The Nellie Spot

Well, I spent a few hours getting my first DVD copied to my iPod using the aforementioned process, but I finally got it to work! I now have the full version of Monster's Inc on my iPod in mpeg4 format. Monster's was the shortest flick I could find in my collection (except Emma's Dora the Explorer videos), so it got the initial test. I have to admit, the quality is quite good, both visually and audibly! And the 1 hour 22 minute file is only 122Mb, which is a drop in the bucket since I have like 25 Gb free on my iPod!

Now to just get my entire movie collection onto my iPod...then we'll be cookin!

Well, this article just made my day! It's basically a step-by-step way to put full-length DVDs onto your iPod using completely free software! Nifty!

Of course, this assumes that you'll break the law to remove the copy protection from the DVD...but if you own the DVD in the first place, you're allowed to have a backup copy of that DVD...and you're just putting it on your iPod. Nifty, and again I say, Nifty.

This Saturday, Allison and I attended the American Heart Association's 2006 Heart Ball in Little Rock. Allison's Dad, Bob Shell, was being presented with a community recognition award for all he and his company do for the AHA. It was a pretty fun night, with tuxedos, gowns, fancy drinking, and silent auctions. Bob's introduction was incredible and truly showed why he deserved the award and recognition. He's a great humanitarian, family man, and overall just great. Most men should aspire to be like him in almost every way.

Here are a couple of pics from the evening. Left to right: Terral & Cathy Gammill (Allison's sister and her husband), Bob & Ginny Shell (Allison & Cathy's parents, my in-laws), then Allison and me. Snazzy group, eh?

You Failed the US Citizenship Test

Oops, you only got 6 out of 10 right!

Around October 13th, we'll be celebrating a new birthday in the Nelson household! That's right! Allison and I went to see the heartbeat of our 0.24 centimeter baby last Friday! We're really excited about baby #2, though we are horribly out of luck on names. Yes, it's still early, but we have only 2 boy names and zilch for girl names.

It was fun telling our parents! We told my parents via video conference on MSN Messenger. Emma has a "I'm going to be a big sister" shirt, and we posed her in front of the webcam! They were excited, though maybe caught off guard a bit. Allison's parents were fun, too. We implemented the "big sister" shirt again when we dropped her off to go to Memphis. They were excited for us (though Ginny seemed a bit overwhelmed by the idea of babysitting 2 kiddos!).

My sister was probably the most excited, but a healthy gene pool of spastic reactions and drama help a lot. We actually implemented the big sister shirt for most announcements. When we ask Emma "What's in mommy's tummy?" she gets this little grin and whispers "bebe" then flashes a big smile. When asked whether she wants a boy or a girl, she says "girl". I'm not sure I can afford having 2 girls, but I wouldn't mind a bit.

Anyway, more updates to come on the growing baby situation!

I had a week-long meeting in LA this past week for work. Basically, it was about all our new products coming out in 2006 and the marketing/ad campaigns aligned with the products. Very fun stuff, but I can't tell you about any of them, or I'd have to kill you. Kind of like Willy Wonka's Everlasting Gobstopper.

I headed out there with some co-workers Monday afternoon. The meetings were held at the LAX Hilton, about 30 feet from the hundreds of 757's landing zones. The group from my office went to In & Out Burgers for dinner (which is literally at the end of one runway for the large planes). We ate some crazy great burgers, fries, & shakes while watching the planes land. Then back to the room to watch TONS of Olympic Curling. Hours of great meetings the next day with a dinner that night in the hotel. Back to room for more curling action. More meetings the next day. That night, my friend Scott and I were left alone to eat dinner because everyone else had dinner meetings (because they're important...we aren't). So, we called up our boss who is in LA all the time at our HQ and also grew up there. We asked for a good, hip place to eat that night. He recommended Joe's in Venice Beach. The last time Jack went there, he saw Steven Speilberg and Juilia Roberts eating there. So, we were in! Jumped in a cab and got to sit in the bar area on the restaraunt. We didn't see any famous people, but the atmosphere was incredible, the wine was great, and the food was spectacular. Neither of us could understand the menu (french/california cusine), but we saw the words "pork tenderloin" and "sirloin", so we ordered those 2 dishes, hoping they didn't suck. My pork was easily the best pork I've ever had. Scott's looked good, but I didn't ask to try any, thinking other patrons might think we're gay. After a great dinner and some wonderful desert wine, we called a cab to go back to the hotel. The cab driver is from London, has been to prison, been addicted to heroin (his 4 year "clean" anniversary was the next day), and had dabbled with meth, was a self-proclaimed ladies-man, and was a big believer in Karma. It was quite a lively discussion on the way back. More curling before bed.

