Don’t get me wrong, I’m so there, but while I read more about Red Sox officials saying how they handle rivalries like Sawks vs. Yanks at Fenway, I’m thinking they are completely unprepared in every sense… Simply put, there is no rivalry in America that comes within a million miles of Rangers vs. Celtic, they claim games like Red Sox vs. Yankees, but at the end of the day, those fans sit together in peace and harmony at both stadiums. Try that with these two teams and you’ll end up with a proverbial bloodbath. It’s not just a game, it’s religious, it’s political, it’s life and death and that’s not just hyperbole.

Fenway Park is a nice baseball stadium, a little cramped, holding only around 37,000, some say it has poor sightlines, and it’s jammed into a city neighbourhood with plenty of bars within spitting distance. How can they possibly try to segregate these fans? In fact how can they even begin to sell tickets publicly? I’d love for it to happen, but there is still a lot of unanswered questions right now.

But first, I need to set the stage. We’re whittling down the TiVo season pass list as it’s spiralled out of control over the years, and at the very bottom there was one listed just as “(5 WTVI)” nothing more, nothing less.

Robyn: How can it record nothing?
Me: Maybe it’s like The Neverending Story, the nothing encroaching on Fantasia. Maybe we need to go to the swamp of sadness to find the answer?
Robyn: ATREYU!!!!
Me: ARTAX! YOU GOTTA KEEP BELIEVING!!!! DON’T GIVE IN!!!
Robyn: Retard…

Yep, that’s me…

So today I downloaded a free app for the iPhone called RunKeeper after Chris Owens was talking about it on Twitter and gave it a whirl on a little circuit of Cornelius and Davidson just to see…

For the most part it was pretty accurate, I needed to tweak the path out a little once I got home which upped my distance plodded from 3.25 miles to 3.31 miles. Overall a satisfactory experience, now I’m in the mood to beat the 57:10 it took me to complete it, I also need to work on a Plodcast playlist as I was just walking on shuffle, skipping tracks that didn’t get me going. A few surprising choices came up, like Billy Joel’s Uptown Girl has a great walking beat, especially as I was going up a bit of an incline on the Davidson/Cornelius border.

And oh yeah, I did this in 87°F (31°C) heat, so I worked up a crazy sweat, I won’t even tell you what my undershirt was like…

The camp it’s self was very informative, the Promotion panel with Wayne Sutton, Lisa Hoffmann, Corey Creed and moderated by Donna Maria Coles Johnson was probably my highlight of the event (other than Mark Jaquith’s keynote speech/WordPress 2.7 preview/release of the latest WordPress 2.7 Beta which I missed some of due to ambient distractions (ie. someone turned the lights off and I nodded off for a few minutes)) as they had a lot of great ideas to pass along.

And there was some comedy to be had as one of the attendees got stuck in an elevator, sadly I know that feeling as I was stuck on my way to an interview back in Atlanta many moons ago.

Overall it was a great event, a great turnout and it has definitely inspired me to do more, so a big thanks goes out to Jason Keath who organised the whole thing as well as the volunteers who made the day run as smoothly as it did, as well as the Charlotte Observer who provided the location for us “new media” types to mingle.

So far it’s as boring as sin, but I consider myself an advanced WordPress user who knows how to bend it to my will. But everyone needs to start somewhere and you can’t please all the people all the time. I’m also surprised at the demographic of the attendees, I was expecting a younger/nerdish group but it’s a broad scale of young and old, and more power to them.

I’m also hopeful that I can network my way into a job, every major Charlotte company is here and I ain’t too proud to beg…

As Amos’ doors opened at 6. I started by arriving at Tavern on the Tracks just before 5 and scored a parking space in their lot that would facilitate a quick getaway after wards. After getting some snacky dinner and hanging around for an hour or so I headed over to the show, unfortunately the queue was long outside, and it was freezing, not a good wait. Rock The Vote people were milling around asking if people were registered or if they had voted already, of course I was harassed but they soon learned I was an empty cause, and I also managed to flog my spare ticket for $40, so I was off to a good start already.

Santogold kicked the evening off and she was ok, not really my kind of thing but entertaining enough for an opening act. As would be the theme of the night, there was a lot of political monologues between songs, but hey, it’s a political event so what do you expect? Another notable thing about Santogold’s set was her backing dancers, 2 women wearing identical clothes and sunglasses who just stood there for a few minutes, offering up an occasional backing vocal before the busted out some crazy syncronised dancing. Very bizarre.

After a little break the Beastie Boys came out to much approval to introduce Sheryl Crow.

Sheryl Crow was good, really good. She came on to do a little solo song before hanging up the guitar to take on the bass and going through a few new songs, her latest CD is actually very good, I recommend it, as well as a few classics like “Can’t Cry Anymore”, “A Change Would Do You Good” and “Everyday Is A Winding Road” (see below for a video of that). I also think the Sheryl was my favourite performer of the night, don’t get me wrong, I like the Beastie Boys, but Sheryl seemed to capture the mood much better with a mostly acoustic set of songs you can chill to.

