Weekend Update

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Went Shopping for an Elliptical…
…and ended up liking one half again what our budget was.

But then again, I suppose that’s the problem with considering all of your options, and not for nothing, but if we’re going to drop a serious wad of money on an exercise machine (again), I’d rather spend a few hundred bucks extra if it helps to ensure that this one doesn’t see the same fate as my last elliptical did and just start blatantly falling apart less than a year into owning the stupid thing! Still making last-minute considerations, but hopefully we’ll have a purchase by the end of the week.

Saw Alice In Wonderland … in 3D
…and it was just as absolutely bizarre as I had kind of expected.

Granted, it still wasn’t a bad movie, per se – it’s just that Tim Burton is an absolute nut job and frankly, I was never really a huge fan of this particular story, anyways. I was a little reluctant going in because I really don’t care for Tim Burton’s overall style – especially The Nightmare Before Christmas, but Sara wanted to see it and there really weren’t any other options for an otherwise rainy Sunday afternoon. Also, watching it in 3d for the entire two hours definitely got to be more than just a bit tedious, but that’s a rant for another post…

Kinda Got Hooked on 30 Rock
…and really, how have we not been watching this show all along?!

So the story goes that Sara started watching this sometime last week when she was playing around with the Netflix streaming on our new Blu-Ray player, and I guess you could say that she kinda liked it, on account of her watching pretty much the entire first season that same night! Well, she had me watch a couple of episodes Sunday night and admittedly, it actually is pretty good. A little quirky, but after watching him in Cop Out, I’ve kinda taken a liking to Tracy Morgan once again, and of course, Alec Baldwin’s just random awkwardness is always good for a laugh. How many seasons do we have to catch up on???

Daily Tweets from Twitter…

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  • 11:29 Ooh – Netflix on the Wii! Pretty cool, even though I can already do it via Blu-Ray… (tinyurl.com/ygm4ep9) #
  • 14:11 Awww, Sarah Palin is going out to "help" John McCain campaign for re-election … how cute! #
  • 14:13 I can picture how that one went down… #
  • 14:13 Palin: "Hey Gramps, I’m gonna come help ya real lots! It’ll be just like old times!" #
  • 14:13 McCain: "Oh no, Sarah – you don’t have to do that. I’ll be just fine…" #
  • 14:15 Palin: "Oh nonsense! Moose
    huntin’ season doesn’t start for another three weeks, and I haven’t done an interview about my simple life or…" #
  • 14:16 "…my wholesome, family values as just a normal, rich hockey Mom in like, two days, so I’m ready to go!" #
  • 14:17 McCain: "Are you sure? I mean, we kinda got beat up on the trail last time, on account of your being marginally retarded and all…" #
  • 14:18 Palin: "Oh facts, schmacts! I’m just a regular, hard-working American like all of the voters out there, John! People don’t really care…" #
  • 14:20 Palin: (Dave, can you make sure my dry cleaning gets picked up on your way to the lodge? I don’t want ano
    ther incident like that last time!) #
  • 14:21 Palin: "Sorry about that … just got a little Tea Party down at the Beaver Lodge to talk about freedom and America tonight, you know." #
  • 14:21 McCain: "Yeah, well it’s going to be really busy, so I guess I’ll just talk to you after…" #
  • 14:22 Palin: "Well, I’ll just see *YOU* out there on the campaign trail, my wrinkly, old friend! By the way, what do you think I should wear?" #
  • 14:22 McCain: "…ummmm, errrr, ahhhh…" #
  • 14:23 Palin: "You know what – I’ll just use ‘the card’ like I did l
    ast time. Boy, being in politics sure is tough work, John!" #
  • 14:24 McCain: "Are you sure there isn’t any way that I can talk you out of this, Sarah??? I mean, seriously…" #
  • 14:25 Palin: "Nawww, it’s ok, John – us mavericks have gotta stick together! I’ll just go ahead and meet you in Arizona, then!" #
  • 14:26 McCain: "Fine. Just at least TRY to read some of those books that I sent to you before then???" #
  • 14:27 Palin: "You betcha, John! It’ll be great to fight for America with you again, buddy. Freedom – Out!" #
  • 14:28 Palin: &quot
    ;P.S. Maverick. ;)" #
  • 14:28 McCain: *sigh* "What the fuck have I gotten myself into this time??? #
  • 14:33 *And this concludes today’s episode of our Political Parodies Reenactment Series for this week. We hope you enjoyed this humorous glimpse… #
  • 14:34 …into The Mind of a Maverick. Tune in next week for A Day in the Life of Obama’s Dog and other political zaniness. Also, don’t forget… #
  • 14:35 …that PPRS is funded solely by the generous donations of readers just like you, so do keep those purse strings open while you laugh… #
  • 14:36 …your way into another hi
    larious weekend here on Scott’s Twitter Account. Coming up in the 3 o’clock hour – nothing! – because we’ve… #
  • 14:37 …all got better things to be doing on a Friday afternoon. Stay humorous, Twitter…* #

