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March 01 Dominick Joseph Sciortino III
Most of you know that my sister Jen (best sissy in the whole world) is pregnant. She was scheduled for her c-section, last Thursday, so my mom flew down to Baton Rouge and my dad and Deb drove down from Atlanta. Last Monday, I was able to book tickets, and decided to not tell any of them. (I like surprises -- ask Tiff & Trev)
Unfortunately, Aim had to stay in Denver, since her sister Jen was just arriving in town to visit for the weekend. :(
I took plenty of pictures, and called with a ton of updates.
I arrived in Baton Rouge Thursday afternoon, and after shocking my dad and Dominick, they secretly rushed me back to the prep room, and we popped the big surprise on my sister, who was about 5 minutes from being wheeled into the operating room. She, my mom, and Deb nearly died when I walked in the door. Everybody was crying - it was awesome. Perfectly executed surprise.
Four hours later, all 20 of us Marsells, Sciortinos, Hirschfelds, Bellangers, McQuiddys, etc..rushed in to meet the beautiful Dominick Joseph Sciortino III. We call him "Nick". He was born Thursday February 28th at 4:56pm, tipping the scales at 7lbs. 11ozs. and he is perfect. My godson is absolutely perfect...I was a gushing uncle, and still am. I was jumping at the opportunity to change dirty diapers, and hold him.
Jen is doing great, as is Dominick. They are so happy. We are all so happy, and we're so excited that we got to meet and spend time with what will most certainly end up the most loved baby boy in Baton Rouge.
Congratulations, Jen Bear, and thank you for allowing me to be part of three of the greatest days of my life. You and Dominick are the perfect couple, and now have a perfect addition to the family.
p.s. - for those of you who thought I'd come back to Denver immediately ready to have a baby, you're wroooong. I knew my will power would win out.
And, here's some video I shot on Friday night:
February 25 Now (Officially) A CelebrityI was on TV, tonight! I know...pretty cool, huh?
Our neighborhood (San Rafael) has been fighting to protect our zoning against big buildings and apartment complexes for just over a year. I enthusiastically joined the march last year, and after rounds of meetings, petition signings and yard signs everywhere, our City Council Meeting was finally tonight. Over 50 neighbors attended the meeting, and 26 agreed to get up in front of the city council and talk about our neighborhood needed to be protected. I volunteered, jotted down a few notes, and jumped up and spoke. It was totally fun!
The bill passed unanimously, and the wonderfully historic neighborhood of San Rafael is now protected by the OD-9 Overlay. Yay, us!
If you're looking for an autograph, contact my publicist at: baron_the_wonderdog@marsell.com.
February 05 iPhone FanboyAs you may or may not know, the iPhone
So last Tuesday I suck it up and buy an 8GB iPhone.
This morning, Apple makes the announcement that a 16GB iPhone is available to the public.
So, after a $100 upgrade and a $40 restocking fee, I'm the proud owner of a 16GB iPhone. If there's any technology that you're wanting to come out, and don't want to wait any longer for, just give me the money to buy it's previous version. That'll guarantee you that the new version will be released one week later.
Okay, back to the point. Having played with an 8GB for just under a week, I absolutely love this electronic piece of heaven. I ride the light rail to work in the mornings, and all of a sudden, I'm wishing my ride was longer than 7 minutes. Why didn't I have one of these when I lived 35 minutes from work.
On one single device, in a span of about 10 minutes, I can do all of the following:
- Send a text message to Ami and tell her I love her
- Take a picture of the bum passed out in the seat across from me
- Email that picture to ten friends (or at least Tiff)
- GPS my exact location on Google Maps, so I know exactly how close I live to my office
- Watch 1.5 minutes of an episode of The Office Season Three
- Listen to 30 seconds of my favorite Hillary Duff song
- Check the weather of Denver, Big Canoe, Playa Del Carmen, and Paris
- View my calendar items for the day so I know how many pointless meetings I have to attend
- Watch a YouTube video of Baron tearing through my living room
- Browse to ANY website on the internet and view their (non-mobile) version of the page
Yeah, it's that great. I love this thing. Is it the best gadget I've ever bought? I'm gonna say that it's right up there with my first MP3 Player and my Xbox 360, so pretty close. If you haven't played with one yet, stop by the Apple store and get addicted.
