injury. Unfortunately, the Ung-hex is as strong as ever.)

Have I ever mentioned that I can’t wait for March Madness?

- Speaking of college basketball, has there been a crazier end-of-game sequence than what happened in the Minnesota v. Indiana game? Even the non-sports fan would appreciate the wackiness that occurred in the waning moments of that game:

1) Down two, Indiana guard Eric Gordon missed a FT. Needing to intentionally miss the next one, and hope that one of his teammates grab the rebound…

2) Gordon bricks the FT, and teammate D.J. White tipped the ball into the hoop. On top of that, White got fouled, sending him to the line for the potential go-ahead FT!

3) White missed the go-ahead FT, but somehow got his own rebound, and got fouled again!

4) White missed the first FT, and hit the second to give Indiana a one-point lead with 1.5 seconds left.

And as if all of that craziness wasn’t enough…

5) Minnesota’s inbounder heaved the ball down to the left of the opposite free throw line, where Minnesota’s Blake Hoffarber caught the ball, spun to his left, and flipped up a shot with his off (left) hand…and scored!

Derek Fisher’s 0.4 second shot thought Hoffarber’s shot was insane.

By the way, it’s not as if Hoffarber hadn’t done something like this before:

Hoffarber became nationally known in 2005, when he won an ESPY award for best play of the year. His Hopkins High School team was trailing by three points with 2 seconds left in overtime of the Class 4A title game when Hoffarber fell during a fight for a loose ball.

It landed square in his hands, and — sitting on his rear near the baseline — he hurled a 3-pointer from the floor and tied the game. Hopkins won in double overtime.

The video highlights, which can be found on the page I linked above, are a must-watch, even for you non-sports fans. This is why college basketball, especially the post-season, will always be better than the NBA.

- Poor Billy Donovan. Apparently he’s not happy with his gutted roster, and who can blame him (Remember: he lost his entire starting five that won back-to-back national championships)? After watching his team get dismantled by Alabama on Thursday, effectively ending any hopes Florida has of defending their national championship, Donovan ripped into his team:

“It’s hard for me to be excited going forward because I don’t see things getting fixed,” Donovan said.

“It’s in front of our guys, what it takes to win. For whatever reason, I haven’t brought it out in them. They’re not committed to it. … I’m not really excited about seeing this group of guys being sophomores.”

Gee, Billy, way to motivate your players! You’re not excited about this group of players? Why don’t you just call them a bunch of losers? Billy, do you realize that you did not recruit two OJ Mayos, two Kevin Loves, and a Michael Beasley, right? Did you really think your recruiting class was going to replace Horford, Noah, Brewer, etc. (all NBA Lottery picks, by the way) in a single season? You don’t see things getting fixed? Isn’t that what a coach is supposed to do?

I love how he starts off by blaming himself, only to quickly shift the blame onto his players. What a classic example of the “It’s not you, it’s me” argument! And Billy questioning other people’s commitment is just too funny; wasn’t Billy the one that signed a contract with the Orlando Magic, only to back out of it fifteen minutes later, effectively killing his NBA coaching career before it even started?

Look, I understand that Donovan is trying to motivate his players, but did he really have to go that far with his “motivational speech?” And if you’re thinking that my vitriol towards Billy has something to do with the fact that Florida knocked UCLA out of the NCAAs two years in a row, I will neither confirm nor deny that.

*whistles*

by Peter
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