Category: Reviews

Having a blog means having an opinion. This category groups reviews of technology, concerts, books, food – essentially all things consumable.

Posted on

Father’s Day Gift Suggestions

( #JoeKnit, #FathersDay )

Image Credit: Somebody in my family

A few weeks ago I came across this post about great father’s day gifts and I read through to see if there were any good suggestions for my old man. If you are a frequent reader you know my father is a popular topic due to his unique personality. If you are not into Mean Joe stories—move on to another post. If you enjoy them or have a father that is a total pain in the ass to buy gifts for—keep reading.

I am not going to overly complicate things, I am just going to list Mike’s (the author) suggestions and state why they won’t work for my dad:
1. Omaha Steaks: My dad is butcher, thats not happening.
2. Golf Accessories: My dad doesn’t like to play golf, although for a short period he did like to sneak onto courses to take walks and nap.
3. Sports Tickets: He could care less about any form of sports or team cooperation.
4. Remote Control: This is not a bad idea on paper, but any of the new remotes that have LCD screens will piss him off and be relegated to a drawer before he even tries it.
5. Fishing Equipment: I have never seen the man take an interest in fish in my entire life (besides eating them).
6. Camcorder: Technology = No.
7. Pocket Watch: He doesn’t care what time it is. He is where he needs to be until he doesn’t want to be there.
8. Restaurant Gift Cards: He’d rather cook for himself.
9. Magazine Subscription: No interest in reading anything outside of a very few select topics (mostly health related, but not the Men’s Health kind of articles).
10. Movie Gift Cards (Netflix, Blockbuster, AMC Theaters): Has lost the attention and desire to sit through an entire movie.
11. Camping Trip: Depends on what you mean by camping. If you suggest a hotel room, jacuzzi, and quality steaks – he might go assuming the right company is involved (not his family).
12. Custom T-Shirt/Polo Shirt: It would have to be the right material and proper color blue or it will sit in his closet for all of eternity.
13. Swim Trunks: This is a man who mows the lawn in meat-stained white t-shirts, old jeans that are held up by string. STRING. He would look at the netting inside the trunks and punch them so hard the little Chinese kid that made them would feel it.
14. Anything from Sharper Image or Brookstone: See #6.
15. Accessories for the Barbecue Grill: Besides his bare hands on the open flame? No.
16. Massage: This actually could be feasible if there was no spa music. Actually, he has an acute hatred for perfumes and sweet smells so he probably would not step foot inside a massage parlor.
17. Shaving Accessories: See #13 – this is a man that does not care about appearances (unless he wants to prove how pretty he is).
18. Wine/Beer of the Month: Does not drink fermented alcohol anymore.
19. A Tie: No

20. A Home Cooked Meal: See #8.

As you can see, he is a pretty difficult person to shop for. Do you have a father or relative like this? Or do you have a suggestion for my old man? Share your stories here. Good luck finding your dad a good gift!

Posted on

Book Review: Deadline

( #MiraGrant, #Deadline )


Image Credit: Jayme Rose

Last year I reviewed the book “Feed” by Mira Grant. The story is set 30 years in the future and zombies are an every day part of life (although still deadly), the main protagonists are a brother and sister duo who are bloggers that get involved in a conspiracy way over their heads (think adult-ish Scooby-Doo without the dog and with real monsters instead of dudes in masks). I liked the book although it had flaws and was glad to see the newest chapter of the trilogy, “Deadline” was released this week… until I actually read it.

Before I start, take note of two things:
1. There are going to massive spoilers in this review, so DO NOT READ THIS REVIEW if you don’t want to know what happens.
2. Generally, I have lost my taste for writing negative reviews. People who go through the effort to produce creative work and build a fan base should be admired. With that said, I feel like this book was a money grab and ties into my rants about every freaking book being a trilogy when there is not enough meat to the story, I am going to touch on that in this review.

Again – massive spoilers to follow.

Grant impressed me in the last book: her take on the zombie virus was interesting because she took an extremely scientific view of how the zombies propagated and that shaped the overall tone and setting of the book. She also impressed the hell out of me by having the guts to kill of her main character (Georgia Mason). Grant lost my respect in the first chapter of Deadline by having the other lead (Shaun Mason) immediately talking to his dead sister. This persists the entire book. Grant spends the entire book explaining how odd it is for Shaun to talk to his dead sister in his head, after two chapters I was yelling at the book saying “we get it, he talks to his dead sister, people think it is odd but accept it – ENOUGH!”

The plot of the second book involves Shaun trying to identify people in the government who were involved in his sister’s murder and the plot holes start appearing quickly. Instead of being proactive, Grant has a minor character from the first book (an junior scientist named Kelly from the Center for Disease Control) appear at their doorstep bringing all kinds of trouble. Kelly’s appearance in the 2nd chapter established that cloning technology exists in Grant’s world. I immediately put the book down and said “they are going to clone George, this is a total cop out”. Shortly after Kelly appears, the characters are attacked and it is also established that Shaun had a “black box” full of writings, videos, and personal notes from George – essentially all of her memories. MacGuffin!!!

