Cocktail Confessions

Big Brother 12

So Big Brother season 12 started last night on CBS.  I don’t know why I always get so giddy about this show.  The idea of being the proverbial fly on the wall and watching silently 12 other people living in a sequestered house from the outside world for the next few months fascinates me.

Of course, there are always different personalities, but you can usually always count on one over-dramatic female, one stereo-typical gay person, one meat-head, one brainiac, and one social outcast.  The formula in how they pick cast members always seems straight forward, and as the saying goes “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”, and in this, CBS pretty much did the same as they had done in the past. 

However, there are a few differences to note this time around: 1) There really aren’t any contestants over the age of 40.  In the past, you could usually count on one or two middle aged or older players, but this season they are all in their 20’s and 30’s.  The oldest one is the 40 year old female cop.  2) As someone pointed out on a Twitter feed I was reading, this is probably the “whitest cast” yet.  I didn’t really notice that myself until I read that, and I have to agree.  The cast is indeed predominately “white-bread”, with one gal that seems to be half black (if that).  3) This has to be the best looking cast yet.  Seriously, it seems as if CBS execs and producers really went out of their way to choose people that were very pleasing on the eye and to the camera.  So much so in fact, I wonder if it is a way to boost rating here after they realized the smash phenomena Jersey Shore is with all these young, hard bodies.  The girls are all extremely attractive in one way or another, and the guys all seem like they may have come out of Surfer or GQ magazine.

Too bad the season premiere was only an hour long.  There was nothing else on television except some stupid press conference regarding LeBron James going to Miami, (and what a Disneyland press conference that was) there was just nothing else on.   An hour just wasn’t enough to get a good feeling for the house guests.  It was barely even a tease.  I suspect there will indeed be some showmance hookups, drama, and alliances, but there just wasn’t enough time devoted to the players for the audience to even warm up to any of them.

Not sure what I think about the saboteur aspect this time around.  Could be fun, but I wish CBS wouldn’t reveal the player so soon, (they said next week).  I think it makes it fun for the audience at home to make their own guesses and be just as surprised, sorta like a mystery for us to solve at home and has a lot of potential to keep us hooked.  However, by revealing the ‘saboteur’ to the viewers after week one, takes some of the tense drama out of the game.  Anyway, I’ll be posting more about the strategies and individual players as the show marches on.

We finished the night by watching Zombieland, a psuedo-campy comedy horror fil with Woody Harilson.  It was ‘okay’ leaning towards ‘good’, but at 88 minutes in length, and the subject material, what do you expect?

Eye Exam

Later today, I have an eye exam.  I’ve always been very blessed with excellent eyesight.  I’ve never had to wear glasses before and at my last general exam, (just over a year ago) I was told my vision was 20/15, meaning at 20 feet, I can see what most people have to move up to 15 feet in order to see.  I also have blue eyes which do make them more sensitive to light than those with brown eyes, and I do tend to get headaches more easily in direct sunlight if I’m not wearing some sort of polarizing or quality sunglasses.

However, the last few months I’ve noticed that my eyes over all just seem to tire more easily than before.  It may be a couple of different things: my age for one (as I did just broach 40), the fact that I stare at flat panel computer screens for the majority of any given day, and finally the fact that I build very small train models (I often wear magnifying diopters along with tweezers when building them).

Needless to say, by the time evening rolls around my eyes just feel a little sore.  They still work just fine, but I am noticing (or maybe its all in my head) that it’s taking a few seconds longer to focus.  Everything is still sharp, but it seems my eyes are slower to respond now at various depths.  When reading small print, I’ve caught myself moving the paper away a few extra inches just so my eyes can relax and adjust, not because they can’t focus.

Maybe it’s time for reading glasses now.  I’m not exactly sure what’s gonna happen, but  they will most likely dilate my eyes where I’ll be wearing glasses until 9pm and I’ll have to look through that funky lens device.  That’s 2 hours from now, and I already feel like it’s a chore and my eyes are tired.  It’s hell getting old.

Since I still have yet to decide on what flash-media camcorder to buy, I am fortunate enough to have my friend Brian lend me his Kodak Playsport this last week for a test drive.  For those that don’t know what flash-corders are, they are basically pocket sized video recorders that instead of using tape or CD media, save the files digitally to internal flash or SD cards.

