This Thanksgiving was a special one. This past August, my father-in-law spent a little over 6 weeks in the hospital after being on life support for double pneumonia. We weren’t sure if the girls (his grandkids) would have the chance to see him again, but he’s around and the in-laws made the trip from Chicago to Georgia so he could cook and be with the family for Thanksgiving. And for that, we’re truly grateful.

He came over on Wednesday to get a head start on the cooking. When I got home from work, the kitchen smelled of candied yams, southern style green beans and more. It was a magical smell. He was back at it Thursday morning, getting the bird in the oven around 7:30 and working his magic. By noon, we had an amazing looking turkey in the oven that was golden brown outside and moist and tender inside. It was perfect.

The family sat down to a thanksgiving lunch at one. It was Amy’s side of the family as one of my brothers had just brought his wife home from the hospital after she gave birth, and the other was entertaining his in-laws and our parents at their house. We invited my side of the family over for pie later that evening.

In all, the bird and sides were good. We ate until we couldn’t eat anymore and then we napped. It was a good thanksgiving, in a year we had much to be thankful for.

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If you’re anything like me, the last thing you want to do is leave your bed on Friday morning. I’m usually stuck in a thanksgiving induced food coma that lasts well in to the Sunday after Thanksgiving and I plan to be that way this year as well. I may have to get up to put out Christmas decorations and get a tree, but thats minor compared to battling the crowds at the local mall or Best Buy. That’s why I was delighted when this years stream of emails from advertisers and online retailers started flying in to my inbox. I’ve taken the opportunity to go through and grab some of the best that I’ve come across.

First up is a coupon code from Sketchers good tomorrow through Monday. Save $20 on any purchase of $100 or more for SKECHERS when you use the coupon code: THANKS20! Offer valid from 11/26/09 to 11/30/09! If the person in your life you’re shopping for needs some new kicks, this is the best way to pick them up!

Next up is one from US Cavalry (in case you know some one who need some kick ass ass kicking gear). 15% Off Any Order of $150+ w/ Code HOLIDAY15 (Valid 11.23.09 – 12.14.09). US Cav is one of the best places on line to pick up gear, boots, shirts and other high quality gear like a Pelican case for your smart phone!

Perhaps the only thing I’d like for christmas this year is a Flip MINO HD Camera. You can pick up The Flip from their online store and save yourself the hassle of going anywhere. Plus, use the coupon code Flip 10 to save $10 on your order or use discount code TM-YEUL-75893807 for $20 off the Flip. And while you’re at it, grab one for me?

BBC America has the gifts for the geek in your life who loves the BBC Programming like Dr. Who, Coupling, Robin Hood, Primeval and more. To see everything they’re offering check out the Great Holiday Gift Ideas from BBC America Shop!

If BBC America isn’t your thing, you can always hit wirefly for deals on the NEW BlackBerry Storm2 Smartphone from Verizon Wireless for $9.99 or the ALL NEW AT&T BlackBerry Bold 9700 Smartphone FOR FREE. Those are pretty amazing deals on two of the hottest phones available on any carrier at the moment. Hard to beat right?

The speaker Company is offering 40% off on almost EVERYTHING with the coupon code 40off. Its hard to beat getting a good quality pair of speakers for your HDTV at 40% off isn’t it? Probably won’t find a deal like that at your local best buy, so head over to
The Speaker Company and pick your favorite audiophile up a good pair of speakers today.

Maybe you want to add a little flair to your loved one’s phone. Well, Zagg has you covered. Now you can customize your own skin. Want your face on your smart phone? No worries, Zagg has you covered and at $10, that’s personalization you can’t beat! Plus, you can’t get the customized skins in the store, you have to order them online!

If you’ve been working on a mancave or bonus room, then this is the place for you. Compact Appliance has kegerators, wine coolers, dehumidifiers, air conditioners and more. And they’re all under their triple play through Monday, featuring FREE Shipping, FREE Sales Tax and Free Returns. Plus, From Black Friday, November 27th through Cyber Monday, November 30th Ice Makers and Beverage Fridges will be 15% off (up from 10% off). Kegerators and Wine Fridges will be 20% OFF during the same period (up from 15% off) – some exclusions do apply. So get your Black Friday-Cyber Monday Special – 20% off Kegerators at CompactAppliance.com from 11/27-11/30 (some restrictions apply).