She was also the easiest to capture in picture as she doesn’t move around the stage much, compare that to the Beastie Boys who were bouncing here, there and everywhere… As a side note, it’s been about 9½ years since I last saw the Beastie Boys live in Glasgow, and they have put out one album in that space of time (four if you include The Sounds Of Science Anthology, Solid Gold Hits (a best of) and last years instrumental effort The Mix Up).

For three guys who are in their forties, the “Boys” haven’t lost a step in the live performance stakes, they played for over an hour in a set that did NOT include Sabotage, backed by Mix Master Mike, and everyone lapped it up. Non Sabotage aside, it was a very, very good time, live staples like “Root Down”, “Sure Shot”, “So What’cha Want?” and “Intergalactic” made sure everyone went home happy, but there was a weaird thing at the end where they didn’t go off stage to come back for the encore, then said they’d be back with the other artists, but once they went off, the house lights came up and show was over. Anyways, these guys were the hardest to photograph, poor light conditions and fast movement don’t mix, and I was so far back my flash would have been useless.

Overall it was $35 (plus fees) well spent, and I’d give a nice nod of thanks to Amos’ security staff for not turning my camera away at the door, his reasoning of overriding the “no cameras/recording devices” rule due to everyone having a camera phone was much appreciated, not just by me, but by a few people around me who were asking for copies of my pictures. Alas most were missed connections as it’s hard to get an email address while loud music is being played, you have nothing to write on and holding a big camera… I said they’d be on Flickr and as of right now they are still the only images of last night on there… So…

Get Out And Vote Tour ’08 (Set)

Originally uploaded by FLC.

Everyone loves her, and she loves everyone. Doesn’t matter where she goes, to the vet or to the “Bed and Biscuit” while we were in Scotland, everyone adores her, everyone wants to take her home, and unlike Charlotte (who was so anti-people, she made an anti-social person seem like the life of the party) she’s not shy to run up on people and basically do that “love me” purr. And boy does she purr, out of control! She purrs so much at night she begins to drool like crazy…

Anyways, we’ve adjusted to the feeding frenzy of three cats as well as the inordinate amount of poo that comes from three cats, but as we were in Petsmart in Mooresville last week buying over 100 cans of cat food, someone from the Bed and Biscuit recognised us via Josie and asked if we wanted to help another cat who had been found outside.

And despite our initial refusal, he was brought in and soon enough we swore up and down it’s just a fostering and we’d find him a new home. But the poor little guy (still nameless, not wanting to make an emotional connection) was covered in fleas, as we found of when we tried to clean him and they all went to the higher ground, his face. So a flea treatment and a proper showering yesterday means he’s much cleaner, flea-free and generally looking like a nice little cat. But unfortunately our efforts to find him a home are proving to be a bit fruitless, so should we just become the crazy cat family and get another gaping maw to feed? Another few pounds of poo to clean up? Decisions, decisions…

Firstly I should be thankful that frivolous spending on our Delta AmEx cards has allowed us to fly using our SkyMiles, and after our last flights to Edinburgh from Atlanta, we decided it had to be done right, so we’re doing it right by flying 1st class for 4 out of the 5 flights we’ll be taking to and from.

But the downside of using SkyMiles is you don’t get the flights you really want, and Charlotte’s airport flies nowhere that helps us, so we’re going this route….

A 10,250 mile round trip that goes from Charlotte, NC to Houston, TX then to Paris, France before ending in Edinburgh, Scotland. This is a 24 hour trip starting lunch time Saturday, we leave Charlotte at 12:30pm and land in Edinburgh on Sunday as 4:30pm. You know that’s going to be fun. At least the way back is a bit more civilised, Edinburgh to Newark, NJ then finally to Charlotte.

As I said, thank goodness it’s mostly first class, the only leg that’s not is Charlotte to Houston. But seeing as I have a fear of take-offs, Saturday/Sunday will be a bad day for me.

Oh, and we’ll be in Edinburgh for the final week of the Festival, how on Earth did I agree to that?

Even before they arrived on Thursday evening, we spent pretty much the whole of the day running around, cleaning up, preparing guest bedrooms and what have you, as well as renew Robyn’s tags and clean her car. So they arrived around 7pm and we gave them the 5c tour, helped unload their SUV, and then took them for dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse for some hardcore flaming hibachi action (as well as Colin trying to impress us with his Kobe beef knowledge). Apparently they liked our beds as they slept for most of the next morning, in fact we had to crank up the early morning Rock Band action to wake them.

