D&D - Grizzly Bears & Dead Ponies

Now that I have a refrigerator I went shopping this morning. No more eating out for every meal. I'm super excited to finally get back on a better eating schedule and hopefully start losing weight again.

But the big thing today was D&D - Pathfinder. The group hadn't played in almost a month due to our DM's computer crashing. But we were back and 99% of the group was there today.

Since it was a Saturday we played the drinking game along with D&D, though I didn't join in this time. Though I did do a shot of some crazy blue concoction that my buddy Will created. It was quite tasty.. unlike last time.

There wasn't a lot of action in this session but we did have a few skirmishes and my character Dash's pony was killed by some very large grizzly bears. Luckily I hadn't bonded with the pony or named him so it was as devastating as it could have been.  We infiltrated a citadel, found the missing Friar who died but mentioned the attack on his Abbey so that was our next destination. We ran into a thief who will be joining our party for a bit and by the end we were heading off to the dark woods.

All in all a fun session... our next one looks to be pretty crazy as Knights who have gone into the dark woods have never been heard from again.

MASH 4077 Podcast Episode 71

It's our 3rd Year Anniversary Podcast!!!

Download from itunes tinyurl.com/MASH4077itunes , listen on Stitcher Radio ow.ly/iZJIz or Listen, get direct download from our main website MASH4077Podcast.com

Show Notes

Kenny Mittleider from Knights of the Guild, Alien Nation: The Newcomers Podcast & Confessions of a Fanboy Podcast, Simon Meddings from Waffle On Podcast, & Al Kessel from Tales from the Mouse House, Fast Forward & Just Because Podcast discuss one of the most successful and longest running television series in history.. M*A*S*H

Today we cover Season 3, Episode #23 - White Gold
71st Episode Overall
Directed by Hy Averback
Written by Larry Gelbart & Simon Muntner
Production code B319
Original air date March 11th 1975

Set during the Korean War in the 1950’s

Plot Summary: The attempted theft of penicillin from the 4077th by a group of suspected black marketeers brings Col. Flagg to investigate. He comes up with a “brilliant” idea of trading penicillin for information. When Flagg is diagnosed with appendicitis, he comes to understand the critical importance of the medication.
 

MGL S2 Trailer, New Refrigerator & Dinner With A Friend

First up My Gimpy Life season two webseries has released a trailer. I had the good fortune of working on seasons 1 & 2 so I'm very excited to see the finished episodes. I also do the official podcast for My Gimpy Life which will be coming out after each episode. Watch the trailer below.

After a month of having no refrigerator my new fridge arrived. There was a bit of a panic when the moving guys couldn't get it up the stairwell and if you remember when I moved in a month ago we couldn't get my "larger" refrigerator up the stairs and that's why I had to buy a new "smaller" one. But I showed them the other stairwell that I for sure thought would not work but they managed to get it up that one and they did it without putting a scratch on the fridge.. yay!!

Of course once it was placed in my kitchen I realized that the doors opened the wrong direction and I had heard you can remove the doors and switch the brackets and such so the door open in the opposite direction. I had never done this before but figured I'd take a crack at it since I know having the doors open on the wrong side would drive me crazy.

The fridge came with directions on how to do this and though it was a slow process and learning experience I managed to get the doors to open the correct way!!  Now I have to wait 24 hours before filling it up.. I can't wait to have cold things again.

During the evening I picked up my buddy Christopher from the airport, he was flying in from up north. He was down visiting his boyfriend but we hadn't seen each other in a quite some time so before heading to his boyfriends we got to have dinner and hang out for a few hours. I'm so proud of my friend Christopher, he is thriving at his new job with LinkedIn, he's one of the my creative and business savvy guys I know. It was great getting to spend some one on one time with him.

