Latest book reviews

The first 2 books I finished before Christmas but never got around to reviewing them. I realized this when I finished the last one on Friday.

Born (Born #1) by Tara Brown

I enjoyed this book. It’s 10 years after the apocalypse and Emma has been on her own the whole time until someone comes knocking at her door. It was different then the typical virus plague books that I read, maybe because it takes place so long afterwards. I added the other 2 of the trilogy to my Amazon wishlist.

I gave it 4 stars on Amazon and Goodreads.

Brightest Kind of Darkness (Brightest Kind of Darkness #1) by PT Michelle

This book was pretty good as well. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Nara dreams about her day every night until the mysterious Ethan comes into her life with his own secrets. Nara loses her dreams and fate starts taking shots at her after she’s interfered with it. Definitely interesting story and I enjoyed it. I added the rest of the series to my Amazon wishlist and even picked up a prequel novella for free while there.

I gave it 4 stars on Amazon and Goodreads.

The Dead Men (Zombie DOA #3) by JJ Zep

I hadn’t read the first 2 books yet but took a shot on it anyways. It hurt a little in some of the backstory comments but for the most part, you can figure it out. It wasn’t a bad read and I enjoyed it, but I took away a star for it’s length. It generally takes me a week to read an average book since I only read around 45 minutes a day and I read this one in 2 days.

I gave it 3 stars on Amazon and Goodreads.

(late) Movie reviews

I watched some these over Christmas break but I never got around to posting the reviews. We rented a few last night as well so I figured I better get this out before I watch the new ones.

It took me awhile to watch the first one because I thought it looked stupid but after catching the first one on TV, Cheri and I laughed at it quite a bit so we took a shot at the 2nd one as well. It was as good as the first one if you like that kind of humor, which we do.

I gave it 4 stars as did Cheri.

I wasn’t sure how much I would like this, stupid comedies can always go either way. I must admit though, I though it was pretty funny. It’s even funnier to see Liam Neeson in a stupid comedy after all the action movies he’s done lately.

I gave it 4 stars, it’s been too long since we watched it so Cheri can’t remember how good it was.

I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to see this either but was glad we did. It was better than I thought it would be. I wasn’t sure how funny it would be to watch an “everyday” couple trying to get back their tape but with Cameron Diaz and Jason Segal, it was pretty funny.

I gave it 4 stars as did Cheri.

I wasn’t too high on this one but the premise seemed to be like the kind of books that I enjoy. It was ok, wasn’t as good as I had hoped. I’m pretty sure I would have enjoyed the book, it just seemed to have that feel to it.

I gave it 3 stars as did Cheri.

Took the kids to see this during Christmas break as well. It was really good. I haven’t see the others in awhile but I think this was the best one. That might be because it was really sad to see Robin Williams turn back into wax at the very end.

I gave it 4 stars, Cheri gave it 5.

New Years–2014 Review, part 2

Check out my last post if you haven’t already to see the first part of my 2014 review. Todays part is all be about my blogs and my social media/internet habits.

The other stat I kept last year, and continued this year was how many words written on this blog, let’s take a look as compared to previous years.

As you can see to the left, I posted 35 less posts this year. I was probably on pace to get 200 or so again but the last 3 months only had 3 posts each. I just haven’t been in the blogging mood. The only reason I got as many posts as I did was because for a couple of months, I was blogging a journal entry every day.  I did reach 300,000 words on my 594th post in August of this year and up until this post, I’m showing 634 posts with a total of 321,709 words. I’m not really sure what will become of this blog since I rarely use it anymore. I would like to use it more but I just don’t really have much to say. I seem to be using my tumblr blogs more often, because I don’t really have to say anything. I just repost or post pictures that I enjoy.

We’ll start off with my blogger blogs. Yes, I have more than 1.

• 137 posts in 2014
• 8 additional followers in 2014
• 46655 pageviews in 2014

This blog is sports card related. Mainly baseball cards (yes, I collect them).

• 1192 posts in 2014
• 0 additional followers in 2014
• 2957 pageviews in 2014

This is essentially an index of all sports related pictures that I’ve posted to all of My Sports Obsession related blogs and sports related Pinterest boards. I haven’t advertised yet until I get caught up with all my previous posts so that’s why the stats aren’t really anything.

• 164 posts in 2014
• 5 additional followers in 2014
• 28709 pageviews in 2014

I’m hoping I don’t need to explain this blog, since you’re on it now.