We then took them to Birkdale Village in Huntersville for some lunch at Maddi’s Southern Bistro (a place we take everyone) and to show them the village and also show where we used to live. Robyn and Heather decided to run in the central fountain to cool off as it was hot and humid the whole day, and with it being hot and humid that meant there was a nice big thunderstorm brewing away while we toured the Davidson 4th Celebration. While Heather was enjoying herself on the kids attractions, I managed to lose my phone in a quick dash for some shelter. I didn’t even realise I had for maybe 25 minutes, and a quick search of the path I took revealed nothing. Now coming where I come from, if you lose something like an iPhone, it’s as good as gone before it even hits the ground, but in sleepy Davidson it’s a different matter altogether. A quick chat with a police officer revealed it was found and it currently resides in the Davidson PD, and a quick walk there and a quick call to it proving it was mine was all that was needed. Crisis averted.

In fact, we discovered this morning that Davisdon PD emailed Robyn’s work email from it to let her know that “The owner of this iPod lost it. Davidson police has it.” and gave a number to call. My faith in humanity has definitely been restored.

Now, for the evenings entertainment we had a literal front row view of Davidson’s fireworks display, due to where we live, we’re right on the Cornelius/Davidson border and they were launching the fireworks within 150 yards of our front door. It was very loud, and smelled of sulphur for hours afterwards, but we sat on our upstairs patio and took them in at close range and it was awesome. If they do the same next year, we’re going to set up a little lemonade stand out front and make a killing!

Saturday, we took them to Mooresville for lunch at a Cracker Barrel before doing a little shopping before we met up with Jill and Ryan for a cheesesteak dinner and some bowling. On Sunday we were invited out on Jill and Ryan’s boat on Lake Norman, Heather really enjoyed herself both in and on the water but in the end we had to high tail it back to the shore as a lightning storm quickly rolled in. We rounded off their weekend with a trip to Concord Mills.

They left early on Monday morning and we basically collapsed for the rest of the day.

All in all, a good time. Now we’re gearing up for our UK visit later next month…

Not a lot has changed bar the look, and its another third party theme, this time I’m opting for the less is more look of DePo Clean by Derek Powazek. Though I do need to get my hands dirty and bend it to my will, so this is just a starting point, there shall be no fancy stuff going on, just simple tweaks and, if your lucky, actual content.

In reality I’m pretty much done with blogging, I’ve been doing it for eight years almost now and it just isn’t as fulfilling as it used to be. When the hefty renewal notice for this domain comes in around August time, it might be time to let it go, while its unique and fun, its certainly not worth the expense of being a .co.uk in a .com world…

WEEK 1: We moved house, all by ourselves (kinda). Originally we were going to move the boxes and get movers to handle the heavy furniture, but on the Friday night (our moving day) Robyn was like “let’s get the mattress, I want to spend the night here and while we’re there let’s get the sofa too!” No small feat… On the Saturday Robyn’s parents rolled in and gave us a much needed extra couple of pairs of hands. Jason (our then current, but now old, next-door neighbour) also pitched in above and beyond and 95% of the stuff got moved in about 6 hours, many trips to and from the new house, but hey! we’re almost there. On the Sunday we got the rest and then I didn’t go the the Springsteen concert… During the week we sold the remaining two tickets for $350 meaning my quick thinking back in the day made us $650, not too shabby, but I really wanted to go.

WEEK 2: I tidied up around the old house, bringing loose items back when I went. On the Sunday John and Marchellina came down from Chapel Hill to help us unpack and move furniture from the garage to correct places. Big help and awesome job! Now we have a semi-decent looking home instead of a haven of boxes and un-made furniture.

WEEK 3: General unpacking of small items, I put the guest bed and the IKEA Expedit together myself (OK, with a little help from Robyn) and for some reason, the cable company played games with me…

Now we’ve had Comcast in Atlanta and Time Warner in Huntersville, so we know bad customer service… Windstream blows them away with sucky customer service. Firstly they no-showed on the install date, 5 phone calls tracked that down. Then they no-showed the next day when they promised they’d be there, then they postponed us by 2 (TWO!) weeks as apparently, they just didn’t want to connect us. No big deal usually, right? Well they have some weird deal with our development where the cable/internet/phone bill is included in the HOA fees. So we’re paying for it if we get it or not, and we’re stuck with them and only them.

Add to this they don’t have cablecards (despite advertising TiVo on their home page) so we’re stuck with basic cable, no free QAM HD channels and a pretty lousy lineup. I say this as they are missing the one channel I need most of all, Fox Soccer Channel. Even if we had digital cable, it’s not in the lineup, in fact the lineup is so screwy that they have ESPNHD but not ESPN2HD, what’s up with that??

So yeah, tomorrow (well, technically today) is the day of the UEFA Cup Final, a competition FSC cover. But I won’t miss it, I’ve found a sports bar in Mooresville that’s showing it, I’ll be there, alone, wishing and hoping for a Rangers win, drinking alone. Sounds like a good reason to liveblog my experience.