"Get Fit" Week 26

I debated on blogging about my "getting fit" this week as I am really disappointed in myself. I am still unpacking stuff and just got a refrigerator today but I have no excuse not to be walking/jogging around the park which is just outside my apartment door. I use the excuse that I'm still crazed with all this moving stuff and part of that is true but I think I'm just using that as a crutch. I really need to kick myself in the butt and start my new workout regime. Last week I weighted in at 196 and today I weighted in at 197, that's a 1 pound increase.

I'm tired of excuses and I hope by blogging about this it will motivate me to get my butt in gear and start working out and losing weight again.

Travel Points, Selling My Couch & Buying A New Fridge

Started my day by redeeming some travel points that I have accumulated over the past year. I have a BofA Visa Travel card and get travel points on every purchase. Well I had 33,436 points which translated into $334.36 credit which I removed from my current plane ticket to Ireland. So instead of $864.36 for the plane ticket I only paid..  $530.51. How awesome is that!!!

I met up with a cute couple at my storage unit this morning, they were interested in buying my couch. Found out they had are newly engaged and just moved into their very first apartment. Both of them are EMT's and the girl is going to collage. They checked out the couch from top to bottom. I was originally asked $100 on Craigslist and got zero responses. So I lowered it to $50 this time and got about 20 responses.. and to be honest the guy was so cute with his crooked smile I would have given to him for free. But luckily he offered me $40 and I accepted. I helped them load it up into their truck and they were on their way. It was tough seeing this couch go, it was a favorite of mine but I just don't have the room at my new apartment and it had to go.

Afterwards I went to Lowes to buy my new refrigerator. As I was checking out I tried to use my travel Visa as this would have been some good points but the card was declined. So I had to use my debt card. As I was leaving Lowes I got a call from my credit card company, it was an automated system informing me of suspicious activity on my card and if I could review and approve the latest three purchases. First was a purchase from 7-11, which I had done earlier in the day. The second was from San Diego Comic Con for a 2014 badge and the third was the Lowes purchase that I just tried to do. I guess because two of the purchases were of rather large amounts and in two different cities they thought someone got control of my card.

I mean I appreciate that they are looking out for me but it sucks that it was declined and I wasn't able to get the $400+ purchase added to my travel Visa for points. But the good news is I got me a new refrigerator... it will be delivered tomorrow.

Had a rare moment today.. was in my guest bathroom and just happen to see myself in the mirror and I don't know what it was.. the angle or lighting but I actually thought to myself.. "I look pretty good today" Now if you know me you know I don't think I'm a nice looking guy. I think in a certain light I am cute but as I have gained weight over the years I see it less and less. But that little moment made my day and I was in a very happy mood the rest of the day.

Final Episodes of Babylon 5 S3

It's Wednesday so that means TV night at my buddy Robert's place. Tonight we continued out first time viewing of Babylon 5

First up was S3 Ep 19 "Grey 17 is Missing" Garibaldi investigates a missing person in the mysterious Grey Sector. Delenn becomes the leader of the Rangers.

This was just an okay episode.. after all the crazy awesome stuff that we saw the past few episodes this one was kind of a let down. It wasn't bad but it wasn't an OMG episode but then again I guess not all episodes can be OMG. It did have Robert Eugland, who I will already remember as Willie from V.

Next was S3 Ep 20 "And the Rock Cried Out, No Hiding Place" Some religious acquaintances of Brother Theo's come to the station. Meanwhile, Londo is instructed to end his feud with Lord Refa even as he conspires to get rid of G'Kar.

This episode just increased my dislike of Londo. I mean I'm glad he set up Lord Refa and made him the fall guy for all the things Londo had done but Refa was not a good guy. Loved the interaction between Sheridan and Delenn and we finally get what we've been waiting for all season.. the kiss. 

Third episode of the night S3 Ep 21 "Shadow Dancing" Sheridan and Delenn assemble a fleet composed of a myriad different alien races and confront the Shadows. Franklin, still on walkabout, finally finds what he's looking for, though it's not what he expected.

Lot's of action in this episode with the huge battle betweeen Sheridan and Delenn's army against the Shadows. I liked the bit of humor with Ivonnava and the Mimbari beds. Was not a fan of the Doctor's walk about storyline so I was happy to see it come to an end.

