Unleash the Music... day 1 morning 1...

Well, Unleash is finally underway. We were supposed to get extra rest this weekend so we would be ready to "make it happen" but I'm sad to say I didn't get a lot of extra rest. Last night I had a REALLY hard time sleeping. I think it was just an overwhelming desire to get started.

If RadioU is training, Unleash is the race. It's the time when we take our 6 months of work and apply all those broadcasting skills to one purpose: raise the money RadioU needs to stay on the air.

Oh, and don't forget that Unleash is only 6 days this time around. 6 DAYS!?!?!?!?! DUDE!?!?!?!

Do me a favor. If you haven't given yet, do it now at unleashthemusic.org. We ALL want to see a shorter Unleash be hugely successful. Not only would it be less work for us, but it gets us back to what we want to do: playing the best freaking music on the planet. No commercials. C'mon already!!!

Oh, one last thing: huge props to Nikki's mom for making waffles and bacon for breakfast. FANTASTIC.

Unleash the Music.

Riot Pounder: Week 2.

2.5 pounds... UP. Yep. I've been trying to lose 1 pound for two weeks and I've gained 2.5. It's pretty darn impressive I tell ya. I guess I need to get more "serious". Yeah. We'll see how that goes....

Gaming Gurus and such...

So, if you hven' head us taling about it, we are in the process of upating Gaming Gurus and broadening its scope. Instead of it only being about gaming, we want to us it a a way of keeping up with the latest and greatest pieces of consumer tech and so on and so forth. I still don' hve a name for it and could realy use some help coming up with one. If you have some ideas let me kow.

Why blog about it? Well, mostly because I'm entering this blog from my Playstation 3!!! I have been using the Wii for some time now to view YouTube videos on my big screen TV in the living room but it is highl impractical for doing any actual surfing. This week on Gaming Gurus we will be looking at a new piece of tech from Logtiech: a blutetooth wireless keybord for you PS3! I'm loving this thing. (Though it does seem to miss th occassional character rom im to time.)

If you've got a good idea, let me know...and remember to catch my take on the Logitech MediaBoard this Thursday!

The Wedding Trailer: WE GOT ONE!!!!

Best Buy gives you money...

....if you bought an HD-DVD player before February 23, 2008. Click here and get some info.

Jesus has something to say....

i love my animals but not this much.....

Hair of the dog: The animal lovers who turned their dead pets' coats into woolly jumpers

The Riot Pounder... Obadiah FAIL.

Have you been following the RIOT pounder? The idea is simple: lose *ONE* pound. Why one? Because one leads to two... but before you can get to two or twenty you must reach *ONE*. One pound sounds easier and is less intimidating. In the RIOT pounder you are not allowed to look ahead to losing more weight. You can only lose one pound at a time. Your only goal can be one pound. One is the number of the counting and the number of the counting shall be one.

Am I making my point?

I started last Wednesday with a weigh in and then weighed in this morning. Did I lose a pound?

Nope.

CRAP! I really thought I had nailed it. I've said no to lots of junk food this week and I've been getting some solid exercise. (Not as solid as I would get during the Spring-Summer-Fall months but STILL, I picked it up.) The result is... not all that disappointing. It usually takes me two to three weeks to start losing weight. I'm not just making that up. When I started running two years ago I went from zero physical activity to LOTS... and I didn't lose a pound for three weeks. (Then magically I lost four.)

So, to quote Relient K: "I'm pressing on". My plan for this week will not be much different than last: cut out unnecessary sugary stuff and/or worthless munching food and get exercise. Also, this week I'm keeping a food journal. I've heard of people doing this before and I'm trying it. More than anything else, I'm doing it to get a good visual of what I'm ACTUALLY eating versus what I FEEL like I'm eating.

Why the fuss? What happened to Commit To Be Fat? Hey, fat is great... but I want to run faster and one way to do that is to stop carrying around extra pounds. Exercise alone will NOT get the pounds off of me. I've got to alter my food intake... but as I've said on the show: I'm not getting overly drastic. That simply leads to big results followed by bee-sting level weight gain. Forget it. I can either easily incorporate it into my daily life or I'll be fat. End of story.

Drunk Lawnmower Man.

PLUS














EQUALS

If you want to read the story and see the actual pictures, click here.

The Great Pancake Adventure....

I'll have to say that the weekend was one that was not overly loaded with adventure. I had some plans that fell through on Friday (I installed my speakers instead), Saturday night saw lots of friends for dinner and the obligatory Starbucks, and Sunday consisted of usual Sunday fare. It was usual until Sunday night...

I am a big fan of pancakes. I love them. I don't know where I acquired this great love, but it is a reality in my life. At home, I frequently make "Buckeye Pancakes" which are pancakes made from Krusteaz instant pancake mix. I add some chocolate chips to the mix and put some peanut butter on top. Viola! FANTASTIC food and an edible OSU tribute. What more could you want?

