jcalvert

Amazon Marketplace Blu-ray deal

I ran across this deal from the forums at Blu-ray.com:

Submit a DVD trade-in order with a total value of $50 or more in our Movies & TV Trade-In store before December 31, 2009 and in addition to your Amazon.com Gift Card, you’ll receive an extra $10 credit good toward your next purchase in the Blu-ray store at www.amazon.com.

I normally sell stuff on eBay, but I decided to give Amazon a try for a couple of reasons. First, with eBay any “profits” I expect to make take a hit with various fees – listing fees, final sale price fees, PayPal fees, and there is a set price of shipping/handling charges that can be applied, which is often too small for larger DVD sets. Second, the Amazon deal looks too good to pass up because it is simple – I pack everything up, print off a free UPS shipping label, and the money along with the $10 credit is posted to my Amazon account.

If sold individually on eBay I could probably make more than the $75 ($85 with that $10 bonus credit) that I am getting with Amazon, but this is really a simple way to clean out my collection of older DVDs that I have watched, never really wanted (gifts), or just no longer need in my collection. Plus my wife does not have to stand in the dreaded U.S. Post Office lines with my three boys during the peak of the Christmas shipping season.

New F1 point system has pitfalls.

I do not like the newly announced F1 point system, but of course no one asked for my input. According the racer.com the new system was announced because of the expanding grid for the 2010 campaign.

A statement from today’s meeting of the World Council said: “Due to the expanded grid of 13 teams, and further to the recommendation of the F1 Commission, a new points system will be in place for the 2010 season.” The new system will award points in the following order: 25-20-15-10-8-6-5-3-2-1.

The change was proposed to take into account the increased field for 2010, when the addition of the new entrants will take the grid up to 26 cars – its highest figure since 1995.

So what happens when some of these teams fold? At some point the manufacturers may eventually return and out spend the weaker teams. This just seems like a bad idea to accommodate the next 3-6 years, not to mention the historical significance of a disparity in past points awarded compared to 2010 and beyond.

I can understand the need to make sure enough bottom feeders (or good teams having a desperate day) are scoring points, but if we are making changes, let’s take it a step further. I have long been an advocate for awarding points for winning the pole, posting the fastest lap, and leading at the midpoint of the race. Awarding points for achieving a pole is a fairly worthy cause. Handing out points for leading at the midpoint of a race would provide for some interesting strategies, and of course awarding a point or two for the fastest lap would give the back markers a reason to keep fighting until the bitter end.

Should be interesting to see how 2010 progresses. This is certainly not the F1 I fell in love with in 1995.

Disappointing Falcons season gets worse – thanks Babineaux!

A disappointing Falcons season took a turn for the worse as Babineaux was book earlier this week [Thursday December 9] on felony possession of marijuana. Yesterday the Falcons responded along typical corporate lines:

“We are aware of the situation concerning Jonathan Babineaux and are in the process of gathering information. Because this is a legal matter, we will have no further comment at this time.”

Hmmm, but no decision has been made on sitting down Babineaux until his legal situation is resolved.

Smith did not say whether or not Babineaux, a five-year veteran who leads the team with five sacks, will play Sunday against the New Orleans Saints. He did confirm rookie defensive tackle Vance Walker’s place behind Babineaux on the depth chart.

Come on Falcons front office; do the right thing and sit Babs. Forget the innocent thing; you know he is just going to plea down the charges and end up with a two game suspension from the NFL. Why not sit him now and a send a message that this franchise does not value winning regardless of the consequences.

WTF is going to happen next? The injuries were bad enough; disappointing, but injuries are out of the team’s control. Call it bad luck. Or maybe bad karma. Now this? How much pain and suffering does a Falcons fan have to endure? This is yet another wasted year, and another missed opportunity to actually put a winning face on the franchise. Yes, I dare bring up the lack of back-to-back winning season. So don’t get me wrong, as a paying season ticket holder and a lifelong fan I want the Falcons to win; badly. But this is just too much. Many boards are say Babs is yet another Mary Jane thug. I am not going to go that far, but we really did not need this as the season continues to crumble around us.

Yesterday I was told that season ticket renewals were mailed on Friday. Speaking of which the debacle last week against Vick and the Eagles was enough to make me strongly consider not renewing my season tickets. What a joke this season is turning into. How bad are things going to get tomorrow? The steady rain all weekend is probably foretelling a long, dreary day at the Dome. Are the Saints going to put up 50? Good grief!

