Chris Leckness

The T-Town Gallery Alabama autograph event was a terrible experience for my son and I

Chris — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 03:40:28 +0000

All this week on 99.1 WZBQ and WJOX (sports radio stations I listen to all day) T-Town Gallery has been advertising an Autograph Signing for last night and tonight, January 21st. I try to find things for my son and I to do on Saturdays for a father/son day and since we are both big Bama fans, we decided to go to this. We decided to skip the session last night since I didn’t want to brave the mall on a Friday night after working all day. Trent Richardson was on signing Saturday anyhow and Brett really wanted to meet him.

Here’s what was posted on the T-Town Gallery Facebook page:

AUTOGRAPH SIGNING: Friday January 20, 2012: Mark Baron, Marquis Maze, Dont’a Hightower, Dre Kirkpatrick, Courtney Upshaw, Josh Chapman, and Brad Smelley from 5pm to 9pm. $200 for all signatures or $35 a piece. Saturday, January 21, 2012: Trent Richardson with Roy Upchurch from 5pm to 7 pm. $50 for both signatures.
We expect the store will be busy so make sure to arrive early! We will have pictures and other things available to purchase for signatures! Be sure to share this with your friends!

The Alabama celebration for their 14th National Championship was at Bryant Denny today, so I figured it would be best get there early to stand in line. My son and I showed up at the University Mall at 2pm and walked around a little. About 2:30, we made our way to center court to get in line. Before we did, we tried to buy some items to get signed at T-Town gallery but they were closed to set up. A sign on the fence said to wait there for assistance. There were 10-15 people in the store and I waited for 10 minutes and nobody came to assist. I wanted to know more about prices and what type of items would be available to purchase. We went ahead and got into line. I looked the number of the store up and gave them a call to ask those questions. The person that answered was quite helpful and answered the questions. She did mention that they had plenty of white panel footballs to purchase. Remember that for what happens later.

It’s now about 2:45pm and we’re looking at a good 2 hour wait. We had some really cool folks around us in the line, so the wait wasn’t too bad. One of the ladies a couple back from me in line had purchased a few 2011 National Championship footballs before she came. Because her father in law didn’t want to drop $85 to get the autographs, she had an extra. I paid her $10 more than she paid to help her out and as it turned out, it helped me as well.

Brett with a new haircut waiting in line to meet Trent Richardson

During all this, the store has a couple loudspeakers, amp, and mic to facilitate the event and make announcements. It didn’t work so well. Only the people right in front of the store could hear. I am not sure if anything important was ever said on it.

Now it’s 5PM and we’re still standing in line. We have approximately 100 people in front us at this point and an estimated 1,000 behind us. The line isn’t moving at all.

Finally around 5:30pm, the players are all set to get started. According to my receipt, Brett and I got into the store and paid for the signatures (all $255 of them) at 6:19pm. This is where it gets very disappointing.

Initially, my plan was to buy one thing to get signed and hope they would sign my son’s Bama cap too. While waiting, I decided to get something for Brett, something for me, and something for my father-in-law. Since I was there, waited so long, I might as well get something nice for my father-in-law and myself. But yes, the day and the idea to do this was more for my son than me anyhow. I am trying to remember that as I sit here disappointed.

As I mentioned earlier, I was told on the phone that there would be plenty of balls and photos to purchase once we get into the store. There were plenty of photos, none of which I felt were a good match for getting autographs of all 3 players on. I could have got 3 individual photos, but I wanted something I could get all 3 on that I could display in my home.

We got into the store and like I said, I wasn’t thrilled with the choice of photos so I wanted to grab a couple white panel balls similar to the one I bought from the lady behind me in line. They ran out of them a couple people ahead of me. They had a one mini white panel football on the table, so I bought it. I still needed a 3rd now. All they had left were official NFL and NCAA balls for $35. With very few options and people rushing me through I agreed to purchase an official NCAA ball. This one would be for my ball case!

3 tickets for each player!

After dropping $60 or so on the two balls and $255 on the autograph tickets, we were on our way to the table to get our balls signed, grab a photo, and meet the guys!

In the photo above, Trent has my third ball in hand to sign and I was still in front of Roy Upchurch. Dre Kirpatrick has his hand on the ball I got Trent to act like he was signing for a photo. The guy on the fence to the left of the video camera is the one that I refer to later in the article. He was the one that refused to talk with me about a deal.

