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Let’s Discuss Sports

@iAmAviG

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July 20, 2017

Let’s discuss sports.

You may not watch sports all the time, or if you do you tend to stick to only a couple of sports.

Personally, I watch a wide variety, from Baseball and Hockey, to Soccer, NASCAR, and the Olympics.

But sometimes a sport or event comes along that everyone should be watching. It may be a yearly thing such as the Super Bowl or the Indy 500, or it could be a seismic sports event, like Mayweather vs McGregor.

But this past Sunday was absolutely historic for tennis. Wimbledon, the classiest of the Opens (and maybe of any sports event), dished out a showdown between two of the top players in the world, Roger Federer and Marin Cilic.
And Federer absolutely dominated en route to his record setting eighth Wimbledon and 19th Championship.
With every serve from Cilic, Roger was already moved into place, reading him like an open book.
Meanwhile, his slices were dipping and his shots were all landing.
So, of course, he finished things off with an Ace.

https://twitter.com/bradripka/status/886608418395566081

We say this all the time, but it really is a great time to watch sports. So many players, written off as “past their prime” continuing to succeed at the highest levels, with 2017 presenting us both Federer and Tom Brady.

Love them or hate them, they are fun to watch tear their games apart, and make it look oh so simple.

Prospect Park Zoo

@iAmAviG

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July 19, 2017

A few months ago I talked about the NY Aquarium and how it was not worth the even discounted prices. But on the flip side they have the Prospect Park Zoo, the most bang for your buck of any of the 5 WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society) locations in NYC.

Admission is just $8 for adults, $5 for children, and it’s easily accessible by train. There is no parking lot at the zoo, but it’s located on a long stretch of road with no buildings so parking can be found at times…when not competing with the Grand Army Plaza Library and Brooklyn Botanic Gardens.

It’s a fairly small and cozy zoo, but unlike the aquarium, they really pack in the variety of animals.

  • Sea Lion Court – When walking into the zoo you are greeted by a nice sea lion pool, where they put shows on a few times a day.

You can then head around the semi-circle and visit the four unique areas of the zoo:

  • Discovery Trail – The trail is a nice little stroll loaded with animals (such as prairie dogs, otters, dingos and red pandas), places for kids to have fun (like a spider web to climb on, broken “eggs” and turtle shells), and an Aviary.
  • Animal Lifestyles – Baboon exhibits, marmosets and Palla’s Cat are a few of the animals in this building
  • Hall of Animals – This is their tiny animal building, holding animals like frogs, Fennec Fox’s, mongoose and the loris.
  • Barn and Garden – The barn is the “children’s zoo” of the Prospect Park Zoo, allowing people to pet sheep, goats, and cows, and see other “barnyard animals” like pigs and alpacas. This area also has a nice flower garden that you can wander through.

Highly recommended for a day of fun, and after you can go next door to the Carousel and Lefferts Historic House.

Breaking Down Kesha Rose

@iAmAviG

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July 18, 2017

It’s been almost five years since Kesha put out Warrior, and she has gone to hell and back in the meantime.

A lawsuit with her producer Dr. Luke took the headlines, with lawsuits covering harassment and business ethics, and it seemed for a while like Kesha’s music career would never make a return.

But in the last two weeks Kesha has put out two new singles, ahead of her new album Rainbow‘s release on August 11th, and they couldn’t be more of what Kesha has gone through.
They also couldn’t be more polar opposites of each other.

The first one, “Praying”, is a ballad filled with raw emotions from Kesha, with a powerful voice, strong emotion, and a high note to end all high notes (although I think it is just a guttural release of everything that she’s been through).

The second song, “Woman”, is that outright pop song, filled with the f-word, that brings back the “Tik-Tok Kesha” who rose to the top of the Pop Charts in 2010.

The lyrics to both are seemingly directed straight at Dr. Luke, featuring lines like:

Well, you almost had me fooled
Told me that I was nothing without you
Oh, and after everything you’ve done
I can thank you for how strong I have become
‘Cause you brought the flames and you put me through hell
I had to learn how to fight for myself
And we both know all the truth I could tell
I’ll just say this is I wish you farewell

and

I don’t need a man to be holding me too tight
I’m a……woman

Meanwhile, the music videos on both are absolute fire. Bright colors, great shots, and highlight the real star of the show: Kesha.

From the first two songs, I think this album has potential to be another chart topper…stay tuned in the coming weeks for the full album review.

How To Properly Scout Out a Hotel (Or Anything Really)

@iAmAviG

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July 17, 2017

So you are planning a vacation or just a trip down to the Shore, and you look at the hotel you have booked, and the site shows gorgeous views of the ocean, pristine beaches and pools, and spotless ginormous rooms.

