Seth Gunderson: January 2008 Archives

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January 27, 2008

Snowboard Trip 2008, by the numbers

Oh snowboarding, how I love thee. This year, for our annual dude's snowboarding trip, we flew out to Denver and caught a shuttle to Steamboat Springs, Colorado. Watching the weather like a hawk since before Thanksgiving, I'll have to admit I was worried since Steamboat opened 10 days late this year. That means there wasn't enough snow.

Over the past few months, however, the snow returned en force. Around Christmas, all of the trails (something in the vicinity of 160) were finally open and Steamboat was having near record snowfall. And just a few days/week before we arrived, they had 25 inches of champagne powder. It was amazing. THE most amazing mountain I've been to so far. I think I'll buy a place and move there (maybe, someday, in the far far future).

Just as I've done in the past, here is the trip breakdown, in numbers:

Basics

...dudes on the trip: 6
...snowboards taken: 6
...laptops taken: 2
...phones with internet access taken: 2
...iPods taken: 2
...some other MP3 players taken: 1

The Flights

...bags checked: 9x2
...times called an idiot for pressing continue too quickly even though the guy told me not to when obtaining boarding passes: 5
...hours spent in airports: 2
...ways created to freak people out while sitting next to them during a flight: 5
...times the lady in front of us turned around to give Aaron the stink eye whilest we came up with said ways: 3
...photos taken of said lady while she slept: 2
...minutes of "300" watched on the way back to KC: 50
...minutes of sound heard while watching "300": 0 (I saw the other headphone jack, you greedy sob)

The Shuttle Rides

...miles between Denver's International Airport and Steamboat Springs: 181
...times we thought we were going to die on the way to Steamboat: 27
...instances when the anti-lock brakes kicked in on ice while exiting into Steamboat: 1 (it was ICE you idiot!)
...hours it took to arrive in Steamboat: 3.5
...hours it took to arrive back in Denver: 4.25
...cars the driver sped up to cut off since he was a vindictive driver: 1
...times the driver caught himself nearly falling asleep at the wheel: 3
...electronic gate meters hit while trying to drop us off at the airport: 1
...people almost ran over at the airport: 1

The Condo

...bedrooms: 3
...beds: 6 (three normal, two inflatable, one rollout)
...WiFi connections found: 3
...WiFi connections able to use: 0
...times Jones moved from bedroom to living room because of my random snoring: 1 (sorry, my nose was stuffed up)
...hot tub visits: 1
...times Jones and Aaron wussed out from going to the hot tub: 1
...inches of snow that fell while in the hot tub: .5
...minutes that we tried to convince Aaron and Trip that the hot tub visit was super cool: 3
...seconds that Aaron and Trip believed that the hot tub visit was super cool: 0
...episodes of Ninja Warrior watched: 6 (if you get G4, check out what American Gladiators doesn't hold a candle to)
...episodes of The Office (UK version) Season 1 watched: 4
...episodes of Arrested Development, Season 1 watched: 13
...Democratic debates watched: 1

Steamboat Springs, Colorado

...cases of beer purchased at grocery store: 4
...cases of beer returned to grocery store: 3 (3.2 beer, really?)
...movies watched at the Wildhorse theater: 1 (whatever that movie is with Rodney Dangerfield, the time-traveling dragon and his little friends)
...city-wide free WiFi connections (that didn't reach up into the resorts): 1

Meals of Food

...dinners cooked at home: 5 (pizzas, spaghetti, roast beef, chili and hamburgers)
...times we used the outside grill: 1
...people we could have fed with our left-over chili: 4
...lunches on the mountain: 4

Steamboat (see flash map)

...days on the mountain: 4 (straight)
...times we went down Tomahawk (or started on it and went wherever the snow took us): 14
...days it took us to find the best run on the mountain (some combination of Tomahawk): 1
...times unbuckling on “roads”: 5
...minutes spent digging out of incredibly deep powder: 70
...feet we could see in front of us when it was snowy/foggy at the top of the mountain: 5, if that
...times asked by a hippie snowboarder if we minded if he smoked pot on the gondola ride up: 1
...times asked by a hippie snowboarder if we wanted to smoked pot with him on the gondola ride up: 1
...hits we took from the hippie snowboarder's pipe: 0
...times we sang “My bro is a Speeeeeeeeed Freeeeak”: 12

Misc.

...stomp pads purchased: 1
...injured legs: 1 (poor Aaron)
...Hoop Shot basketball games purchased: 1
...shots made on the Hoop Shot basketball game: 2 (that I saw)

Conclusion

...times I was glad to be there: about 1,000

Posted by Seth at 10:04 AM | Comments (2)

January 16, 2008

BMN: One Missed Call

�We see bad movies so that we can truly appreciate the good ones.�
– Someone who (obviously) thinks we’re doing a service.