Before we got to the table, the three balls I had were handed over to someone who handed them to the players. I didn’t even get to shake the players hands, say thanks for their service at the University of Alabama, or hand them the balls to get signed. Before I was even in front of the 1st of the three players, Upchurch, all three balls were signed and being handled by a security guard or policeman (can’t remember) and we were being shuffled out of the store. I grabbed the ball for me and asked a handler if I could at least get a picture of Trent Richardson acting like he was signing my ball since it was already signed (photo below shows him acting like he’s signing it). While he obliged that request, my son had his iPod Touch out trying to get a good picture of Richardson. He was almost crying when he asked me, “Dad, can you ask Trent to smile for my picture?”. I told him to just snap the picture, that’s probably the best you’ll get. We were shuffled along.

Trent Richardson simulating the signing of my football at my request for a photo.

With 3 balls in hand while trying to get through a huge crowd of onlookers with my son by my side we moved on. I had not even had a chance to look at the balls.

We get across the hallway to a shoe shore where I was going to let Brett pick out some new tennis shoes. While he was checking out the selection, I was checking out the balls. The 2 white panel balls looked sweet but when I got a look at my ball, my heart sank. IT LOOKS LIKE ABSOLUTE GARBAGE! I can barely make out who is who. The photo of the dark football was taken when I got home with lots of lighting on it to show it better. While I was checking it out in the shoe store, the two guys helping my son with a new pair of shoes were commenting on how bad it looked too. One suggested that I go back over and get my money back. I considered that, but I thought I should wait another day since it was so busy in there and would be for the next couple of hours. Look at the difference in the one above and the two white panel balls below. I should have skipped over the dark, bumpy football and got photos signed for myself. Roy Upchurch’s autograph is decent.

This is the football I am unhappy with. It has tons of lighting on it. It looks even worse in normal lighting.

We grabbed Brett some shoes and I called my wife to see if she wanted me to pick up some dinner. She could tell I was upset and I explained to her a little but didn’t really want to discuss it until I got home. She suggested I go talk with them before I leave.

I stood there telling my son to settle down and give me a sec. After 5 minutes I decided to try to make them a deal. I headed back, asked the police officer keeping the onlookers back to grab someone from the store to talk with me. After he realized I had already gone through the line, he got a guy over there that tried to help. He happened to be the one that told me that they were out of the white panel, 2011 Championship balls. I showed him the ball I was unhappy with and explained to him that I would be willing to let them keep that ball if I could buy something else to get signed without having to pay another $85 for the autographs again. Let me rephrase that… I paid $35 for the ball and an additional $85 for the autographs on it. I was offering to GIVE them that ball back and PURCHASE something else to get signed. The store would not incur any loss since they could give me the 3 autographs again only at the expense of 3 former Alabama player’s 2 seconds of writing. They would make more money off the addition item or items I would purchase and they could even resell the ball I was unhappy with. This guy went into the store to get an actual employee of the store over there to talk to me. Without even listening to my offer, he cut me off with, “NO REFUNDS” and walked off. After standing in line for all that time and spending $300 to be shuttled through the process like an unappreciated prison worker, I was shocked with the short answer without even letting me finish talking. I can understand they were quite busy, but in order for my offer to work… the players needed to be there and if I wait, they will be gone.

After this… I went from disappointed with the whole situation to mad. We left to pick up dinner and return home.

My son is 9, but he’s very bright and he knew I was mad. He tried to cheer me up with a couple of offers. The 1st deal was him offering to get me those autographs when he makes it to the NFL. Cute. I wanted to laugh, but I couldn’t. I can now though. The other offer was for him to get a sharpie and trace over the autographs to make them easier to see. NO BRETT. Please don’t.

On the way home, Brett shared with me his disappointment too. He was upset that he didn’t get to a) talk to Richardson b) shake his hand c) get his picture taken with Richardson, and d) get his Bama hat which is already signed by a couple other players signed. He knew and understood it was busy, but he thought he’d have more than a few seconds. He did get a photo of Richardson snapped with his iPod Touch. I explained to him that each signature was going to cost money and that I wasn’t prepared to pay $85 to get a hat he actually wears signed. The big white panel ball is for Brett anyhow.

When Brett got to meet other Bama players at another store in Tuscaloosa, there was time to chat a minute and the players he’s met have been cordial. Hell, Prince Wimbley even took off his 1992 National Championship ring and let Brett hold and wear it. I wasn’t prepared for this type of situation. The owner of the store, the police, and employees in the store were rushing people out very fast. I was very disappointed in this.