The next day was the last of the meetings, only 3 hours. We went to a little sushi spot not far away and ate a ton of great Japanese food and sushi. We got to LAX at 1:00 PM, and our flight didn't leave until 5:15 PM. We chilled in the Admiral's Club (VERY swank if you've never been in one...air travel gets much more fun when in this place), and watched more curling for several hours. Some Starbucks coffee and onto the plane back to God's country.

I'm pretty sure anytime someone goes to Memphis, they have to either listen to or mention the song "Walking in Memphis".

A couple of weekends ago, Allison and I headed to Memphis for the weekend to celebrate her birthday and Valentine's Day. We dropped Emma off at Allison's parent's house and headed into the snow-filled city of Memphis. We wanted to eat some Interstate BBQ when we got there. They have a place inside the Memphis airport and ate some there on our honeymoon travels. Allison found that they have a real restaraunt, so we mapped it and headed there when we pulled into town around 7:30 PM (Friday Feb 10th). They were closed. Totally bummed and scared for our lives due to the shady-ness of the area, we got back on the road. Our second option was Huey's, apparently voted as the best burger in Memphis. We drove for about 45 minutes looking for a certain street, and missed it. We ended up downtown by the Pyramid, which is SO not close to where we meant to end up. However, I did stop to take a picture, since it was covered in snow and looked pretty nifty. We resigned to skip Huey's and head back to an On the Border we passed along the way. Time is now 8:30 PM. We head back up another road that ran parallel to the road we came down, and we quickly found Huey's. But it was closed, too. At this point, we were mad and hungry. We drove up to On the Border, got inside only to find out they closed the kitchen around 7:30 because they didn't have any customers due to the snow. Now we were REALLY mad. Back in the car, we end up next to our hotel at an IHOP at 9:00 PM. It takes about 10 minutes before anyone takes our drink order, another 5 minutes before the drinks get there, and another 15 minutes before they take our order. And they weren't busy at all. 30 minutes later, our food arrives...complete with curly black hair on our pancakes. It was a really horrible time. We got to the room and crashed, hoping that Saturday would be better.

We got up and went straight to the Pottery Barn Outlet and browsed for a while, not finding too much success. We headed back to Interstate BBQ to eat lunch. Quite tastey food! I did find some pork sludge on the inside of my drink glass, which put a bad ending to a great lunch. Then we spent an hour looking for another shopping center and went to the Apple store, which is really just a big fat tease. I really want the new Intel 17" iMac, but don't really have the $1,500 to drop on one. We did get to see the new iPod Nanos that are replacing the Shuffles...super cool. Allison ended up getting one later at Best Buy. A quick stop by Target to get a toaster oven / toaster thing for Allison, and we headed out to dinner. We ate at Paulette's, a cozy little fancy place. The food was great, the wine was great, and the company was fantastic. They are well known for their great deserts. We ambitiously got our own deserts and finished about half of each of them. We headed back to the hotel and crashed.

Sunday, we slept in and headed back to Little Rock. Allison and Emma stayed in the Rock while I drove back home. I spent last week in LA for business meetings, so they just stayed there a couple more days while I was gone. All in all, it was a great trip, minus Friday night's dining adventure.

Sorry I haven't posed much lately. I'm in LA for business all this week....lots of new product information which is pretty nifty and fun.

I hope everyone has a great valentine's day and wicked cool rest of the week.