They generally retail for sub $200 and target people on the go who who want to record video clips or still pictures on the go without lugging around a larger, more professional camera or camcorder.  They aren’t meant to make you the next Cecil Demille, but for those that like to share memories via FaceBook, YouTube, smaller emails and the like.  Features are generally limited and is really meant to do one-touch recording on the fly.  Think social sharing teens, soccer moms, and dads on the hunting trip.  If you understand this, then you should know what to expect and what not to.

The big three are considered to be Kodak, Sony, and Cisco.  All the others are poor imitators, and you get what you pay for, so don’t expect superior quality in both recordings or durability if you go with one of the off-name brands.  Out of the gate, I eliminate all the Cisco ‘Flip’ brands because of the cost factor.  There is nothing that the Cisco ones do any better than the Kodak or Sony models other than cost more.  They may have made it virtually ‘idiot proof’, but with the various Flips, you sacrifice pure 1080p HD recordings and as a reward for stripping down to the most basic features, you actually pay more.  That being said, many people do like their Flips for their simplicity, and no one can argue their marketing machine made a splash as the Flip Mino and new HD Slyde are practically household vernacular…but that doesn’t make them the best.

I’m torn between the lower end Sony Bloggie and new Kodak Playsport.  Both have pros and cons that on paper seem to cancel each other out.  From what I have read the Bloggie has superior video qulaity whereas the Playsport has better audio pickup.  Both have 4 recording settings that are identical, have zoom features, have editing software, have the ability to take 5 megapixel still shots.  Bloggie has a built in USB connection, whereas the Kodak uses a cable.  Kodak is roughly $40 buck cheaper and is has one additional feature that extreme outdoors people may indeed like…it is waterproof up to 10 feet under water making it ideal for the beach, skiing trips, and backyard pool parties.

So now that you get the idea, here are my preliminary findings on the Kodak Playsport:

1) Lowlight conditions do not favor this camera.  We used it once at night in my backyard with the only light source being some tiki torches, bleed over light from the kitchen to the backyard, and some decorative overhead hanging lights.  The Kodak did not fair very well.  I suspect the Sony may not do much better as neither has a flash or floodlight function.  Perhaps too much a battery drain?

2) However filming at dusk seemed to be okay.  The raw format for the Playsport is .MOV files, friendly to Apple and Quicktime applications.  The following video was taken at the San Clemente, CA pier this past Sunday at roughly 6:30pm.  I think the colors turned out pretty well, and the raw playback footage on my PC (prior to YouTube uploading and conversion) was nice, albeit it somewhat shaky (more on that in a second).

3) Now the shakiness.  You’ll note that even with EIS turned on, it stills seems very jerky even though my panning was fairly smooth.  I have heard this from other people as well and that the Sony Bloggie may indeed do a better job at image stabilization.

4) Here is the second video taken just a bit later.  Again, looks good other than a bit shaky:

Miscellaneous stuff: comes with a wrist strap and a very small and somewhat generic manual.  Visiting the Kodak support page, I noticed that a new firmware patch was released in March of this year, shortly after the the Playsport went public.  Too bad I couldn’t find anything at the Kodak webpage that informs users what the firmware upgrade actually does, but here’s to hoping it addresses the EIS and the reported false battery charged readings.  That is, some people are stating that the battery doesn’t seem to charge 100%, or even if the indicator does register that the internal battery is 100%, only minutes after use, the icon shows it’s already 25% spent which may make some users wary how the long the battery life actually is.

The nice thing was that that plugging in the Playsport to my PC via a USB cable, Windows XP detected it immediately and there was no additional software I needed to install.  I was able to go in to the media storage and quickly drag and drop the .MOV files over to my PC.  That was pretty seemless.  I did not have a chance thus far to play with the actual camera for taking still shots, nor did I use the included editing software that is built in to the Playsport to alter my videos.

Now I also created a YuoTube account and uploaded both movie’s there as you see embedded above.  One thing I did note…the raw .MOV files are much sharper than the YouTube videos you see here.  I assume YouTube has some type of conversion and compression process and in the end you may notice a bit more pixelation and muted colors.  That could be because YouTube uses the .FLV format or something else.