Lastly, we have ThinkGeek. ThinkGeek is perfect for the geek in your life who has ever dreamed of sleeping in a Tauntaun. Pick up a Tauntaun sleeping bag, lego camera, starwars usb drives or more. And get Free FedEx Home Delivery. when you Use code: DEALNEWS. If you haven’t checked out thinkgeek yet, do yourself a favor and go by there. They have stuff for everyone.

As more christmas deals pop up, I’ll be sure to post them… if you found my post helpful, let me know. Please?

As Promised…

After I posted I got two more in my in box. First up, Logitech is offering Black Friday/Cyber Monday Offers Nov 26 thru Nov 30 that promise up to 60% off items. Wave Keyboard? – Regular Price $49.99, Now $24.99. Limit 1 per customer, Cordless Desktop® Comfort Laser Keyboard Mouse Combo – Regular Price $99.99, Now $54.99. Limit 2 per customer and more. Check out the Deals if you want to know more.

Plus, OtterBox is offering FREE SHIPPING on all orders and 50% off on Impact Series Cases for select blackberry devices (like the storm2, the tour and the curve 8900 and 8520!) as well as 10% off on ALL iPHONE cases on Monday. So if you need a case, make sure to check out OtterBox. I’ve had two of their cases and they’ve been excellent!

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Google Wave in Chrome

Simply share a thanksgiving story in the comments and you get one!! Couldn’t be easier. Tell me about the time your father-in-law drank too much and made out with the turkey, or the time your sister invited her boyfriend over and they got caught getting high out in the back yard. Whatever your best (or worse) thanksgiving story is, I want to hear it. The first 15 people to comment will receive invites.

YOU MUST FILL IN YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS as thats how I’ll send you the invites!

Thanks and Happy Thanksgiving!

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One of the problems I faced earlier this summer was how do I record a concert that was being broadcast online using my computer with out having to go out to an external recording device or back in to my microphone jack so the sound quality was good. I did some research and found that Audacity would do what I wanted to do. Thats another post. This post is how to fix a problem with using audacity on both Windows Vista and Windows 7.

On windows XP you change the input setting to your sound card in Audacity and you’re ready to rock and roll. You’d think this would be as easy to do on Windows Vista and 7, but it isn’t. By Default, Microsoft has disabled the sound cards (on board or added) as input devices. Its an easy thing to fix, if you know where to look.

To enable the Wave Out mix:

1. Go to the Sound item in control panel
2. click on the Recording tab
3. Right click on the background of the tab and select “Show Disabled Devices”
4. find the Wave Out mix item and right click on it and select Enable
5. It will now show up as a device channel in application like Cubase and Audition

Now you can select the input device as your card. I did have to set the sound card as Default on my windows 7 box, but other then that its been pretty good… Let me know if this has been helpful…
So now you can capture audio from any program in Windows

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This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Popstation. All opinions are 100% mine.

You know you do it. Sing along with your favorite artists while you’re in the car (come on, we know you secretly like Lady Gaga). Hum the tune to the current pop hit while you’re showering. Belt out horribly off key lyrics with your coworkers at the Karaoke Bar after work on Fridays. Don’t be ashamed, we all do it. The only difference is that some of us could actually become pop starts (ala Kenny Chesney) thanks to a cool site called PopStation.

PopStation is a kind of Online Karaoke Bar that’s generating a lot of news in the world. You sign up (for FREE), hit their practice rooms to practice your song and then record your version of it. Once its recorded you’re left to the mercy of the voters as your song climbs (or bombs) the charts. The cool thing is that if your song makes it to number one on the charts you’re entered in a contest to make it big.

Awarded every 3 months, one #1 Artist will earn what people dare to dream of. Win “The BIG Deal” and “The Artist Formerly Known As You” and a guest will enjoy an all expenses paid three night stay in NYC at a ridiculously hip hotel. You will be picked up in a luxury car service and whisked off to a professional recording studio where you will spend two days recording your very own album with the help of a professional production team.

Artists that prove themselves to be vocal superstars, add emotion to the music, and make the songs their own have a better shot at being selected.

Win “The BIG Deal” and you?ll get a crash course in the music industry, gain valuable insider knowledge about how to promote yourself and your music, and experience the dream.

