Bad parents!

Who pays someone to take photos of their kid in front of the ugliest mural west of the Mississippi? These bozos, apparently. I threw up in my mouth a little when I realized what they were doing.

Just think about the traumatic childhood this kid will inevitably have with parents who are so misguided. These are the type of people who let their kid juggle kitchen knives because they're afraid telling him not to do something will damage him emotionally.

Nut jobs.

Young Hillary Clinton

What was Hillary like as a little girl? Now we know.

It could have been worse

I couldn't figure out why the balls weren't shooting out of the top of Jake's new toy. It took me a second to notice the watch my dad got me when I graduated college clogging the tube.

Then it dawned on me: that orange part at the top could just as easily have been a toilet bowl. You get my drift.

George Lucas screws up yet another franchise [SPOILERS]

Originally, George Lucas wanted to call the movie Indiana Jones and the Saucer Men From Mars. That alone should give you a feeling for the quality of this movie's screenplay. Still skeptical? Here are some of the more memorable scenes from the film:

• Shia Labeouf swinging through the jungle with a legion of monkeys
• Everyone surviving a trip over three consecutive, 100+ foot Amazonian waterfalls
• Aliens from another dimension
• A nuclear explosion

Even with the expectation that since this was Indiana Jones that things were going to be above and beyond (how many times can a 60 year-old guy get punched in the face?), the movie was gag-inducing at parts. Too many parts. Sure, there were some good scenes (granted, I can't think of any of them at the moment) and Harrison Ford does a pretty good job, but overall the movie didn't bring anything new to the table and was over-the-top hokey.

If you're an Indy fan, you'll probably see the movie anyway. If you're hesitant and don't care about seeing it on the big screen, wait for it to come to DVD.

Image courtesy of here.

I'm a frickin' hero

Some birds built a nest in a drain pipe over our patio and a baby bird fell out of it. I think it probably had a jerk older brother or something who pushed it, but that's pure speculation on my part.

It looked so helpless sitting there alone chirping on our patio that I couldn't just step on it - I had to return it to its home. So I donned some gloves (it had talons, you know), stood on a chair and nudged it back into the drainpipe from which it came.

The bird looked a lot like the one pictured above, except without the nest.

Panasonic Toughbook banner ad

Nothing says "tough", "rugged" and "original" like sheep.

I saw the new Indiana Jones movie

The Powers That Be at work were kind enough to take everyone to go see it today. I'll hold off publishing my full review until tomorrow when my wife and in-laws see it. But in the meantime, I'll just mention that I give it 2.5 stars out of 4, and the half a star extra is only because it's an Indiana Jones movie.

I spoke. And Twitter listened.

Yep. That's the kind of power I wield on these interwebs. Just earlier this week I said, "Twitter, you gotta at the very least stop leaving people in the dark." So what did they do? They opened a Twitter account.

Yes, you can now follow Twitter on Twitter.

www.Twitter.com/Twitter

This is brilliant because now they can let all their users know when something is wrong simply by using their own service!

Wait...

It arrived. Twice.

I now have TWO softcover, ruled, pocket-sized Moleskine notebooks! My friend Erin delivered one she brought up from the BYU Bookstore in Provo on Sunday (thanks again!), and the one I ordered of Amazon finally showed up at work.

Lesson learned: if I'm going to order a notebook online, make sure I have plenty of space left in my previous notebook and order it early.

The horribly ironic thing is that I haven't even done so much as an inaugural scribble yet. It's weird. Getting a new Molie is a little intimidating. I'm not sure why, but I feel like I need to be very careful not to screw it up. So I'm excited to get them (0bviously), but once I do I feel like I have to have something worthy to write in them before I can do so.

I'm pretty sure none of this is healthy.

I once heard of a farmer who bought a brand new, beautiful truck. The first thing he did after he signed the papers was walk out and key the side of it. The salesman was obviously shocked and then the farmer explained how now he wouldn't worry about it getting dinged up while working on the farm. He could go out and use it for what it was intended and wouldn't think twice about it getting bumped, scratched, dented or dinged.

I need to key my Molie.

Maybe I furiously scribble on the first page until the pen starts leaking. Maybe I write some profound quote. Maybe I tear the first page out all together, sort of an overly dramatic Dead Poets Society gesture.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments.

A letter from the IRS

My wife and I got this letter from the IRS informing us that our economic stimulus check should be arriving by the 16th. Odd thing is, the letter is dated the 19th and we still don't have our money.

What does one do in a situation like this? Fortunately, there's a helpful subhead in the letter which reads, What You Need To Do. Allow me to quote directly from the letter:

"You do not need to do anything."

Let me make sure I understand: The IRS mailed us a letter telling us we should have our money when they knew we didn't. I'm certain they're aware that we don't have our money as they're the ones who are sending the money to us.

In addition, we aren't supposed to do anything.

Huh.

So...what's the point of the letter? And why didn't they just mail us the check?

Non-news news of the day: Twitter is down

"Something is technically wrong" is the understatement of the year. It's ridiculous. As Michael Arrington said, if Twitter could keep the site live for 24 consecutive hours that would be news.

It's interesting. I'm reading Getting Real, the e-book from 37Signals (the guys who made Ruby on Rails on which Twitter is built). In it they're quite adamant about launching your product/site quickly and with minimal features - worry about scalability later. The whole time I've been reading it I've had the thought, "Oh yeah? What about Twitter?" rolling around in the back of my head.