The Chef

The question has haunted me: What *IF* I could enhance this experience? My pancakes are coming from a bag where I add water. It stands to reason that a better pancake mix could result in a better pancake... right? In this ongoing seach for a better pancake mix, I have tried the recipe you find on the back of the Bisquick box. TERRIBLE. Next up? An internet recipe that claims to be the one currently in use at the Cracker Barrel. Cracker Barrel has AMAZING pancakes and I couldn't resist the urge to potentially recreate them at home. Here is the supposed recipe:

12 to 15 pancakes

2 cups sifted all-purpose flour

2Tbs baking soda

1 tsp salt
Heaping tsp sugar

2 eggs

2 cups buttermilk

The Recipe

I'm not exactly the chef so the Recipe could contain bat guano and I wouldn't bat an eye. So if anyone sees something in that which looks amiss, please let me know.

With recipe in hand, I gathered the ingredients.

The Ingredients

Everything was going fine until I realized that I had no buttermilk. Fortunately, I had some fake buttermilk on hand and was able to make it work. There is something about a powder that must be refridgerated that makes me a little nervous... but I'm told it works fairly well.

Instant Buttermilk

The Mixture

The batter looked pretty good. (If that is possible) I moved into the final stage which is the frying. This was a very encouraging stage because the pancakes look identical to the ones that you get at Cracker Barrel.

Looks Can Be Deceiving

The pancakes were AWFUL. I think that the amount of salt that the recipe calls for is way too much... I guess? They tasted salty... yuck. I really thought I was in for a triumph, too. I sat down with my real butter and real syrup... and that was that. Next step?

Yep. It ended with pizza. Bummer. If you've got a great pancake recipe, e-mail it in to riot@radiou.com.

to quote Obi - this story is wierd......

just click on the gnome...

UPDATE* you have to watch the Video of the gnome

Of speakers and blizzards...

If any of you have been following the speaker purchase and installation saga that I've been telling here's an update:

After more than 90 minutes, I am now able to listen to radio in my car. I've been doing the Zune/iPod/CD thing for 9 months but the absence of a properly hooked up antenna has left me radio-less. Getting in and correcting the problem was easy. Re-attaching the dashboard by myself was nearly impossible.... but it is done.

The problem? Speaker harnesses/brackets. I don't have 'em. This happened in my last car and I simply removed the ones that were attached to the car. I beat the CRAP out of the ones in the driver's side door and they would NOT come off. Huge mistake. Now I have to go to Best Buy and buy parts. There is only one problem:
We're under a blizzard warning. I'm not going anywhere. So much for speakers... It'll be Sunday or Monday before I can make it happen. CRAP!

The Wedding's Trailer: STOLEN!!!!

I'm giving them some cash. You should, too. Details here.

Internet Explorer 8, Dual Shock 3, and other numbers...

Earlier on the show I was talking about IE8 and how it repeatedly caused my computer to foam at the mouth. If having a rabid computer is your thing, you can download it here. In fairness to Microsoft, it *IS* in beta and my computer here at Riot HQ is ghetto beyond imagination. I may try it at home this weekend.

Remember that Dual Shock 3 controller that I ordered from Play Asia? I cancelled the order. Yeah, I know, I know... but I figured I'd get more use out of some speakers than I would out of the controller. I thought Play Asia was located in Japan but found out in the middle of the cancellation process that they were located in Hong Kong which convinced me that there was absolutely no way I would be able to cancel my order. I was wrong. I got a very nice response from a customer service rep within a couple of hours letting me know that they cancelled my order and my money was refunded. I have this $10 credit that is sitting in my Walmart account (They mispriced Rainbow Six Vegas 2. I ordered it. They cancelled it. They gave me $10.) I may take that $10 and grab a Dual Shock when they hit stores on April 18.

There is supposedly a huge winter storm coming to my house this weekend. They are calling for 8-12" of snow in the next 24 hours. Right now there is nothing. I'm hitting Blockbuster on my way home to snag up something to do in the winter cold. I'd like to tell you that I'll be sledding or doing some other awesome exterior winter activity but I'm leaning more towards SSX from the comfort of my loft.

Behold virtual me:

Behold actual me:

Have a great weekend, everybody! Anyone else thinking about Appleseed next week?

i really like this picture......

Padded lampposts for distracted texters being tested in London

Two clues a video game (or any piece of media) is no good.

1. They contact you and beg you to cover it. ("Would you be interested in interviewing one of our producers?")

2. There isn't a single review posted anywhere on release day.

I'm describing Army of Two, in case you were wondering. Carry on.

You need gold cables, son!!!

Our friends over at the Consumerist have a GREAT post about the difference between Monster Cables... and coat hangers. (Click me to read it.) Unfortunately for Monster, the difference is negligible. With so much fuss all over the interwebs (and the R!OT) about NOT buying stupidly expensive cabling for your home theater system, I'm amazed that this stuff still sells. I say this, but I do have a relative who stood in Best Buy and made the foolish mistake of saying he wanted the best of everything. I slapped my forehead. I begged. I pleaded. He purchased.

A Monster Cable rep hugged him. Weeping, they walked to the counter together and my friend wasted money.

What doest the RIOT buy instead? MonoPrice. Erik found this place and I buy ALL my cable from 'em.