We took a little trip down to Baltimore this week, with our original goal being the procurement of an Adam Jones bobblehead from the O’s/Mets game. Naturally, Eddie Vedder decided it would be a good week to schedule some solo shows at the Lyric Opera House, too. Add in some bowling, a trip to the National Aquarium, and a drive up to York to visit Kree, and you’ve got one of those fun vacations that leave you completely drained.

Eddie Vedder kills the Lyric

While Mundis and I failed to land tickets to both Sunday and Monday’s shows, we did get to go to the second night…and it was awesome. Mundis initially thought that Monday’s show was better than both of the Chicago shows, and he very well could be right. The crowd was much better than the Chicago crowds, which could be a big part of our reasoning. While there were still the constant requests for songs, it was nowhere near as obnoxious as the drunken morons that ruined the crowds at the Auditorium shows in Chicago. Even the large guy who smelled like cheese sitting next to me couldn’t ruin such a good show.

As usual, Vedder was on. The Lyric, as a venue, simply made his voice sound that much better, too. He refrained from playing a lot of the songs that I hate hearing, and played a few that we didn’t hear when we were in Chicago last year. It was essentially the same exact concept as in Chicago, but with a varied playlist – same opening act, same backdrops, same stage set, etc., so there really isn’t much to add to our experience. Liam Finn was entertaining, and we even got to briefly meet him after his set. Nice guy…too bad Vedder going on cut our time together short.

If you haven’t seen Vedder solo, get a ticket…that is, if he ever tours solo again. I’m willing to say that I’ve enjoyed his solo shows more than nearly every Pearl Jam show that I’ve seen. Maybe it’s the jaded Pearl Jam fan in me…maybe it’s the intimate setting…who knows. He’s just so much clearer, and much more musically powerful, when he’s not fighting the noise around him. His personality opens up a bit more, and he’s a lot more entertaining than you would think if you had only seen him front Pearl Jam. It’s really all about the emotion shining through, though. Despite all of the drinking and smoking, he can still use his voice to carry a room like very few people.

National Aquarium

Fortunately, we had a day to waste in Baltimore between the Vedder show and the O’s game, so I used the random Tuesday to finally get back to the National Aquarium in Baltimore. I hadn’t been there since I was in high school, and I could never work out a way to get back…until now.

It was more or less exactly the way I remembered it, though, so it was fun…juuuuuuust not nearly as much fun as it was when I was a kid. I was also a little bummed that some of the sharks weren’t in the tanks…no hammerheads or threshers – the sharks were always my favorite. Fortunately the jellyfish exhibit, which happened to be the last thing we saw, was awesome! I can say that jellyfish officially freak me the hell out, but they’re wild to see in a closed environment. The price of admission seems a bit high, but it was still worth it, even if just for the nostalgia.

A night at Camden Yards

The original purpose of the trip was to take a trip to Camden Yards to see the Orioles, and more importantly, pick up the Adam Jones bobblehead (which is frickin’ awesome, btw). It was awesome to be at an Orioles game again. Fortunately, we had seats covered by the upper deck, so watching the O’s beat the Mets in the rain with Mundis, my Dad, and Megan went smoothly. We also got to see Matt Wieters’ first career home run! I’m 2-0 when attending O’s games the last two years…maybe I should go more often.

Last night was out of control. After watching the Pens lose every Stanley Cup Final game at the Double Wide Grill in Southside, our hockey fan idiocy forced us to search for a way to break the bad juju that we had decided forced those losses. Naturally, we blamed the poor results on the Double Wide, so we were forced to watch game 7 somewhere else. Having witnessed the Pens come-from-behind 7-6 OT victory against the Wings earlier in the season at Harris Grill, we decided that was our best bet. Besides, who wouldn’t want to watch the Pens beat the Wings over a delicious serving of mac & cheese?

We gathered up the finest crew and headed over early to snag seats at the bar. The game was simply unreal. The Pens victory made any hint of regret at the money we spent going to games dissipate in the mist of beer-soaked celebrations. Harris Grill is far from your ideal “sports bar”, but it didn’t matter…the place was jumping. We immediately headed to Southside to partake in the victory celebrations going on in the streets.

