My blog n'at

One thing that I’m bad at is remembering the year. I kept thinking it was 2010 for some reason and have no idea why 2012 doesn’t seem far fetched. Maybe I have a thing against years with odd numbers? This past year was eventful personally but when it came to blogging it was kinda meh. Either way here’s a quick recap so my kids don’t have to sift through archives.

January 2011
Year started off great with the Winter Classic (even though Pens lost) and spending the first 2 weeks home with my new baby. I also decided that I would attempt to go a full year without drinking a Bud/Miller/Coors product. Not to be some elite prick but to see for myself how tough it would be. With the amount of picnics we attended and moments of weakness for going cheap I’m proud to say I’ve made it a full year and some days.

February 2011
Kept the busy pace with a quick trip to Baltimore to pick up the first of what would be many awards for a website I made. Even thought it was winter I was falling in love with the city. I will be going back soon. I also hit my mid 30′s while only suffering a minor “oh shit, I’m getting old” moment and Teaspoon got his first haircut while hitting the terrible 2.

March 2011
2 things happened, we got sick and I ate a lot of fish.

April 2011
My mom wanted to know why I didn’t invent Facebook, the internet or cure cancer. I had some views on the sale of Iron City which turned out to piss off a bunch of yinzers and Pittsburgh purists. Eh, it happens.

May 2011
Should I Drink That turned 5 years old on the 5th and we had a whirlwind bash in Boardman, Ohio as we took over the Big Tap In after party. We cracked open a 101 oz bottle of Double Arrogant Bastard that we have been sitting on for 4-5 years. It came with a padlock. Nuff said. I figured out how you can take a trip with Megabus to Erie (or Pittsburgh from there) and have a very low cost time. I celebrated national Craft Beer Week and if you haven’t heard me talk about it yet, am on the planning group for Pittsburgh Craft Beer Week coming in 2012. This month also was record breaking numbers as we raised money for March of Dimes which helps preemies such as my boys.

June 2011
After many years of hard work I graduated cum laude from college. It was incredibly stressful when I threw work and the family into the mix but the support was fantastic! I’ll probably have my student loan bills paid off when Teaspoon is starting school.

July
We did that moving thing which pretty much consumed our entire month and turned in our keys to the skid row of Cranberry. The sky was more blue that day and birds chirp was sweeter. SIDT was featured as a “What’s Hot” on iTunes. I think the summer heat made people delusional

August
I had my first tour of the Pens new home, Consol Energy Center. This was big for me because, well hockey is life.

September
Its official, baby 2 is on the way. We had known for a few months but finally made it public. Steel City Big Pour 4 was a huge event for SIDT. Our second booth allowed us to play more with the live podcast plan. Well recorded live but it was still cool to have beer runners and brewers coming up asking to talk to us. All of this was made possible from our live debut at the Big Tap In back in April which we’ll be doing again in 2011. I did my first solo session at Podcamp Pittsburgh. It was a blast because for once I wasn’t talking about SIDT but social media in higher ed. I love social media. I love to talk about it and I love help people understand it. I should probably be charging for it but honestly with my schedule its more of a hassle to figure out a rate structure. Though, that was 2010 thinking, we’ll see about 2011. Daddy has some diapers to pay for

October
Fun thing about being a dad, taking the kid to the pumpkin farm. Pens open their new barn and while I loved the place there was a lot to work on. I found my first grey hair. *UGH* 5 year wedding anniversary proved that we just lost track of time making babies. I found something in my basement while cleaning that was totally badass. A rather preggers Lushie chased kids down the street for smashing our pumpkin and made one wet his pants.

November
Lushie and Jackson went away for one last weekend so I lived it up and had some of the best Pho in the area after a night at the BEV Lounge. Teaspoon microwaved his sneakers and I haven’t stopped laughing since. Lushie was told to take it easy so I cooked the entire Thanksgiving meal. Everyone survived. SIDT was named a finalist in the Podcast Awards for the 3rd time.

December
Lushie and I took an afternoon to ourselves and visited the Vatican Splendors. Most people don’t think of me as the religious type but hey, you learn something new about me. We took our former landlord to court and won our security deposit back. Funny that we had to “win” back our own money rightfully owed to us. It also taught me about how dishonest and shady people can be even when they swear they’re honest. This Christmas holiday I also got the greatest gift of all, my son Owen. With that I published a log of everything I was thinking from conception to birth. Final cap of the year was getting tickets to the Winter Classic Alumni Game and Winter Classic.

2010 was an incredibly busy year. More than we ever anticipated and I’ve never been so overwhelmed in my life. Its because of everything I have learned this past year that in 2011 I’m going to shift gears and focus more on my family, the house and my career. I graduate in June so that will be one burden off my shoulders. School, work, buying a house, moving, trying to get it organized, having a baby, trying to get SIDT to the next level and getting a side writing job off the ground was intense and I realized I need more balance.