And the final episode of the night as well as the final episode of Season three, S3 Ep 22 "Z'Ha'Dum" Third season finale. A face from Sheridan's past takes him on a dangerous mission to meet his Shadow counterpart. Londo receives important news about his political future. The Shadows mass a fleet against Babylon 5

Just when Sheridan and Delenn's relationship looks like it's going to the next level, Sheridan's "dead" wife arrives on Babylon 5 and throws a wrench into everything. Just when you think it's the end of their relationship Sheridan hatches a plan and what a plan. He sacrifices himself and blows up the home base of the Shadow creatures. It's heartbreaking as Delenn get's a goodbye message from him and he confesses his love for her.

Season 3 was an amazing season. They started giving us answers to things that we were introduced to in season 1. I know Sheridan isn't dead and it looks like Garibaldi is off to rescue him. Is the war over? Are the Shadows gone? Still have to deal with the corrupt Earth government. Can't wait to see where season 4 goes.

Serenity Comic, SDCC Tickets & Shorty Awards

The new Serenity/Firefly comic book mini series comes out today. It's going to be a six issue mini series hopefully it does well so they do another one. This takes place after the movie. I think they are releasing six different variant covers to issue #1. I need to makes sure I get to a comic shop soon and pick this one up. I have really enjoyed the previous Firefly comic books and I see no reason why I won't love this one as well.

Today at 10am SDCC 2014 tickets went on sale for "professionals". I was at my computer at 9:45 and clicking on the link just in case they opened early. Well at 10am on the dot I clicked the link and got in. I filled out everything and managed to get my free badge, a free guest badge (last year these were gone within a few minutes) and I purchased one other badge. I filled in all my credit card information and pressed the button.. I got a "processing" window but after a minute an error page popped up. I wasn't sure if it all went through or if I had to start over again. By this time five minutes had passed and when I went to select tickets again they were out of the "free" guest badges. But when I signed in to try and order tickets again I noticed that the information that I had put in earlier was still there.. it looked like my order went through before the site crashed.

So I waited a few minutes to see if I would get a confirmation email or something but nothing came. My friend Doug tweeted that his confirmation came instantly. That was disheartening so I figured I got screwed and would have to try and get "regular" badges when they go on sale next month. I fiddled around with the site and somehow managed to get a confirmation page to pop up for my order. I took a screen grab of it just in case they said I didn't have tickets.. but luckily a few minutes later I got an actual confirmation email with my barcode for all my tickets.. so I did get the maximum amount of tickets that I could get at this time, one free one for me, one free guest one for my brother and one paid one for my bestie Chris.

I was a bit stressed out when I didn't think my order went through but in the end I'm just glad I got my tickets for SDCC this year... now we need to get a hotel... the fun never ends.

Shorty Awards are still happening.. I'm currently in 18th place with 40 votes. It's a far cry from where I need to be to get into the top 4 but what can you do. I still don't understand why friends and followers aren't throwing me a vote since it's so easy.. but I guess they have their reasons. If you would like to nominated me for a Shorty Award you can just follow this LINK.. it only takes a few seconds... thanks.

Spent the evening at my buddy Robert's place eating pizza and wings and watching Babylon 5. Will do a separate blog post on my thoughts on tonight's episodes.

HIMYM, DMV, Storage, Mail and Great Friends

Started my day by watching last nights How I Met Your Mother and I have to say that was one of my favorite episodes of the series. It was titled How Your Mother Met Me and was all about the kids Mom. I love the actress they got to play "the Mom" and it was great watching how her storyline interwove with Ted and his friends storyline. I don't know if the writers planned all that but it was some very nice writing and storytelling. Of course they didn't meet yet and I know they are waiting until the final episode for these two characters to finally meet and I'm hoping the last line of the series will be.. "And that's how I met your mother"... End of Series.

