iPad ePillow Review
iPad owners usually have a hard time putting down their beloved tablet-champion. They travel with it, eat with it, sleep with it, watch TV with it, take smoke breaks with the thing, you get the idea. If you have an iPad then you know what I’m talking about. It’s hard to disconnect yourself. Loved ones get bitter that you spend so much time with the damn thing. Well these loved ones aren’t going to be too fond of the iPad ePillow by Veyl.
The ePillow is an ergonomic, iPad holder that is available in chocolate brown or deep black. It’s basically a pillow that holds your iPad. The holding mechanism isn’t complex. You just slip the iPad in a vinyl ledge, place the pillow on your lap or on a table, and sit back and relax.
The ePillow costs $29.95. It doubles as an actual pillow, so if you fly a lot, this is a good thing to pack. The pillow rests comfortably on an airplane tray table so you can enjoy some hands-free iPadding when you fly.
The iPad ePillow isn’t for power users. This isn’t going to replace your current case or whatever default setup you have. The ePillow is for loungers who like to view things on their iPad with minimal device interaction.
If you need to type, play games or use the bottom button to cycle through programs, you’re probably better off just holding your iPad with two hands. If you like to stream videos or read with your iPad (especially in bed), the ePillow is pretty sweet.
Aug 31st
Killer Elite Trailer
We’re going to check out a screening of this film next week. Looks pretty entertaining. Plus, if there’s a bad movie with Clive Owen in it, I haven’t seen it yet. Okay, maybe Duplicity was a miss, but you usually can’t go wrong with Clive:
Decent cast, plenty of action and one sweet stache. How bad could it be?
Aug 30th
SENNA and ESPN Films 30 for 30 Blu-Ray Giveaway
Sports documentaries are usually super hit or miss. Some just fill the air with simple storytelling and a type of play-by-play chronicling that comes across as uninspired as a bottom ticker update. Other sports documentaries just really get to you, man. Like goose bumps, I-can’t-believe-that-really-happened-style get to you. SENNA definitely falls in the latter category. The film is a study of the life of famous F1 racer Ayrton Senna. It’s already won awards at Sundance and the LA Film Festival. SENNA is setting box office records in the UK and it’s generating some real energy here in the States. Here’s the trailer:
The film hasn’t reached its full release yet. It’s already playing in New York, LA, DC, San Francisco, Berkeley, Irvine, San Rafael, Cambridge, Chicago, Detroit, Nashville, Miami and Philly. Here are the remaining release dates:
- August 26th Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, Palm Springs, Palo Alto, Portland, San Diego, Scottsdale, Seattle
- September 2nd Charlotte, Knoxville, and St. Louis
- September 16th Kansas City, Milwaukee, Las Vegas
To celebrate the theatrical release of SENNA, ESPN Films has provided us with three Blu-ray sets of their 30 for 30 Series to give away to three lucky readers. Each set is valued at $74.99. Here’s a full list of all the titles:
Muhammad and Larry (1980)- Kings Ransom (2009)
- Small Potatoes: Who Killed the USFL? (2009)
- Without Bias (2009)
- The Band That Wouldn’t Die (2009)
- The Legend of Jimmy the Greek (2009)
- Jordan Rides the Bus (2009)
- The U (2009)
- The Birth of Big Air (2010)
- One Night in Vegas (2010)
- Straight Outta L.A. (2010)
- No Crossover: The Trial of Allen Iverson (2010)
- The 16th Man (2010)
- Silly Little Game (2010)
- Run, Ricky, Run (2010)
- Guru of Go (2010)
- The Two Escobars (2010)
- The House of Steinbrenner (2010)
- Fernando Nation (2010)
- Pony Excess (2010)
- The Best That Never Was (2010)
- Four Days in October (2010)
- Marion Jones: Press Pause (2010)
- Tim Richmond: To the Limit (2010)
- Unmatched (2010)
- Little Big Men (2010)
- Into the Wind (2010)
- June 17th, 1994 (2010)
- Winning Time: Reggie Miller vs. the New York Knicks (2010)
- The Two Escobars (2010)
- Winning Time: Reggie Miller vs. the New York Knicks (2010)
I totally love this series, and I try to catch them whenever they’re on. The U and Pony Excess are two that are worth watching again with all the scandalous Miami football headlines making the rounds. If you prefer gut-wrenching stories that’ll make any dude’s eyes water, check out Without Bias or The Two Escobars. If you enjoy playing fantasy sports, Silly Little Game is a must-see.