Naturally, I missed the Steelers celebration after the Super Bowl, but I wasn’t going to miss this…I actually wanted the Pens to win. The scene was ridiculous, with the police in full riot gear forcing people off of Carson St. and into the alleys. We saw a guy get run over by a Ford Explorer after he fell while trying to jump into the back seat of said vehicle while holding a beer…he got up walking quite awkward, but claimed he was okay. Ha ha…sure you are, dude. It was just nuts down there. We didn’t see any car flipping or couch burning, so the cops seemed bored, but it was a lot of fun to be in the midst of such a wild celebration…especially on a Friday when you don’t have to go to work the next day!

I’m still in disbelief over the win. To get there again, and actually pull it off…in Detroit…in game 7…unreal. It’s the first time where I felt united with my fellow Pittsburghers. It’s just a shame that football season is going to come along and make me dislike this town again. Ha ha.

Until then…I’m going to celebrate this victory, and I look forward to watching the DVD that’ll inevitably come out!

I’ve already been raving about how amazing the Stanley Cup Final has been, but it just keeps getting better. With a tight 2-1 victory last night in game 6, the Pens have forced a Stanley Cup-deciding game 7, and I can’t wait…

Game 6 was everything I could’ve asked for in a game. It was physical, fast, and close. Fleury’s save with just over a minute left in the game pretty much sums up how insane and exciting hockey can be. From my seat, you could only watch the crowd reaction from behind the far goal for any idea of what happened. The Pens are up 2-1, and the momentum is in the balance…possibly the series…

Save.

Holy crap.

The Pens are going to win game 6!

It was absolutely beautiful to watch all of the Wings fans who had come to Pittsburgh fully expecting to watch the Wings lift the Cup again – and pay upwards of $1000/ticket to sit in A – go home in complete disappointment.

Speaking of seats…I was fortunate enough to land the best seat of my season. After having lady luck shine down on me during the drawing for AE box tickets for game 4, she brought out the spotlight for game 6. With Megan in NYC for work, I only had to pick up one ticket, but the ticket prices had skyrocketed as the end of the series drew closer. I kept Ticket Exchange open all day, but the cheapest single seats were holding steady at over $400 for crappy seats.

Just as I was about to settle for a $421 ticket in E, I refreshed the page to find a single ticket…going for face value…in A15…row E…five rows from the glass…Pens shoot twice side! For $385 I was able to watch the Pens force game 7 at the same level where I fell in love with the game! It also gave me an opportunity to test out the new lens from a closer point-of-view. While football season seems like a distant memory, I have to say that right now there isn’t a better game to watch than hockey…especially if your team is the Penguins.

When I decided to stop using Davis’ old equipment – after the first night of my first non-PSL league a few years ago – I purchased my bowling balls from Bill’s Pro Shop at Mt. Lebanon’s AMF Lanes. I had been using those same balls since, improving steadily along the way, but heading into a new PSL session, I decided it was time for a fresh start. Unfortunately, Bill had left Mt. Lebanon lanes to open his own bowling alley, so I had to find him. Davis had told me before that it’s tough to find a good pro shop guy who can drill correctly, so I needed to stick with the same person. The brief search led me to Legacy Lanes – Bill’s brand new bowling alley.

Before we even made it down to the pro shop, we were amazed at the facilities. They had completely gutted and rebuilt every aspect of an old dilapidated bowling alley. New lanes, the most modern Brunswick displays and setters, a sweet bar, private lanes, laser tag, etc. It was ridiculous…especially after having only been in the most beat bowling alleys that Pittsburgh has to offer.

Our trip to the pro shop provided us with even more insight. Turns out that Bill typically keeps 4 of the lanes oiled up with one of the sport shots for some of the regulars that come in to practice for tournaments. He even said that you could call ahead, and with a days notice you can get any shot that you want laid down. For those of us not accustomed to such serious bowling accomodations, it was like a bowler heaven. Ha ha.

Bill is also an awesome pro shop guy. He was able to pin-point issues immediately with the drilling of Megan’s old ball just by watching her release. He drilled everyone on the Nine-Dash Heroes’ new balls, and everyone seems happy with the result. With Megan and Sam ditching the plastic for entry-level hook balls, and getting their new balls drilled fingertip, we’re looking to improve our team average by a lot once they get a hang of it.

Anyway, I plan on bowling at Legacy quite a bit now that I know of its existence. I might’ve worked my way up to being a 200+ bowler on Arsenal Lanes’ house shot, but I’m not even close to being able to claim that I’m a good bowler…as evidenced by the poor scores that I’ve put up when trying to roll on my first sport shots. I want to improve, and the only way to do it is to have access to the conditions that Legacy is willing to put out. With my new, more aggressive ball (Rogue Cell), I look forward to working my way back up!