For the entire book, the characters run around to different CDC offices saying the same exact thing over and over again: there could be potential cures to the zombie virus but the CDC is suppressing research. Grant establishes the CDC as the bad guys early and the rest of the book forces a series of ridiculous plot twists (why would the Government kill millions of people when the last outbreak almost wiped humans off the Earth – no logic!) By the end of the story, the CDC manages to introduce the virus to insects that essentially causes all hell to break loose (because it can spread so easily). The last few pages reveal the George clone and the book ends.

Deadline could have been a fifth of the size and integrated into the other two books, but instead (I am guessing) the publishers pushed Grant to add a lot of filling and pump out an extra book. It was a bad decision because the quality of the second book was not near the first and it felt like a massive holding pattern. I don’t know if I will pick up the third book, but I am honestly hoping Grant redeems herself on the third and final outing for these characters.

Posted on

Reviewing Music Cloud and Backup Services

( #Amazon, #GoogleMusic, #Cloud )

Over the last few months, mobile music lovers have been treated to a few new innovations in accessing their personal music collections. I am going to spend a few minutes reviewing those new services.

Amazon Cloud Service

The first music cloud service that I could access (officially) on my phone was Amazon’s Music Cloud service. Amazon starts off by giving you 5 GB of free online space, but with the purchase of a cheap album, your cloud drive will be increased to 20 GB. Another good feature is any music you purchase from the service does not count against your space restriction (translation: if you buy music from Amazon they host it for free).

When I first got the service, it was snappy and worked well in my dead zone house with just the phone signal. Over the last few weeks I have experienced the service getting stuck even in good reception areas. That said, the streaming service, doesn’t seem to drain the battery too bad which is a plus. Overall Amazon’s service works well. Although I have one more minor gripe: the “download files to your computer” feature asks me to download the download app every time I want files, even though I have it installed already. Annoying. Glitches aside, I have been buying most of my music through them (screw apple!).

Google Music Service

A few weeks ago Google announced it would be offering a cloud music storage system. The difference between Amazon and Google is that you can’t buy music from Google, but you can upload up to 20,000 songs. It took about a week, but I uploaded 50 GB of music to the system which was just under 8000 songs.

The service is slick and works well on my phone. Since I have both Amazon and Google stream apps on my phone, I have found Google’s service more responsive and less buggy – which makes sense since it is their operating system. The web interface is very similar to Amazon’s but has album pictures which is nice.

The upload app that runs on your computer is a little buggy and gets stuck after a while, but I guess processing 8000 files can be excessive.

Learn more about Google’s music service here. One bad thing about the service is you have to request and invite and is not open to all Google users to start with, but it is honestly worth the wait.

Apple iCloud

Reports are coming in this morning that Appple is about to announce a cloud service as well. I could care less. I hate their draconian DRM policy and never purchase music from iTunes.

Personal Cloud: Western Digital My Book Live

The last option I am going to discuss is a personal NAS drive that you can open up on your firewall for a personal cloud. I purchased a 2 TB Western Digital My Drive for $140 bucks. I plugged it into my router and it immediately worked.

The nice thing about this little device is that is has a built in DLNA server which can feed your music and files to all of your computers, gaming systems, and phones. It would VERY well with my android phone (something I could not figure out using Windows Media Player media sharing services).

Adventurous people can cut open firewall rules so they can access their music from their phones anywhere they are. Personally, I don’t have much desire to do that since I have the other services, but the My Book drive is a really cool device to have in the house, especially if you have streaming media devices – it just works well.

Conclusion

Right now the Google service is impressing me the most since it can host all of my music and isn’t giving me much trouble. That said, I really like this NAS system I have set up and the combination of the two allowing me to finally sell my insane CD collection to the used stores to free up space.

Posted on

DME: Upscale Beer Pong

( #BeerPong, @drinkingmadeeasy )


Image Credit: Joseph Mollo

Drinking Made Easy posted my article about a $750 beer pong table.
Check it out: Upscale Beer Poing

Update: The DME link is down, so here is the full story…

Beer-pong gets a bad wrap. Often associated culturally-devoid fraternity “bros”, many of my peers scoff when I suggest playing a round. Playing beer pong doesn’t have to be relegated to shamed exile in a dank basement, especially if you have one of these. A talented young man named Joseph Mollo created an extraordinary beer pong table that is not only classy, but offers new innovations to the game.

Drinking Made Easy had a chance to speak with the Mollo about his creation. The 21-year-old has a family background in woodworking that gave him access to tools and materials. He put those skills to good use with this recent creation: “I was inspired to build a table that would not only be an exceptional playing surface, but hold its own as a furniture piece when not in use. Its a conversation piece that draws attention for anyone whether or not they have had any beer pong experience.“

The table is comprised of quality wood and incorporates attractive lights into the design. Joe says it takes him 7-10 days to create a table from start to finish. This quality work comes with a hefty price tag – $750.00 (USD) plus shipping. Joe says “the cost is based on quality materials, time, and craft.”