I had a very productive day, first was a trip to the DMV. My registration for my car was due, I had to change my address on my license as well as my car registration and I've been wanting to get an updated photo for my license as I'm tired of folks not believing that the picture on there now is me  ---> . I made an appointment a few weeks back so when I got there I got in the appointment line which had only one person in front of me. A few minutes passed and a guy gave me a form to fill out and then a few minutes after that a number for one of the customer service people. I waited about ten minutes for my number to be called and I walked up to the window and explained all that I wanted to do. When we got to my picture on my license the woman looked at the picture and then gave me a smile. I said.. yeah I know it's long overdue for an updated picture.

I changed my address on my car registration and license and also got my 2015 tags for my car. I had to go to a different person to get my picture taken. Again the woman taking the picture looked at my old picture and asked when I took it. I told her it had been 20 years, 40 lbs lighter and a head full of hair. She kind of laughed and took my picture. I have to wait 10 or so days before I get my new license in the mail. And I have to say an appointment is the way to go. I got out of there in about 30 minutes total.

After DMV I headed up north to my storage unit in Santa Clarita to put my refrigerator back together and clean it up as well as my green couch as I need to get them up on Craigslist and sold asap. The fridge took some time to put back together and after cleaning it up I realized that we didn't do as much damage to it during the move as I thought. There is a rather large scratch on the front and a few minor ones on the sides and handles but overall it's not that bad.

I got an email informing me that the folks who purchased my house left some mail at their realtor's office which was about 30 minutes further north in Acton so I headed up there to pick it up. I am very thankful that the owners of my former house saved the mail for me as there were a few tax related forms as well as several refund checks adding up to about $1400.  I don't understand why the post office is not forwarding all my mail as I am getting some mail at my brothers house which is where I forwarded my mail to.

Talked with my buddy Erik via skype. We've been talking either by skype or phone since the day we officially met Jan. 4th (25 days ago)... he's pretty awesome!!

My friend Jen called me while she was driving home and asked if I wanted to walk around the park with her when she got home. I said of course, so around 8pm she stopped by my place and we headed across the street. We walked around the park five times ( probably 4 or so miles). We had a blast because when Jen and I get together we always have some very "interesting" conversations :)

After the walk we said our goodbyes and I came home to find my buddy Chris (who is currently abroad) asking if I wanted to do a skype chat with him. I haven't visually talked to Chris since new years and that was with a group. We haven't had any one on one time for quite some time so I was excited to be able to chat with him. It was only for a half hour but it was great seeing his face. I miss talking to him daily. It was a great way to end my night.

Maleficent Trailer, Shorty Awards and Sherlock S3

Disney released a second trailer for the new movie Maleficent with Angelina Jolie. I thought the first was was awesome.. this one is AMAZING!!!! The music is very ominous and chilling. I hope this is the tone of the movie. I can't wait to see this.

 

My friend Doug nominated me for a Shorty Award for Best Podcaster and I have been promoting it the past few days as you need to be in the top 4 to make it to the finals to be considered for the award. The current leader has 159 votes and I figured with 2500+ Twitter followers and over 800 friends on Facebook I'd be able to beat him easily.  Well it's not as easy as I thought. So far I've gotten around 24 votes and I appreciate each one of them. I just thought with so many followers I would be able to get a few more by now. I don't know why folks aren't voting for me.. maybe they don't feel that I am the best Podcaster and that's cool. I was just hoping for a better turn out and it's not happening. I'm not giving up I'm still tweeting and Facebooking about it and I will continue until the nomination part of this process is over on February 18th. I want to thank my buddy Dallas for promoting me on his Facebook and Twitter.. I really appreciate it. If you have a twitter account and would like to vote for me just follow this LINK... thanks

So you may have seen this tweet earlier today.. "My buddy @truebrixon just suggested that I get whored out for corndogs. Since he was whored out by his friends for cheese." Many of you asked what this was about and I told Erik @truebrixon that I would have to explain this in a blog post so here is it. I was talking to Erik tonight and he told me that there is this cheese truck parking in the hotel parking lot where he is staying and his friends "jokenly" said he needs to break in and get them some cheese.. he protests to they said he needed to woo the driver and he replied with... "So you want me to whore myself out for cheese" and his friend said yes. I then asked what could I whore myself for and earlier in the conversation we were talking about Disneyland corndogs so he said "why don't you whore yourself out for corndogs" and thus the tweet was born.