January 10 HD DVD vs. Blu-ray WarHappy Thursday! If you are considering selling an HD DVD player on eBay, you'd better get it listed today. Universal HD DVD contract expires (and most importantly, from last week) Honestly, I'm not sure how HD DVD could rebound from this chain of losses. It's not an official victory, yet, but I'd consider this one a foregone conclusion. As an owner of both Blu-ray and HD DVD, I really didn't care which one won the war, so long as the war ended. Looks like we're getting close. January 08 The Amazing BaronDecember 28 Avalanche vs. Red Wings 12/27/07
December 15 Ami Reacts to 2 Girls, 1 CupDisclaimer: If you go and find the video, you're on your own. Good luck and may God have mercy on your soul. December 11 Flogging Molly Live
Fortunately, we live downtown now. The Flogging Molly concert started at 8pm, and there were two opening acts. So, at 9:00, we threw on our parkas and the boots and trudged out into the silent, empty streets with one destination in mind. The Fillmore Auditorium at Colfax and Clarkson. We live on 23rd and Emerson, which is one block over and eight blocks up. Piece of cake. We walked two blocks and flagged down a fishtailing, smoke-ridden cab. :)
We arrived, and the second opening band was just finishing up. We hit the bar for two MGDs and two shots of Jager, and just hung out and talked until the sound check was over. We moved up to the first 1/3 of the hall, and squeezed our way into a pack of kids, right in front of the soundboard. When the band came out, the sound and view was perfect - not too close, to mistakenly end up in the mosh pit and not too far, to not be able to see their faces. If you've never been to The Fillmore Auditorium in Denver, you really have to see it to believe it. It was my first ever concert there, and the place was massive. I'm used to going to shows at The Gothic and The Ogden and The Aztlan, where everyone is crammed into about 2,000 square feet. The Fillmore holds thousands of people and used to be an indoor sports facility. It's standing room only, and the standing area rests beneath giant glass chandeliers, bathed in purple light. It's an amazing venue.
The concert was amazing. They played every one of our favorite songs, which never seems to happen at concerts anymore. They played "Seven Deadly Sins" as the encore song, which was the first Flogging Molly song I had ever heard and one of my very favorite songs. The sound was tight and every chord was legible - every beat on the accordion was clean. They played a total of about 20 songs, and they were all hits. It was like listening to a live album. I've been to alot of concerts over the years, from Rush to Ice Cube to Nirvana to George Benson to The Exploited to Wu Tang Clan to Jimmy Eat World to Circle Jerks to Outkast to Earl Klugh to Boyz II Men to Fugazi and on and on and on. The Flogging Molly show was definitely in the top five. November 30 A Fallen FriendI had a bad feeling, yesterday, when my boss Linc grabbed my arm and asked me if I could come into the board room for a minute. The first thing that popped into my mind was that someone on the team had given their notice. I wish it had been that.
Aaron P., one of my friends, and one of our team of developers had committed suicide. He hadn't been to work in a few days, and a good friend (and other co-worker) went to check on him and found him.
I was just starting to get to know Aaron, as our paths really just started to cross from some workgroups that we were in together. At first, I (admittedly) didn't get along with him because we were both strong personalities and in my experience, cocky guys don't always get along well with other cocky guys. Aaron was cocky, but that was cool because Aaron was smart and could back it up. He was young, so we all just kind of knew that he was proving himself, and he did. He was the kind of developer that always knew the cutting edge tools, way before you did. And you'd just sit in a meeting with him and nod, as though you'd heard of this killer app too, while secretly writing down it's name so you could research it when you got back to your desk. Believe me, I was guilty of doing this more than once.
So, now he's gone. And my heart hurts for the pain he must've felt that drove him to this. Those of you who know me well know that I've not had a favorable history with loved ones and suicide. I hate it. I hate it's essence and I hate that good people are so tortured inside that they fall by it.
My thoughts are with Aaron's family and his closest of friends. Especially his four-year-old son. His dad was a good man.
September 20 Mission TV Mount AccomplishedThis is kind of cool. I got a wall mount for our new TV and my good friend Austin helped me mount it last night. It's articulating, so we can turn the TV towards the kitchen when we're cooking. It also lies flat against the wall, when you're sitting in front of it.