Random Saturday Gaming Links

Some random video gaming links for your reading pleasure …

The demise of a once proud franchise?
Bill Harris (Dubious Quality) on the possible demise of EA Sports NCAA Football (and possibly basketball) series:

Physics-based gameplay, an offensive style that is now common, and “authentic offensive styles of play” are possible additions to the game? WTF have you guys been developing for the last ten years? If you’ve been developing this game for ten damn years (at least) and teams aren’t ALREADY playing like they play in real life, then that’s a fail.

It would be disappointing to see the NCAA series get canned, but then again it has become rather stale. This year was the first time I completely passed up the game. EA Sports obviously has some work to do to recapture the magic and popularity of this once great franchise.

The Nintendo DS kicks core gamers in the nuts.
Eurogamer has this bit on the unexpected success of the all UK conquering Nintendo DS:

Bitter core gamers, annoyed at the invasion of their sacred domain by a host of newcomers, occasionally dismiss the DS in the same terms as they do the Wii – it’s your mother’s console, designed for the “casuals” and with nothing to appeal to real gamers. They miss the point. The DS has something for everyone, successfully filling almost every niche in the market – and it’s only by filling an enormous range of niches that a platform can ever truly become mass-market. Yes, the DS has fitness and brain training applications for the older generation, but it also has core games for the traditional market – and so much more besides. It has software for small children, for teenage girls, for language learners, for music fans, for tourists, for aspiring chefs and for everyone else in between.

Nintendo’s popularity is obviously at an all time high, and the DS (or its latest incarnation – the DSi) shows no sign of letting up anytime soon.

Holiday gift giving guide.
These things are typically a dime a dozen, but GameShark’s stand out thanks to Santa’s helper. She is very cute in a sexy sort of way, and all decked out for Christmas! I started to say that I would like to unwrap her for Christmas, but figured this is sometimes a family site.

HVB still alive and kicking
High Velocity Bowling has to be one of the better implemented motion sensor gamers on the PS3. The developers have done a damn good job of keeping the game fresh with cheap DLC (usually $0.99 a pop). If I break out my PS3 anytime soon for something other than movie watching, I am sure that HVB will get turn or two.

Sony slims down losses
An article that kotaku.com picked up shows that Sony is still taking a loss on the PS3 Slim. $37 per console sold adds up after a while. Prorated over 10 years (you know, the Sony lifetime achievement console plan) and things do not sound so gloom and doom for Sony after all. I should be a spin doctor.

Happy rainy Saturday!

Personal responsibility; what a concept!

In his weekly newsletter, Georgia Congressman Lynn A. Westmoreland (3rd District) has this nice little dandy worthy of a quote:

When the government picks winners and losers, everybody loses. We have to restore the power of capital in capitalism. Businesses must succeed on their own – or be allowed to fail. Instead of a permanent bailout fund, we need a plan that permanently ends the Bailout Era and restores personal responsibility in our free markets.

There are plenty of folks on the left who would love to see the concept of personal responsibility go the way of prayer in schools, Christmas tree lightings, and mangers on the steps of our courthouses and other government buildings.

In search of disc scratch repair magic

I wrote about this problem a couple of days ago; my kids’ Wii games seem to be scratching left and right. That is probably an exaggeration, but I do have four games sitting on the kitchen counter waiting for dad to work some magic. On a whim, or sort of a careless “why not try this” moment, I purchased some Audiovox Surface SURF404 DVD/CD/Game Disc Scratch Repair Kit from Amazon.com. This junk turned out to be complete waste of money.

Just for shits and giggles I decided to post a “user” review of this product:

I purchased this product to help fix several of my kids’ Wii games – four different games had various degree of scratches. One of the games had very “heavy” scratches; obviously deep scratches that ran across the game disc as well as several that ran with the disc tracks. The product did not help this game at all. One of the games had very light scratches; what I call “feather” scratches. Multiple applications of the product did not remove the scratch from the surface, which is what I expected, but I was keeping my fingers crossed that the product would somehow bond and fill-in the surface of the scratch. No such luck.

This product may work fin [sic – SOB – I hate a type-o in a review!] on other media, but it did not help with Wii games. [I gave this stuff 1 star.]

Yesterday my wife called some of the local movie rental stores to ask about disc scratch removal services. We figured we would pay $5/disc, which while expensive, would be a much better alternative, not to mention cheaper, than replacing all the scratched games. No such luck. The stores either pretended to be ignorant, or they said they do not offer any sort of service. I guess they just throw out movies that are scratch. One of the stores did mention Scratch Out, but the reviews are so mixed on this one that I am not sure if I will waste my money.

