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Tricia's Musings

Random Thoughts about life in general, living in the big city of Toronto

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You are here: Home / Archives for Entertainment / Movies

Gift ideas for teens?

November 24, 2008 by Tricia

After I wrote that post about wanting to get started on my Christmas shopping early this year, Chris and I had a little talk about what we’re going to do for Christmas this year – present wise, I mean.

Over the last few years our families on both sides have pretty much agreed not to exchange presents between the adults. Why? Well, everyone has children (except us) and we’re all established in our homes. We don’t really need presents. Oh they’re nice, but when you already have most everything you need or want you don’t really need to get Christmas presents.

So for the last few years we’ve all just been getting presents, for the most part, for the kids in the family. That’s still a lot of gifts to get! Between Chris and I we have 17 nephews and nieces, plus two on my side have kids of their own so add three more to the list (oh and add our two god-children as well!) If we were also buying for each of the adults individually we could add another 20 gifts to the Christmas list that we’d need to buy! So I guess we cut it in half … but it’s still a lot of gifts to buy.

Most of our nephews and nieces are in their teens and I find teens the hardest to buy for each year. Most of them don’t really need anything in particular. I mean they all have iPods, game players, closets full of clothes … so what do you get for a teen that already has everything?

As I said earlier I’m keeping my open for anything that’s on sale that might make a good gift. I think for at least half of the kids I’m leaning towards getting newly released DVD’s, music CD’s, and perhaps some popular games. I just need to find out what they already have (what games and game players, dvds and music) and what others are planning on getting them so they don’t end up getting two or more of something.

I spent some time this evening looking at the DVD section at Buy.com. There are a lot of great movies that have just been released on DVD and there’s a section there where you can pre-order DVDs that will soon be released like The Dark Knight , Mama Mia, Indiana Jones the Kingdom Crystal Skull, Step Brothers and many other movies. I figure that if I order some movies that are only being released at the end of November or in early December there’ll be little chance that the kids I get them for will already have these movies.

Of course, for some of the kids I might just buy them gift certificates. I’m fairly sure some of the teenage girls might like a gift certificate for one of their favorite clothing stores.

So do you have teens on your shopping list? If so, what kinds of things are you thinking of getting them?





Filed Under: Entertainment, Family, Gifts, Items to Try, Movies, Music, Shopping, Television, Video Tagged With: Buy.com, buying, christmas, Christmas_gifts, deal, DVD, dvd_section, Games, game_console, game_players, Gifts, gifts_for_teens, gift_certificate, gift_ideas, ideas, kids, Movies, Music, Nephew, Niece, Shopping

A perfect gift for someone recovering from surgery in the hospital?

November 2, 2008 by Tricia

Chris was just talking to our friend J. She lives out of town with her husband, but in three weeks she’ll be in Toronto for open heart surgery! She’s had some heart problems for a while and it’s time to get them fixed before her problem gets worse.

When we talked to J’s husband earlier in the week we invited him to stay with us while his wife is in the hospital. He hadn’t even thought of where he might stay or even how much parking would cost if he spent most of the day in the hospital at his wife’s bedside.

We aren’t sure how long our friend will be in the hospital, but we do know she’ll be sedated and intubated for a few days after the surgery so that she can recover from the surgery better, so I expect she’ll be in the hospital for one to two weeks or longer. Can you imagine how much it would cost her husband to stay in a hotel and to park his car at the hospital on and off for two weeks? Or to drive back and forth from where they live (two hours from Toronto)? Yeah, so he’ll save a LOT of money if he stays with us!

Anyway … I know what being in the hospital is like. It’s noisy, it’s boring and if you aren’t feeling well it’s even worse. It’s nice to have friends and relatives drop in, but that can make you even more tired. So I was trying to think of something that we could get our friend so that she could pass the time in the hospital.

I just visited Buy.com to check out their weekly sale page, but I didn’t find anything that might be appropriate for someone recovering from surgery in the hospital. Then I had a great idea. Why not get her a portable DVD player? I was looking at the Philips DCP750 and it looks like it has all the features she’d need.

Now I just have to secretly find out if she has a portable DVD player and if she’d be allowed to use it while she’s in the hospital. I’m pretty sure that once she’s out of Intensive Care she’d probably be allowed to use it. It would certainly be a great way to pass the time and both she and her husband could spend time watching movies on the DVD player.