It took us about 2 hours total to mount it. I think both of our hearts nearly stopped when we hung the TV and about thirty seconds later, one of the wall bolts pulled out of the wall. Yikes. Apparently, we had sunk the bolt into the edge of a stud, and it didn't have a full grip. Thank God we found it when we did, or Ami and I would've had a rude awakening at about midnight.
September 08 Our New House!We bought a house! Our closing is this coming Wednesday and we'll move in next weekend.
It is less than a mile from Lodo ("Lower Downtown Denver"), and walking distance to all of the buildings, restaurants, sports arenas and bars.
Here's a map, showing it's proximity -- the location is absolutely amazing.
We were very fortunate to buy in this terrible real estate market, because we got a brand new 3,000 square foot home in downtown. It was a headache selling our Highlands Ranch house, but it was SO worth it.
By the way, when you look at the exterior picture, below, we're on the right-hand side. The next door unit is owned by the builder, and from what I hear, it's a beast, at just over 4,000 square feet!
Come see us, we can walk to a Broncos game! Or Six Flags Elitch Gardens. Or an Avalanche game. Or the Denver Pavillions. Or the Art Museum. Or a Rockies game. Or the Zoo.
You get the point. :)
August 25 Goodbye Willowick HouseAfter five years, we are officially moved out of our Willowick house, in Highlands Ranch. A team of eight of us loaded up all of our belongings into a POD unit, did a final cleaning, and moved out at roughly 4pm.
It was a little bit emotional, doing our final walkthrough and seeing "our home" completely empty. Those of you who have been through it before will surely understand. When you finally close the door and shut the garage door for the very last time, the lump in the throat wells up. Maybe it's just because it was our first home...maybe it was because we were thoroughly exhausted, but driving away was certainly harder than I think either of us imagined.
But we did it. And we're moved in to our temporary home base, which is a Lodo condo, off of 27th and Blake. We are a stone's throw from Coors Field, and directly across the street from Ami's work. It's kind of cool being directly in the heart of the city. I've always lived in the 'burbs, so this is an entirely new experience for me. I'm excited - it's a taste of what's to come.
So, where does that leave us, now? Well the computer is up and running, the condo is fully furnished, and I'm about to hook up my Xbox 360, so life can go completely back to normal.
Come visit us. The location is fantastic! June 07 Europe, Part IIParis was beautiful!
We arrived on a bright and sunny evening, only to find out that sunset in Paris is around 10:30pm. Ami looks over at me, while we're eating crepes, and says, "What time do you think it is?" I guessed 7pm, only to find out it was nearly 10:15pm...not a big deal, just really weird, when you're used to an 8:30 sunset.
Our hotel was really close to the subway station, the Champs Elysees (say it with me - shawz elizay) and the Arc de Triomphe. We went up the Arc de Triomphe our first night, and the view of Paris was spectacular. We took tons of pictures of the Eiffel Tower, and just watched the city sparkle underneath us.
The next day, we took a boat ride down the Seine, visited the Eiffel Tower, and went on a hunt for what was supposedly the most amazing coconut ice cream on earth. We found it, a block from Notre Dame, and it truly was the richest, coconuttiest ice cream we'd ever eaten. There was shredded coconut blended right into the ice cream.
Oh, time out. I have to tell you about the Eiffel Tower. If you've never been there, as I hadn't, you probably have an image in your mind of how big it is. And, until you actually stand directly under it, you have no idea. It is absolutely massive. I must've snapped about 20 shots from underneath the tower, simply because I was in such awe of the size. (see pics, below)
Next day, we spent about an hour in the Louvre. It was amazingly busy, and we were somewhat "arted-out", from all of the museums we visited in London. We hit five major sites at the Louvre:
1.) Mona Lisa (overrated, in my opinion)
2.) Venus de Milo
5.) Mezzanine Bathrooms
After that, we blazed, for a lunch of baguettes with meat and cheese and crepes. Okay, while I'm talking about food, here's my story of crepes in Paris. Most of the busier areas have crepe stands, with fresh hot crepes. These are the only way to go - line or not, it's worth the wait. You can get a variety of toppings, from sweets to meats to just sugar. Ami's favorite was the lemon and sugar crepe, or sucre' aux limon. My favorite was the chocolate hazelnut crepe, or crepe nutella. Honest-to-God, we ate a crepe after every meal except one, in Paris.
