Let's Give It a Try

As mentioned below, I took a short video last night at the concert. I'm clueless about editing and such, but alas, I found "Windows Movie Maker" on my machine. Cool. Thankfully it was pretty intuitive and I grasped the basics. A quick search of YouTube indicates that although posting videos, concert footage, etc. might not be 100% legal, apparently Keith Urban's lawyers don't care, have bigger fish to fry, and/or think that short, low quality video posted online isn't doing much harm (heck, it might actually sell another ticket, or shirt, or CD...who knows?!). So, let's try this video thing. Pardon the roughness of it...After all, I didn't have press credentials and neither did my camera. : )

From Beale Street to "Down Under"

I surprised Leah several weeks ago with tickets to the Keith Urban show. We didn't really jump on tickets way back in February or whenever they went on sale, and although there were probably tickets in the nosebleeds available via conventional outlets (i.e, Ticketmaster), we just didn't really make it a priority. She even made the comment, "If I get his new CD, I won't say anything more about going to the concert." And I got to hand it to her...she kept her promise. One day I was perusing the internet for tickets to see how much it'd set me back if I were to get them. Places like stubhub (which is just a centralized and specialized place for people to sell their own tickets at the cost of a 15% fee or something) had them for like $120-150. EACH. No thanks. So I checked eBay. Seemed that for whatever reason, I could virtually get them for face value. Now that's more like it. I actually happened upon a guy from Missouri who bought them for his wife for Valentine's only to find out she had another valentine. At least, that's what the auction says.

So anyhow, we started with a dinner on Beale at Pat O'Brien's. It was good, but clearly the kitchen cannot handle the pressure of 1) large crowds, and 2) non-hostess led, seat-yourself seating. And this was a hour and a half prior to show time. Oh well.

The concert was great, and Mr. Urban put on a good show. Behind the stage was a HUGE screen that was sometimes showing live video of him or the band (a la the big screens at church or the Jumbotron at the stadium), other times it was showing music video type scenes or even some creative montage of colors or whatnot. I couldn't believe the clarity and brightness of the live images, and I don't know a lot about digital and hi-def tv and all of that, but the images on that thing were spectacular.

Shooting pics in an environment like that are indeed a challenge. First off, a flash does no good because the range of a standard flash is about 10 ft. Secondly, the camera is most likely doing its best to analyze light conditions and adjusting itself accordingly, which might not always work. And if you manually open the aperture to allow for more light, your image then becomes more likely to experience blurring if you and the subject aren't totally still. Lastly, when you zoom in too much, you lose clarity with a typical point and shoot camera--this is why pros have to use a zoom lens that's 2 feet long and requires it's own tripod!!

Anyway, enough of the photography lesson. Here are my favorite pics from last night. I also shot a 1 minute .avi file with my camera, but it's currently 100 MB and YouTube might laugh at that, I don't know. This my first foray into digital video online, so if there's a video editor something that will allow me to make it smaller or shorter, let me know! Steve, you the man, so call me and we'll go into the Russell Production Studio!

Another First

Nicholas...and his parents...experienced a right of passage tonight. His very first haircut. Looking back over the pictures of the last year and a half, it's quite comical actually. For the greater part of his first year, he hardly had any hair, and it's amazing how much his entire look has changed with the loss of "baby fat" and more hair on his head. The other day we were playing with the sprinkler in the yard, and we noticed that the back of his hair came down almost past his neckline. "Yep, time to get it cut," we said. So tonight was the night. And don't mind the tears on the floor that fell right below Leah...they should be dry by now.

Waiting His Turn

Getting Ready
Getting it Cut...


All Done!!

Steve's Nemesis

Saw a license plate tonight that I had to get a picture of....Steve, somebody's thrown down the gauntlet!!

Duhh...I Knew That

What me, Scott, Leah, Steve, and my dad always knew (but my mom vehemently disputes) . . . We ARE smarter than our younger siblings! Told you! Neener neener neener! : P

So Where's Al, and Jesse?

Let's see....a hate crime, somebody lost their life, African-Americans were involved.....so surely Rev. Al and Jesse Jackson are gonna be on TV, The Today Show, Larry King, etc, talking about what in injustice this is and how the suspects should face a swift and appropriate punishment, right?

Oh, well, since the suspects are black, then that changes everything, doesn't it?