After getting home and telling my wife all about the day, she shared a story that I didn’t know. Apparently she had a bad experience with one of these signings a couple years ago. Terrance Cody was signing at the same place and my wife and daughter were in line to get an autograph for us. He was signing from some time to another time and when that time was up, he got up and left. There were 6-10 people left standing in line. My wife was 4-5 back and she was upset but not as upset as two kids in front of her. They were all left without an autograph.

Let’s recap

My son disappointed in his chance to meet Trent Richardson.
I am disappointed in the quality of my prize for waiting for 3 hours and dropping $300.
There was no interaction with the players we were paying to get autographs from, or very little.
There were not enough items to purchase for autographs in stock.
The event started late making it seem like things were more rushed than it should have been.
I felt as if I paid to be treated as if we were an inconvenience to the players and store staff.

Here’s another thing that I can’t help wondering. What about the people behind us in line. They are now out of small and large white panel balls so others won’t have any opportunity for a quality autograph on a good ball for autographs. In addition to that, I was close to the front of the line and I didn’t get in the store until 6:19pm. The event was from 5-7pm so how many of the hundreds behind us are going to walk away without an opportunity?

At this point, I am giving the small white panel ball to my father-in-law and I have the large white panel ball I purchased from someone in the line displayed in my son’s room. I am considering using my ball as a very nice, very expensive ball for my son and I to play with in the yard. It’s a quality football and all his other footballs are worn out anyhow.

Bottom line, I won’t be wasting my time or money on any other autograph events put on by this company. Instead, I will wait for Bama Fever opportunities and/or just buy memorabilia from companies that offer autographed items with a certificate of authenticity at retail prices like I have been doing.

Maybe I am overreacting, but for $120, I feel somewhat justified. The ball looks horrible, my feet and back hurt, and my son didn’t enjoy the experience.

ROLL TIDE!

Update: I wasn’t the only one that had a crappy experience today. Apparently some people were led to believe that the autographs were free!

A friend of mine posted this on Facebook tonight!

Went to the mall to get Trent Richardsons autograph..after 30 minutes in line (behind a lot of people that had been waiting way longer) and the radio guy comes across the speaker and says, These autographs are not free by the way, It will be $50….. Needless to say I left & so did a lot of others. I love my Alabama Football but I am not paying anybody $50 for their signature. Ttown Gallery should have been upfront with the people and put that little bit of info in their ads and posters…..

Chris’ Virtual Yardsale #1

Chris — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 04:43:21 +0000

When I had a bunch of cases and accessories that I had for review on Aximsite and Mobilitysite, I would come here and have a Yard Sale Contest. What I would do was offer the items up and let readers choose what they want and comment for a chance to win the item. This was fun, but things are different these days. While 50% or more of the items I would give away were purchased by me, the rest were review or demo units. These days, I don’t have much coming in and I buy most of the things you see me use or review online. I don’t have the income from advertising to purchase these items and give them away like I used to. That said, I will be selling things more often. I will post most of these here on ChrisLeckness.com since I don’t have the time or patience to use Craigslist or Ebay.

So, what do I have up for sale today?

32 GB Zune HD - I purchased this for my flights this week despite having other Zunes. I don’t see myself using it often enough to justify hanging on to it.
AT&T Elevate 4G/LTE Hotspot (No contract) – I paid $269 cash for it last week to have back up data at CES for uploads. I can’t really see hanging on to it moving forward.
Samsung Chromebook in Arctic White (model #500C21-H01) – This is the original Samsung Chromebook that didn’t sell too well. I didn’t use this very much and never activated the 2 years of FreeVerizon data (100mb/mo).
JVC Everio HD Video Camera (model #GZ-HD300BU) – This is the camera most of my videos over the last year have been shot with. I don’t think I have ever even had it out of my house. I replaced it with a newer Sony video camera last week. Nothing is wrong with it and the only reason I replaced it is because it doesn’t have a external microphone input.
Sony Ericcson Xperia X10 (White Taylor Swift Model) – Only used it for a week.

If you are interested, I can provide photos and info on what comes with it, etc… Make offers via contact form.

My CES 2012 Wrap Up

Chris — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 06:32:19 +0000

I have skipped the last couple Consumer Electronics Shows since I stepped out of writing about mobile when I sold my websites. The show has changed a little since my last attendance. It seems to have gotten more crowded, but the quality of the show seems to have declined. More big companies seem to skip having a booth, limiting their presence to private meetings and side shows like “Digital Focus” and “Showstoppers”. I actually believe I like it better that way. I was able to see 50-60% of what I wanted to see at the two side shows.

