MattPie

Wow, in before the lock, I renewed on the 20th or so.

Really? I kinda like the local Comcast office's system. When you walk in there's a kiosk with a couple buttons. You select your need (new service, repair, return, etc.) and it prints out a little ticket for you.

Is this new? I renewed my phone at the end of June (Galaxy Nexus), and I could keep my $29.99 unlimited plan.

I haven't been buying many books lately, but that's more because I haven't been reading as much. I've bought a couple ebooks, but I'm mostly avoiding them as I don't know how long the formats (or more importantly, the DRM scheme) will last. I'll be pissed if I have to go re-purchase things. I'm the same way about music, I still buy CDs. But for public domain stuff (like gutenberg.org) and the library, ebooks are generally cool. It's really nice when travelling light to only have to pack a small tablet-like device rather than one or more books (that may get damp, in the case of motorcycle camping).

Read the Bible, you'll get a bit of both! Finishing up the last book of the Eragon four-parter (quadrilogy?). The first book was OK, I read the next two years ago since my girlfriend at the time was reading them but they got more and more tedious as time went on. Occurred to me that the library would have the last one, so I picked it up for the sake of completing the set. It's just as tedious as the third book, but I'm pushing thru just to finish the series. You can tell the author is pretty young, it falls into a lot of cliched plot lines. As a side note, the way my local library handles ebooks seems to work pretty well. Once you get a library card (which can be done online and they'll mail it to you), you can browse on the web and then check out a book for 7 or 14 days. The only hassle is I don't have a personal Windows or Mac machine at home, so I had to install Adobe Digital Editions on my work laptop to download the book. Once that's done, ADE sees my Nook and I can just drag it over. You could read it thru most devices (computer,phone, tablet, etc.) if you don't have a dedicated reader.

I have a highly-informed source in Twitter in addition to Dreger, check out @spndchz. :)

If I remember correctly, it was situational. Both in that series and the Boston series the year before, no one though Buffalo would stand up to those two teams, but they did. They also didn't win either, but it wasn't because they got run out of the building.

Socialists can also be facist. But the pledge is just kinda weird. Pledge allegiance to the US, fine. To the piece of cloth? Eh.

That's pretty creepy. Is that in the evening? I did watch any of the evening stuff, I had it on during the day though and it was pretty 'down to business'.

I'll start listening when you conceed any point that you disagree with. So far you've just been rattling off talking points and no one can possibly be right unless they agree with you. Seriously, that's the impression I'm getting. I'm with Scotty. I'm better off than I was 4 years ago. I'm still comfortable and have enough income to do most of what I want. Would it be nice to have a little more income via paying less taxes? Sure! I am willing to say that poor people can suck it in the process? No. I'm willing to give up another motorcycle so others can have healthcare. That's what it comes down to for me. To whip out a pithy quote: Freedom isn't free, so stop whining about paying your taxes.

NC BBQ doesn't really do ribs though, right? BBQ is so varied it's tough to compare styles.

He does have a point on that one. Fox News is the go-to place for conservatives to get their news. By your own suppostition, all the others are liberal (a view I don't entirely share). It would make sense that liberals (just to use black and white terms) would split their view among the 4-5 'liberal' cable news outlets. FWIW, there's a spectrum of views in the cable news. MSNBC is on the left, but the others aren't as liberal as you'd paint them to be. It's not unlike Apple's iPhone being 'the most popular smartphone'. While true, iPhone counds for 25% (give or take, I'm not going to look up the numbers) while the collection of Android phone manufacturers carve up 60% (Windows phone and RIM cover the remainder). Fox news is the most popular because it's unique.

Oh, snap.

So are these 'Philly' cheese steaks, or something else? Well, having peppers on it really answers that question but I'm curious. Anyone try Jim's in East Aurora?

Chains under 10 locations get a pass in my book. You wouldn't dismiss Dinosaur (which I think is good BBQ but not the best I've had) despite there being 4, soon to be 5 locations. Tully's, at 11 locations, still isn't that great though, it's not even as good as the bigger sports bar chains. Hot dogs: Ted's are great, but they're really just Sahlen's dogs with normal condiments. I usually end up at Louie's or Seneca Texas Hots because of the Texas Hot angle. They have a few places in Eastern PA and NJ that do Texas Style, but it's not the same. The wiki article on Texas hots is pretty interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_hot_dog

That's exactly what I did roughly a year ago. I don't have Hulu+, but spend most of my time on Netflix and the NHL app for my PS3. I do get NBC, CBS, and Fox (among other things) over the air, but I don't get a good signal for ABC. I don't watch broadcast TV very often. Pros: low cost, somewhat less distraction Cons: Harder to watch live sports, no DVR, a certain amount of isolation about current events and culture (that's a pro during election season)

Gamecenter and PS3 last year. FIOS 15/5 (or maybe 25/5) Internet, wired connection to router. - Quality: Far better than SD, not quite 'real' HD. The picture is sharp, but the motion isn't as fluid as full-blown HD. - Feeds: Except for the games in Europe, I had the kinda-HD feed. - Channel: I can't remember many (if any) games that I didn't have the MSG feed. - Blackouts: if the game is on local TV, it'll be blacked out on GC. So, and NBC, NBC Sports, NHL Network, or your local market (Philly in my case) will be blacked out. Note that this meant the entire playoffs was blacked out for me since "all" the games were on cable. (I don't have cable, so I'd have to go out for them if I was fired up to see them) There's a thread about this I started last year. Search for it.

Yeah, he's a chum.

I think we can take from this that no one knows much about the Atlanta hockey scene.

It's pretty dark in Wales too. :)

Note that I think this one is looking like 50-100/hr (depending on who you read), so it's not going to be 4th of July up there, just the occaisional shooting star.

Easy as...

B

This could have been the best thread of the offseason if it had gone on longer. :)