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The Bargain Hunter

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Toy Story – Special Edition Blu-Ray / DVD Combo – $22.99
Toy Story 2 – Special Edition Blu-Ray / DVD Combo – $22.99
———————————————————-
Subtotal – $45.98

Target Combo Discount – Buy 2, Save $10 = -$10
Coupon – DVD —> Blu-Ray Upgrade (Toy Story) = -$10
Coupon – DVD —> Blu-Ray Upgrade (Toy Story 2) = -$10

New Price – $15.98 ($7.99 each)

Each movie contains a voucher worth up to $8.50 to see Toy Story 3 when it gets released in June.

Final Price = -$1.02

Logic: We’re no doubt going to go see Toy Story 3 when it hits theaters anyways, so basically from my perspective we bought our tickets three months in advance and Disney & Target gave us Blu-Ray copies of the first two movies for free!

🙂

One Final Note: Rumor had it that this could’ve been pushed even farther by taking a copy of the weekly Toys ‘R Us flier to Target and asking them to price-match the $16.99 / each sale offer. I didn’t bother with this because I didn’t have the flier handy and didn’t feel like driving all the way across town with the off-chance of Target not offering their own discount in return, but I did read accounts online of people doing exactly that and subsequently paying $3.98 at the register instead of $15.98!

Still, I can’t complain…

Daily Tweets from Twitter…

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  • 09:25 @ThatKevinSmith Are you kidding?! That KLSX show (Not That Bad!) with @BrianLynch, @JayMewes, and @edgarwright was hilarious! #
  • 09:26 @ThatKevinSmith It’s still one of my favorites to go back and revisit, like the first Evening With… recordings. #
  • 09:35 Wool socks. (tinyurl.com/ycchgna) #WorstGiftEver #
  • 09:37 Close second – a box full of bricks, although technically that was supposed to be a "joke." I was 7, and did not laugh. #WorstGiftEver #
  • 15:58 How many people wo
    uld seriously still choose service DOGS if they knew that MONKEYS were also an option?! (tinyurl.com/3jnl6s) #
  • 19:47 I always feel like kind of a manly Mary Poppins when it’s raining and my umbrella pops out of the car before me. #

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And while we’re already talking about movies…

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Sara and I used to go to the theater all the time, however not for nothing, but a little thing called nursing school really kicked the crap out of that little pasttime of ours! Fortunately, though, our schedules have finally started syncing up a little more as of late, so we’ve been slipping away at two hour intervals more and more.

Here’s a quick review of everything that I can remember from our recent theatrical renaissance…

She’s Out of My League
Absolutely hilarious – by far one of my top 5 favorite comedies in the last couple of years. Go. Watch. Now.

Valentine’s Day
Not great, but not horrible. Guys, you’ll live if your S.O. insists on your taking her to see this one…

Cop Out
Surprisingly funny – it’s got a unique mix of actors, but it was fun to watch and it looks like it was probably fun to make.

When In Rome
Probably the cheesiest out of this entire list, but … well … yeah – that’s about it. Least favorite of this list.

It’s Complicated
Awkward funny, but Alec Baldwin seems to be the king of that lately. Not bad.