Its actually a pretty cool deal when you think about it. You can enter FREE for a chance other people have been dreaming about. No waiting in lines at American Idol contests or listening to Simon talk about how absolutely droll you are. It’s all online. In your house. On your time. Plus, original Popstation songs are released Monday – Thursday (M – Hip Hop & R&B, T – Country, W – Pop, Th – Rock) and are available in the practice rooms for 2 weeks. People are encouraged to “make them your own”.

Why not visit PopStation today to register free for your chance at fame!

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Now cool is this? 14 artists have come together to release an album with some really good cuts on it (Bonfire Live in NY from Third Eye Blind) on the Indie Rocks! A Benefit Album For Malaria No More. The album itself is $10 and ALL proceedes go to help Malaria No More. So for every purchase, $10 goes to help end malaria deaths in Africa.

The donations help to distribute and educate families in Africa about mosquito nets, one of the easiest and cheapest ways to help fight the disease. But don’t buy the album strictly because its for a good cause (which it is) buy it for the kick ass cuts from groups like Peter Bjorn and John, The Grates, Third Eye Blind, Dirty Little Rabbits, the Walkmen and more.

Its awesome that for $10 you get 14 tracks that aren’t available anywhere else and you help stamp out Malaria. Isn’t it?

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This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Sponsored Tweets. All opinions are 100% mine.

I’ve been doing paid blogging of one sort or another for years now. It was only natural that when a good way to make a little extra from twitter came along that I’d do that as well, enter Sponsored Tweets. The process is simple you sign up for sponsored tweets and they send you a message when you have an available opportunity. You log in, write the tweet (or approve it for tweeting) and you sit back and let it do the work for you. The beauty of it is how simple it is.

I’ve been a “publisher” for sponsored tweets for a while and with the occasional sponsored tweet, I’ve managed to earn enough money to buy two lunches. It’s not a lot, but these days, every little bit helps right? The cool thing is that I’m not alone. Some pretty big name twitter users like Kim Kardashian, Bob Vila, Sister Hazel and Leann Rimes use sponsored tweets as well. How cool is that?

Sponsored Tweets is brought to us by IZEA, the people behind SocialSpark and PPP, and there’s a pretty cool API they’ve developed for the program as well that has a bunch of developers working hard to incorporate it in to twitter apps.

If you’ve been looking for a good way to make a little extra from twitter, or maybe you need to get your brand out there on the twittersphere, I’m pretty sure that Sponsored Tweets will work for you!

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Its a sad day today, after a drawn out courtbattle and years of supplying the world with warez, movies and more the Pirate Bay has officially shut off the tracker. Although the site will remain operational for now, millions of BitTorrent users will lose the use of its tracker and will instead have to rely on DHT and alternative trackers to continue downloading.

In the fall of 2003, a group of friends from Sweden decided to launch a BitTorrent tracker named ‘The Pirate Bay’. It soon became one of the largest BitTorrent trackers on the Internet, coordinating the downloads of more than 25 million peers at its height.

Despite this success, The Pirate Bay operators today decided to pull the plug and close down the tracker permanently. The evolution of the BitTorrent protocol has made trackers redundant they say, as BitTorrent downloads work well with trackerless solutions such as DHT and PEX.

To read the Full article at TorrentFreak Click Here

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At this time of year, its always nice to hear about companies doing things for the little guy. This year its no different as new to the scene Real Time Search LeapFish has teamed up with Make-a-Wish to send a child and his family to Disney. LeapFish’s tweet-a-cause is generating five cents for every tweet that sends out the simple message:

Just tweeted 2 grant a childs wish! #LeapFish donates to #makeawish foundation for each tweet. http://bit.ly/3Tj8A Please retweet!

Jacob, age 4, has a rare and life-threatening disease that has affected him since birth and his one big wish is to go to DisneyLand with his family. Your efforts tweeting can help get Jacob there as LeapFish is donating 5 cents a tweet now through November 27th as they raise $10,000 to send him and his family on a once in a life time trip!

So do what you can to help get the word out about this tweet-a-cause and lets help make Jacob’s Dream come true!

LeapFish is an evolved search engine that captures the traditional, multi-media and real-time Web, through a single, connected search platform for both searching and sharing content. Founded by Ben Behrouzi (co-founder of Reply.com), LeapFish is a privately held, 100-person corporation headquartered out of CARR America Corporate Center in Pleasanton, California. For more information, visit blog.leapfish.com.

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Last year, I wrote a post about Friday the 13th in which I Gave 13 facts about the 13th. Well, here’s 13 more for you!