Though every husband out there should say that I'm referring to THEIR wife, I'm actually referring to my own wife as the wonderfullest girl in the world. Since there are roughly more reasons for this title than there are numbers, I will limit my explanation to just one example.

Allison absolutely LOVES Valentine's Day. In fact, she says it is her favorite holiday. It also coincides with her bithday (Feb 11th), so it's twice as fun for her. She's so very creative that she is doing the 14 days of February for me...a little gift every day until Valentine's Day. It started off with a Hostess Apple Pie from the gas station and a card on my dash board on February 1st. The next day was a $5 Sonic gift card so I could go to lunch. Then a date over the weekend, and a few other "TV" dates (with frozen hot chocolate from NYC). Last night, I got a Valentine's Day card from Emma with Dora stickers on it, which just brought a ton of joy to my heart.

I'm excited to see what the remaining days hold, but most of all, I'm excited to see how much this most wonderfullest girl in the world has in store for me to show me how much she loves me. For reasons I will never understand, she actually likes me! And Dallas Theological Seminary says miracles died with the Apostles! BLAH! They're obviously not married or just dumb.

Allison, thanks for being so wonderful, thoughtful, and loving. I don't deserve it, or you. But I'm so grateful that you chose me to be your object of affection...it's extremely wonderful and extremely humbling. I love you!

I have 2 major "blasts from the pasts" to report on!

Trumpet
I played trumpet from middle school to high school, and polished off a scholoarshipped year in the Razorback marching band. Yeah...I was an ultra-band-nerd (but to other band nerds, we refer to ourselves as band studs, though). My trumpet was stolen from a friend's car on campus and I then picked up guitar.

I've had a serious hankering to get a trumpet and start playing again. I have some friends (Martha & Georgia) who have played / are playing in the Arkansas Winds Community Band, which really made me want to play trumpet again! I just returned a guitar my Dad bought me years ago to him, since I wasn't using it and it was just taking up space in my closet. He emailed me the other day and asked if I'd be interested in a trumpet in place of the guitar! He has an old friend who is mega-trumpet dude and has a couple of trumpets...and he's giving Dad a great "friend" discount. So, instead of me trying to get a cheap, clunky trumpet, I'll be hitting up a Bach Stradivarius. I'm super-stoked and can't wait to start practicing so I can reuse some forgotten talent again!

Da Rollerblades
That's right, folks...the Chocolate's have returned to NWA with a dusty vengance! My first sophomore year of college (yeah...there was a 2nd sophomore year, too), I spent more time in my skates than I did regular shoes, and considerable more time in them than in class (thus the 2nd sophomore year). Literally, I spent between 8-10 hours a day in my skates. I upgraded to the Chocolates near the end of my rollerblading life, and stowed them away at my parents house. Well, they have made the trip back to Northwest Arkansas with me, and hopefully, they'll be used at least a few times before I deem myself too old and out of shape to really do that stuff again. More than likely, I'll just hurt myself the first time out and throw them away. Regardless, I'm pretty stoked to go old-school again.

That's right...I just won the dumbass award! Emma and I were in Gerry the Minivan inside the garage, getting ready to go eat with my sister's family.

I hit the button on my visor to open the garage door.

Allison walks out into the garage.

I back up trying to make room for her to get around the side of the van and get in.

CRASH!

The time between me opening the door and beginning to back up was about 3 seconds.

The door was about 2 feet off the ground at this point.

Now it's off the track and warped. We forced it down and locked it until we get it fixed.

I would like to thank my family and friends for this award I have just received. It takes a truly magnificient performance to achieve this award.

I will set the Dumbass Award on my mantle, next to the many other Dumbass Awards I have earned in my time on this earth.

