1TO10REVIEWS

My Review: 2

Diane Rehm is the radio-program host of the “The Diane Rehm Show.” She hosts her program on WAMU through the American University in Washington D.C. The show is nationally syndicated on National Public Radio (NPR.)

I love NPR. But Diane Rehm is driving me frigging crazy. Everyone just gushes on and on about how wonderful she is: she’s articulate, educated, well-spoken, interesting, insightful, etc., etc. and blah blah blah.

The truth is she is maddeningly annoying because she talks…so…god…damned…slowly. It’s making me crazy. I frequently listen to NPR on Sirius Satellite radio, and they play her show constantly. 3 times a day I find her on the air.

Now, I know that she has a speech disorder. She has Spasmodic Dysphonia, a disease of the larynx which causes involuntary spasms of the muscles in the throat and larynx. This cannot be treated with speech therapy or vocal training. The most effective way to treat it is with Botox injections directly to the throat. And that sucks. The disorder caused her to take a break from broadcasting. My assumption is that she speaks so slowly as means of coping with her disorder.

That’s all well and good; I applaud her efforts and sympathize with her plight. I am very sorry for her and for other S.D. sufferers. I know full well that I sound like an insensitive prick. A real asshole. But the fact remains that she is driving me crazy. I can’t stand the sound of her slow, warbling chaotic voice. IT DRIVES ME NUTS.

So I give her stupid voice on her stupid program a stupid rating of 2. I don’t care how articulate or intelligent or sensitive she is. She is a radio personality, and that line of work depends on a solid, commanding mellifluous voice. Diane Rehm does not qualify.

My Review: 5

I think Guitar Hero, the series of games from Red Octane, kicks motha-flippin’ ass. I love to rock out, it’s simple and fun. So I am not going to review Guitar Hero in general; everyone already knows that it rules.

Instead I am going to review, specifically, GH3 for the PC.

I don’t own a gaming console. I know, it’s crazy, my bad. For a techno-weenie geek-boy to not own a gaming console is like a Kansas City holy-roller only owning one bible. Not normal.

Nevertheless, I don’t own a gaming console. I’ve played GH2 on the Xbox 360 with friends, and played GH3 on the Wii. I had a lot of fun, but I didn’t want to sink $400-$700 into owning a console so that I could play one game. However, I did recently build my own PC. My buddy Jeff helped me put together a custom computer. This was my first time building my own machine. I bought all the components, installed everything, the works. Jeff helped. Here are the major stats:

• NZXT Apollo mid-tower computer case
• Antec Tru-Power Trio TP3-550W power supply
• Intel Core 2 Duo 2.66 GHz processor
• Asus P5E-VM DO motherboard
• Corsair XMS2 240-pin DDR2 memory (4 x 1 GB)
• 2, Asus 18x lightscribe DVD-RW burners
• Nvidia GeForce 8400 Graphics card w/ 512 MB dedicated video memory
• 2, 7200 rpm Seagate 500GB hard drives in a RAID 1 (hardware RAID)

Being as I have a brand-new bad-ass mother-jammer (three hyphenated double-words in a row, yes!) I figured maybe I should search for whether there is a PC version of Guitar Hero 3. Wouldn’t that be cool? Maybe it’s nicer to rock out in front of your television, but I do have a 22″ widescreen LCD monitor, so that’s not too bad. Since I already built the computer anyway, this seemed like a cheaper and more reasonable alternative.

So, 1 or 2 Google search results later, lo and behold there is a version of GH3 for the PC.

Aspyr, a gaming company, contracted with Red Octane to port a version of GH3 for the Mac and the PC. Sweet. Better yet, on my routine visit to Costco the next day they are selling the PC version. Right there at Costco. Life is good again.

So, now I have a sweet machine and the video game I’ve been drooling over. How does it all stack up? Not that great.

It’s not terrible, but I have some deep concerns. For one thing, it stutters a little bit. When you are playing a musical game that depends on your being able to follow the rhythm of the song, stuttering present a pretty big issue.

The minimum system requirements for the graphics card list a “Video Card: 3D Hardware Accelerator Card Required – 100% DirectX 9.0c compatible 128 MB Video Memory.” They recommend 256 MB video card. Mine is a 512 MB card, and it still stutters. The only way I could find to mitigate the stutter was to lower the graphics resolution in the game options to the minimum setting. This did not wipe out all the stuttering, but it did help enough so that the game is playable. Yay.