As for the rest of this week, Robyn’s parent are coming up Friday night was we have tickets for the NASCAR All-Star race again, my decent into NASCAR fandom continues unabated…

For starters, we’re in the best place to be right now… We can buy a house without needing to sell one. And as the market goes further and further down the tubes, we’ll be making out like bandits soon enough. And even though Charlotte isn’t sliding down like, for example, Atlanta, that doesn’t mean everything is coming up roses here. But we’re ahead of the curve.

So we went to see a single family house, having previously viewed a townhome in this development, we knew this is where we wanted to be. And you know that saying “you know as soon as you open the door”? Oh, we knew… This place is gorgeous, dark hardwood floors throughout, dark wood, stainless steel appliances, the list goes on…

We actually went to see it twice. Now we’re crunching the numbers and initially it looks favourable.

So who knows, there is a downside… If we move soon, we face the possibility of moving the cats to a strange new house then ditching them as we leave for 2 weeks in Scotland at the end of May, or we wait till after then and face the possibility of my brother and his family visiting while we’re still unpacking. Or we move really soon, but too soon for me as we haven’t even begun packing.

EDIT (8:40pm): Well, we made an offer… Now we wait… SQUEEE!

EDIT (1/4/08 3:00pm): Oh shit, our offer was accepted, now we freak out! SQUEEE!

The Brighton at Antiquity (set)

Originally uploaded by FLC.

So yeah, I’m backing Kansas to go deep again, will I ever learn? And I’m on the Tyler Hansbrough Farewell Tour Bandwagon™ all the way to the end this year, so for that reason, and that reason alone, I’m opting for blatant homerism and backing North Carolina over UCLA. And sorry Dave, I’m not buying into Memphis to go far.

The worst part is I’ll miss all the opening weekend as we’re heading to Atlanta this weekend, so if you see me, excuse me for glancing at my iPhone every so often, gotta keep track of my LOCKS!

First a little back story, since it opened in 2005 Charlotte Bobcats Arena has been Charlotte Bobcats Arena, and that’s pretty rare in modern arenas and corporate sponsorship. I can only think of four other big arenas that don’t have corporate sponsorship, Madison Square Garden in New York, Rose Garden in Portland, New Orleans Arena in New Orleans and The Palace of Auburn Hills in Detroit, but I digress… Recently it’s been reported that the Bobcats are in talk with Time Warner Cable to rename the arena the Time Warner Cable Arena, quite a mouthful no?

Now this hasn’t been officially announced, but on Sunday at the game against Toronto, on the sideline they had big Time Warner Cable Arena signage on the rotation. Odd I though, as at this point I hadn’t heard anything about it being renamed, so I snapped a picture of it. Later that night I uploaded it to Flickr and thought nothing of it. The next day at work I received two calls in quick succession on my iPhone from a number I didn’t recognise, and when I get calls at work from numbers I don’t know, I kick them straight to voicemail. So I had 2 missed calls and no voicemail, kind of an odd combination. So I called it and it took me through to the secretary of Greg Economou, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for Bobcats Sports & Entertainment, another mouthful, but needless to say, he’s high up in the Bobcats organization. Not knowing why he would call me I left my name and number and about an hour later he called me back…

He explained that it was a mistake to display that signage, and in order to defuse a potential hiccup, would I be able to remove my image from Flickr?

Now, before I continue:

OK, now that’s out the way, he proceeded to say that he would repay me for the inconvenience. Whatever I wanted, tickets for a game, be his guest at an event, press pass to get on the floor, whatever… Now I was quite taken aback by this, I mean, if you were offered pretty much an open door to a major arena, what would you do? I did the first thing that came to mind… Tickets to Springsteen in April! I said this as I’d previously mused how extortionate the prices for this event were, and how often to you get to see Springsteen and the E Street Band live nowadays? Consider it done he said, he or one of his associates would call me.

This was on Monday afternoon, now almost 72 hours have passed with no reply and I’m unsure what to do? Like I said, the Bobcats are a client of ours, so I don’t want to be a dick and rock the boat on this. But on the other hand, a man’s word is bond, right?

Another thing that kind of weirded me out was how quickly he found me. The picture hit number 3 on Google for the term “Time Warner Cable Arena”, but even then there no mention of my cell phone on my Flickr account, somehow within 18 hours of posting the picture to Flickr my cell phone was buzzing away. He worked hard to track me down, and it wasn’t even a “are you the Gregor Smith who was at the Bobcats game last night?” He knew it was me, there was no beating around the bush.

So yeah, what should I do? I’ll prolly call his secretary in a few hours, maybe I’ll push the picture back from the privacy of “marked as private” on Flickr and see if it reenters Google quick as before. Many possibilities…

Prepare to be amazed.