During the evening my friends Jes and Dallas come over to my place to watch the first two episodes of the new season of Sherlock. I had seen the first episode last week but the other two had not seen it yet. First up was S3 Ep1 "The Empty Hearse" Two years after the devastating effects of The Reichenbach Fall, Dr John Watson has got on with his life. New horizons, romance and a comforting domestic future beckon. But, with London under threat of a huge terrorist attack, Sherlock Holmes is about to rise from the grave with all the theatricality that comes so naturally to him. It's what his best friend wanted more than anything, but for John Watson it might well be a case of 'be careful what you wish for'. If Sherlock thinks everything will be just as he left it though, he's in for a very big surprise. 

So after the shocker that was the finale of series 2 I couldn't wait to see how they were going to explain how Sherlock faked his own death. I liked the opening scene when we see of "possible" explanation on how he survived. And later we get a "Slash" version of it and then again at the end, from Sherlock himself, but we are lead to believe he wasn't telling the truth.. so it's left to the views imagination as to how he did it. 

I have to say I love Mary, I think she's a perfect addition to the duo, now trio. She can stand her own against Sherlock. Jes informed me that the actress who plays Mary is actually Martin Freedman's partner of many years. That explains their great chemistry. 

Sherlock's surprising Watson and Watson's reaction was brilliant. I don't blame Watson one bit for beating Sherlock to pulp. Loved Detective Lestrade reaction to Sherlock surprising him. I liked that Sherlock teamed up with Molly to investigate some mysteries. And the end when Watson forgives Sherlock when he thought they were going to die. And during that scene I kept saying.. I hope Sherlock isn't playing with Watson but of course I should have known better. I can go on an on about how much I loved every aspect of this episode.

Oh and I loved the conversation between Mrs Hudson and Watson about him finding someone new and she asks what's his name and Watson goes on the defensive about not being gay. That's an on going joke from the very first episode and I love that they continue with it here.

All in all a great start to series three.

Next we watched S3 Ep2 "The Sign of Three" As Lestrade fumes over his constant inability to convict the Waters gang of bank robbers Holmes prepares for his role as best man at Mary and Watson's wedding. His speech, initially bizarre, turns out to be a moving tribute to his friend whilst he also contributes two anecdotes of recent cases, both unsolved. The first concerns a young guardsman whose life Watson saved after he was the victim of a 'locked room' attempted murder. The second involves a man who uses the identities of the recently deceased to date different women. As he looks around the wedding party Holmes suddenly realizes their connected solutions, which also involve Watson's former commanding officer, disfigured war hero Major Sholto. 

This was by far one of the funniest episodes of Sherlock. Sherlock's best man speech was awkward then sweet and once again awkward. Drunk Sherlock and Watson was the best. We got to see an entirely different side to Sherlock in this episode. I loved that these two different stories blended together into the third and main story of the wedding of John and Mary. I loved Sherlock's interaction with the bridesmaid. I got to see my favorite "bad girl" Irene Adler, even for just a minute.. it made me smile. It was a very touching episode, made me tear up several times but more often I was laughing out loud. The ending was very melancholy with Sherlock not sticking around and leaving the wedding reception alone.

I can't wait for the final episode of series three.... and then we have to wait once again for series four next year (hopefully) but I hear we might be getting a special Christmas episode.. here's hoping.

Booking My Trip To Ireland & The U.K.

I don't think I have mentioned it much on this blog but since my house sold I have been planning my ultimate trip to Ireland and The United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland). These are destinations that I have been wanting to visiting for almost 20 years. 

