Season's Greetings!

... and a happy new year too! I know it has been very slow here for the last few months, but thank you to anyone who actually reads this. My new year's resolution will be to post more often! I'm on Christmas break now so who knows what I'll have to share.

Pond Hockey!

First post in waaay too long! Feels bad man. Okay, I live in Minnesota, the "State of Hockey". So it's pretty big here. I'll admit that I like baseball and football more, but there's nothing better than lacing up the skates and hitting the ice. There's a pond in my back, backyard that we clear off in the winter to skate. We just got a good dumping of snow so today I got outside with the snowblower to clear it off. Here's what we got so far:



There's an island in the middle of the pond, so that's what that lump with pine trees on it is. As you can see, the ice is still crappy. After the initial cleaning off with the snowblower, I scrape off as much of the leftover snow as I can with a shovel. In the above pic, we have a bad situation. It got warm last week which turned the ice a little slushy. Then it snowed, creating a "crust" on top of the ice. To fix this I will have to flood the rink with a hose to make it nice and smooth. I will probably flood tomorrow. None of my family helps me prep this thing, mind you.

Soon she will be ready for action. We bought lights last year so we can play at night, the best time to play. I will probably keep you guys updated, if you're even reading this!

GIMP

Hello, world. I recently downloaded the program GIMP, as most of you know it is the cheap man's Photoshop. I've been playing around with it for a couple weeks and here are some simple pieces I have created. I do realize they are not good, but I'm still getting used to the program. Also, I haven't posted anything of substance in a while, so here is something to look at.

Update

Sorry I haven't posted anything in a long time. I've been held back by homework and such, thus I have not done any concepts. But I hope to start doing some things soon. Not sure what but I'm feeling creative. I had spaghetti for supper tonight, it was delicious.

How I Spent My Saturday...

Hello all, I haven't posted in a long time due to me starting school and getting back into the swing of things. Anyway, I had a pretty fun day yesterday, and I would like to share.



I went to the Gophers game yesterday, they played USC, the Trojans not the Gamecocks. Speaking of which, I think people should stop calling South Carolina "USC", because there is only one USC and it just confuses me when people call the Gamecocks "USC". But I will save this rant for another day. Back to my story. Daytime temps were in the high 50's, so it was a tad bit chilly.

I arrived two hours prior to kickoff, so I was able to enjoy all the activities going on outside the stadium. This was my second time attending a game at TCF Bank Stadium, my first was last season vs. Cal. We got lost on the way there and barely made it in time for kickoff, so yesterday was my first time really exploring the place.

This is a view of the back of the main video board. It is the 13th largest in the world, and from what I can tell, the 4th largest in college football. What I'm trying to say is driving up to the stadium and seeing this thing is pretty awesome. My camera died before the game started, so sadly I don't have as many pictures as I'd like. Surrounding the scoreboard is a nice little area with plants and rocks, it's pretty cool.

One fun thing about yesterday is that Sports Illustrated's college football experience tour was stopped in Minnesota this week. They had a tent and gave away free special edition SI's about college football, t-shirts, pom poms, caps, etc. Dan Patrick was there signing autographs, he seemed like a really nice guy. You could also get your picture taken with the Heisman. The line was really long so I didn't do that. I doubt it was a real Heisman Trophy though. They had that blimp flying above the tent, I took the picture with my phone.

The Big Ten Network also had activities set up to promote some show about the top 50 icons in Big Ten history. They had a gigantic bobblehead of Dave Winfield when he played for the Gophers, so that was neat-o. It was taller than me by a good two feet or so from what I recall.

So after checking everything out on the outside of the stadium, we ventured to the inside. The shape of the stadium is a horshoe, and the "top" of the horseshoe is just an open concourse with more plants and trees and things of that nature. We stood in front of the netting by the goalposts and caught the footballs as they tumbled down the net while the USC kickers practiced.



My uncle has had Gopher season tickets since last season, just because the stadium is the best. The view from the seats is actually pretty nice, and the seats have really thick padding on them, for your butt. But my favorite thing about the seats is that there is a cool lounge for the people that sit in that section. There's a concession/bar area in the lounge too.





