Happy Birthday Hayley

So, Hayley Williams just turned 20 on Dec 27 so I thought I would post an acoustic video.

Paramore - my new favorite band.

If you like Fall Out Boy or Panic at the Disco you will probably like Paramore

Hotels Switching Mindset

So, This may not be surprising but have you noticed the trend recently where hotels have been slowly switching over to flat panel TVs in all their standard rooms?

But have you also noticed that the once popular "Pay us $6.99 to watch a Pay Per View movie on our special movie service" is also disappearing?

As more and more hotels adopt flat panel TVs they are also including DVD players for free in the room itself.

This may not mean much to the general public but for those of us with kids, it's a huge perk, but not only for the DVD player.

For the past 10 years I have been trying to plan vacations around hotels that expose the Video In ports on the TV which allow me to hook up my .

Well, as these hotels switch over to DVD players and flat panel TVs the once hidden/unavailable Video In ports are now swinging naked in the breeze.

Time to pack up your WII, PS3, and Xbox 360 and take it with you for your next hotel stay.

I recommend the Pro Gamer's Case found on Amazon, it works great but don't try to pack the game cases themselves, just add your games to the DVD wallet full of movies you are already bringing and enjoy the benefits of flat panel TVs.

Google now with embedded links

So, have you noticed the new Google search results now contain links? You don't even need to conduct the search anymore, just start typing and click the link.

Not sure where this comes from but it's another cool Google feature

FINALLY!

3 Man Onyxia Woot!

60 Second Vegas Guide

So, I have this friend that recently went to "Vegas" (do you really even need the LAS?) for the first time and he asked me if I had any advice so I took some time and wrote up my personal tips.

Cordell's 60 second Vegas Guide

Ok, this really won't be 60 seconds but I had to call it something.

I have been to Sin City bout 8-9 times now and I always discover something new but there are definitely a few main attractions.

I basically break it up into 4 main categories

1. Gambling

2. Sight Seeing

3. Entertainment

4. Food

Not necessarily in that order but I will touch on each of them in the next few weeks/months

Gambling

This is obviously what Vegas is known for but some people spend their whole vacation without dropping a single penny into a machine or on a table.

First off, there are no more coins in Vegas, everything has been turned into little paper certificates that print out of each machine, some people love it some people hate it.

If you wanted to hear the loud "ching ching ching" sound of thousands of quarters dropping when you hit the big jackpot you won't find it in Vegas. Well, actually they simulate the sound of the dropping coins but there really is no substitute for the old coin machines.

Personally I like it because it's cleaner, lighter and easier to play a ticket in another machine.

However, the tickets are not transferable between casinos so just be sure to spend them while you are at each place. Chances are you will not get back to the same casino twice even though you may tell yourself, "I will go back on Wednesday", trust me, unless you are staying there you probably won't go back.

There are 3 basic types of gambling in Vegas

• Slot machines
• Table Games
• Sports Book

"Slots" are the bread and butter of Vegas casinos, there are hundreds of them in each casino and they come in all shapes and sizes. The main appeal of slot machines is either for the low cost penny and nickel machines that you can play for hours at a time or for the high cost high reward machines.

Slots are the only place you can find a payout in the millions, but chances are you will be playing for $3-4$ per pull of the little one armed bandit.

A little FYI about the big payouts, the casinos share the expense and payout of the larger jackpots. Here is a link that explains a little about progressive jackpots

Cost per pull - This is what I use to determine whether I personally play a slot machine and it comes down to simple math.

Most machines will have better rewards for more cost, you can't win the BIG jackpots without playing the max on a machine.

Therefore, I like to examine each machine, see what the total cost per pull comes out to and then find a machine with the highest payout for the same cost.

For example, if you are sitting at a quarter machine and it takes 3 quarters to play the max bet and the payout jackpot is 20,000 credits, which comes out to $5,000 then the cost per pull is $.75 for a chance at $5,000.

However two machines over there could be a nickel machine with a higher payout for lower cost per max pull. For me it's all math, some people think some machines are "lucky" or they simply like the gameplay of a certain type of machine. I'm a high cost, high reward gambler.

Just remember if you are willing to spend $3-$4 per max bet on a machine and if it doesn't have a big spinning progressive jackpot above it you probably aren't getting the best value per pull.

The best advice I can give for playing slots is find a machine that you enjoy playing or simply always play the progressive jackpot machines.

Here are my favorite machines to play when I'm in Vegas

Star Wars- there are only 6 of them and they are usually quite popular so you may end up waiting in line. I Play the "Dark Side" machines for what seems to be a good payout.

Monopoly- these are fun because the special bonus game is fun when you hit it.

Wheel of Fortune- You will see these EVERYWHERE because they are so popular. I got a little bored from playing them so much but you may enjoy them at first.

These are usually tied to the largest progressive jackpots in the casino.

Wizard of Oz - a fun bonus game with low enough cost to be entertained.

A bit of warning, they change the slots around quite often so you may not see the same machines at each casino

If you haven't checked out Google Gadgets, I thought I would post one to my blog as an example.

Move your mouse around slowly and watch the spider realistically follow it. Well not fully realistic because a spider following a mouse cursor probably wouldn't really happen but the spider's movements are very realistic.