Now Guitar Hero is not really a graphics intensive game, and truthfully I don’t really notice the difference all that much. However, I think it is totally lame that it was necessary to lower the resolution to the minimum. My new computer meets or exceeds all the other system requirements in addition to the graphics card. That tells me that the problem is probably not my system. I think it much more likely that Aspyr did not make a very good port.

It is also possible that Red Octane did not do as good of a job with GH3 as they did with GH 1 and 2. Harmonix (who is now making Rock Band, a Guitar Hero competitor) did all the coding for GH 1 and 2. Red Octane contracted with a different company to code GH3 - that’s part of the reason that it looks significantly different from previous versions.  The new company coded it up pretty fast, and perhaps they didn’t do as good of a job.  I have seen stutters on GH3 even on the Wii, though not as bad as what I experienced with the PC.

Another bone I have to pick is the controller.  The guitars for all other versions of Guitar Hero 3 are wireless.  Not so for the PC version.  In fact, the guitar for PC is actually the Xbox 360 guitar for Guitar Hero 2, right down to the little Xbox logo.  That is pretty lame.  I can (sort of) understand using a wired guitar on the first version, probably simplified a few things.  But at least give me my own guitar, and not one that has Xbox symbols on it.

Apparently Aspyr has released a patch for the game, patch #1.1, and it is supposed to resolve certain issues. I am going to download it and try it out, but I am not overly optimistic.  I supposed any port is likely to work less perfectly than the original.  And it honestly  isn’t that bad.  It’s just not great either.  Not the experience I was hoping for anyway.  So, because it is mediocre, it gets a solid 5 out of 10.

My Review: 1

I am incredibly disappointed. I have a bone to pick and a forum from which to descry the ineptitude and irresponsibility which is www.myshoestore.com. To put it another way, they suck as badly as it is possible for an E-tail shoe store to suck. Al Bundy would be an improvement to their sales team.

My fiancee (soon to be wife) needed a pair of hiking boots for our honeymoon in New Zealand. We looked the old fashioned way, and 3 different brick and mortar shoe stores were unable to provide the right boot for her size 5 1/2 foot. So we went online, and found the right pair of boots, “available” in the right size, for a good price. And with free shipping! El yay.

So I placed the order, received an on-screen confirmation with the promise of an email confirmation to come. No email came. I check my spam folder, and still no email. My credit card was charged - a total of $158.99. I waited three days, and when I still had received no word I called the customer service line. I was told that the order had been placed and received, and that it normally takes 10 days to fill an order and ship it out. The customer service rep said that my email had most likely been placed in spam by accident. She promised to re-send the email, and suggested that I check my spam folder. Great.

So, I kept an eye on my inbox for the rest of the day. No email. I checked my spam folder repeatedly. No email.

Oh well, they said it would take a little while for the shoes to arrive. So I waited. I waited for 12 days. No email. No tracking number. Nothing. So I called again.

I spoke with a woman who informed me that the shoes I had ordered were out of stock. At this point I have paid $160 for boots. I’ve waited more than 3 weeks. My honeymoon is now less than 2 weeks away. I’ve received no emails from the company. I was told, in person over the phone, that my shoes were on their way. They have my money. I have no shoes.

Enough I told her. Forget it, please refund my money. And that is when I learned that it takes 30 days to process a refund. A refund for an item I never received, an item that is not available. So I ask for a supervisor. A supervisor was unavailable, so I asked for a call-back. Guess what happened.

I hate myshoestore.com. They are evil, smelly, and despicable. They deserve less than a 1 rating, but this blog is called 1to10reviews so I cannot give them a lower mark. It just wouldn’t make sense.

So I am making it my mission to join every review website and rating website I can find to give them a poor ranking. The have created an enemy in me, and I will shout from every rooftop available to me that they have terrible customer service, lousy communication, they steal money without providing goods or services, and they should be run out of business as quickly as possible.

Here is my review from RateItAll.com:

Here is my submission to the Better Business Bureau:

I’ve threatened to submit companies to the BBB, but this is the first time I actually did it. It feels good. I am still looking for more review sites. If anyone knows of any good ones, please leave a comment and let me know.

———————————————————————————————————————————–

UPDATE:

According to the most recent comment, MyShoeStore.com seems to be out of business.  When I visit the webpage it seems to be down.  I’d like to think that I had a little something to do with it. 