• 26 posts in 2014
• 693 pageviews in 2014

This isn’t actually my blog, but I guest post on it. I post anytime I get any University of Michigan related sports cards. I don’t keep track of followers since it isn’t my blog and the stats I have above are related to my posts only.

My next set of blogs are all tumblr blogs. I’m more seen on these because I can queue them up on the weekends to run all week. Plus I don’t have to type anything out, just post or repost pictures.

• 345 posts in 2014
• 1 additional follower in 2014
• 4 likes or reblogs in 2014

I post a lot of different stuff but it’s mainly TV and movie posts. I also post my Last Song of the Day on most days there as well.

• 436 posts in 2014
• 40 additional followers in 2014
• 1133 likes or reblogs in 2014

On this blog, I post, obviously, cats. Every 5th post is a picture of my kitty. Lots of funny cat gifs.

• 589 posts in 2014
• 30 additional followers in 2014
• 91 likes or reblogs in 2014

On this blog, it’s sports, all the time. Lots of White Sox and Colts but also a lot of other stuff. Including vintage sports photographs. NBA, NFL, NCAA and MLB.

• 518 posts in 2014
• 58 additional followers in 2014
• 292 likes or reblogs in 2014

This blog is all Michigan Wolverines. A lot of sports but non-sports also, anything related to the University of Michigan.

Now on to my Twitter stats, and again, yes, I have more than 1. Twitter is annoying in the fact that I have to have a different email address for each account. Unlike blogger and tumblr, where you can just log on once and click which blog you want.

• 4835 new followers in 2014
• 587 tweets in 2014
• 131 retweets or favorites in 2014

This is my main and personal account. I tweet out links to my blog posts from this blog and my A Day in the Life of a Nobody blog as well as personal tweets. My Instagram usually posts here as well.

• 4441 new followers in 2014
• 626 tweets in 2014
• 212 retweets or favorites in 2014

The only thing that gets tweeted out here are blog posts from the Cats Are Cuter blog up above and once in awhile, I’ll retweet Instagram pics of my kitty.

• 4320 new followers in 2014
• 959 tweets in 2014
• 117 retweets or favorites in 2014

This blog goes along with the 2 My Sports Obsession blogs listed above as well as I tweet out any sports related tweets that I may have, such as games I’m watching and such.

• 4199 new followers in 2014
• 426 tweets in 2014
• 60 retweets or favorites in 2014

This blog goes along with the Michigan related blogs above. I also tweet out personal stuff that’s related to the school such as when I’m watching their sports or any other related tweets I may have.

Since we’re already on social media, we’ll continue with that.

• 2603 things pinned (17 different boards).
• 56 status’ posted in 2014
• 88 other things posted in 2014
• 50 personal photos posted in 2014

These stats are from my personal facebook page. As you can see I don’t really post a whole lot compared to a lot of other people.

• 50 posts to Instagram

• AOL – 2422 read emails
• Gmail – 5187 read emails
• GMX – 660 read emails
• Hotmail – 1370 read emails
• Yahoo – 3259 read emails

Yes, I have 5 email accounts. That’s because of stupid Twitter who you have to have a different email address for each account. The Gmail is the one I use for personal stuff which is why it has more and the yahoo one is the one I use to sign up on websites and newsletters and such.

I guess I should have put this on part 1 since it isn’t really internet related. Oh well.

• 610 incoming minutes used
• 766 outgoing minutes used

I have no idea how those are so high because I rarely talk on the phone. I round up so if it was a 10 second phone call, it gets counted as a minute so that’s part of the reason.

• 2903 texts that were alerts of some kind.
• 11992 incoming and outgoing texts that were to people I know personally.

I get alerts from my bank, the local sherriff’s department and Google calendar alerts. As well as some others but those are the only ones I can think of at the moment.

The majority of the personal texts are to Cheri, my mom, my brother and Samantha.

 

So there you go, those are my stats for 2014. Why were you a slacker and not keep stats?

New Year–2014 Review, part 1

If you’ve read this blog, then you know I keep stats throughout the year. All you have to do is go back and read my 2013 review about this time last year.  I’m now 41 years old, been married to Cheri for over 4 years now after our whirlwind romance way back in 2009. Chris is now 21, working and living on his own. Skyler will be turning 20 in the spring and is still doing well in college, also working and living on her own. Samantha is in her first year of Junior High, which means it’s all about her friends and not her grades. Trevor is in 4th grade and is still all about the grades, he is our straight A student. There’s a brief look at the family as of now.