First off, I want to thanks Xavier Lanier, Owner of Notebooks.com and GottaBeMobile.com for bringing me along for coverage of CES 2012. While I personally feel I didn’t do as much as I wanted to, I tried. I spent a great deal of time and money before the show to position myself to be able to produce more content faster while at the show. I didn’t want to have to spend my evenings uploading videos and writing. My plan was to upload videos and write as it unfolded. I failed. My laptop had troubles and my MiFi kept losing connection at 70-80% on my YouTube uploads. I was miserable. On top of my technical issues, I didn’t want to duplicate content so I didn’t waste a lot of time looking at some of the phones that others from our team were scheduled to cover. Check out this post to see what I planned to work with.

The Phones

I was able to check out most of the phones I wanted to get hands-on with though. While I didn’t take videos, I got to get familiar with them. Here are the phones I got hands-on with:

Nokia Lumia 710, 800, and 900. Check out Chuong’s Lumia 900 1st Look video.
HTC Titan II. Here’s my 1st Look Video.
Motorola Droid 4. Check out Adam’s Video.
Motorola Droid RAZR Max. Check out Adam’s Video.
Samsung Galaxy Note. Check out Adam’s Video.

I didn’t get around to checking out the LG Phones unfortunately. I skipped most of Samsung’s offerings as well.

I decided not to trek over to check out the Sony Xperia Ion either since I didn’t want to get excited about a phone that will take forever to get Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) based on my previous experiences with the Xperia line.

Nokia Lumia 900

I absolutely love the Lumia 900. Perfect screen size, fast, and the Cyan color is sexy. The camera, even though I didn’t get unload photos off of it to check out on a big screen, seems awesome. The build quality is top notch and feels very premium. The only issue I have with it is that I am no longer an AT&T customer, so I am going to have to either grab a new line on AT&T or wait for a Verizon equivelent. The Nokia Windows Phones eliminate one of the things that draws me to Android – free, quality navigation. I really do not like the implementation of Bing’s navigation. Nokia’s added navigation solution looks great.

HTC Titan II

It’s basically a rehash of the HTC Titan, but it’s got LTE. Having LTE is a good or bad thing depending on how you look at it. The battery drain on current LTE devices is massive. I love to see big speed tests but most consumers, myself included, don’t need that much data speed. The Titan II is running the same version on Windows Phone 7.5 (Mango) as the Titan and looks and feels almost identical. What is different is the slight boost in battery, support for LTE and HSPA+ as a backup, and a huge boost in camera specs for the front and rear cameras. The styling of the Titan II is has changed a tad with a slight curved profile in a similar was to the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

Motorola Droid 4

If any of you have been reading my ramblings for a while, you’d know that my form factor of choice for a long time was the slide out keyboard. Since screens have gotten bigger and onscreen keyboards have gotten better, I was able to leave that dying form factor behind. The original Droid was well done and offered a really slim form factor while still having a slider. The Droid 4 is super thin considering. I’d love to buy the Droid 4 and rotate between it and my Galaxy Nexus.

Motorola Droid RAZR Max

This one is dead sexy, but I’d rather have the Galaxy Nexus. The battery is massive on the RAZR Max though. It has a 3,300 mAH battery compared to the regular Droid RAZR’s 1830 mAH battery. It’s really not a RAZR at that point since the additional juice sacrifices it’s razor thin profile.

Samsung Galaxy Note

I never thought I would ever say this, but… it’s too big. It’s like having an HTC Advantage up to your ear. No, not really, but it’s close. I really don’t think I could use the Galaxy Note as a phone, a mini tablet yes… just not as a daily driver phone. It’s very nice otherwise.

The Events

I had a great time at the press events, dinners, and parties that I had a chance to attend.

The AT&T Developer Summit was top notch, but I wish the opening keynotes wasn’t 2 1/2 hours. The last 30 minutes with all the phones being announced was great. Having Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, HTC’s Peter Chou, and Nokia’s Stephen Elop all on stage was a treat.

As always, the Pepcom press event was top notch. I had a great time watching the 2nd half of the Alabama/LSU National Championship game. ROLL TIDE. Digital Focus afforded me time to play with the HTC Titan II and Nokia Lumia 900 without being beat up side the head with some rude guys massive video camera. I had an awesome time catching up with some PR folks I haven’t seen in a couple years, especially Palm reps that now represent HP.

I was very impressed with Showstoppers as well. In the past, it’s been an event that I have jumped in/out of fast but I ended up staying the entire time and still didn’t talk to everyone I wanted to. They’ve definitely stepped it up a notch.