Last night we met up with Barbato & Kromer to check out The Black Keys show at the Three Rivers Arts Festival at the point.

As I stated last August after they played AE’s NAMU festival, I’m just not that impressed…which sucks, because I really like their studio stuff. The Black Keys live, though, is just a sloppy exhibition of noise. Simplicity can be amazing at times, but every song live is basically a run-on sentence filled with distortion and simple drums under an umbrella of ringing cymbal noise. Even the songs that I absolutely love get butchered with sub-par vocal performances and disjointed, overwhelmingly careless guitar playing. They just haven’t done justice to their own music – which is awesome in the studio – the two times that I’ve seen them.

What’s annoying is that while I’m 0-for-2 in the “will The Black Keys impress me?” challenge, a search on youtube will result in some good performances, like the following – which is one of the better performances I’ve seen and one of my favorite songs of theirs:

I love the hard-hitting, in-your-face approach…just not the execution. I’m totally cool with low-fi production, too, but I still need to feel it. For now, I’ll just continue rocking out to their CDs and wait until the next free live show to give them another chance. Third time has to be a charm, right?

You constantly come to new realizations as you grow up, mature, and experience new things. One of those things that I’ve learned is that live NHL hockey is by far the best spectator sport you’ll find. I love football, too, but hockey still gets my ticket money. Especially when your team is good…and even more so when you’re talking about the Stanley Cup Final! It’s also nice when your new camera lens shows up, so you can take better photos from section D!

Mario Lemieux drop the ceremonial first puck on Tuesday:

I was fortunate to go to games 3 & 4 here at Mellon Arena this week, and all I can say is “WOW”. The Pens entered their 2-game home stand down 0-2, and knowing that the only way they were going to have any chance of a repeat loss to the Red Wings in the Finals was to win both games…and that’s exactly what they did. With a boisterous crowd at the Igloo, good bounces, and improved play, the Pens managed to prove that they deserved a second shot at the Red Wings.

Game 3 wasn’t the best game of the series, but they got it done. Mario Lemieux dropped the ceremonial first puck to get the night started, and the excitement was just boiling over after that. After missing the Finals last year because of the prices, I was pumped to go this year. The tickets had dropped a lot before game 3, which enabled us to get tickets at face value – a near impossible task these days in Pittsburgh. The Pens survived a sloppy second period, to come out and play a third period worthy of the 4-2 victory.

Game 4 was even better, with the Pens playing the most inspired hockey of their series. They dominated every facet of the game, and had Mellon Arena louder than I’ve ever heard it. When Jordan Staal scored a shorthanded goal to tie the game, Igloo blew up. It was absolutely deafening. The entire second period consisted of people standing for large amounts of time, cheering wildly, and pushing the Pens on. They went into the second intermission with a 4-2 lead, and dominated the third period to guarantee that the Red Wings’ deficit would stay 2 goals. Fleury was also a monster in goal. Oh, and my tickets were in the AE box, so I got to enjoy some awesome food and hang out with great fans from work.

I just hope the Pens can figure out a way to win this series.

Let’s Go Pens!!!

This Sunday was our playoffs for Spring PSL bowling. We went in with relatively high expectations, and actually met them as a team. We wanted a top-5 finish, and ended up finishing 4th!

Our first game was really strong, as we actually had the highest first round score (766) of all of the teams. Unfortunately, we couldn’t carry that form over into the second game. We still finished with a 713, but with Sam and I both bowling under average, we just couldn’t get it done.

Meadows and Megan both had solid days. Meadows’ 214 and 223 would’ve locked up a championship if I hadn’t completely crapped the bed with a 155 in game two…which also happened to be the game that would decide who the Kingpin was. Nothing like bowling a 211 average for 8 weeks – a full 7 pins higher than anyone else in all of the leagues – and having one game decide who’s the top bowler in PSL. I should’ve rolled better, but I just failed to adjust to different lane conditions on the front lanes. Oh well…maybe I’ll finally bowl better in the summer session.

Regardless, our team finished 1st in our league night and 4th overall in PSL. The upcoming session will hopefully be our best. Meadows is setting out to record a 200 average, Megan and Sam are both going fingertip and trying to throw with a hook, which should up their average a bit, and I’ll be aiming to improve my average a little. I’ll shoot for 215, but it’s going to be tough. With Meadows setting our team scratch average at 700, we’ve got some work to do.