1. The British Navy is said to have built a ship named Friday the 13th, or the HMS Friday, which on its maiden voyage left dock on a Friday the 13th, and was never heard from again. As LiveScience readers pointed out, however, this story seems to be a legend. The Royal Navy Museum states on its web site that this story, which has been told before, is a hoax. “There has never been a Royal Navy ship named HMS Friday – or after any other day of the week for that matter,” the museum states.
2. Many hospitals have no room 13, while some tall buildings skip the 13th floor.
3. Quarterback Dan Marino wore No. 13 throughout his career with the Miami Dolphins. Despite being a superb quarterback (some call him one of the best ever), he got to the Super Bowl just once, in 1985, and was trounced 38-16 by the San Francisco 49ers and Joe Montana (who wore No. 16 and won all four Super Bowls he played in).
4. Butch Cassidy, notorious American train and bank robber, was born on Friday, April 13, 1866.
5. Fidel Castro was born on Friday, Aug. 13, 1926.
6. President Franklin D. Roosevelt would not travel on the 13th day of any month and would never host 13 guests at a meal. Napoleon and Herbert Hoover were also triskaidekaphobic, with an abnormal fear of the number 13.
7. Superstitious diners in Paris can hire a quatorzieme, or professional 14th guest.
8. Mark Twain once was the 13th guest at a dinner party. A friend warned him not to go. “It was bad luck,” Twain later told the friend. “They only had food for 12.”
9. Woodrow Wilson considered 13 his lucky number, though his experience didn’t support such faith. He arrived in Normandy, France on Friday, Dec. 13, 1918, for peace talks, only to return with a treaty he couldn’t get Congress to sign. (The ship’s crew wanted to dock the next day due to superstitions, Fernsler said.) He toured the United States to rally support for the treaty, and while traveling, suffered a near-fatal stroke.
10. The number 13 suffers from its position after 12, according to numerologists who consider the latter to be a complete number — 12 months in a year, 12 signs of the zodiac, 12 gods of Olympus, 12 labors of Hercules, 12 tribes of Israel, 12 apostles of Jesus, 12 days of Christmas and 12 eggs in a dozen.
11. The seals on the back of a dollar bill include 13 steps on the pyramid, 13 stars above the eagle’s head, 13 war arrows in the eagle’s claw and 13 leaves on the olive branch. So far there’s been no evidence tying these long-ago design decisions to the present economic situation.
12. This week’s Friday the 13th (11/13/2009) is one of three to endure this year. Such a rare triple-threat occurs only once every 11 years.
13. The driver of Princess Diana hit pillar #13 at Place de l’Alma when she was killed in Paris, France.

There you have it, this week’s Friday the 13th List!

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Usually, I’m sporting a nicely trimmed goatee. The oldest, G has been complaining that the goatee and mustache was “prickly” when I kissed her goodnight, so I decided to do something about it. After I dropped her off at school the other morning, I came home and shaved before I left for work.

Needless to say, the reception my clean shaven self received was less then stellar. Em told me I wasn’t allowed to shave and that I wasn’t her daddy. Mary was Mary and as she is 6 months, wasn’t too put off by the clean shaven daddy as the voice was the same. Amy held the position that she usually has when I shave. I look like I’m 12. All things you want to hear from the people who are supposed to love you no matte what right?

Well, when I picked Grace up in the afternoon at the bus stop, she insisted I grow it back. Now she complains when I kiss her that its too rough. A guy just can’t win. She’s repeatedly told me to go to the store and buy a fake beard until it grows back out. Right now? I think I’m going to try growing the Magnum PI mustache or a handlebar mustache….

Thoughts?

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Unless you live under a rock (in which case, sorry to bother you Patrick the Starfish) you’ve heard of some of the cool give aways that Charter Communications has been running (they gave away laptops last time) then you’ll be interested in their current offering. They’ve upped the ante with their Camaro Sweepstakes. Thats right, you have the chance to win a 2010 Camaro 2SS. Complete with the black and yellow paint job if you choose.

The contest runs through November 26th at noon and you can enter on line (no purchase necessary) to win. In addition, you also get a $100 gift card when you buy 3 bundled services (not to worry, they have deals for smaller bundles as well). Charter has been making people’s lives faster for a while now, why not let them improve your garage as well?

