uninteresting :: rich

eh, so i had my bachelor party about a month ago. it took a while to get all the pictures organized, but here they are. i’m happy (and surprised) that there’s a decent set of pics, because i don’t remember much picture taking going on.

there were 10 of us in total, a good mix of guys who got along well:

• Chris: who i’ve known since 1st grade
• Paul & Matt: the twins i’ve known since middle school
• Dr Jon: known since college, my bff-if-i-had-one
• Frank: SF party friend since about ‘97
• Davestar: met at Stanford grad school around ‘99
• Jeff E: another SF friend since about ‘00
• Jason: my brother-in-law since ‘03
• Jeff R: my cousin-in-law to-be

Oli & Rob should have been there, but it probably wasn’t the best place for folks on the wagon. and my brother Dave, well, Shanghai is a bit far to travel from.

it started Thurs night, with only Frank, Jon, Davestar and Chris in town. the suite at THEhotel at Mandalay Bay was swank. drinks were flowing from the minute our bags were put down around 5p. Davestar was christened IceMan (read: Ice Boy)…little did he know it would be his job all weekend long (to get ice). we hesitated at the fact that it was a non-smoking room for about 3 seconds. had dinner at Rum Jungle, then some gambling…money was lost all around. it was an early, mellow night.

Friday morning, Jason arrived (drove in from LA) with a ton of Costco supplies. booze, snacks, redbull. excellent. mozied on down to the pool for lunch and dropped more money at the poolside tables with bikini-clad dealers. we were already drinking all day, and when Paulie arrived we drank more in the hotel room. Davestar was MIA and finally stumbles back into the room, and he’s tanked. dressed for the night, we head out to Tao, which is apparently the highest grossing restaurant in the US. Chris made some friends while we waited forever for our table. we had crack with our meal. afterwards, we hit Olympic Gardens, and it was good. fast forward a few hours, Matt Henneman arrives, and we end up at Eye Candy (the club in the middle of the Mandalay casino). fat white chicks, group ornpay viewing and the Davestar russian whore incident.

Saturday was all about the sleep, and more sleep. then rally for the last night, and dinner at the excellent and reknowned Nobu at Hard Rock. afterwards, Mr. Edmunds provided the hook up at Penthouse Club - there’s our booth - and it was good. loves were found and lost, wallets emptied. overall, it was the defining moment (ok, maybe 5 hours) of the weekend.

and so it went, my bachelor party.

A welcome home BBQ for my baby

Originally uploaded by richlin71

she’s home! it sounded amazing. i can see the difference, and i think it’ll be a pretty significant ’shift’ for the both of us.

seesmic is a site where you have short video conversations with people from around the world. a little hard to grasp the concept of why you’d want to do that, but once you get it, it can get kinda fun. here’s a ‘private’ video chat between me & Oli that wasn’t so private. unfortunately, the embedded video doesn’t show all the hilarious replies from other people.

i’m checking out vimeo, which seems to have much better video quality than youtube. came across this amazing clip:

topography from Huba Gancsos on Vimeo.

#1 in under 5 years. not bad:

iTunes Store Top Music Retailer in the US

CUPERTINO, California—April 3, 2008—Apple® today announced that the iTunes® Store (www.itunes.com) surpassed Wal-Mart to become the number one music retailer in the US, based on the latest data from the NPD Group*. With over 50 million customers, iTunes has sold over four billion songs and features the world’s largest music catalog of over six million songs.

“We launched iTunes less than five years ago, and it has now become the number one music retailer in the world,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of iTunes. “We are thrilled, and would like to thank all of our customers for helping us reach this incredible milestone.”

*Based on data from market research firm the NPD Group’s MusicWatch survey that captures consumer reported past week unit purchases and counts one CD representing 12 tracks, excluding wireless transactions. The iTunes Store became the largest music retailer in the US based on the amount of music sold during January and February 2008.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.