Pats Prediction

Good thing it's only the pre-season as I failed to post a Pats Prediction last week. I had gone to see the Brockton Rox game last Saturday and forget to throw up a score before I left in the afternoon.

Here is tonight's prediction:

24 - 20 Pats over Redskins

Both teams have potential top 10 defenses but the Skins will really miss having Clinton Portis tonight.


I was in Toronto this week for business so I didn't post anything. I managed to see the Blue Jays play the Athletics on Tuesday. I'll post pictures and details soon.

Rotten Apple, Good Music

I'm definitely not an Apple person; I hate Macs and find them totally unnecessary. I like the internet image that shows a series of baby toys and the Mac one-button mouse with the tagline, "Macs, simple computers for simple people". Several years ago Macs served a purpose in graphical design and computer animation but those days are long gone. The new television commercials showing a middle-aged guy in a tweed jacket as a PC and a young punk as a Mac are clever but they work against Apple. Consumers sympathize with the PC and recognize the "Mac" as representative of its fanbase, smarmy spoiled loyalists.

The one thing that Apple has done right is the iPod. It's a wonderfully designed device. The execution is nearly, if not totally, flawless. The device is compact, simple to operate with one hand, and intuitive. I never read the manual for my iPod; I charged the battery and simply started using it. I am a manual-reading kind of guy, too. I'll spend the time to read the manual for even basic devices just to ensure that I have learned all the little tips and tricks. The iPod didn't require any reading.

Many detractors don't like the iPod because of the forced association with iTunes. Until today I never understood what the fuss was about. I installed iTunes a couple of years ago without any trouble and had not updated the software since. I read about the changes that Apple continually implemented in the digital rights management (DRM) of later versions of iTunes and I avoided all updates like the plague. As a result, I had no complaints. I could purchase music cheaply and easily without going to the store and subsequently burn music CDs for the car or stereo and then rip them back to MP3 format if I need to edit the files for ringtones or other purposes. The DRM had little effect on my music and use of it.

Today I wanted to purchase the new single from the Killers, "When You Were Young". I decided to pre-order the new album since "Hot Fuss" was so good and the new single is great. I heard the new single on the radio yesterday and immediately recognized the artist as the Killers.

When I tried to pre-order the new CD, "Sam's Town" iTunes forced me to upgrade to version 6. I was happily running version 4.7, thank you very much. I begrudgingly went to upgrade my iTunes version and was forced to install Quicktime 7(.1?), too. I'm sick of Apple's pathetic attempts to force the use of Quicktime upon iTunes users and iTunes upon Quicktime users. The only time I ever use Quicktime is if I want to view movie trailers at the Quicktime website. It's totally useless otherwise. Windows Media Player 9 and 10 support High Definition and offer more versatility.

After waiting 15 minutes for the Quicktime portion of the install to complete I shut down the install operation. I had to relaunch Windows and run the entire install again. Way to not piss me off, Apple. If you're going to bundle your crappy software, at least make sure the installation configuration is robust enough to work on PCs. In case you haven't heard, Apple, PCs dominate the market.

Time will tell if the new version of iTunes will really muck up my DRM and use of the software.

I've got my Killers single now and I'll have to wait until October 3rd for the rest of the CD.

I did buy the Angels and Airwaves (AvA) CD, "We Don't Need to Whisper" that I mentioned a few weeks ago. Simply put, this CD is one of the best I've ever heard. I'd be remiss to not mention it and explain it.

I don't for a second believe that "We Don't Need to Whisper" will be, or should be, universally praised and loved as much I love it. I understand the difference between something that will sell 10 million copies and something that might achieve a gold record. The beauty of this CD is that for those people who enjoy the genre of music it should really resonate. It struck a major chord with me.

Tom DeLonge clearly spent months crafting the CD. The major themes are repeated lyrically, as is the case on many a CD, but also musically, sort of like a movie score. There are hints of melodies that are contained in multiple songs. The end result is that the whole CD is simply brilliant. I can't remember another CD that made my spine tingle so much on the first listen.

Again, Tom isn't the world's best singer. The music isn't the most complicated or technically adept. The hooks are incredible though, and the emotion shines through.

I would recommend that anyone who likes alternative rock, rock, power-pop-punk, or similar check out the website at http://www.angelsandairwaves.com/ . You can watch the videos for "The Adventure" and "Do It For Me Now" at the site. If you enter the main site you can listen to "The Adventure" and "It Hurts". For some reason, the "Enter the Site" link will spawn new windows to clothing sites Tom is affiliated with. Click it a few times and you'll get into the site.

If you like the three songs you can hear on the site do yourself a huge favor and pick up the CD (even if you have to use iTunes).

I Like Mike... One Way More Than the Other

I watched a little bit of the Monday Night Football game on ESPN this week. I wanted to see how Tony Kornheiser would do in the booth. While he's not as bad as Dennis Miller, he's not a whole lot better. He seemed tentative to me and he didn't add anything substantive to the broadcast.

