Sorensilk, you got it "almost" right, you gave the "ROCKER" when you should have slipped Rockstarr the "SHOCKER"!

Happy Birthday R*

I knew it was bound to happen eventually and today was that day. The massive tree that sits on the neighbor's yard came crashing into the house.

It looks pretty bad, but to could have been a lot worse. In photo 6 you can see one of the limbs missed the house by less then an inch. If it had connected, the entire back porch would have been destroyed but only 1 small window was broken.

The hardest hit was the bedroom, there is a HUGE hole in the roof which which also created an equal sized hole in one of the bedrooms. There are 3 smaller holes in the roof but it didn't break much more then a few shingles.

Yesterday was Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerrys. Did the single stop on Lark & Jay Street, place wasn't as packed as last year but it was very windy and cold so I'm sure that kept some people inside.

MikePop snuck past the NY Border Patrol and was in NYC for the weekend. He was nice enough to join Jake, Alissa and her friend, along with myself at Sammy's Noodle Shop & Grill on 6th Ave between 11th & 10th.

It was very cool finally getting to meet one of the more elusive, mostly due to his geographical local, members of HN. A big thanks to Mike for allow me to go plus one on the #Hiptop & HN/SKH Meet Map.

On a minor side note, he's alot taller then I expected him to be.

Killing time at Chinatown Fair before I meet up with MikePop from Hiptop Nation. Played decent, thanks to all the time I've been logging up at Crossgates on the SF machine there.

Ended up splitting 6 games with this one guy who was of equal skill level then I switch machines and got creamed by one guy and his Sakura, double perfect both rounds.

Took a break after that.

Heather Rogers was over at The Sanctuary For Independent Media to promote her book Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage.

She showed her 2003 documentary on the political history of rubbish in the United States then spoke for about an hour. She talked about how the United States is the number one producer of garbage on the planet and how with just 5 percent of the global population we generate 30 percent of the world's trash with the average American throwing away a staggering 4.5 pounds of trash daily.

She then took questions from the audience and the discussion swung from talk about the Mobro 4000 which was the barge that carried 3.2 tons of trash down the east coast to the gulf of Mexico then back to NY, the future of landfills called mega-dumps, to marketing schemes of the major automotive makers and beverage makerturers.

Interesting and thought provoking topics.

Nomadic film and video curator Astria Suparak came to town and brought "Quantum Leaps" with her. The screening was an amalgamation of styles and eras which features work from about a dozen artists.

One that I liked was called "Yoga Death Match" (Photo 3) by Jim Munroe. It explored the relationship between the ancient Hindu art of spiritual discipline and the modern art of online gaming. Good stuff!

Another clip that had me rolling was "Taco Monde" by Philippe Blanchard. It was full of flying neon hot dogs (Photo 4) and middle fingers.

After Rockstarr got her Hunt 4 prize, I asked if she could spare a landyard since she bought 100 for a $1 when they were for sale on TMo.com.

I didn't just get one, I got ten and a keychain!

I felt the love and I'm feeling pretty dirty now.

Made a trip up to the Saratoga Gaming & Raceway to see if I could win a few extra bucks for next weeks release of V for Vendetta, which I'm trying to see on an IMAX screen.

As I walked around I saw games with titles like Jackpot Party, Reel 'em In, Triple Diamond, and Vegas 5-Line video poker but the one that really stood out was this. The machine is called Ray Charles America The Beautiful, and I'm just wondering doesn't his estate have any money left from his California Raisin Advisory Board TV commercials?

Took a swing over to Valentine's to see if I could meet up with this months HipUser, Matt. As, I got there Across Five Aprils was up on stage, rocking it hard, so went to the back where I found Matt, he travels with the band and sells merchandise for them.

We chatted for a few about the Hiptop and I commented that I must have seen 4 or 5 other devices as I had walked around. Matt informs me that tons of bands have SK2s. Right after that Matt introduced me to the lead singer of A5A, Brandon who had come over to the back table, as they had just finished their set. I asked if he had a SK2 as well and sure enough he did. He told me that he's addicted to the device and is constantly on it.

The club was too dark to take a really good photo but a friend of Matt, had a pocket flashlight on him, so he flicked it on and I grabbed this shot.