Aug 22nd
JT Holmes, Skydiving, and the Hotels.com Mobile Booking App
Last week, I went on a trip to Lake Tahoe, courtesy of Hotels.com. I got to hang out with some really cool people and I even got to try skydiving for the first time (more on that in a second). Hotels.com put me up at the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort, Spa & Casino, and I totally enjoyed myself.
The trip featured a skydiving shoot with extreme sports athlete JT Holmes. If you haven’t heard of Holmes, he’s a guy whose idea of a thrilling weekend is like 10 times more hardcore than whatever you or I do with our spare time. Holmes is a skydiver, free skier and base jumper. He’s appeared in multiple skiing films, 60 Minutes did a pretty sweet piece on him and his wing suit jumping skills were featured in Transformers 3. So yea, this guy knows how to have some fun.
Holmes partnered up with Hotels.com as part of a larger effort to promote the brand’s entry in to mobile apps. Hotels.com is launching a high-speed mobile booking app next month. In addition to giving travelers the ability to book a hotel in under a minute, the Extreme Mobile Booking App will also feature 20,000 last minute deals at over 140,000 hotels across the world.
Users will be able to access previous and future reservation info online or offline, and the app makes use of your mobile’s GPS features so that you can locate the closest hotels with the best deals while you’re on the go.
The app will also support Welcome Rewards loyalty points. You can track your points and redeem them right from your phone. For every 10 nights that you accumulate in hotel stays, you get an extra night for free.
So in Tahoe, JT Holmes proved just how easy it is to use the new app when he took a 15,000 ft plunge out of the sky and booked his own hotel reservation in less than 60 seconds. Here are some photos from the shoot:
I got to experience tandem skydiving for the first time during the trip, and it was unreal. I mean, I thought I’d be freaking out or just so full of adrenaline that I’d yak or piss or lose my mind, but that’s not how it went down. I’m kinda afraid of heights so I thought I’d be trippin’ out a whole lot more, but the experience was surprisingly tranquil and calming.
The freakiest part of the whole thing was sitting in a closed room by myself watching an instructional video from this freaky, monotone-voiced dude who was telling me that tandem skydiving was awesome but I could die doing it:
Before I got in the air, I jokingly asked my tandem skydiving instructor if anyone had ever met the crazy bearded dude from the video. In a very serious face, the guy turned to me and said, “That’s Bill Booth, man. He invented all the equipment that makes tandem skydiving possible.” Whoa, my bad!
But back to the jump. Like I said I really thought I’d be freaking out at the whole thing. I did a 9,000 ft jump (I totally went with the bunny slope entry package) that featured 30 seconds of freefall and five minutes of floating. As soon as we spilled out of the plane, I was just in a total meditative state. It was just so serene and peaceful. After I landed, I felt like I had just been meditating for a week. Just super clear headed and borderline spiritually cleansed. I totally expected it to be a fear-filled exercise in extremeness, but it was kinda the opposite. And I really liked it.
Thanks again to Hotels.com for a great trip and good app. When this thing out when it comes out next month, give it a try. If an extreme athlete can book a reservation while skydiving, you can probably find a pretty sweet deal on a hotel while you’re on the road.
Aug 17th
LA Beard and Mustache Competition
The MANjr crew stopped by the first annual Los Angeles Beard and Mustache Competition at the Federal Bar in North Hollywood on Sunday. Leading up to the event, the competition was featured in the LA Times, UrbanDaddy.com and LAist.com, I mean this was the inaugural LA beard and stache bash, so we had to check it out.
The place was packed and there was a really open, festive vibe at the event. The competition featured five categories: Mustache, Partial beard, Business Beard, Full Beard Natural and Freestyle. Those who didn’t compete came to marvel at the bearding prowess of the contestants. And without a doubt, there were tons of sweet staches on display. And some seriously impressive beards that took years of effort to create.
Shawn Hasson took home the stache trophy and Jack Passion was awarded top beard honors. No controversy there. Both those guys looked like heavy favorites going into the finals. Take a look at some photos of the event and make sure to check out the video to see how the competition went down:
Check out the full list of winners at BeardTeamUSA.org.
Aug 16th