But when you get there you find that it’s not all that they showed it to be…

Most people have taken to Yelp or TripAdvisor to read reviews and hear what people who have stayed there have to say, and that’s a great starting point. But the real trick is to view pictures from the location taken by regular people and not PR and Advertising Specialists.

The trick? Instagram.

Open up your Instagram (and if you don’t have one, make an account…no one is forcing you to post anything or follow anyone) and go to search.
By default, it’s going to search “Top Results”, which include people you follow and posts from them.
If you scroll over a bit, past “People” and “Tags”, you get to “Places”.
Put in the place you want to stay, select the exact location, and you’ll see posts from real people staying there as recent as now, and not year old reviews from that one time that the hotel had an issue.
You’ll see the good and the bad, from the great hot tubs to tiny hotel rooms.

Safe travels, and let’s hope none of us end up in a terrible hotel room!

Early Review of YouTube TV

@iAmAviG

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July 13, 2017

I’ve had YouTube TV now for a few weeks, and here is the good and bad/strange of it:

  • The service is smooth. The startup is quick, the channels all run smoothly (I’ve had internet connectivity buffering, but never buffering because of YouTube), and the app is easily laid out.
  • The Channels are seemingly in a random order, which doesn’t make scrolling through for a channel easy, but the search is simple enough to find what you are looking for.
  • The DVR is just plain weird…YouTube is big on “Unlimited DVR”, so much so that it leaves a few features to just be head scratchers, some of which make it difficult to figure out what you’ve seen and what you haven’t. For example:
    • They feel the need to record every instance of a show. If MasterChef is new on Wednesday night, they record it. They rerun an older episode Friday night, they record it. This means the DVR is overloaded with episodes of MasterChef. Shouldn’t really be a big issue, except…
    • They don’t let you delete anything. If you delete something from your DVR it deletes all episodes of it…past, present, and future. And you need to “re-add it” in order to record future episodes.
  • They record whichever instance of a show they feel like, not necessarily the one you choose. An example from this week:
    I recorded the Home Run Derby Monday night, off of ESPN, a 2-hour program.
    Tuesday morning I watched it, and it all worked fine.
    Sometime in the day on Tuesday they decided to replace it with a 2 1/2 hour version of the program off of ESPN 2.
    This doesn’t seem like a big deal…except ESPN 2 was the Spanish language Derby, while ESPN was in English. Bye-bye English commentary.
  • I wish they had more in app settings. For example, let me choose to “stream only over Wi-Fi”.
    I log into the app over 4G, just to add something to my DVR, and instantly it starts playing the first channel in the queue, which burns through unnecessary data. And yes, I’m gonna hit my limits for the month.

I plan on keeping YouTube TV for two months total, and unless they really wow me, I’m going to give Hulu TV a try as well.

Beauty and the Beast #Review

@iAmAviG

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July 12, 2017

Disney reimagined the classic Beauty and the Beast in live action form starring Emma Watson (Belle), Dan Stevens (Beast), Luke Evans (Gaston) and Josh Gad (LeFou), and they couldn’t have done it any better.

The story is one we all know, of Belle’s father getting lost in the forest, captured by a Beast, and then she takes his place as he awaits his one true love before the spell that made him the Beast takes hold forever.

Could anyone be happy if they aren’t free?

Adding a few new songs into a very strong soundtrack was a risky move by Disney, but it worked…but the part that helps is the outstanding lineup of voices that this movie boasts.
Broadway legend Audra McDonald and Emma Thompson bring the heat, while Watson and Stevens hold their own.

The movie has picturesque scenes, from rolling hills to a grand castle, and makes Belle into the simple girl that she should be while donning the Princess gowns, instead of forcing her into becoming a Disney Princess.

I’ve now seen the original, the live action remake, and the Broadway show of Beauty and the Beast, and while I may be a tad biased, I think this is a must watch for children and adults alike.
This movie gets a 9.5 out of 10.

New York Yankees – Court Is In Session #AllRise

@iAmAviG

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July 11, 2017

I’ve never seen anything like it. New York Yankees rookie Aaron Judge is 6’7″, 280+ pounds, and just a beast of a player.

I went to a game last week and after talking to a few super-fans, we were unable to find a player in the last 20-years that created the buzz in Yankee Stadium, day in, day out, that Judge does.
Sure, when Jeter was heading for 3,000 the fans were excited.
But everyone’s in Stadium experience is all about the Judge. People don’t take bathroom breaks if he’s due up that inning. People are on their feet, cameras in hand, waiting with baited breath on every single one of his at-bats, regardless the score of the game, and if players are on-base.