I'm actually somewhat annoyed, nay, peeved, that ESPN broke up the Mike Patrick - Paul Maguire - Joe Theismann combination. I really liked those guys as a team. I like Mike Patrick's voice and I have no problems with his calm and excited tones. Paul and Joe provided a "point-counterpoint" type of argument during games while sharing their experience and opinions.

I'm not a fan of Mike Tirico. I don't like his voice; he's too excitable and not even-keeled. He also seems to always have an agenda. I'm not convinced that he's a totally neutral observer.

Another MNF bummer is that Hank Williams Jr. is still going to provide his annoying pregame introduction song. I was hoping that he would be lost in the transition to ESPN. He's going to incorporate all kinds of different guest stars this year. >sarcasm< Woo hoo! >/sarcasm<

The Pats didn't quite live up to my lofty pre-season expectations ("Oh, a sarcasm detector, that's a real useful invention!"), but they did some things well. I was very pleased to see a Corey Dillon reminiscent of the 2004 version. He looks healthy again and appears ready to be a bruiser for the Pats. Laurence Maroney looked awesome last week. He reminded me of St. Louis' Steven Jackson, displaying speed and power (and dreds). I coveted Jackson in the draft a couple years ago, so I hope Maroney is even better.

Are You Ready For Some Football?

It's a Friday night party!

The NFL pre-season continues tonight as the Patriots face the Atlanta Falcons at 8PM on CBS. This is the first pre-season game for the Pats. They should provide a pleasant distraction from the suddenly pathetic Red Sox.

I was happy to find that the St. Louis / Indianapolis game was broadcast in HD on FOX last night. FOX has been showing Saturday baseball games in 16:9 standard-definition. The baseball games look absolutely terrible. I figured FOX might try to pull the same garbage on the fans during the NFL pre-season.

I have no idea if the game is in high-definition on CBS tonight. I hope so.

The NFL pre-season signals the start of many fantasy football leagues. I must admit that the NFL.com fantasy football commercials are pretty funny. I've seen two and they were both memorable. In the first ad one guy is telling the new player that kickers are drafted early and that running backs aren't important because you can always trade for one. He ends by telling the new guy that he's the new guy's friend. In the second ad a guy is trying to draft WR T.J. Houshmandzadeh, but he can't pronounce "Hoosh-man-za-da".

And now for a new feature at Digital Sox, the "Pats Prediction". I will predict the outcome of every Patriots game this year.

Pats Prediction:
20 - 13 Pats over Falcons

Brady leads the team to a TD in his only series and the Falcons don't do much until Matt Schaub enters the game. Beyond that, nobody really cares as long as no one gets hurt.

Come On Baby, Light My Fire

The Sox dropped a game they should have won last night. That makes
four straight losses to the D-Rays and Royals, also commonly known as
"the two worst teams in the American League".

The losses are tough enough on their own merit. What bothers me more
than losing games against very bad teams is that no one on the Sox
seems to really care. Even Schilling commented on the fact that the
team maintains a very even keel. That was a positive in Schilling's
eyes.

Well, the laid back approach isn't working.

It's time for someone to light a fire under the Sox' collective backside.

On any other team that guy would be the manager. GL2:EB is too much of
a player's manager, though. By not chewing out the team he's affirming
his nickname (Grady Little 2: Electric Boogaloo, for the uninitiated).

In the absence of a fiery, gutsy manager, the Captain should seize the
opportunity to contribute from the DL. Varitek could light the much
needed fire behind closed doors and get the team pointed in the right
direction.

Be the guy who popped Slappy McPurplelips in the kisser when it was necessary.

We need that passion.

Moblogging, Mo Problems

Rejoice, rejoice, for this is my first ever moblog (mobile blog). I
just got the very awesome Cingular 8125 smartphone. It really is a
great cellphone and a great PDA. More on the phone at a later date.

I want to rant about Shaw's tonight. I enjoy the finer things in life
(at least when time allows). I don't ask much of this world (most of
the time). I only want three things from my grocery store.

1. The ability to redeem bottles and cans.

2. The ability to cash in my loose change.

3. The ability to buy fresh food.

Shaw's managed to pull an 0-fer tonight.

The bottle redemption machine wouldn't take the beer bottles from the
anniversary party we just had for my in-laws. At first I thought that
maybe it was a Crudweiser machine because it said that Sam Adams'
bottles weren't accepted. When it didn't take Crud Light bottles I
knew that Shaw's was starting to piss me off.

Then I dumped my jar of coins onto the sorting tray of the Coinstar
machine. I look up at the screen and notice it says the machine is not
ready for service and please see a manager. As I'm picking up my
change an employee walks by and says the machine is "closed". What.
The. Hell.

So I'm buying my groceries and I'm nearly finished when I pick up some
cottage cheese. I happen to see that said cottage cheese expired FOUR
DAYS AGO!

I used to like my local Shaw's, but now I'm not so certain.