Seinfeld Impulse Purchase

Yesterday Amazon ran the Seinfeld – The Complete Series DVD set as “the deal of the day” for the low, low price of $84.99. My wife and I love this show, so after thinking about it most of the day, I decided to make the purchase. Never mind that I already have season 1-4; I can probably eBay those to recover a few bucks. The old “must see TV” was a nice impulse purchase – Merry Christmas to me!

PixilJunk Shooter

I just realized that PixilJunk Shooter is out. Although I haven’t played much of anything lately, I will probably drop $9.99 on this one. The PixilJunk games are solid pick up and play experiences, and I always enjoy a good shooter.

Braves dump Soriano

By accepting salary arbitration, Rafael Soriano completely screwed the Braves. Of course for the players and teams baseball is a business, and Soriano figured to get more money in arbitration than via free agency, so Soriano did what he had to do to protect his bank account. Or at least Soriano did what his agent thought was best. Arbitration made sense for Soriano, but sucks for the Braves and their fans.

By going the arbitration route, Atlanta will no longer get draft picks as compensation for the team signing Soriano, and the Braves were on the hook for an unexpected $7 million (or more) after already dipping their toes in the bullpen free agency market. The really sad part of this is reactionary move is that Atlanta would have ended up with a really solid bullpen if they could afford to keep Soriano’s salary on the books. Too bad because Soriano would have also brought a lot more via trade come July, than a December trade with Tampa Bay. The best the Braves could do was Jesse Chavez.

Wii games scratch easily.

I was going to make a go of finding something really interesting video gaming related to comment on this morning, but I could not really find a damn that that was at least interesting enough to warrant a small comment, rant, gushing titillation, or downright disgust. Oh well, maybe tomorrow.

As I sit here and write this, I have a stack of Wii games next to me that my kids say are scratched – they will not load, or they skip and crash at certain points in the game. The stack continues to grow. Wii Sports Resort, Star Wars: The Complete Saga, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and Madden 08. The Madden game is of small consequence – the boys already have Madden 10. The rest are somewhat concerning.

I order some Audiovox Surface SURF404 DVD/CD/Game Disc Scratch Repair Kit from Amazon to attempt to fix some of the discs, but no such luck. I am not sure if Wii games are just really easy to scratch or if my boys are really hard on their games. Maybe a combination of both.

If anyone has any suggestions on a really good scratch removal product or service, I am certainly open to ideas. I have asked my wife to call some of the local video stores to see if they offer any type of service. I would expect some of the larger stores to have some type of in-store service, at least for their own movies and games, to restore a scratched disk.

All is quiet on the videogame front.

My PS3 has not been getting much of a workout of late; except for playing the occasional Blu-ray (watched X-Men 1 last weekend), the PS3 is off most of these days. It is not as if I have nothing to play – FIFA 10 and Madden 10 should get plenty of sports time with Ferrari Challenge getting my racing pleasure on, but things have just not worked out that way.

I also have Demon’s Souls just sitting around (no guidebook cover problem if you do not use the damn thing) and Dragon Age: Origins is a possibility, although the latter is technically being saved for Christmas. One of these days I could actually jump back into Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, which is a splendid game, but much like the rest of my collection, it is gathering dust.

Usually I am looking forward to some upcoming release. I have no idea what is next, what the next “it” game happens to be, which videogame magazines are pimping reviews. It is kind of an awkward time for me as a gamer. My free time is focused on other interests, but as I wrote several months ago, these days video gaming is sort of a season hobby. There are only two Falcons home games left, of course the upcoming Bowls and NFL Playoffs, and then the weather will turn nasty. Well, as nasty as it manages to get in Columbus, GA.

As we head into the Christmas season, maybe a couple of days off here and there will motivate me to jump back into some of these games, but for now it is not even fair to call video gaming a hobby. My how times have changed!

Falcons still in Wild-Card picture; at least mathematically.

Never tell me the odds, especially when they are not pretty and downright unrealistic. According to NFL.com, the Falcons are still “in the hunt” for a Wild-Card picture.

At 6-6 there are really on the outside look in at the Eagles and Packers, both of which sport 8-4 records. Making things worse, thanks to last Sunday’s debacle, the Eagles hold a tiebreaker over the Falcons. The Giants at 7-4 are also “in the hunt” and much like the Eagles, they also hold a tiebreaker over the Falcons.