———————————————————————————————————————————–

FURTHER UPDATE 7/7/08:

It’s official.  Their site has a goodbye and goodnight message posted up.  Here is a screenshot:

I don’t know if I really had anything to do with it, but I sure feel vindicated.

———————————————————————————

Comments on this thread are closed.

My Review: 10

I love Aspen trees. There is nothing I don’t like about them. The trunks are lovely, silver grey with very few branches until you reach the upper foliage. The leaves are shaped like a short, broad paddle and delicately veined. They are green in the spring and summer, and in mid-Fall they begin to turn a beautiful, bright yellow. Towards Winter the leaves will drop, and then bud again in the Spring.

Aspen trees typically grow in Alpine and sub-alpine regions between 3 and 8,000 feet of elevation above sea level. They are often called quaking aspens, because in high winds the leaves (which are paddle shaped) will blow and beat against one another, causing a soft rustling, or quaking sound.

Here is an Aspen-lined road Some of the leaves

Some of my favorite regions in the world have a great deal of Aspen growth, including the Western and Eastern Sierra Nevada mountain range (South Lake Tahoe, CA and Tom’s Place, north of Bishop, CA)

Aspens up in South Lake Tahoe, CA

Gorgeous Aspen in full Fall foliage

Tahoe Forest with Pines and Aspens

Here is a video of a “Quaking Aspen” in motion:

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6713288611472713854&hl=en]

Incredible golden Aspen leaves

I find no fault with Aspen tree, although I do wish that it grew in more places. Though, perhaps, that is one of the reasons I find it so special. The quaking Apsen, especially in its full Fall regalia, is a full 10 out of 10.

My Review: 8

Do you have a close friend of the same sex? Someone with whom you spend a LOT of time? I do.

We drive places together, drink coffee together, eat together, play Guitar Hero together. It’s very sweet. Sometimes we argue, we laugh a lot, and we make fun of other people together. It’s like we’re dating, or even married. But we’re both straight. Sometimes I think I’d be good at being gay, but I am pretty much into women and boobs.

He’s married, I’m getting married in two weeks, and we both like girls, so we don’t have sex with one another. Which I think probably makes the relationship less complicated than it might otherwise be. We piss each other off, buy presents for each other, and help each other feel better about ourselves. We’re in a gay relationship without the sex, and it’s awesome.

My Review: 8

Buying goods at a Costco brick and mortar store requires a certain kind of mind-set. If you are in a hurry, you should not go to Costco. If you are tired or cranky, you should not go to Costco. But, if you want to browse around, buy goods at a great value, and/or have a great return policy to in the event of problems, then Costco rules.

The variances between certain stores make it difficult to specify a lot of hard and fast attitudes. For instance, does your Costco have the full cold cases at the back of the store with fresh foods and designer cheeses, or only one simple cold case with a few deli type items? Does you Costco make rotisserie chickens? At the checkout lines, do they offer bags, let you purchase re-usable bags, or hand out boxes from unpacked deliveries? These things affect the overall experience.

But if you enjoy commerce, and you like buying new toys (or a lot of damn food) then Costco can be a magical place. I remember the first time I shared it with my friend Rochelle. Having never been there, she had adopted a supercilious attitude about it, bemoaning the excess of American commercialism and excess. But once she walked around, and saw the shiny electronics and flat screen TV’s on the front, right-hand side of the store, she was as much in heaven as the most hard-core consumer. You can’t help but be excited about all the quantity.

Currently I live close enough to Costco that I can walk there. Having done so, I don’t know if I can give it up. Sometimes I still drive (if we’re buying things that are too heavy or too bulky to carry) but it’s so exciting knowing that I can walk there. Sighhh. But crossing the acre-long parking lot (after parking at the rear to avoid the competition for spaces at the front) contains a special joy. Perusing the various samples can be joyous and exhilarating.  (Although it is irritating when people wait in line, clogging the aisles, before the samples are ready.)  Eating an over-sized hot-dog and a soda for $1.29… sometimes I am overcome with emotion. Is it joy, nostalgia, indigestion? I’m still not sure, even after minutes of self-examination.

As long as I am ready for the crowds, mentally prepared for the long lines and the over-stimulation, buying goods at Costco remains a wonderful and exciting experience, even after 20 years of shopping from Price Club to Costco and beyond. The jury’s still out, however, on Sam’s Club.