“If you watch ‘JAWS’ backwards, it’s a movie about a shark that keeps throwing up people until they have to open a beach.”

This episode was a little fun to do. I started off of a script that I had written out which I thought was pretty good and witty, but upon reading back into a portable recording device, just sounded stiff and un-natural. After a few additional attempts and not liking any of them, I decided to throw the script out the window and record free style…in one take.

The result is something that sounds more real and fluid, although like most, I needs to work on my “um’s” and “uh’s”.

In this episode I start off by talking about a dinner party I was recently invited to by my friend Jon, and avoiding a piano bar party that my wife attended that resulted in chaos (people throwing up, getting thrown out, loosing articles of clothing) to a posh little place called Hush in Laguna Beach, CA. It’s a swank place with very good food (I’d give it a 4.25 stars on a scale of 5), great atmosphere for an intimate dinner party or romantic evening with your significant other. They have a very cool bar that is relaxing on the eyes and a mellow vibe with top shelf liquor.  Hush is a small place, but sometimes smaller is indeed better, and it’s hard to put into words, but the aesthetics is akin to a mash up of modern art meeting an episode of Miami Vice.

Next off we end up at the local chapter of Long Beach’s, “Club Bounce“, which none of us was really prepared for.  This Laguna iteration can be found in a subterranean bar on PCH that doubles as The Main Street Bar.  What I and most of our party didn’t know is that this location is a gay and lesbian watering hole, and needless to say it was quite the eye opener.  I loosened up with some liquid encouragement in the form of Manhattans and ended up dancing the night away, even if I was just a piece of meat in an all girl mechanic mosh pit.  I did learn a few things the next day however: 1) I need to work on my cardio as I was totally out of breath at various points in the evening, 2) my club shirt was the most feminine article of clothing in the joint clearly labeling me as a ‘metrosexual’, 3) cheap whisky and heavy handed sweet vermouth equate to a serious next morning headache.

 - gallery coming soon -

I also finally saw the movie juggernaut that is know as Avatar, but in 2D.  It was good and I enjoyed it, but because maybe I didn’t see it in 3D or IMAX I’m not sure what all the hype was about.  In my personal opinion it wasn’t as good as people made it out to be, and I also understand why some critics call it ‘Dances with Wolves’ in space.  I saw a lot of other, shall we say ‘borrowed’ elements and ideas from World of Warcraft and the Star Wars franchise, especially ‘Return of the Jedi’.

Finally a few tidbits on some of the science fictions shows I’m currently watching such as Lost and FlashForward.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (32.1MB)

The poster caught my eye.

And I am glad it did.

Apparantly I’ve never heard of this little gem from our Canadian friends up north.  Based on a B&W short, this mockumentary style comedy ran on Canadian televion for seven seasons beginning in 2001.  It also spawned a few television specials and two feature films.  “The Big Dirty”, the first feature film was my first exposure to these characters and it was downright hilarious.  Not all the acting is top noch, but I don’t think it is supposed to be.  Each character is his or her own unique traffic accident waiting to happen and how they keep a straight face while selling you on their schtick is beyond me.

It’s a special type of humor, very similar to the style of ‘The Office’ or ‘Parks and Recreation’.  If your into that dry delivery and very intelligent although sophmoric humor, then I think you’ll love this show.  Like most mockumentaries of this nature, you’ll fall into either of two camps:  A) you won’t get it and thinks it’s dumb, or B) you’ll howl and cry out laughing.  Thank goodness I fall into the later category, and can look past the low budget (that’s half its charm anyway) and enjoy the nonsense and antics for what they are.

Now I suppose it’s up to me to go back and get the shows on DVD either through Netflix or purchasing the seasons through Amazon.  Either way, this is now on my “must see” list.  I’ll spare you the details of the chracters and plotlines, as they can all be found at the Wikipedia entry here.  But suffice to say, the antics at the trailer park are so ridiculous and out there, that they actually seem plausible as do many of the characters themselves.  The character’s Ricky, Julian, and Bubbles (pictures) are perfect and I swear they are charicatures of people we all actually have run into at one point in our lives.