One Missed Call It’s a rare occurrence that Hollywood would write, film, and release a film that garners zero positive reviews. It’s a more rare occasion when the BMN crew can’t go confirm such absurd claims. Last night was when both of those rare moons were aligned and we found ourselves heading to the theaters to see “One Missed Call.”

It had been a while since our last movie rated at the lowly 0%, but we were well prepared. Or, we were willing, that’s about as prepared as you can get. The film still sits at a lowly goose-egg on RT, and I’m fairly certain that none of us would give it a positive review. The thing about OMC is that it could’ve been a fun movie, but something, err, a lot of things, were missing.

I overheard the following story on some movie blog, it succinctly describes why this movie was so horrible...

The other night, Andrew Klavan, the writer of the screenplay was out at a bar and ran into Yasushi Akimoto. They struck up a conversation and upon discovering that Akimoto was a Japanese horror writer, Klavan mistakenly thought he was talking to Koji Suzuki of “The Ring” and “The Grudge” fame.

This is where the story gets a little shady. Klavan knew the writers strike was coming up quickly and thought that this was a quick way to turn a screenplay around quickly, get it filmed and earn a fat paycheck before he was picketing. After a few cosmos, Klavan asked if Akimoto had any new work as of late. Akimoto told him about his greatest work ever, a series of novels that was centered around people receiving voice-mails from themselves at the time of their death. Klavan thought he had hit the jackpot. Then Akimoto dropped the bombshell on him, the novels had been made into movies overseas!

More cosmos were ordered and Klavan proceeded to get Akimoto wasted. The following was transcribed from several cocktail napkins that Klavan used to pitch the movie idea the following morning:

Chick on phone at beginning. Cat runs away. Chick gets voicemail. Both get pulled into pond. Death. Probably spooky. Fire in a building, kid smashes face into window, looks like it’s trying to be silly. Main chick won’t look into peep hole of door. More voicemails, everyone’s a friend. Death. Die. Killed. Fiery kid in hoodie. Gobstoppers in eating. Detective. Ed Burns!!! Eddie rules. Freaky dad fom Twin Peeks. Cigareete burns on arm, poor girrl. Momm issues. Baby on phone. FREAKYYY corpse crawls in thunrder rainstorm. Can’t break phone, c keeps calls calling you. Seances and exorsisms on tvl. Kid killer in celll phone. IN CEL PHONE1

That’s what was pitched to Warner Bros. And they went with it.

I will say that I don’t think the movie was a zero. It wasn’t a good movie, but it wasn’t a zero. There were just a lot of loose ends that were evidently lost in translation. Nik said he hoped they shot that digitally, otherwise it was a waste of film. And here’s Scoot’s description of the movie:

People get voice mail from the future that plays the sound of them dying. Then, later, they die. (Think "Final Destination" mated with "The Ring", then the offspring mated with "Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure", then that offspring ate a DVD of "Scream" and then took a shit.)

Yeah, that’s about right.

Posted by Seth at 07:48 AM | Comments (1)

January 13, 2008

Hasbro, It's Time to Man Up

This one goes out to all you Facebookers out there: do you play Scrabulous? First off, if not, you're missing out. If you do, then you need to be aware that it could be going away in the near future. Why is that? Because Hasbro decided to sue Scrabulous since it's an exact rip-off of Scrabble.

On one hand it makes total sense as to why the lawsuit has been issued – Scrabulous is a clone, plain and simple. But because it was so well made and smartly integrated into a Facebook app, the guys who created it are making at least $25,000 in ad revenue a month due to the insane amount of players. Yikes. That's not your concept, guys.

But on the other hand, they just made Scrabble a LOT more top of mind than it has been in years. People all over are playing it and having a blast. Even Ashlee and I played the original board game a few weeks ago, and then for xmas, we got a 20-minute Scrabble edition to play during short breaks.

Hasbro, I think it silly for you guys to file a lawsuit. How about you man up and say, "nice job on making a game that people love to play (again)." Then, pay the dudes what you think the game is worth and subtract all the ad revenue from that figure.

Don't be dicks.

Posted by Seth at 08:00 AM | Comments (1)

January 12, 2008

Because 50 Seconds Just Isn't Worth It

In some of the most ridiculous news I've ever heard come out of the NBA, it appears that the Atlanta Hawks and the Miami Heat will must replay the final 51.9 seconds of their overtime game that occurred on December 19, 2007. Yes, you read correctly, they're REPLAYING the final 51.9 seconds of the game.

The reason they have to do this is because Shaquille O'Neal supposedly fouled out during overtime. Come to find out, he really didn't since the scorer's table made a mistake and inadvertently gave O'Neal a foul when it was committed by someone else. In addition, the Hawks were fined a whole $50,000 (or roughly 7,200 beers) for being negligent about the whole error – you see, home teams provide the staff running the scorer's table.