I only had 2 goals for 2013 and I only accomplished 1. My 2 goals were a new house and a new job. I left my old job in March or April so I got that one out of the way fairly early which also affected the second one, getting the house. Getting a house got delayed at the beginning of the year so I said screw it, I’ll get a new job and put the house on hold until the summer but just before we were about to get into a new house, I got laid off from that job. So my only goal for this year is a carry over from last year. As of now, we are waiting until we get taxes back and then we’ll start looking again. Hopefully by summer we can move in to a place. If not, it’ll carry over until next year. I believe I’ve been trying since 2012 so I’m not expecting much.

Let’s get to the stats, that’s why I’m here. Last year I only kept restaurants eaten at, I kept a lot more this year but we’ll start there.

• 1 time – 5 Guys, Beef O’Grady’'s, Cici’s Pizza, Cracker Barrel, Dutch Essenhouse, the Golden Egg, Hardees Heinnies, Nelson’s Port-A-Pit, Papa Vino’s, Red Robin, Salsa’s, Scottie’s Brewhouse, Simonton Lake Drive-Thru, TGI Fridays and Uptown Kitchen.
• 2 times – Applebees, Bravo Café, Culvers, Hacienda, Sonic and Wendy’s.
• 3 times – Fazolis, Smith’s Food Mart and Volcano’s.
• 4 times – 7/11.
• 5 times – Chik-Fil-A, Dairy Queen, Little Ceaser’s, Long John Silvers and Steak N Shake.
• 6 times – Mancino’s and Subway
• 9 times – Martin’s Deli

35 different restaurants listed up there. Some surprises as in I thought we ate there more often. Such as Heinnies (bar/restaurant, we love their burgers) and Bravo Café (I love their gyro’s and we both love their breakfast). Smith’s Food Mart is a convenient store but they sell your typical gas station food and 7/11 is on there because we love their hot dogs. Martin’s Deli is our local grocery store’s café who have the best fried chicken we’ve ever had. Mancino’s was in double digits and in the top 5 last year but I picked it up a lot after work because it was right down the road and I don’t work there anymore.

Let’s get down to the top 6, all these had at least double digit visits.

• 10 times – It’s funny how this restaurant has been around since we were kids (my wife worked there in high school) and last year we never had it but this year we had it 10 times. I had never actually eaten here until Cheri took me, now it’s one of our favorites. We’d probably eat here even more often if there wasn’t only 1 local location.

• 11 times – Tied for 4th, last year’s rank was #3 (18 times). We both love the beef ‘n cheddars and would probably eat here more if it wasn’t so expensive. It’s also 11 times because it’s on the corner between Martin’s (grocery) and Walgreens Pharmacy which we visit frequently. I ate here more the previous year because I got on a Ruben kick for awhile.

• 11 times – Tied for 4th with Arby’s, last year’s rank was #4 (14 times). We both love their original chicken sandwich’s. That’s pretty much the only time we go here is if one of us is craving those and usually when they are 2 for $4.

• 12 times – This is a surprise for 3rd place, last year was unranked (5 times). We are not huge fans of Pizza Hut (although we do like their new pan crust). If we want pizza, we generally prefer other places so why is this ranked so high? They deliver. This is our go to, last second, Cheri doesn’t feel like cooking and I don’t feel like leaving, place.

• 54 times – Once again, Taco Bell comes in at #2, last year’s rank was #2 (41 times), This is technically our #1 favorite place to eat but once again, ends up in #2. We even ate here 13 more times this year than last year. They even put one in right next door that I walk to now and it still ended up at #2.

• 58 times – Once again, McDonalds comes in at #1, the same as last year (65 times). If we love Taco Bell so much more than McDonalds, why does it keep coming in at #1? One reason, one word, breakfast. McDonalds is our go to breakfast when we eat out, because if we’re out, we’re usually on our way somewhere so we need something quick, or one of us hits a drive-thru to take it home. We just don’t go to a sit down restaurant often for breakfast. We probably only had something other than breakfast 10 or 15 times.

What else did I keep track of this year? Plenty. How about books.

As you all should know, I keep track of my books on Goodreads and they do a nice little thing at the end of the year where you can see all your stats for that and previous years.