Day four was spent at Disneyland Paris. As a thirty year Disneyphile, it was one of my favorite days of the trip. Stay tuned for a posting devoted just to this. It was a blast.
Finally, we took a leisurely stroll day, at the end of the trip. We happened upon a cemetery in the center of town. It was cool, but somewhat small and cluttered. I remembered hearing that Jim Morrison was buried in Paris, so I hit my trusty Blackberry, and we were off to the Pere' Lachaise cemetery. Buried within are Oscar Wilde, Frederik Chopin, Georges Seurat, Jim Morrison and many other famous Europeans. It was unbelievable. As you'll see, in the pictures below, the architecture was unbelievable and the entire cemetery was a photographer's heaven. I think Ami must've snapped 20 or 30 pictures within just one row of mausoleums.
All in all, we ate like pigs, walked like dogs, and really enjoyed each other's company in this wonderful city. I know I've missed some highlights that I'll just have to tell you about in person. Paris was a beautiful city full of friendly people that were eager to help a couple of Americans who were trying to speak their language and enjoy their customs. The city of lights was a great ending to a wonderful trip to Europe!
May 28 Europe, Part IWe're alive and well in Europe! As mentioned in my earlier post, we spent the first five days in London. The flight was a piece of cake, as we left Denver at 9pm and flew straight through the night. We slept most of the flight, and arrived into Heathrow at noon on Wednesday.
London was fantastic. After mastering the London Underground (the tube), we were able to move effortlessly around the city, visiting almost every museum and art gallery in the greater London region.
We went to Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, The London Eye, London Bridge, and just about every other big name attraction in London. The only thing we didn't do was visit the Tower of London. I refused to pay $32US (!!) to see the "beefeaters", ravens, and the crown jewels. I think that's close to what we paid for a full day at Disneyland.
Oh yeah, for those of you Harry Potter fans, we went to King's Cross station, which is where they filmed the scenes where the kids boarded the Hogwart's Express, in the movies. They actually had a Platform 9 3/4's, with a baggage cart disappearing into the wall! (See the picture, below)
Overall, we liked London. The british pound is valued notably higher than the US dollar. In essence, the cost to us Americans is roughly DOUBLE. For instance, when you walk into a restaurant and order a coke that costs two pounds, you are basically paying four dollars for that coke. Yikes. London is expensive. Oh yeah, and people in London are in such a hurry. Even New York has never seemed as fast paced (to me) as London. People nearly run on and off the subways to get where they're going.
We are now safely in Paris. A bit exhausted, but still having fun. It's been rainy since we arrived, but beautiful nonetheless. Stay tuned for Part II, with a summary of the Paris portion of the trip.
Au revoir!
May 21 Off To Europe!!Ten fabulous days and nights in London and Paris!
We leave tomorrow night, at 8:15 (Denver time) on a nonstop flight to London. We'll be in London Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Sunday morning, we take the chunnel train to Paris. We'll be in Paris Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. We then head back to London, and fly home Friday afternoon.
All in all, we'll be gone from 5/22 to 6/1. The house is on the market, and hopefully there'll be a handful of showings, while we're gone.
We'll take plenty of pictures...See you in 11 days! April 10 Cabo San LucasCabo was interesting. First off, I have to say, a vacation is a vacation. Regardless of the location, it's always great to get away, and be by the ocean for a few days.
That being said, I don't think I'd ever choose to be by the ocean in Cabo San Lucas, ever again. It is REALLY, really touristy and the local peddlers are over-the-top obnoxious. You can't walk five steps without being harassed by someone selling trinkets, gum, hats, taxi rides, silver, fishing trips, sunset cruises, decorative dinnerware, wooden snakes, braids, meals, or one of a million other things that apparently Americans think they can only find in Mexico.
There's nothing quite like eating breakfast, with a chain of peddlers standing at the foot of your table, shoving silver bracelets in your face.