My Review: 3

You know what sucks? Getting pee stains on the front of your underwear. You know what else sucks? Having poo stains on the rear.

Really, these events are great reasons for buying dark colored underwear.

Some friends used to call me doody-pants, because I once asserted (while drinking a lot of Saki) that everybody accidentally poops in the underwear once in a while. No one was willing to admit that they suffer from this problem, and I had to suffer the indignity of an unfortunate nickname for several years. But I don’t care what you call me, the fact is, I’m right. Everyone lets a little bit slip once in a while.

It might be pee, because you didn’t shake enough at the urinal and you put it back too quickly. But, as my brother always says, “if you shake it more than twice then you’re just playing with it.” Or, you might just be in a hurry.

Also, you could hav ejust laughed a little too hard and let a little pee spray out That sucks, but it does happen.

And everyone, seriously everyone, has a little poop staining on the back of their shorts once in a while. Maybe your ass-hair is too thick and poo gets caught in it making it too hard to wipe it all off. Maybe you were in a hurry and didn’t get to wipe as much as you’d like. Maybe some jerk left the Cottonelle wipes open and they all dried out. Any number of reasons could account for poo stains, up to and including the kung pao chicken that they made a little too spicy last night.

Poo and pee stians on your underwear are not fun. But they are not the end of the world, and rest assured that you are not alone. They rate a 3 out of 10 because they can be uncomfortable and a little embarrassing, but hey, life is a little uncomfortable and embarrassing.

My Review: 4

Meetings, in general, are difficult to like. They can be fun, with the right group, and if they are stay relevant and on track. But too often meetings end up lasting 6 times longer than necessary. Right now, I am sitting in a meeting that started at 10:00 AM. It is currently 2:40 PM. We broke for lunch (about 20 minutes) but basically its been straight through.

Jeremy (a friend who writes a blog called Live Digitally) once said that he thinks meetings should never need to last more than an hour. I buy into that philosophy, and here’s why:

• Once you go past 1 hour, you are probably beyond the attention span of most of the participants
• If you have more to talk about than you can fit in one hour, you are probably trying to do too much in one meeting
• Or, you have more people in the meeting than really need to participate

Now, a good meeting can actually be pretty enjoyable. You feel like you accomplished something, you reached consensus with a group of people you trust, and you have a clear plan of action to move forward. And you did all that in 51 minutes. That would get a 7 or 8 in my book, because there is a lot of satisfaction in work done well.

But too many meetings run over long, with too many people expressing dumb-ass opinions that don’t move the topic forward. So on the whole, I have to give “meetings” (in general) a score of 4 out of 10.

——————————————————————————————————————–

Update 8/23/2007

It is now 4:13 PM, and I have been in the same meeting for more than 6 hours.  Sighhh.

My Review: 1

There may one day come a time when the subject of a review will receive a 0. For the moment though, as the title of this blog is “1 to 10 Reviews” I will restrict the lowest possible score to a 1. And cubicles receive that score. They suck.

Thus far in my professional career, I have avoided cubicilism, or the state of being ensconced in a cubicle for the 8 working hours of one’s daily life. I am opposed to the cubicle on moral as well as practical grounds - I believe they are wicked and immoral.

Ok, that’s kind of hyperbolic, but I still don’t like them.

It’s hard to explain why I dislike cubes so much. Office cubes I mean, the type like you see in the movie “Office Space.”

I think they simultaneously restrict and expose the self. You are shut up in a public space; that’s something of an oxymoron, but maybe that’s part of the reason I dislike them so much. There is a serious lack of privacy (if you need peace and quiet for making phone calls for instance), but there is also this weird type of territory that is created, carved up and doled out in the use of cubicles.

The office in which I work installed some cubicles recently. I politely requested to have space in one of the offices (with a window and a door) that were still available, and I was much relieved when my request was granted. I would probably have gone into crisis mode had I been asked to occupy a cube.

The point here is that the cubicle lifestyle is not for me. I think it makes a person feel exposed and confined at the same time, and neither of those are good feelings. I oppose the cubicle lifestyle, and I rate it a 1 out of 10.