Out of the 26 books I read this year, I only ranked 4 with 5 stars but I also only ranked 1 with 2 stars or less so that makes a pretty decent year of reading. 2 of the 5 star books were from the Hollows series by Kim Harrison which I love and of course, ended this year as well. Those were also the only 2 books that I paid for, all the rest were freebies.  How did this year compare to others you ask? Let’s take a look.

2012 is inaccurate because I didn’t start using Goodreads until the very end of April. I read a lot less this year because I only read at work and I switched jobs. My previous job I read up on the line anytime I had time where as my job now, I only read on my breaks. I essentially went from reading 7 or 8 books a month to 1 or 2 a month. Big time difference.

The Goodreads site even shows how many pages you’ve read all year long. Doesn’t really mean anything but it’s still cool to see.

You know with all the music I listen to that I’m going to keep track of something music related. Because I’m not a huge fan of Spotify’s random play (I have over 2000 songs on my playlist, I shouldn”t hear any repeats for a long time but I’ll get a couple a day), I create a new playlist with all the songs on my playlist and then throw anything I really like a couple of times on one list and then mix them myself and put them all on one list and start from the top and work my way down. So it’s not hard to keep track of how many songs I’ve listened to on Spotify. I do keep track of songs not on my playlist such as when my wife uses it in her car or sometimes on the rare occasion, I’ll let Samantha play her list but that number is an estimate. I don’t actually sit and count them.

Songs on my playlist Anything & Everything – 2175.

How many songs I listened to off of that playlist in 2014 – 8427 tracks.

How many songs I listened to off of other playlists in 2014 -  approximately 321.

Music is another thing I don’t get to partake in as often as I did at my previous job. At my previous job I listened to my Spotify all day long (12 hr days) except when I was on breaks (yes, I listened to it while reading). Now, I pretty much only listen to it when I’m in my car and the rare occasion when I’m home alone or the wife is sleeping. So I’m pretty sure that number will go way down next year as well.

I also kept track of how many movies I seen this year. Not each title or anything but how many and how. Let’s see what I got.

• I rented 45 movies on DVD – the Majority of these are from Redbox but some probably came from Netflix as well. We usually get the TV series from Netflix that we can’t stream so we don’t get too many movies from there.
• I streamed 4 movies – Yeah, only 4. Those were all probably from Netflix which we generally stream TV shows. Let’s face it, Netflix sucks when it comes to good new movies. I’m not much for rewatching movies I’ve seen before.
• I watched 35 movies on TV – Technically, I watched the streaming ones on TV but this category is movies I catch on TV or ones I watch on Demand. I only count movies where I watch start to finish so if I started watching something half way through, it didn’t get counted.
• I went to 5 movies in the theaters – We don’t go to the movies to often, way to expensive. I can tell you what all 5 movies were and where I saw them. 3 of them were at the $1 theater, 1 was matinee price at a regular theater (which is still expensive) and the last one I had a gift card so the kids got in free. The movies were Captain America: the Winter Soldier (3 times), The Guardians of the Galaxy and Night at the Museum 3. I didn’t keep track of the titles, I just remember those.

I also kept track of how many (and what) sports I watched and played throughout the year. I didn’t keep track of the teams but I could tell you what the majority was because I generally watch my teams and that’s it. Very rarely do I sit down and just watch any game, other than the Super Bowl.

Sports watched (live or TV)

• Baseball – 19 games, all were White Sox games but 1. I think I caught a Michigan (NCAA) game on TV once as well. Only 1 of those was live as I took the kids to their first White Sox game.
• Basketball – 44 games, all those games were split between Michigan (NCAA) and the Bulls. 1 of those was live as I went to a Michigan game.
• Football – 22 games, all those games were split between Michigan (NCAA) and the Colts and I probably watched the Super Bowl for 1 game. I went to 1 Michigan game live.
• Hockey – 1 game, I’m not really into watching hockey but I got invited to a Notre Dame (NCAA) hockey game and went. I love hockey live, just not a huge fan of watching it on TV.

Sports participated in

• Basketball – 2 times, I did manage to get my fat ass out and play basketball twice with a group of guys this year. I would love to do this more often but getting enough guys together is usually the problem.
• Golf – 9 times, the majority of that was towards the beginning of summer when I worked with my brother, we would go after work. I haven’t gone since I switched jobs again.

That’s all I have for today, but don’t worry, that’s not all the stats I keep, but since this post is already over 2000 words, I better save the other stuff for another time. It’s all blog and internet related. Until then, A, B, C ya.