Other than the constant barrage of harrassment from the local "merchants", it was pretty fun. We did an ATV tour along the oceanside that was totally awesome. Ami and I decided to get separate ATVs, and we had a blast, tearing up and down the beach. You should have seen her flying around on that bike, like a motocross pro...I was totally impressed.
Oh yeah, I ended up pulling an "Evil Kneivel at Caesars" maneuver and flipping my ATV, while being thrown about 10 feet onto the beach. I didn't get knocked out, so fortunately all that was damaged was my pride. That, and the clutch on the bike was a little hosed after I tipped it back over. Glad I bought the insurance! It was a riot, although a little painful.
The food was awesome, too. We ate fish, shrimp, lobster, ceviche, and about every other seafood available for really cheap prices. Most places had beers for $2 and tacos for $2, so we'd sample a whole bunch of different local favorites, and decide which ones were our favorite. If you've never had the chance to try chilaquiles, I highly recommend them. All in all, our eating excursions ended up to be one of the highlights of the trip.
More high-res photos at our Flickr account.
March 27 SurpriiiiiiseBack, last November (as I'm told), Tiffany and Ami joined forces to plan a surprise trip to Denver for my birthday. This past Friday, they sprung the surprise on me, and it was perfectly executed. My office-mate Tony was in on the surprise, and took me to lunch at a Thai restaurant about 10 minutes from the airport. At that same time, Ami picked up Tiffany and Trevor at the airport, and showed up at the Thai restaurant to surprise me. I was completely shocked. In fact, it took me about an hour to just put it all together and make sense of what was going on. To complete the surprise, Ami notified me that my boss was in on the surprise, and I had been excused from work the rest of Friday and all day Monday. NIIIIICE...three-day weekend with our best friends in the whole world. Again, life is good. So, in the spirit of my post-Disneyland blog, I'm gonna try and outline the top five moments of the best birthday weekend EVER:
Thank you Tiff and Trevor for using your free Southwest ticket to come out and make it an amazing weekend. And, thank you for spending several thousand dollars on meals, this past weekend. "$140 for chicken fried rice!!???" Also, thank you to my co-workers who played along to preserve the surprise. Thank you to my sister for the giftcard to Melting Pot. And most importantly, thank you, Ami, for putting together (and keeping) an amazing surprise...I love you! March 18 Big MarchIt's been a big month, so far, all leading up to my birthday, this coming Tuesday.
Congratulations to my sister, who found out she's pregnant! She's due the last week of October, in what will certainly be a very big surprise from the pumpkin patch. Oh, and thanks to her, for taking some of the heat off of Ami and I to have a kid.
Congratulations to Dave, on finding a great new job. His last company was terrible, so it's great to hear that he's re-energized, and loving his career again.
Congratulations to Ami for having a fantastic yearly review, which promises REALLY BIG things in the coming months.
Finally, congratulations to my company, IP Commerce, for sealing up some huge deals that will lend themselves to big successes for us, down the road. Also, we had HUGE advertising coverage this month, with full page co-Microsoft spreads in US News and World Report, and the inside cover of this week's Newsweek!
The weather was 73 yesterday, and is 76 today, for a beautiful mid-March weekend. Ahhh, life is good. :)
February 16 This is Just Wii-diculousI wanted a Nintendo Wii so bad for Christmas, but I refused to pay a penny of markup. I waited and waited through the holidays, and couldn't seem to get my hands on one. Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years -- I searched for one in Atlanta, Denver and Phoenix, with no avail.
Finally, a few weeks ago, Ami and I were at the Del Taco on Broadway and Bellevue and she said, "Let's try the K-Mart next door". So, we trudged into the ghetto-ass-nastier-than-wal-mart Super KMart, and back to the electronics department. Sure enough, they had 5 or 6 of them available, so I picked up one for myself and one for my friend Austin.
So, now that I got my Wii, what do I think?
I'm not a fan. Don't get me wrong, I'm faithfully playing the Zelda game, and it's definitely a fun game. The fact that I have to swing my arms at the screen to use the sword feels and looks super gay. Thankfully, the gameplay is fantastic, or I'd have returned the Wii a week after I got it. Maybe I'm just lazy, or maybe I just hate exercise, but when I'm gaming, the last thing I want to do is break a sweat.
I'm keeping my Wii |
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