Thanks to Mollo’s unique design, the table creates new game-play elements. Joe says “the table’s design introduces a new shot to beer pong called the skeet shot shown in the video I provided. The ball is thrown into the curve and launches off the opposing side into the cup for 2 cups. Swatting is encouraged (for all the traditionalists looking for a new).”

While the table may be expensive, the craft and creativity of the creator cannot be denied. It is a beautiful piece of furniture that any social drinker would be proud to feature in their home. Creators like Joe are will beer pong out of the frat houses and basements and into the parlors and game rooms of the masses. If anyone else has a customized table, let us know in the comments section, we would love to hear about your designs.

Posted on

Neil Finn takes request from an iPad

( #NeilFinn, #iPad )

Crowded House singer Neil Finn (who is an excellent front man and a personal favorite) has long been in the practice of inviting local musicians to play with him during his solo shows. I felt it important to focus on that before I mention that the person invited on stage was noticed for waving around an iPad.

Frankly, I think it is douchy and I hope that it doesn’t encourage Apple fanboys to start bringing their iPods to concerts (like they do at movies), but I will give the kid props for getting on stage to play with Finn. He does an admirable job.

Posted on

Joey Interviews… Gary Sutton (writer of Oskaloosa Moon)

( #GarySutton, #OskaloosaMoon )


Image Credit: Tim Snell

Sometimes this little blog creates fun opportunities for me (without me having to do a thing). This post just so happens to be one of those situations. Last week a writer named Gary Sutton came across my Amazon profile and then my website (to send me a note). We exchanged emails about his most recent book “Oskaloosa Moon”. Gary kindly agreed to answer a few questions after I finished reading it.

“Oskaloosa Moon” is the story about a young man with a facial deformity growing up in Iowa in the 50/60’s. His deformity instigates a few adventures and (of course) causes issues. Other readers have mentioned similarities to Forrest Gump and now that analogy is stuck in my head. While there are similarities, Sutton’s story does not sugarcoat the harsher aspects of our society—this book is not a fairy tale.

Before we get into the book, I thought your named seem familiar. There is a Gary Sutton that writes financial books—is that you?

I’ve written a few business books. The most recent was “Corporate Canaries” by Thomas Nelson and “The Six Month Fix” by Wiley.

How did you get into writing?

Started liking the process in high school. Thought then that I wanted to write a book one day. Vietnam interrupted and then family. Took about three more decades before I had anything worth saying and it started with a series of business books. I felt I had enough literary license to the analogies that it seemed possible that I could write a novel. So I did.

Where did you get your inspiration for “Oskaloosa Moon”?

I think much of the book is what I experienced and what I saw. Some of it is what I imagined could have been. My junior high and high school girlfriends refuse to read it believing that it’s my story—it bothers them too much.

Did you have to do a lot of research to get the geography down?

No problem at all; this is where I grew up. I’ve been to every locale. But, I did have a lot of old friends scan the manuscripts for accuracy and added details…except those two girlfriends who couldn’t bear the story.

Moon is a complex character. While reading the book and trying to get into his head, I had a hard time deciding if he was an outright genius, a savant, or had a slight learning impairment. What is your official position?

With apologies, I don’t have one. He’s what you think he is.

Moon’s physical disability is a major plot point in the book—you waited a chapter to reveal that information to the readers, why did you hold off instead of giving the reader the information right away?

Telling all quickyly is journalism. Holding back is fiction. Journalism is information delivered efficiently. Fiction is entertainment unfolding.

The book gets pretty dark towards the end—why did you choose that direction?

There was an actual incident here in San Diego that inspired that. A deformed young man named Dale Akiki was wrongly imprisoned. The story reasonably tracks some of the things that happened to him.

One of the characters, Mr. Nordstrud, was written out of the book rather abruptly—was he always intended disappear or did you plan to revisit him at some point?

He’s a composite of some helpful adults along the way who nudged me away from trouble and pushed me towards better directions. No… I had no plans to revisit the character. Some of those good people disappear.

The main antagonist of the book (Dr. Throckmorton) plays like a classic comic book villain. Did he always exist as such a bastard or did you ever envision a more sympathetic (shades of gray) version of him at some point?

In fact you are so right, there was no evil guy in my small towns. But—the Superintendent and the Principle of Ames High did try to withhold my diploma.

As a writer, what is your opinion of eBooks? I read Oskaloosa Moon on a Kindle, and I am just curious what a published pro thinks of this new distribution model. Do you think it will be better for writers by cutting out the publishers (eventually)?

I view this as an inevitable business model, but feel bad about the gradual and steady loss of print and longer stories. I still don’t have a Kindle, iPad or NOOK but will soon, just to not be left behind. No, I don’t think it will be better by cutting out publishers. I’ve already had two novelas stolen and columns resold without permission, and so, the ease of digital theft will hurt the middlemen a lot but also the providers just as it did to music.

I want to thank Gary for this time and for writing a very engaging novel. Mr. Sutton is working on a few books at the moment: a revision on a non-fiction book for college seniors on how to snag that first paycheck and he is hoping to publish a new fictional novel in 2012.