You can follow Charter on Twitter or fan Charter on Facebook to stay on top of their awesome contests. Did you know that they’ve given away everything from an HDTV every day to Xbox 360s to a Hybrid Car last year? Why not enter and see what you can win!

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One of the things on my list of things to do is travel the world. I’ve done most of the US and the Caribbean, but I want to see Europe. Every once in a while, I’ll check the online deals or I’ll listen to Clark Howard and his weekly price updates on the airlines and think to myself, “wouldn’t it be nice to pack the wife up and head to London for a week?” Or maybe you’ve been to London (you lucky sod) and you want to go somewhere like Cairo, Dubai, or Nairobi. Well, British Airways has you covered!

Through November 16th, British Airways is offering AMAZING deals on their flights from New York (JFK) to places around the world starting at $229 one way (the cheapest I saw was Madrid, Spain from $205 ONE WAY!) and hotel packages starting at $659. There hasn’t been a better time to fly with the airlines competing for passengers, plus, you can check baggage as this is an international flight so no worries about fitting everything in to the overhead!

One of the other nice things about flying British Airways is the fact that they go everywhere you want to go around the world and they do it with comfort and luxury. Over 200 in flight entertainment options, complimentary food and drinks and some of the most comfortable seats in the airline business!

I was amazed at how easy it is to book a trip using their site, now the only problem is where to go and what to do with the kids and dogs!

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This week’s ASMW post is another freebie (notice a trend here?) from Amie Street. This one is by Pearl and the Beard, a pretty cool folk group I discovered just this morning (because I saw the free download link).

One of the recs for this song called it sort of “Folk Gothic” and I’d have to agree. The vocals work well and the tune is haunting in a good way. One to add to the library. And you can’t beat the current price. Can you?

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So back in October I posted about my first impressions with google wave. I mentioned in there I was a little depressed by the number of people I had available to converse with, however, that seems to be changing as now I’m on my second round of invites to hand out.

Once the first group of people started receiving their invites, things picked up. Also, the big G added the ability to make “public” waves where anyone can see them, this is a big plus as it opens the whole community to more things. One feature that would be nice to see would be the ability to create groups or mail lists so that I don’t have to click through and add 20 people to one wave.

So far, outside of easily being able to share things like youtube videos, photos and other files with people at the drop of the hat, the most addicting thing on Wave is the sudoku plugin that enables you to play sudoku with your friends in real time. its pretty cool competing against the clock and your friends and watching as they fill in blanks you were going to get to.

It does seem to be a bit of a resource hog, but that could be to the scripting required to make wave run right. I’ve noticed that IE requires the Chrome Frame from google to even load Wave properly and Firefox crashes like Gruntled after a night of moving servers from one building to another if the wave is too large. The only browser that seems to handle it properly so far is Google Chrome (which I guess is to be expected) as it can load waves with 200+ messages in it with out any problem.

The more I use Wave, the more I have to say I actually like it. It takes the convenience of email and the realtime factor of IM and mashes it in to one. There’s room for improvement, but it seems that GoogleWave is getting better and more stable every day (though there were issues with the Sudoku game yesterday that were driving me insane!). GoogleWave will be a boon to organizations who’s users need to collaborate in realtime (even easier then things like goto meeting) and once the full api is available to developers, I would imagine that we’ll see no shortage of plugins and extensions for the Wave of the future.

Oh, yea, if you’re on GoogleWave, say hello mcangeli@googlewave.com

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Here’s a Freebie from AmieStreet today for your listening pleasure from Bob Waddington. Blairstown is a nice mix of vocals and music that would be a good addition to any collection. So go ahead and download it today for FREE while you can!

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So its that time of year when husbands and boyfriends and would be boyfriends all over the world start fretting about gifts. What should I get her? If you’re unlucky like me, you have Christmas, her birthday and Valentines Day all in a row (the first three months suck as far as that goes). If you’re not, then you at least have two of those (and maybe a couple more to worry about as well).

Well, fret no more, I’ve got the ultimate answer, chocolate gift baskets. Thats right, chocolate gift baskets. Imagine surprising her with decadent dark raspberry chocolate triangle, Dark and Milk Chocolate Pistols, Chocolate Truffles, Dark Chocolate Goji Berries or something else thats made of Dark Chocolate. This is Pure Hawaiian chocolate infused with the spiritual energy of experienced meditators personally trained with the Dalai Lama. Potentially a perfect chocolate gift basket for the holiday (or any) season.

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