Does that sound like a good gift for someone spending a couple of weeks in the hospital? Any other ideas?

Filed Under: Entertainment, Gifts, Health Fitness and Beauty, Home and Lifestyle, Items to Try, Movies, Toronto, Video Tagged With: DVD_player, gift, gift_idea, Hospital, hospital_parking, hospital_stay, intubated, open_heart_surgery, portable_dvd_player, recovery, sale, save_money, stay_at_house, weekly_sale

One of the movies I was in is on TV tonight

January 5, 2008 by Tricia

Long time readers of this blog might remember that way back when I had my own jewelry business (I would diamond cut designs on rings, bracelets, pendants and so on, gold plate jewelry and create jewelry molds – my business was called “Gold Cuts”) I also did some extra work in the movies and commercials.

Well … I did that for about two years when I was first starting my business, as well as working part time at jewelery store outside the city, working for another jeweler in the building I was in and at the Toronto Convention Center as a security guard. Yes, I held down a lot of part time jobs in order to pay the bills as my business got on it’s feet.

Of all the jobs that I did during that first year or two as I got my business going the extra work was by far the most fun. It didn’t pay all that well, but it was certainly an interesting experience. Plus it was fun to spot myself in some of the commercials and movies as they came out.

One of the movies that I was an extra in was called The Brain. It was supposed to be a horror movie, but I doubt anyone watching it was all that scared. It was a very bad movie!

I never did buy a copy of the movie when it came out and I think went straight to video, but Chris and I did rent it one night just for laughs. I think I can be seen in the movie five times. The best scene is one where I’m in the audience and I’m screaming in horror.

Last night I was going through the channels setting up shows I wanted to tape on our PVR (that’s like a TIVO) and I discovered that The Brain is being shown on DRIVIN tonight at 7:15 pm and again at 7 am on Sunday morning.

In the Toronto area DRIVIN is channel 327 on Rogers. I think you have to have the movie channel package to get that channel.

Just to show you how cheesy the movie is the TV description says: “Viewers of a talk show kill themselves after the host becomes allied with an alien brain.”

Uh huh … bad movie. LOL I think most of the movie takes place in the TV Studio so there’s no sexy scene or sexy corsets or anything remotely enticing! Believe me it would have helped the movie if there were some scenes like that.

If you are the least bit interested in seeing this movie be warned that it’s not a very good movie at all. If you just want to see me in it I suggest that you tape the movie and then fast forward until you get to the studio audience scenes and then watch for a girl in a blue dress. As I said there’s one scene where I’m doing a great fake horror scream and you can see my quite well in that shot.

This is the first time I’ve actually had a chance to make a copy of the movie. If I can I’ll try to get some screen shots of my “scenes“.

Let me know if you get a chance to see the movie.

Filed Under: Entertainment, Great Sites, Home and Lifestyle, Movies, Recreation, Television, Toronto, Video Tagged With: bad movie, bills, blog, business, buy, Chris, Commercial, commercials, design, Extra work, five scenes, fun, Gold Cuts, horror, horror scream, interest, interesting, jewelry, jewelry business, Job, movie, movie extra, Movies, night, part time jobs, scenes, security guard, show, studio audience, Talk show, The Brain, time, Toronto, Toronto Convention Centre, TV, TV talk show, Video, watch, watching

Avot mV allows you to watch near real time video on your mobile device

December 21, 2007 by Tricia

Mobile phones that are capable of accessing web based video are becoming more common. I’d say one of the most well known mobile phones would be the iPhone and also the iPod Touch.

Unfortunately, just like in the old days when everyone connected to the internet using slow modems web based video delivered to cell phones can be slow to download and when playing while downloading the video could go through delays or be of poor quality.

I don’t have an iPhone but I do have a mobile phone with web capabilities and I’m excited about the Avot mV video delivery platform that’s been introduced by Avot Media.

Avot mV is apparently the first solution to give mobile users unlimited access to any web-based video. The platform, once installed on your mobile device, will enable you to quickly and easily search, personalize and play videos from all over the internet.