With four games to play, if (call it a BIG IF) the Falcons play well until the bitter end, they could go 3-1, which would earn them back-to-back winning seasons. I think that is really all they have left to play for this year.

Georgia goes Independence Bowling

In a season of disappointment, the Bulldogs went about as low as they can go, accepting a bid to Shreveport to play the Aggies of Texas A&M.

This Georgia team needs the extra practice time afforded to Bowl bound teams. Forget the artificial buzz about sending the seniors out on a high note. The early word from Coach Richt is that he will spend most of his time working some a hodgepodge group of grad assistances to come up with some sort of defensive plan to stop the Aggies. This may not end well.

I wonder how well Georgia will travel, and if the A&M fan base is at all excited about the matchup. The Independence Bowl, Dec 28 at 5PM on ESPN2 will probably feature a ton of empty seats, and be poor represented in the ratings department. Of course I will watch and be pulling for the Dawgs, but it will be more about pride, not a reward for a well-played season.

Falcons embarrassed by Eagles

I am not going to go into a whole lot of details, but suffice it to say that this game totally sucked. Or rather the Falcons totally sucked. So did their so called fans.

Not only did the Falcons embarrass the franchise with such poor play, but the fans as a whole deserve a big WTF? I can understand cheering for Vick. I look around me each week and see plenty of his jerseys, but chants of “We want Vick! We want Vick!” were just too much to stomach. Mark Bradley of ajc.com saw things slightly differently:

No matter how it seemed on TV, Vick’s sort of homecoming commanded no consensus. He drew more boos than cheers when he made his first appearance, and even after the two touchdowns this was not — no matter how the national media might portray it — a case of every single Falcons supporter changing sides. The majority came ready to support the home team, but the home team did nothing to hold up its end.

Let’s put it this way. Vick was booed (plenty of woof-woofs too) more than cheered his first couple of appearance. When Vick scored his first TD, the stadium erupted in pure adulation. Never mind that this meant the Falcons were now down 20-0! After the Eagles when up 27-0, before the Eagles came out again on offense, the Dome was filled with “We want Vick!” chants. When Vick came in, there were mostly cheers; by this point in the game there were not enough true Falcons fans left to make any sort of difference. When Vick scored, the Dome went nuts. Clearly Vick is still an ATL favorite.

I have no problems cheering for Vick. Give him a round of applause, and be done with it. The reality was that there were more Vick fans than Falcons fans. I just don’t get it. Regardless of the player (no matter how popular), support your team, but such is the mystique (what else can I call it) of Vick, who once again captivated the Dome.

Falcons turn to backups against Eagles

How many times have I written this year that the Falcons injury report is a mile long? Well, too often, this is part of the reason for a 6-5 record, soon to be 6-6. Falcons will be without Turner, and I seriously doubt we will see G Harvey Dahl, Turner, or Jenkins. I can see White toughing it out, but things are not going to be pretty.

At the beginning of the year this was going to be the matchup – Vick was coming back, and the Falcons would be playing the Eagles for a possible Playoff preview. This game still matters, but in a much different way than most of the pundits predicted. First, Ryan is not starting. Second, Vick will not receive any meaningful play time. Third, while the Eagles have the inside track for one of the two NFC Wild-Card spots, if things fall their way, they could actually win the NFC East. The Saints already have the NFC South in hand, and the Falcons are on the outside looking to get into the Playoffs. This game is really important to the Falcons Wild-Card aspirations, which makes all the injuries completely suck.

The Falcons already have lost tiebreaker opportunities to Dallas, and the Giants; it will be too much to overcome if the Falcons fall to the Eagles. Can the Falcons actually win this one? The homer in me says yes.

Three keys to the game:

Redman has to manage the game without turnovers. He is a veteran so he should have the savvy to control the action on the field after a week of full practice with the first team.
The Falcons must control the clock; keep the Eagles offense off the field will keep the Falcons defense from being exposed. Let’s face it, the defensive line has been awful getting pressure on opposing QBs, and I am not even going to go into the problems with the secondary (that horse has been beaten).
The defense must get pressure on McNabb. Oops.

It is cold enough to freeze snot right now, so I may just skip the whole tailgate thing, get the kids some McD’s and head directly to the Dome where it should be warm and cozy. If I have another clown tell me I should sit down, then I may have to do a write-up on how much the Dome sucks. Let’s just all sit on our hands and pretend like we are watching golf or something.

Go Falcons!