Dinner with Microsoft arranged by Sonus Group was very nice. It was a great Italian dinner at Maggiano’s that included social conversation about Windows Phone with Greg Sullivan and Ben Rudolph from Microsoft. I walked out with an Samsung Focus Flash that I ended up giving to Adam Mills to review. We should be giving it away as a contest prize on GottaBeMobile when he’s done too.

Famous People

I had a few encounters with famous people!

I shook hands with Ludacris.
I was pushed out of the way by LL Cool J’s handlers just before I took a photo from about 2 feet away from him.
I hollered out “Roll Tide” when Andrew Luck got on stage at the Lenovo/Microsoft party, but then shook hands in a photo op with him 10 minutes later.
I was a few feet from the AWESOME Alistair Overeem on the show floor. It was uncomfortable because I had 100′s pushing behind me to get closer. I wasn’t able to get a good photo either. I will say though, he doesn’t look as big in person as he does in the octagon.

Other People

I was happy to meet my fellow staff at GBM this week. I’ve already met Xavier a couple times, but I met the rest of our team for the 1st time! KT Bradford, Chuong Nguyen, Adam Mills, and Josh Smith. I had a good time with them all.

I ran into a lot of fellow bloggers/writers that I’ve known for years and loved running into them just like old times. I met many newer folks in the industry that I have been following and conversing with on Twitter for a couple years, but never met in person too! There are too many to name, so I won’t try and risk leaving someone out.

Special shout outs to my great friends that I always love hanging out with at events… Matt Miller (middle in photo above), Mike Temporale, Johan Van Meirlo (right), Judie Lipsett, Graham Skee (left), and more.

Wrap Up

Overall I had a great time and enjoyed covering CES again. I was excited to see so many phones shown and announced at this CES, it seems like there were more than usual at a CES. I am sure there are some surprises for MWC (Mobile World Congress), but many companies laid out some love this week.

I had a great time socially, but I am very frustrated with how poorly I did at live coverage of the events. Hopefully I can redeem myself in May at CTIA in New Orleans.

I think I am ready for CES 2012 [Gear]

Chris — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 05:58:36 +0000

Using my favorite bag of all time, the Pharos GPS accessory bag, I am loaded up and ready to go. Those of you that have known me for a while will recognize it for sure. I will also be carrying the Logitech Kinetik 15.4 bag to carry it all in. Disclaimer: Don’t hate the photos, they were taken in a poorly lit room with the Galaxy Nexus.

We start with a basic laptop for video editing and posting. Powerful enough to get it done.

Here we have the Pharos Bag! Contents reveals over the next couple photos.

Top left is a couple microUSB cables and a charge. Top middle is the Zune HD 32GB for in flight audio entertainment. Top right is empty, but it’s the memory card box in the next photo. Bottom left is the charger for the Canon S100 in the bottom middle slot. In the bottom right slot, I have my Galaxy Nexus battery charger and 2 spare batteries.

Several MicroSD cards, memory sticks, adapters, Eye-Fi, etc…

In the side compartment of the Pharos bag, I have a handful of screen cleaners to get the crap of demo devices for prettier photos.

Some money and batteries for the video cam microphone.

One of two HD Video cameras and the microphone. I am trying a new video camera out, but if it doesn’t do well for me, I am bringing along old faithful.

Finally, a nice monopod for those long interviews with vendors.

Follow GBM Editors on Twitter for CES 2012

Chris — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 03:24:02 +0000

So, everyone else is doing it so I will too.

But seriously, GBM will be at CES in full force and we plan to bring the awesome. Sure, you have much bigger sites your there that will have CES covered to, but we are GottaBeMobile.

GottaBeMobile – @GottaBeMobile
Xavier Lanier – @xavierlanier
Josh Smith – @Josh_Smith
Adam Mills – @admillios
KT Bradford – @ktbradford
Chuong Nguyen -@chuongvision
Chris Leckness – @chrisleckness

Stay tuned to GottaBeMobile for coverage if CES 2012.

I might start collecting these mini Android Collectibles!

Chris — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 02:38:29 +0000

I got a case of these in, busted them and my wife thought they were so cute that she claimed a couple.

I am reading some websites to see which that I got are rare and found that this clear blue one is.

I’ve also found that there were others released earlier which is a no brainer since the ones I got are series 02. I guess I am going to be spending money to complete this collection. Why? No idea, but I am a collector by nature. It’s in me.

A Message to LSU Fans, REMATCH ROLL TIDE!