Sherlock Holmes
Although I was hoping for a Wild Wild West-style “action movie” that was more comedy/slapstick than action, but Robert Downey, Jr. definitely made the lead role enjoyable. Curious to see if they’ll taking advantage of the huge gaping hole that they left open for a sequel at the end, though…

And a few more that I’m looking forward to here in the near future:

Daily Tweets from Twitter…

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  • 10:57 Kinda looking forward to the world ending today at 11:15am when the President signs the health care bill … a half day at work sounds nice. #
  • 12:35 twitpic.com/1agekg – You know what this auto ad needs?! More hippo!!! #
  • 13:27 Waiting for Verizon to reply via e-mail to justify being rude to my wife on the phone yesterday… #verizon #badservice #
  • 13:28 Is arguing over $50 of shady data and roaming charges worth losing a long-time customer??? #verizon #badservice #
  • 17:49 @greggagliardi You should totally do it! Today is the first
    day of the rest of your cashew-eating life!!! #
  • 18:14 So which is worse – accidentally shooting your mouth off or accidentally shooting somebody in the face with a hunting rifle? #vicepresidents #

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Up – An Inaugural Blu-Ray Experience

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So I finally took the plunge and picked up a Blu-Ray Player last week.

The cheap, progressive-scan DVD player that I got for free with my TV back in 2004 had been getting worse and worse about not wanting to play perfectly scratch-free discs, so that was a nice excuse! Granted, our HD TV being an older model, doesn’t actually support 1080p, only 720p and 1080i for high def resolutions, so I knew out of the box that we wouldn’t be getting the absolute best picture, but well, let’s just say it was a little easier to justify a couple hundred in our budget for the new player rather than a few thousand for a shiny, new TV!

Although we have been eyeing a very sharp 73” Mitsubishi DLP at Best Buy for less than $2,500 that we’re thinking would go great in our dream house that we won’t be buying for at least another year…

…on-sale this week for $1,999 – can you believe that?! That’s about how much I paid for my 52” Rear-Projection TV six years ago, but I digress…

Anyways, this blog isn’t meant to be about TVs, but Blu-Ray, and there’s still plenty to say about that little enhancement. Because of the previously-mentioned reasons, I was a little unsure that we’d see much of a difference between traditional DVDs and Blu-Ray, so I was certainly happy to see that the difference was just about as significant as standard def TV vs. Discovery HD Theater! It turned out that a Pixar title was a great choice for my first Blu-Ray experience because the visuals were just incredible. Hell, even the trailers looked amazing, but the real magic was in the movie itself … I would’ve never expected to see such a dramatic difference, especially from a “cartoon,” but the clarity was truly worth the upgrade! In fact, I really struggled to find a few new movies to buy in Blu-Ray versus repurchasing ones that we already had, but just seeing that picture quality convinced me that at least for a couple, I think we may end up buying new copies of anyways.

I’m definitely thinking the Lord of the Rings triology (which comes out in a few weeks) and the first two Toy Story movies (because Disney has a promotion out on them right now).

I’m sure I’ll write more once we’ve had a chance to check out a few more (awesome movie suggestions are very much welcome!), but one closing note regarding the movie Up itself … wow, was that a freaking emotional film! Fortunately it got a lot more manageable as it progressed, but the first ten or fifteen minutes – I’m not sure I’ve ever gotten that emotional over a Disney movie before! After the intro and what seemed like sort of a slow start, I was really beginning to wonder if this was going to be the first “bad” movie that we’ve seen from Pixar, but then it started with the quirky, little funny parts here and there and really seemed to grow on me. Granted, it was certainly no Incredibles, but it’s probably arguable that Up doesn’t belong at the bottom of that list, either.

Bottom Line: Up – pretty good; Blu-Ray in general – fantastic; Return to Blogging – as wordy as ever…

😉

Daily Tweets from Twitter…

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  • 12:49 True dat. RT @aliceenewman: aint nothin’ like health care reform and FB status updates to make you realise which of your friends are wackos #
  • 13:56 Is it gloating if somebody makes a website about it??? (didtheypasshealthcarereform.com) #
  • 16:16 @lorisaurus Is that safe, what with all of the diseases and such that they carry? #
  • 16:44 I have NOT tickled many a Tyrannosaurus… (but if I did, Saturn would be as good a place as any) (tinyurl.com/ycktfhd) #
  • 17:17 Finally, a bracket
    that *I* can get into! (muppetcast.com/tournament/) #

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