So tonight I jumped online and booked my trip. It was tough hitting that final confirmation button. As this is a life long dream, but I am currently out of work and have been for almost a year. The responsible part of me almost won out and I struggled with this for the past two weeks... but you know what, you only live once. I'm 43 years old and have never left the United States..  I have a bit of extra money (from the house sale) and I know if I don't go this time I'll regret it.. so I clicked the confirmation button... there is no truing back now.

The fun/stressful part begins... the planning stage. I'll be flying out on March 15th and retuning home on April 17th. Yes that's 32 days for this vacation. It's going to be EPIC!!!! And what makes this even more special is that my best friend Robert will be joining me for the first part of the leg. He also booked a trip to Ireland/England a few months back and at the time I wasn't sure of what dates I was going to go so we didn't plan anything together. But now that I moved my trip up our schedules aligned and we are now going to do Ireland together. I even managed to get on the same flights as him so we can travel together as well.. woohoo.

We fly into Dublin, Ireland on March 16th and we drive/train up to just outside Belfast were our friend Thomas lives. There are no set plans as of yet but Robert and I, and possibly Thomas will explore all of Ireland. We plan to rent a car and drive the entire coastline. We're going to to take a week to do this. After the week Robert is heading to London for a week and I'll be staying in Ireland a few more days to hang with Thomas before making my own trip to the Scotland,Wales and England. Not sure if I'm going to start at the top in Scotland or at the very bottom in England but I will be taking the next 3 weeks and exploring every part of that beautiful country.

And as you all know me, if you read my blog.. I'll be documenting the entire thing.. pictures and video blogs. I'm also thinking about doing some sort of podcast or something similar. I'm still in the very early planning stages for all this. All I know is this is going to be a trip of a lifetime and I can't wait for it to begin.

Podcasting, In-n-Out & Goodbyes

Today started in a panic. I am recording some MASH 4077 Podcasts today at 11am but I'm still not able to find my podcasting equipment, which is packed away in one of my hundred boxes. I looked a bit yesterday with no luck so this morning I was up early and as soon as Thomas got up I started looking again. I went through almost every box/bin and of course at fate would have it, I found the equipment in the very last box in the very back of the guest closet.

After my morning ordeal Thomas and I went out for breakfast once again to the NoHo Diner. On our way back we walked around the park. Once home I started preparing for the podcast while Thomas watched some more TNG.

Today my co-hosts and I were recording 7 episodes of our MASH 4077 Podcast. It's been a while since all three of us were together for a podcast as the last batch was missing Al. Two fun hours later we had seven podcast recorded. We had a blast recording these. I think the episodes are not only going to be informative but a lot of fun to listen to as all three of us just clicked. Now I have the fun part of editing these podcasts together before releasing them every two weeks. We're currently recording season 4 of MASH, we have many more seasons to cover and years left to record.

After podcasting I took Thomas to In-n-Out, I was surprised to hear he had never tried them. In all his visits to LA I figured he had to try them at least once.. but that wasn't the case. So we drove out to the one in Burbank as it was the closest to Airport and he was going to be leaving right after lunch.

He went for the full experience and got a Double Double. From the way he ate it (with in a few minutes) I'd say he liked it. But he had the same opinion as me.. There food is good but it's not the best ever hamburger by far. But at least he can now mark that off his list of things to do while in California.

After the late lunch I drove him to the Burbank airport and his mini birthday weekend with friends has come to an end. What is so great is that I will hopefully be seeing him in March sometimes if my travel plans pan out.. here's hoping.

It was great getting to hang out with Thomas the past few days. He needed a friend and a shoulder to lean on and I'm glad I was the one he came to for the support. I hope he had a fun weekend and was able to take his mind off things.

After I dropped of Thomas at the airport I came home and had my daily 2 hour Skype conversation with my buddy Erik, as always it's a highlight of my day/night getting to talk with him... good times are always had.

The only other HUGE thing to happen tonight is that I booked of my Ireland/England trip but I'm going to do an separate post about that.. so look for that soon.