Chris — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:04:14 +0000

Now here’s a video that explains this whole Alabama vs LSU thing perfectly. It’s exactly how I feel about the situation.

I will be in Vegas on January 9th, I sure hope that Pepcom has TVs running at the event I will be at during this game. If they don’t, I am going to have to skip the event which would suck considering the Pepcom event is the best 3-4 hours of CES.

Oh, another thing about Bama to share, an Alabama theme for Windows Phone 7.

Check out GottaBeMobile for how I did this. If are interested in getting a hold of this theme, just contact me.

Test Post from WordPress 2 for Android

Chris — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 06:59:21 +0000

Just testing out the newest version of WordPress for Android .

Attaching an image below…

What’s in this version:

1. Version 2.0:
2. Use the Dashboard and Quick Action Bar to get one-tap access to everything you want to do with your blog. 3. All new post editor including a rich text formatting bar and enhanced media features.
4. Full support for Android Tablets.
5. Post Format support.
6. and more!

Terrible Fantasy Football Day! Why?

Chris — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 08:41:56 +0000

I was all excited. I have won Fantasy Football leagues several times, but never have I made it to the Playoffs in 6 leagues in the same year. I was ready to collect a couple crowns. My best finish last year was 2nd after backing into a playoff spot as the lowest seed. I upset a couple teams and my luck ran out in the championship game. This year, out of 6 teams, there was no way I wasn’t going to win at least 1 right? I still have a chance in the same league I finished 2nd in last year since I had a bye today, but it’s not looking good for the other 5 teams. I am eliminated in a most of them and have a miracle chance in 2 of them.

Let’s break them down going into Monday. Even though I am embarrassed, here’s why today sucked. I made bad decisions and players that normally carry me well, sucked.

I got hammered in this one. Jordy Nelson and Victor Cruz have been rocking it lately. They turned up pretty lame today. Aaron Hernadez hasn’t done squat lately, so I rolled with my backup since he’s done as well as Hernandez lately. I also made a huge mistake and rolled with Grossman since I was concerned about Big Ben’s high ankle sprain. With McFadden being out for the last month and half, I have been living and dying with Blount and CJnoK (Chris Johnson). Neither of the really stepped up today. I GOT SMOKED! I finished the regular season in this one 2nd after leading the league almost all year.

I got beat here and other than going with Tony G over Hernandez, there wasn’t much I could do about it. If I rolled with Hernandez like I did most of the year, I would be up 9-10 points with the Steelers D left. I was the 4th seed in this league and the person I faced was dominant all year.

This matchup, rolling the dice with another TE actually worked but Blount laying an egg killed me. I could have won this one! Watch Gore go for 200 and 2 TDs tomorrow night. I doubt it, that’s why I benched him.

Oh Eli how do I love you, let me count the ways. Holy shit Eli, what have you done? An elite QB can score 4 points in their sleep. With all the injuries at RB (AP and Forte), I was happy to hear AP was going today. He didn’t go far though. I don’t think anyone would play DeAngelo over AP. Don’t hate. I figured Eli would outperform Cam this week. A miracle by Antonio Brown is the only way to save this matchup.

I rocked this league all year. I was 2nd and a strong favorite to meet up with Matt Akers of Windows Phone fame for the championship. That’s not gonna happen now. I got shellshocked. This is a 16 team league and talent is thin. I drafted Freeman thinking he’d have a good year. I was wrong! There was little I could do to win this week, my players just didn’t perform. I almost rolled with Shonn Greene over AP, wouldn’t have mattered.

Well, I have one more league and it’s a money league. Wish me luck.

Canon PowerShot S100 vs Canon PowerShot SX230 HS

Chris — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 00:27:48 +0000

Last month, I needed a point and shoot camera. I headed out to Best Buy and played around with all the point and shooters they had. Unfortunately for me, the Canon S100 wasn’t there yet. It was recently released and I had to travel to Birmingham to grab the one I have now.

I am not much of a photographer, but I know what I want my photos to look like and the SX230 HS wasn’t giving them to me.

Here’s a comparison of the two cameras:

Here’s a couple quick shots taken in 100% auto mode:

SX230 HS on left and S100 on right

SX230 HS on left and S100 on right

SX230 HS on left and S100 on right

The Verdict?

No verdict yet. I used the SX230 for about 1 week, but only a couple hours for the S100. The verdict is still out. From my quick tests, I don’t see a ton of difference. This was only in auto mode with no flash, so I might find a bigger difference in other modes.