This kinda crap chaps my hide. And I'm not talking about the crime itself. It's just that had it been a group of whites, Asians, etc., who pulled a black PASSENGER out of a car and proceeded to beat them to a pulp so that they later died, how much would we be hearing about it? How many times would we see the victim's family at a press conference, with Jesse or Al standing beside them?

So why not now? Don't they believe that racism is rampant and needs to be squelched...isn't that what they're always preaching? So why aren't they joining forces with this guy's family? It's because of the ever-present double standard. Blacks can't be racist. Blacks can't commit hate crimes. Blacks are always the victim, even when they aren't. As long as you have such a distorted view of right and wrong from one section of American, strides will never be made to bridge the gap that these pompous windbags widen at every opportunity.

Click . . . Take a Pic!

(bonus points to the first parent who chimes in with that reference). If you know the answer and you're NOT the parent of a small child, then you just might have some explaning to do. Nieces or nephews, maybe...but that's about it.

In the "we must know each other really well" department, Leah and I were recently planning a gift for each other that ended up being the same thing. The result: a Canon PowerShot A570 digital camera. Did we have a digital camera? Yes. Was it worth a crap? No. It was a Fugi FinePix 1.3 mp camera that was heavy and clunky. And the little sliding lens cover thing was broken, and the display would sometimes say "Read Error" when reviewing pictures. Or that annoying red "Sorry, I ain't working" light would come on when attempting to take pictures. So it was time.

I had planned on getting one for Leah for our 10-year dating anniversary which was June 7. She admitted that it was her plans for our 5-year wedding anniversary in October, which would also give us a chance to have fun with it on vacation in October. So we decided we'd put our heads together and do the "It's our present to each other" thing.

Being analytical, I felt like I needed to review and read and get opinions. I was eyeing a Nikon at first, and Leah discovered this Canon. Then Googling that one turned up this guy, who seems to know a bunch about cameras and explains how a $150 camera can take just as good of an everyday pic as a $5000 camera can (also read the megapixel article, on how the camera industry is tricking us into believe that MP's are the litmus test, and how my 7.1 MP camera is thus hugely inferior to Steve's 10MP. Not exactly so.). Anyway, I read the reviews on cnet and went to Best Buy to grope their sales floor models (the cameras, not, uh, nevermind) and then pulled the trigger online. Why pay retail price plus 9.25% tax when a place like buydig.com sells its it for 20% less, no tax, and free shipping?

Now it's time to learn how to use the stuff that is at my fingertips. Exposure compensation and white balance and f2.5 shutter gobbledegook....wth?! I'm not trying to go pro, but I would like to know more of the "advanced basics" to take better pictures. I'm supposed to be taking an introductory-to-intermediate class tomorrow morning at Wolf Camera...One of those classes that they offer for free to people who buy cameras from them but allow evil people like me (who didn't) to pay for it. I envision a room full of 60-year-olds failing the final exam of "Please adjust your camera to manual flash" and feeling that it was a total waste of 2 hours, but I hope I'm wrong.

Comcast, aka Ben Dover

When I moved into my house 6 years ago, there were two choices for high-speed internet service: Time Warner and BellSouth--both were similarly priced, as I remember. 45 bucks, give or take. I don't remember why I picked cable (Time Warner), but I did. Been happy as a lark. I could probably count on one hand and have fingers left over how many times it's been down for any significant period of time. I bought me a DLink wireless router and got up and running with WEP and stuff with no probs whatsoever. BellSouth would occasionally send unsolicited mail or call me in an effort to have me jump ship, but the small price difference wasn't enough to justify all the hassles of switching equipment and embark on the seemingly endless process of updating my numerous online accounts and personal contacts with my new info.

Until now. Comcast has come to town and realized that $44.95/mo just ain't cutting it. So I get a letter stating that starting July 1, it'll be 5 bucks more. OK, I could possibly go with that. But that's not where it ends. Starting 1/1/08, this rate will be almost $61 if I keep the cable modem, or if I go buy my own they'll toss me some crumbs and only charge me $57.95. So let me get this straight... In order to keep my identical setup, you're jacking up my rate 35%. Wow. Now, let's look at BellSouth's rate, shall we? DSL Xtreme is 37.95, and Xtreme 6.0 is $42.95. Or I can keep Comcast and pay almost $20 more. BellSouth is also getting me discounts on my phone bill and DirecTV, but that's just gravy, IMO. I changed service because it just boggles my mind that Comcast feels that their service is so great that their pricing can be so non-competitive.

Oh well. Mr. Comcast executive...This user is about to close his account, and it shouldn't be hard to figure out why.