To download Avot mV directly to your mobile phone you can just point your mobile browser to the Avot mV – Product Site. If you are using your computer you can simply visit the Corporate Site to learn more about this innovative program. You’ll also be able to download a copy of Avot mV to your desktop. At that point you’ll need to hook up your mobile device to your computer in order to upload the program to your mobile device.

I’m certain that you’ll enjoy using Avot mV. The platform features intelligent search capabilities that will incorporate your personal preferences which will make searching for videos across the internet easier and faster.

I hate typing in urls or even much text on my cell phone. I bet you do too. One feature of Avot mV that I’m sure you’ll appreciate is that you can simply point and click on videos that you’re interested in instead of having to type in urls. This is of course most beneficial to iPhone users since the iPhone is a true “touch” phone.

Once you’ve found a video that you’d like to watch the Avot mV platform transfers the content to your mobile device in as little as a few seconds. This is much faster than earlier mobile solutions. Since the video is transferred to your mobile so quickly you’ll be able to play the video in near real time and as a result you should not experience grainy video quality, delays or jitter.

You can maximize the size and clarity of the video just like you can when viewing a video on your desktop computer screen.

If you’d like to download videos and then organize them into a playlist that you can watch when you are commuting to and from work or when you are taking a break you can do so with the Avot mV platform. In fact you can create an unlimited number of playlists. I know if I was still taking the subway to and from work each day this feature would definitely be of interested to me!

You can see a list of supported web enabled devices on the Corporate site. Mobile devices such as the Apple iPhone/iPod Touch are supported.

If you are interested in the Avot mV platform visit the website to learn more about it and you can also visit the Avot Media Official Blog to keep up with the Avot mV platform news.

Filed Under: Cool stuff, Entertainment, Home and Lifestyle, Internet, Movies, Recreation, Software, Video, Web and Technology Tagged With: apple iPhone, Avot mV, cell phone, computer, download, free, install, Internet, ipod, media, mobile device, multiple playlists, no delays, organize, personalize, platform, play, playlists, program, quality, quick download, real time video, search, site, Software, support, upload, Video, watch, watch videos, web capable mobile

SourceTix.com has tickets for events throughout North America

October 18, 2007 by Tricia

I think it’s always a great idea to know of a few online sites where you can find tickets to major events. SourceTix.com is definitely a site to check out.

SourceTix.com offers a comprehensive inventory of Theatre Tickets, concert tickets, and sports tickets.

The site has recently been redesigned. I’m not familiar with it’s former layout, but I found SourceTix.com’s current layout to be quite easy to use. There are menu buttons under the page header that will take site visitors directly to the sites home page, sports, concert or theater ticket listing sections. There’s also a menu on the left side of the page with expanded listings for each of the main ticket categories and a search box.

I actually like the fact that visitors can easily search for event tickets by city. It appears that visitors can search for tickets pretty much anywhere in North America.

As someone who’s going to be traveling to another city in the near future I appreciate the ability to search for tickets throughout North America. Who knows, perhaps I’ll spend some time on the site and see if I can find tickets for some events in Las Vegas in November. I’d love to see one of the shows in Vegas while I’m there.

You’ll be able to find tickets for upcoming future events and even to sold out or hard to get events. For example, I live in Toronto and even thought the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team isn’t doing so hot games are almost always sold out. They have a strong fan base and it’s always hard to get tickets. I checked the listings for the leafs and SourceTix.com has tickets for Saturday and other future games! Unbelievable.

I just told my husband and he had me check for tickets for a game which should be popular with the fans – the Toronto Maple Leafs Vs. Montreal Canadiens November 13th and yes, there are tickets. That impressed my husband to no end.

When searching for concert or theater tickets you can search by top sellers, top venues, by specific locations such as Broadway, off Broadway and in other ways.

No matter what your entertainment interests are SourceTix.com is a site to bookmark and keep in mind the next time you want to go to an event.

Oh and at this time SourceTix.com is offering a 2007 promotion for 5% off tickets. Just use the following code “source07” when you order tickets.

Filed Under: Culture, Entertainment, Movies, Music, Nightlife, Recreation, Socializing, Sports Tagged With: 5 percent off, Broadway, cities, city, concert tickets, concerts, events, football, hockey games, Music, North America, off Broadway, offer, online, promotion code, show, shows, sold out events, sourcetix.com, Sports, sports tickets, theater tickets, ticket, Toronto, travel, visit, visitors

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