We’ll see what 2011 has in store.

Winter Classic Game album | Alumni Game album

The Winter Classic is quickly becoming the Super Bowl of the hockey world. I couldn’t make it to Buffalo for the first Classic game and the last couple years I would watch the game but I was never “into” it. This year with Pittsburgh hosting all of that changed. I’ve been to a lot of high profile hockey events in my days and will say that this was the most incredible ever.

I walked over from town on a night filled with a mystifying fog lingering over the rivers. With the lights of the bridges and city glowing it was a scene reminding me of a Crow movie. As I passed PNC Park the tailgating began and what a party these people were having! The amount of hockey love was amazing! Still the vibe didn’t hit me until I reached Heinz Field and walked through Spectator Plaza. Knowing this is a growing event I appreciated what was there but could see how the NHL could have dominated a lot more floor space.

Signature Sandwich Face-off
In a first for the Classic, Aramark pitted the signature sandwiches from the Washington Capitals (The Fury) against the Pittsburgh Penguins (Kielbasa Grinder). Its no secret that I am obsessed with the sandwich but I was severely disappointed with the offering at the Classic. The meat was dry, the cheese was hard and there was barely any sauce. Somehow it won though so kudos for that.

The Game

I went to the game with my nephew Ben. We have started making it a tradition going to important Pens games together and this was another one to chalk up. Our seats were in 147 which if you go there for any other event don’t exist. If you’re watching the Steelers game its the open end section of the south end zone. Seats were incredibly tight (dude next to me was 180lbs and barely fit) but the view was absolutely amazing.

Besides the Caps winning 3-1 the game was hard hitting and amazingly fast given the poor ice conditions. Officiating was mediocre which we’re use to and probably to the disappointment of HBO/NBC you didn’t see much from Crosby or Ovechkin. At the end of the game neither team shook hands, they just left the ice. I have a severe hatred for the Philadelphia Flyers but the joy I see in defeating the Caps grows every game. Pens fans hate Philly because that’s history. Its just what you do. Caps players and their fan base hate anything Pittsburgh and I LOVE it. It makes for a healthy obsession with my team.

In between periods were short sets performed by Hinder, The Clarks and Styx. Styx? yeah I guess they thought it was a Steelers game. The bands sounded great but that happens when everyone does the lip sync.

What I wasn’t crazy about
You take the good, you take the bad and… that song is now in your head. You’re welcome.

1. Heinz Field needs upgraded. It was great 10 years ago but I’m still pissing in a trough, your concession stands don’t take credit/debit cards and your Nacho Grande is 2 cups of cheese? Your sound system crackles and the video was 3-5 seconds off of the audio. It was worse than watching TV and listening to the radio. Lame.
2. Alyonka Larionov – who hired this girl? The most basic video segments and she fumbled over all of them. You called the band “The Styx”? Were the cards in Pittsburghese and you couldn’t read them? You’re not that cute. What a joke
3. The Franco Harris/Jerome Bettis shootout – Who’s idea was THAT debacle?
4. rain – mother nature you were a pain in the 3rd.
5. Cell coverage – my phone showed 4 bars and 3G coverage but I couldn’t upload anything and twitter was impossible. Its worse than Consol Energy Center. Verizon should spend more money on coverage than on advertising being a top sponsor.

The weekend was absolutely amazing and I will never forget the hockey love that took over the north shore.

New Year’s Eve 2011 will go down as a crazy day.

First off we have the debacle that was the 2011 Winter Classic Alumni Game. John and I arrived 1 hour before the game started and walked around to see the booths and overpriced swag that was for sale. At 9am we made our way to the gate and found ourselves in the middle of a near riot.

There was only ONE gate open for 10,000 people to enter. Doesn’t seem like an issue but apparently that plus a couple turnstiles lead to a total bottleneck that ran over an hour wait for some people. The game started at 9:30 and it wasn’t until almost 10am that we got in. I was reading tweets from people inside the game to get score updates and fans wondering where everyone was. A good 60% of the fans were still outside.

Check out the quick video of the Winter Classic crowd outside I shot with my phone.

Oh wait it gets better. So not only did we miss all but 6 minutes of the 1st period in which the score was 3-3 but then they only played 2 periods and it ended in a 5-5 tie! The guys all wanted to play more but one made the comment in an interview that the NHL said no. So for $25 + 20 in ticketing fees from Ticketmaster per ticket I saw 26 minutes of hockey most of which was spent watching on a scoreboard. The audio and video were way off sync, the food was bad and the mics barely worked.

The NHL and Heinz Field were a complete FAIL on this event and I hope for the sake of the 70,000 fans coming to the Winter Classic that they get their shit together. Heinz Field should stick with the football business and keep entertainment to the professionals.  Can’t even buy anything with an ATM/Debt card.  What a joke this place is. Another thing they should take lessons from the Pens on.