The Gophers ended up losing 32-21. Not bad at all. Here are a few more pics to wrap up this post. Look for a report card for TCF Bank Stadium on Stadia Arcadia sometime soon!

Backyard Baseball Season Concludes

Summer has come and gone and so have the backyard baseball seasons for kids across the country. In my league we play 3-on-3 and use tennis balls and wood bats, with games being played in my neighbor's backyard. The field we play on is named Central Grounds, as it is in a central location everyone can bike to. Here is a look at Central Grounds.

Some of the quirks of our park include the three trees in right-centerfield. Pesky to both hitters and fielders alike. They take homers away from hitters but are also quite tricky to field because you never know where the ball will fall out. We also built a batter's eye which you can see in the picture. It's part of the fence so you need to hit it over. My neighbor's dad owns a snowmobile racing team so we use barrier fence that was used at some races. Dimensions are 160-148-148-152-160 so as you can assume, shutouts are our equivalent of a no-hitter and home runs are plentiful. Our league leader, Jake, who played on my team, hit 77 dongs over the 40 -game season. I had 46, coming in third place. As for my team, the Biscuits, we were the worst in the league but also led the league in homers.

Nike Pro Combat Recap and Reviews

Unless you live under a rock, you know that 10 Nike schools unveiled their Pro Combat uniforms for this season. I'll do a quick recap of each and rate them on a scale of 1-10. So without further ado, let the games begin. Note - Click on the school's name for a link to their Pro Combat page on Nike's website.

Alabama - So these ones are pretty lame. Anyone watching on TV won't be able to tell the difference, and quite frankly houndstooth is so unoriginal. Every 'Bama concept I see on the boards tries to be unique by using houndstooth. Well I have some news for you, it sucks. 3/10

Boise State - Now we're talking! Many people are upset about the fact that these are gray, because gray is not a school color, blah blah blah. If it's only going to be for one game then I don't have a problem with it at all. I'm digging the oversized helmet logo and the one blue sleeve. Pretty solid set for the Broncos. 6/10

Florida - Gator skin! Awesome! Well not really. It's definately an upgrade over their Pro Combat unis from last season (yep, the toilet seat pants) but this is a little blah to me. TCU was the first team to use reptile skin so I think they own the right to be the only team to use it. Florida goes a little overboard with the gator skin in my opinion, but it looks alright. I think it'd look cooler with white pants. 4/10

Miami - First of all, I don't like the green helmet paired with an orange monochrome uniform. But I do like the palm tree pattern on the green parts of the uniform. Overall it's kind of disappointing. I think they could have just made a home uniform of last year's PC and called it a day. Oh well. 5/10

Ohio State - I like the inspiration and simplicity of these. The number font is really cool, something I can't recall seeing before in my lifetime. Other than that there's nothing fancy about these, but I do like them. 5/10

Oregon State - Cool throwback inspired uniforms for OSU. The stripes on the undershirt is something that has been talked about before as a solution to the garbage-looking stripes we see on uniforms today. This will be a good experiment to see what they'll look like on the field, but I don't think they'll look so hot when it's all said and done. I applaud Nike for at least trying it out though. 6/10

Pitt - These are a magnificent piece of work. Exactly what Pro Combat should be. I like the steel beam-like helmet stripe and number font. These are just badass uniforms all around. 8/10

TCU - Cool last year, boring this year. Arguably the most unique Pro Combat uniforms from last season, but it's time for something new. I think Nike should have given a new Pro Combat to some other school if they were just going to basically reuse TCU's Pro Combat from last season. Regardless, they still look good. 7/10

Virginia Tech - Black for black's sake? Perhaps, but these still look great. The orange and maroon designs really pop on the black, making for one nice looking uniform. The computer chip pattern, or whatever you want to call it, comes off as a little too cheesy for me though. All in all a very sharp look for VaTech. 8/10

West Virginia - Personally, I think these are the best Pro Combat uniforms this season. The dusty coal looking pattern on the helmet is fantastic, I'll just put it out there that it is the coolest football helmet I've ever seen. Smudged black, as Nike calls it, on the rest of the uniform looks great too, especially on the numbers. The inspiration for this uniform puts it over the top. 9/10

Well there you have it. I can't wait to see these on the field.