My Review: 8

Sol and I are sitting in the Capitola Mall south of Santa Cruz right now. We’re in line, sitting in camp chairs, outside the AT&T store. We are waiting for the opportunity to spend $600 and buy an 8GB iPhone. We have problems.

But this was really the way to do it. The Apple store is cool and all, but they are way over crowded, whereas the AT&T store in the Capitola mall is way more off the radar. So, instead of getting in line last night at 6 PM and standing there for 24 hours, we were able to come over here and get in line at 10:00 AM today, and we’re still like 12th in line.

So now, it’s 3:00 PM, we’re still feeling good, and we’re only 3 hours away from purchase time. And we’re styling too. Sol brought along a projector, speakers, extension cord, power strip, a macbook, and Star Wars. So we are projecting Star Wars onto the ceiling of the Capitola Mall - everyone in line is pretty stoked on us as a result.

Here is Sol and I in line; Star Wars is projecting upwards.

Our friend Sheree works here in the store - she wouldn’t tell us how many phones they have to sell, but she seemed optimistic about our odds. We’re feeling pretty good about our prospects. The questions is, do I keep it, or try to make some money on Ebay? All the nerds are incensed by the idea of NOT keeping it, but I am still on the fence.

I’ll update later on after the sales process happens - in the meantime the atmosphere here is festive and pleasant. 3 hours left to go. This event gets an eight, cause it’s ridiculous. David, signing off at 3:00PM, Pacific Standard Time.

————————————————————————————————————————-

Update #1 - 3:51 PM (PST) - Friday June 29, 2007

Lauren Sagar from the Santa Cruz Sentinel just came by to interview all the crazies that are waiting for the iPhone. She seemed duly impressed that we were screening Star Was on the ceiling, not to mention the water bottle full of Jack Daniels that we offered to share with her. We also shared with her the fact that Starbucks around the corner has been very generously coming by with snacks and treats for all of us hungry gadget freaks. Oh, I also got a phone call form my mother. She seemed awed and a little exasperated (in a kind, motherly way) that we were so committed as to wait in line for 7 hours to buy a really expensive phone.

Lauren Sagar - Santa Cruz Sentinel

————————————————————————————————————————-

Update #2 - 12:36 PM (PST) - Monday July 2, 2007

So, I think we need a little closure here. We finally arrived at 6:00 PM on Friday evening. The moment of truth. The culmination of 7 hours in line waiting to buy a phone. Right till the end I wasn’t even sure I wanted one. But I am here to testify. I am here to tell it on the mountain, ‘cross the oceans, in the valley and over the river… the iPhone kicks ass.

After waiting that long I had to purchase the thing; but the computers were running slow, so I had some down time. I went over to the demo model and started screwing around with it, and OMG it is so cool. The interface is easy to use, the screen is crystal… I’ll stop here because I may do a whole separate review of the thing. But suffice to say that I like it a lot and I am definitely keeping it.

In regards to the experience of waiting in line for the launch and purchase of the iPhone, it was pretty fun. Star Wars was a big hit, even with the security guards. Around 4:30 the Cingular store closed up shop and kicked out all the customers. Then at 6:00 they re-opened to allow us nerds to come in, 7 people at a time, to purchase either a 4GB or an 8GB version. Needless to say I went with the 8GB. Armed security guards stood at the store entrance to maintain order and keep things under control. By the time 6 o’clock rolled around the line had swelled to around 150 people. I’m certain that those in back did not manage to get a phone - brutal.

Sol and I were 15th and 16th in line , and it took till about 6:30 for us to get in the store and make our purchases. I’m glad we weren’t number 62 and 63; the anticipation at that point would have been irritating.
All in all I have to say the experience of waiting in line for the launch and purchase of the iPhone merits an 8. It was a circus. And circuses are fun. Except for the clowns; those dudes are creepy.

————————————————————————————————————————-

Post Script

An interesting after note. Remember Lauren Sagar from the Santa Cruz Sentinel? Well she did a write up of the iPhone experience. Sol and I made the front page. If I can get a hold of a clipping I will scan it in and post it here. Hooray. We’re famous.

————————————————————————————————————————-

Update to the Post Script

Here is the front page photo (bottom half) from the Santa Cruz Sentinel. Mardi Browning at the Sentinel very kindly sent me a copy, even though it was over a month after publication. Thanks Mardi.

By the way, the green water bottle I’m holding… yeah, it’s full of Jack Daniels.  Hoo-rah.