At least the seats weren’t bad.

Thankfully the night was better and I got to spend it with my boys (Teaspoon was sleeping at this point)

And a delicious beer

I’ve never been a big Christmas person. In fact the holiday would annoy the shit out of me every year because of how fake everyone was about being good and giving meanwhile the uber obsessed ones would drive me insane with their bat shit craziness like most of Steelernation. It wasn’t until I started having a family that this would change and while I’m still a bit “meh” I’m coming around.

This year was different. This year I was stunned!

Before I started break from work I received some monumental news from a co-worker that I can’t say until its “officially official” but will hint that.. no I won’t. You’ll have to wait. Then I won $20 on a $3 scratchoff card Lushie got me as a stocking stuffer and $35 from a football pool that my mom apparently entered me in at the church I belonged to in Erie. I was feeling pretty good by this point and as a small family we had a great Christmas day.

We celebrated Christmas at my bro’s a little late because my mom was sick. What I opened as my present left me stunned. I will be attending the Winter Classic on Saturday with my nephew/godson Ben. What a lot of people don’t know is that as a Pens ticket holder I was offered tickets in the summer and had to say no because it was too close to Lushie’s due date. I was devastated as a hockey fan but knew this is one of those things I had to do. My freaking kid could be born, I’m not missing it! I was bitter for awhile and refused to even read coverage.

I started to get angry. I told a few people on Facebook/Twitter about it and was actually called “stupid” and “dumbass” for passing up on such an event. The bitterness grew but by taking a step back I realized it wasn’t Pens fans saying it, it was the Steelers fans who jumped on the band wagon. People can be brutal on the interwebz

Back to the ticket. So I sat on the couch stunned. My brother said that the family will make sure that if Lushie goes into labor that a plan was in place to make sure I don’t miss the birth.  I was speechless. Not because I had a ticket but because my family pulled together to make sure this happened and I had no idea. Some may think that a game like this is trivial but unless you’re married to me you have no idea how many things I have had to turn down.

And then…

Lushie went into labor at my brother’s. She didnt say anything just in case it was a false alarm but around 6pm she said we needed to find a sitter. By 4pm the following day my 2nd son was born.

This Christmas I’ll be in hockey nirvana. Friday I’m going to the Alumni Game with my good bud John, Saturday I’ll be at the Winter Classic and I have a new healthy son.

I probably could have worded that better but I won’t. That’s exactly how I feel right now.

I will not being going to the Winter Classic with the ticket I was offered through the Pens by the NHL. If you know me I would go to the ends of the world for my Penguins (I’ve been a ticket holder for 10 years and sat through the no playoff debacle, I can say they’re MY Pens) but here is why I gots to do what I gots to do… n’at.

When the email came out I was getting a ticket because of my season ticket holder status it was like Christmas morning. the details were sketchy but I was happy. Early August came and the invoice showed up. $140 for 1 ticket! Heck it’s the Winter Classic in Pittsburgh I cant miss this! Then I continued to read. I’m in the 500 level at the top. That’s right, the far back corner at the top. Lovely eh? Whatever, I was still happy because I was going. Then the shocker. Money was due August 25th (that would be today). That’s in between pay periods for me. UGH!

I called the Pens to see if there was anything they could do with the due date since I would get paid in a couple days. I thought maybe some Ticketmaster giftcards I had or add it to my ticket package would work. A very snippy ticket rep (she was probably tired of these calls) told me this was an NHL event, not a Penguins one and that if I didn’t pay by the 25th I would lose my seat.

Lushie and I sat down to see if we could make it work. I had sold some school books online so there was extra income but I thought about it and finally stopped. Why am I going through all of this trouble trying to figure out how to get money together for a game? Its not that I don’t want to go bad enough, it comes down to responsibility. I just finished moving, we still have a lot we need for the house plus a kid on the way in January. I could borrow it but since we started saving for the house last year its been a “If I don’t have the cash, I wont do it” mentality. No charging. Yeah I’m missing out on some things but so what, I need to do whats best for the house. (Holy shit, when did I become an adult). Now the NHL thinks they can give me 2-3 weeks to come up with $140 without any prior indication of what we may be paying besides rumors on the internet?  Screw that.

The NHL doesn’t care. They know the seat will get sold and that’s what counts. I’m tired of how half assed the league keeps doing things. It sucks when you get 2-3 weeks notice that you have to make a payment on playoff tickets for the Pens but we know what to expect to spend at least.

So thank you NHL and the decision makers for this. Thank you for having an unrealistic approach for ticket holders of the teams involved.

I’ll find someway to get into the game but it’ll be on my own terms. I’ll still buy the hat and the shirt because I support hockey and am a cheerleader for Pittsburgh. Besides, sitting on my couch with Teaspoon is a great way to watch hockey.

I just hope Lushie doesn’t go into labor…