August 20, 2009

Slalom

Mandy got up on one ski today! Mandy has been dropping a ski for awhile and got up on the old reliable EP combo slalom waterski. My parents gave me this set of EP combo skis for Christmas in 1988. I have taught quite a few people to waterski using them. ;-)

Posted by bourea at 03:29 AM | Comments (0)

August 17, 2009

Waterski Tournament / Rock Band Battle

At the final 2009 Ohio INT waterski tournament I skied a personal tournament best of 5 buoys at 15' off at 36 MPH. Mandy and my parents were able to share in my triumph. Unfortunately, it was too hot for little Barks to come. I was very happy to ski well and finish first in the Slalom Expert division this tournament stop. Larry rounded 4 buoys (with an injured shoulder) so 5 buoys was what I needed for a first place finish.

Larry won first in Ohio since he skied better than me over the course of the tournament circuit. I finished 2nd in Ohio in the Slalom Expert division. At the awards banquet they had a rock band battle for entries into the grand prize drawing to win a Hyperlite wake skate. Matthew, Mandy and I competed in the rock band battle with the song 'Living on a Prayer'. Mandy sung and played bass guitar. We won the battle and Matthew won the wake skate. It feels good to be a rock star!

Posted by bourea at 01:23 PM | Comments (0)

XBox 360 / NetFlix

The recent XBox 360 update drastically improved the on demand Netflix experience. You can now modify your instant play queue directly from the XBox itself. The Netflix user experience on the XBox is simple and user friendly although not as comprehensive as the website experience.

You can browse the top 50 films in a variety of categories. A couple of the categories are driven by movies you previously enjoyed and additional movies like that particular movie are listed. Kudos go to the Netflix team for a great job making Netflix even better. One additional feature I would like in the future would be the ability to search by title name or browse alphabetically. I am glad Netflix isn't a bloated hard to use product and I realize each feature has trade offs in terms of ease of use and simplicity. I trust the Netflix team to continue improving the movie experience without over complicating the user interface.

I heard that in November Netflix will offer HD streaming of 300 movies and TV shows further improving their stellar platform. I just need to upgrade to a HDTV.

Posted by bourea at 01:09 PM | Comments (0)