For some weird reason, the wife has let me run rampant with the gadgets lately. Of course, she loves me (for another strange reason that I'll never understand) and wants me to have these things. Or, she just knows I'll think about them day in, day out until she just gives up and lets me get them. Regardless the reason, I'm super up-to-date on my gadgets. Here's the list, in order that I got them:

Canon SD550 Digital Camera
I had been wanting a new digital camera for quite some time. We got our first digital camera after we got married as a Christmas gift from my parents. 3 Megapixels was pretty nice in those days. Response time was lackluster, though. With an always-running 2 year old now, I was missing a ton of great pictures, without the ability to zoom in very well to get the good part of the picture. So, for Christmas, Allison got it for me (and the whole family, of course) off eBay for 15% less than Best Buy was offering...way to go little shopping-bargain-hunter wife! I've loved this thing...great pics, super fast response time, and easily navigatable with lots of features, packed into a small package!

Cingular's Palm Treo 650
I have a 30 second memory. I'm always forgetting events and meetings, at work, at church, and at home. And that's not good. I had looked into several PDA's on eBay and actually bought an old school HP iPAQ for $50. I got stoked, and then bummed when it wouldn't connect to the computer correctly. I sent it back, realizing I wouldn't find another deal like that for a long time.
However, my friend Todd got a Treo 650 PDA/Phone for Christmas and didn't want it. I told him to quote me a price and I'd talk it over with Allison. He gave me ridiculously low price, and I actually UPPED the price. I though Allison would pass out...but it was still a crazy great price. I stuck in my SIM card and synched it with Outlook the next day at work. Now, I'm a remembering FOOL! I love this thing, though it took some getting used to. I don't feel dumb anymore, which is a good thing.

Video iPod
I had a 20Gb iRiver H120 for about 1 1/2 years. I loved this thing, too. Granted, it was no iPod, but I got the MP3/WMA player with built in FM tuner and voice recorder for the same price as an Mp3 playing iPod of the same size...hands down, I liked it better. However, I filled that 20gb bad boy up pretty quickly. Also, the only downside to the iRiver is that it doesn't sync with your computer...it's 100% drag and drop. I got Allison a Shuffle for Christmas, and she loves it. While washing dishes this past Tuesday, I randomly dropped the question "Honey, can I get an iPod tonight?". I about dropped the dish I was cleaning when she said "Sure!". So, we went to Best Buy to pick one up, but struck out...none in stock except the 30Gb models. We went to Target to look there, and struck BLACK gold! That's right...I picked up the black video iPod in al it's sweet ebony beauty! I've never even played with an iPod until this point...and I gotta say, they're pretty amazing. I already have all my songs on there (4,000, which is drop in the bucket to what it'll hold), the music video of Kanye West's Golddigger, and a full episode of South Park! I bought an Agent18 cover to protect the crappy scrath-seeking screen that Apple put on the iPod. This thing actually gets me a little hot and bothered! I love it, though my thumb is extremely tired nowadays from scrolling through the song and album list. I can't wait to get The New Tragedies album on there (a skater friend of a skater friend's band...they're REALLY good).

Anyway, I'm feeling pretty techno-ful and wanted to share with the world how wonderful my great wife is! Actually, she's SO much better than this...I'll post more about that later, so stay tuned!

As previously posted, Springdale announced that they would pick up pretty much anything on their trash run this past week. Well, they lied through their tooth. I get home Wednesday evening and find an empty trash can, surrounded by all the "anything" items. My sister actually did the same thing, and was so mad that she called the Mayor of Springdale to ask why it wasn't picked up! He said that they picked up all the stuff inside the Springdale city limits and stopped at the Johnson city limits, since technically Johnson isn't Springdale. That makes some sense.

Oh wait! It doesn't make sense at all! We Johnson-ites actually pay for trash service from Springdale. So, our payment goes to Springdale Waste Management each month. But when it comes to picking up random trash items on special days, we get treated like bastard children! I'm pretty sure there is a lawsuit in there somewhere...

But instead of suing, I suggest this: all Johnson-ites unite! We collect our random junk Springdale Waste Management snubbed and dump it on the WM management's yard. Then, they'll be inclined to pick it up and haul it away.

Springdale sucks...I'm so glad I live in Johnson...except on Pick Up Any Kind of Trash Day. Then it would be nice to live in Springdale. But that's the only time.

Suck it, Springdale Waste Management!