Holy Asian Prom Iron Man

I went to see Iron Man this weekend and I was pleasantly surprised. I haven’t seen any of the other Marvel inspired movies, but this one was done very well. It was actually pretty funny which is always good. Looks like a sequel is due out in a few years and I’m sure it’ll be worth the money.

On Sunday there was a prom going on at City Hall as there has been almost every weekend since I moved here. It was an all Asian prom, though I spotted the token white girl in the sea of people. Having a red carpet down a street where bums are living doesn’t scream “Prom to Remember” to me.

Matt Ryan is not worth $72million

As I mentioned in my pre-draft breakdown I am a firm believer that Matt Ryan is very overrated and will be a flop in the NFL. I don’t know if he’ll be as bad as Ryan Leaf, but he’s not Tom Brady. For some reason the Falcons think he is worth $72million. The fact that $34.75million of that is guaranteed is appalling. He hasn’t played a down in the NFL and wasn’t even that good in college, but yet he is making close to the salaries of Brady, Manning, and Big Ben. Last time I checked those guys where Pro Bowlers with Super Bowl rings and this was a 23 year old kid with ZERO experience. I think it is time for the NFL to follow MLB and the NBA with a rookie cap and make them get that maximum contract 3-5 years down the road when they earn it.

UpDown.Com

UpDown.Com is a really cool and fun way to get into financial trading with no risk. You get to invest $1MM dollars in stocks and play the stock market, risk free. There is the ability to socialize, make recommendations, and day trade like the pros. If you’ve ever wanted to test out your “strategies and ideas”, but where to afraid to invest real money this is the website for you. I have been playing for about 2 weeks and I’m up about $35,000 so far. Here are some of the stocks in my portfolio that have earned some big dollars.

AAPL
BHI
IACI
LUK

Bay To Breakers = $*it Show

So the ING Bay to Breakers race was this morning and goes right by the apartment. So I went down to check it out for about an hour and see the madness. While it seems like a ton of fun, and just a massive walking party, there were some things about it I didn’t get. ING should be ashamed to have their name on this event. ING is a financial institution with billions of dollars of revenue and being the title sponsors of an event with naked, drunk people parading down the streets isn’t a good fit. If I was a customer of ING I’d be taking my money elsewhere if they really think sponsoring this race is a good use of advertising funds.

Things I Saw:
- Some great costumes
- Lots of naked people, not sure why they thought this was a good idea
- Tons of kegs and stereos being pushed on man made makeshift floats
- People carrying full bottles of wine and liquor
- People climbing streetsigns
- People slipping in the pile of cups that were being thrown out
- A teeter totter serving beverages
- Roller skates, shopping carts, and any other object that could be used to pull stuff
- Kegs and more kegs

Things I Didn’t See:
- 1 cop. In my hour of being outside I didn’t see one cop
- People eating. Those people are going to crash pretty fast with all that walking and drinking but no food
- Very many registered runners

From the Official ING Bay to Breakers Website:

Is alcohol permitted on the course? No.
Are bicycles, skateboards or rollerblades allowed on the course? No. For safety reasons bicycles, skateboards and rollerblades are not permitted.
Are pets permitted on the course?No. Pets are not allowed on the course for their own safety and the safety of our participants.

Here comes H&M…

This week on The Republic reported that H&M will be opening at the Scottsdale Quarter in Spring of 2009. If you haven’t visited one of H&M’s 150 stores over the past 8 years you are in for a treat, maybe. Either you will love H&M or go in once and never again. Personally, I love it and so does my girlfriend. H&M has great fashion and low low prices. Everything from jeans to suits can be found, and at great prices. While often there is a hunt to find the right sizing, since many items have the European sizes listed as well, it is well worth it. I remember last year when the rumor of an opening at Tempe Marketplace surfaced but nothing amounted to more than that. While H&M is going to do great in Scottsdale/Phoenix, I’m not sure Kierland is the right place for it. I see H&M as a better fit at Tempe Marketplace, Desert Ridge, Mill Avenue, or maybe a stand alone. It isn’t upscale so I’m not sure how the snooty Scottsdale folks will deal with the low prices.

SF Weather

The past few days in SF have been amazing, well I guess only for me. It has been as hot here as it is in Phoenix and I’ve been able to wear shorts. Ace is loving the warmth and not having to shiver outside. It is so funny to watch people panting and downing water like it was 110+ degrees in July with dry heat. While I wish this would last, it has been kind of nice to be bundled up. I think the mid 70s pants and short sleeves weather is my favorite and the weather channel says that is what we will be having all next week, yay.

HTC Touch Diamond

HTC announced that it’s new Touch Diamond will come out later this year. This will be another new phone that Sprint will add to it’s revamped lineup that includes the Instinct that I wrote about earlier. All these new touch phones have one sole purpose, to compete with the iPhone. While I love the features and such, I am not sure I can get away from my Palm with the full keypad. Using the screen to type seems slow to me. I’ve seen people use the iPhone for the past 7 weeks here in SF like it is attached to their hand. I can type much much faster than they can and I’m not sure I want to give that up right now. HTC does have the Touch Dual which combines the touch screen and a small keypad. Hopefully the full keypad and crazy touchscreen is only a short while away.

AZCentral’s 2008 Readers’ Choice Awards

Every year azcentral.com does it’s annual awards. Here are some of my comments.

It seems liked a lot of new places won awards. I’m all for giving accolades to new, and upcoming spots but I think a place needs to be in business for a year to prove it can make it to get an award. Most businesses fail in the first year.

I find it interesting that a lot of the smaller, non Phoenix/Scottsdale businesses won awards. Either people in the outer communities are voting more, maybe they have have nothing to, or people are venturing out of their city limits to explore new businesses. I hope it is the exploring part because there certainly are some cool things outside the Valley.

What idiot is in charge of Arizona’s highways?

So this article came out a few days ago about adding ramp meters on the loop 101. I don’t know who thinks this will solve anything. The problem with the 101 is that there are too few lanes and too many idiots driving. Between the 51 and 101 I’ve never seen such poorly built highways. They were built too small for the amount of expected traffic and adding carpool lanes was a waste of tax dollars. I’d really love to meet the person who oversees Arizona’s highway and see if has a G.E.D. or is just naturally a moron. Good use of tax dollars, I mean money raised from speed cameras on the same highway. Are we going to then put cameras on the ramp meters to make sure people follow them? I’m sure that would be another great way to add revenues.

DMX Goes 114mph on Loop 101

I’m not sure if everyone saw this, but DMX was arrested for going 114mph on the loop 101 through Scottsdale. This happened between cactus, shea, and hayden around 830pm. Now I know from experience that getting to go even 70mph on the 101 is a hard task with all the traffic and congestion so I am going to give DMX some kudos for even achieving that type of feat. Too bad those darn cameras are there. I’ve been a victim of them too DMX, I feel ya.