51.7 seconds? Really? I could understand a whole quarter, or an entire overtime period. But less than a minute? That just doesn't make any sense. I hope that it's worth it and that no one gets hurt.

Posted by Seth at 07:47 AM | Comments (2)

January 10, 2008

Who Wants Red Pants?

The annual snowboarding trip is coming up and each year I upgrade one, or two, of my gear (gotta look good on the snow, yo). But this year, while deciding to find new pants, I was thrown a curve ball.*

While watching WhiskeyMilitia.com for deals, I spotted some super sweet 686 pants, so I ordered them. They arrived a few days later and, to my surprise, they weren’t Avocado in color. They were Red. Blood red.

I didn’t really want Red pants, so I contacted the peeps at WhiskeyMilitia.com and told them that my order was messed up. I explained that I had ordered the Avocado pants, but instead had received the Red ones (which I couldn’t find anywhere on the web). They said that mistake had been happening quite a bit recently and they would look into options on fixing it.

They came back with a response that it was their fault and they took 100% responsibility. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do to return the pants and that I would have to sell them on eBay, or something, if I wanted to recoup my money.

That was an unacceptable answer in my book, so I contacted the manager, told him the story and demanded a refund. He said that he’d look into the situation and get back to me by the end of the day.

His solution was simple – check out how sweet you’d look in these sweet pants (see below). Dude somehow went to my MySpace page, downloaded a photo and Photoshopped it onto the red pants.

Ridiculous.

* In no way is this story real. I just thought it would be fun to make a stupid photo in Photoshop and pawn it off as a real story. Actually, I fooled Todd with this made up crap. Sorry Todd.

Posted by Seth at 02:56 PM | Comments (4)

January 07, 2008

This is what I’m Talking About!

I’ve finally narrowed it down. The other day, as Ashlee and I were driving around town, I had an epiphany – the reason I so badly want to get rid of my car is because I hate driving. I don’t hate my car, per se, I just hate driving in general. I hate having to get gas. I hate having to pay insurance. I hate having to get repairs, and oil changes, and new brakes. I hate stopping at stoplights that don’t have motion sensors when half the other stoplights do. I hate idiotic drivers. I hate parking tickets.

I hate it all.

I know there are good reasons to get rid of my car, especially if one lives in a city that’s conducive to doing such a thing (and, by the way, KC isn’t one of those cities), but really, the main reason I want to get rid of mine is because I hate driving.

The good people over at Low Impact Living agree and tell you how you can go car-free, if you hate it as much as I do. Hopefully I can make this a reality by year’s end. If only we had Zip Cars in the area.

Posted by Seth at 10:03 PM | Comments (3)

January 03, 2008

Fayetteville Takes Flight

A while back my friend Todd had an idea. He wanted to create a site that was about Fayetteville that was kinda The Onion and kinda Lunchtour. Basically, it was going to be a opinionated fake/real news about what’s going on in NW Arkansas and other pop culture things. Instead of running this by himself, he enlisted the help of other peeps in Fayetteville. Luckily, being from Fayetteville and having a good pulse on what’s happening in the area, I was invited to take part, too.

I’m pumped to announce that Fayetteville Flyer has been up and running for several weeks now. Some of you may have no clue as to what’s going on when we rant about the Hogs and/or Fayetteville, but for the most part, there’s not a whole lot that you won’t be able to weigh in on.

My role will be mainly to provide my opinion on what happens in Razorback country (instead of ranting here, where 5% of my readers know and care about what I’m referring to), but I’m sure I’ll hop in here and there along the way. My favorite features of the moment are the “100% Accurate Weather Center with DBartho” and the new traffic report videos.

Go check it out and subscribe to the RSS feed(s), it just might be worth your time.

Posted by Seth at 09:26 PM | Comments (0)

January 01, 2008

Auld Lang Syne

Out with the old and in with the new, I always sometimes rarely never say. I'll make a special exception this time. Because it's 2008!!! Woo-hoo! That's right, in about 30 minutes, the entire Arkansas nation will be watching the AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic and cheering for our hogs to win. But that's not why we're here. No, we're here to make resolutions for 2008 and stick with 'em! So let's hit the ground running...

Experience at least five cultural events in KC (First Fridays, Museums, Plays, etc.).
Get rid of my car (this doesn't mean I'll be without a car, just not the one I currently have).
Pay off remaining credit card debt by mid-year.
Walk to work at least 100 times.
Exercise at least 100 times (gym, running, etc.).
Go through storage and purge.
Eat more vegetables.
One fried food item per week.

I don't think I'll have problems with these. But I thought that in previous years, so we'll see. What are everyone else's resolutions? Oh, and happy new year!!!

Posted by Seth at 09:30 AM | Comments (1)