And the reason is quite simple: He makes the game look so simple.
His swing is pure, and he can easily put the ball out to left-, right-, or center-field.

Here was his 29th home run last week, which tied Joe DiMaggio for most in a season by a Yankee rookie…and it was still a week before the All-Star game (he has 30 by the break):

(blow that up to full screen and enjoy my shoddy camera work)

Last night at the Home Run Derby he made a spectacle out of it, just launching moonshots, one of which wasn’t counted as a homerun because it hit the ceiling on its long arc and fell back into fair play.
But here was his 513′ shot, the longest of the night, absolutely crushed.

In history, there have been only 11 players who are 6’6″ or taller who had 1,000+ At Bats, and barring any career injuries, Judge is going to be in an elite class with players like Frank Howard and Dave Winfield.

.@Delta Changed My Flight, So I Changed To @JetBlue

@iAmAviG

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July 10, 2017

I booked a flight for late October using Delta Airlines, flying direct roundtrip from JFK to San Diego.
All was well and good until this weekend Delta decided to “change my itinerary”.

Previous flight – SAN (9:40PM) –> JFK (6:02AM)
New flight – SAN (8:05PM) –> LAX (9:07PM)…LAX (10:45PM) –> JFK (7:10AM)

There are three things that this changed, each one annoying in their own way.

  1. For starters, it’s no longer a direct flight. I just don’t like the constant taking off/landing (who does), and looked hard for a direct flight.
  2. The flight now takes off 95 minutes earlier and lands over an hour later.
    Any plans I had for the day gets cut down by two hours.
  3. Meal service is on flights departing 6AM-10PM. The original flight fit into that by 20 minutes.
    The new flight leaves the original destination before 10PM, but the real (cross-country) flight leaves too late to qualify, despite being on board an hour later in the morning.

So with all this in hand, I went back to Delta and canceled my flight, booking an almost similar flight on JetBlue, leaving once again in the 9PM hour from San Diego heading across the country.

UPDATE: I emailed Delta on Saturday night about the change…they replied back to me Friday morning, almost six days later. Does that sound acceptable?

Heating Up #SOTD

@iAmAviG

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July 6, 2017

Some Songs of the Day to heat up your summer.

God, Your Mama, And Me – Florida Georgia Line feat. Backstreet Boys

Never gonna run dry, never gonna come up empty
Now until the day I die, unconditionally
You know I’m always gonna be here for ya
No one’s ever gonna love you more than
God, your mama, and me

Issues – Julia Michaels

No, you don’t judge me
‘Cause if you did, baby, I would judge you too
‘Cause I got issues, but you got ’em too
So give ’em all to me and I’ll give mine to you
Bask in the glory, of all our problems

Galway Girl – Ed Sheeran

You know, she played the fiddle in an Irish band
But she fell in love with an English man
Kissed her on the neck and then I took her by the hand
Said, “Baby, I just want to dance”

The Cure – Lady Gaga

And if you say you’re okay
I’m gonna heal you anyway
Promise I’ll always be there
Promise I’ll be the cure

Logan #Review

@iAmAviG

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July 5, 2017

It’s been 17 years since Hugh Jackman took on the role of Logan/Wolverine, and in that time he has turned it into an iconic character in the Marvel universe.

But now it’s 2029, and the mutants of the world have long been cleaned out. Logan (Jackman) is older, his healing capabilities have slowed, his claws are rusted, and he’s living isolated from the public with an albino and an even older Professor Charles Xavier (Sir Patrick Stewart).

While he just wants things to remain simple until they can get away on a boat and live at sea, that all changes when a young mutant, with strangely similar powers, shows up on his doorstep, being chased by all sorts of might and military.

This has long been said to be Jackman’s last appearance as the Wolverine character, and if it is then he plays the final act to perfection.
The movie is long and constantly entertaining, and finally drawing a page from Deadpool‘s book, as it’s a Marvel adult movie (read: language) that fits the Wolverine character.

I want to quote Roger Ebert’s review site on this one:

The action scenes have purpose and connect so much more powerfully than most superhero films, in which they are often just ways to show off the budget. When “Logan” breaks out into action, it feels organic to the plot, moving the themes and characters forward…“Logan” is the rare blockbuster that could be a game-changer. It will certainly change the way we look at other superhero movies and how history judges the entire MCU and DC Universe of films. Don’t get me wrong. I love a good popcorn superhero movie as much as the next guy (maybe even more than most critics), but “Logan” shows how deep one can go in the genre if they just approach it in a different way. In that sense, “Logan” deconstructs the modern superhero movie. It will be hard to put it back together again. — Brian Tallerico

This movie gets a 9 out of 10.

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