I'm the first to admit I know zero about building web apps (I consider myself a consumer geek, not a back-end geek). But I do know that from a user standpoint, if your product crashes this frequently with no explanation as to why or when it will be back up, something's gotta change.

I don't know if the problem lies with Rails' inability to scale or Twitter's. But Twitter needs to figure it out and it certainly seems like they've had enough time to do so.

The Notebook (not the movie)

Here's a history of the ordering process for the notebook I ordered a week ago:

I'm in Utah and ordered the notebook from some podunk bookstore in South Carolina via Amazon.

It shipped from Oregon.

It sat in Union City, California for four days.

It then flew from California (over Utah) to Denver, Colorado where it has been "processed".

I charted the information/physical trail and it looks something like this:

It appears to me that they're trying to avoid directly sending me the product I ordered.

A nitpicky error in the season finale of The Office

When Michael reluctantly gives Toby his watch during the exit interview, Toby says he'll set the watch for Costa Rica time. From what I can tell, Costa Rica is in the same timezone as Scranton.

*sigh* I'm a nerd.

UPDATE: check the comments for the subsequent drama that has unfolded since I posted this.

"But the ads made it look so cool!"

I'm doing a little research for a commercial we're shooting on Thursday that involves a bunch of sci-fi nerds standing in a line waiting for the premier of their new movie. (Although the commercial has nothing to do with sci-fi nor movies.)

As I tweaked the script, I remembered the red guards from the original Star Wars Trilogy (I think they were first seen in Empire Strikes Back). Wanting to learn a little more about them, I jumped on Wikipedia. From the 'pedia:

[Imperial Royal Guardsman] are the best and most loyal of the Imperial stormtroopers, solely responsible to Palpatine.... A mere 4% of all trainees would survive the rigors that awaited them to become Royal Guards; during a year-long training program, recruits sparred against each other continuously perfecting their combat skills. ...In their final test, each fought his training partner to the death...

Seriously impressive, right? And then there's this guy who's in charge of guarding the Palpatine's 10-speed:

The Emporer can be such a jerk sometimes.

Image courtesy of here.

Does ANYONE in Utah have this Moleskine?? - UPDATED X3

It's driving me nuts! I've called every bookstore I can think of and NOBODY has these notebooks in. I ordered one from an Amazon retailer on Sunday and, from what I can tell from the tracking info, it's been sitting in California since Tuesday.

I'm looking for the pocket sized, ruled, soft cover Moleskine notebook.

Do you have one? Do you know where I can get my hands on one ASAP? Drop me a line and if I can in fact get one, I'll buy you a snow cone.

UPDATE: Barnes & Noble said they had one at their Gateway location:


Except when I called, they don't really have it in stock. *sigh* And I went and got my hopes up.

UPDATE 2: BYU Bookstore has copies in. My good friend Laura is going to mail me one on Monday...unless someone else is going down sooner.

UPDATE 3: My good friend, faithful reader and distant relative, Erin, is coming to Salt Lake tonight from Provo and will be bringing me the long awaited notebook.
Photo courtesy of here.

Android is gonna rock

Come the end of the year, Android (Google's mobile phone platform) could be a fine replacement for the ol' iPhone. Seriously. Check out some of the apps those smart folks over at MIT have already come up with:

Loco
Loco is a mobile social network built on top an Android phone’s contact manager, so anyone in your contacts is already your friend, so to speak. You’ll be able to view and track where your friends are located using Google Maps and real-time geolocation. So, in essence, you can check out the scene at a few places before you commit to going all the way across town.

Locale
Locale is a dynamic settings manager. You set up different settings for your phone based on time and location. So when you’re at home, you can automatically have all your calls forwarded to your home phone line. When you’re at work, you can have your phone set to silent mode and have your phone’s background screen set to a constantly updating work chart.

GeoLife
GeoLife is basically your to-do list on top of Google Maps. When you get within a certain range of something you need to pick up, it alerts you.

It also works as a traditional to-do list for things that aren’t location-based. The team that put this together is also working on a route-creation system wherein you could pick a few important items from your list and then have a route plotted out for you to follow that day.

And that's just three of the seven apps reviewed at TechCrunch. No, I don't think paying an extra $20 a month for data is worth it for the iPhone. (Yeah, that could change when the iPhone SDK comes out.) But I'd be willing to shell out the extra cash to get access to those kinds of programs.

Liveblogging my TRAX ride

This is my experience riding the train home last night. I wrote most of it as the events were happening, so it's a little choppy. Enjoy.

You gotta be kidding me. I don't leave work until almost 7:00 on a Friday. To make things worse, most people are walking to the Jazz game. Without knowing it, they're rubbing it in my face: "Ha! You're just getting off work? We've already been home, had dinner and come back and are now going to an NBA playoff game. Sucker."

I board the train. Some woman/girl/chick is yelling into her Bluetooth headset. I believe she's talking to her mother. "If I had, like, fifty bucks, I would have had Amber run down here." Something about frozen coffee. I'm not the only one who's annoyed. People keep glaring back at her. Of course, she could move to the back of the train where there aren't any other passengers. No. That would be considerate.

"When was the last time I was out late? Besides that night with Jodie, I haven't been out late since Charles was in my life."

I could list a few reasons why Charles may have left.

As I consider whether or not I should inform her (in an equally loud voice) that I'm blogging her conversation, the unbelievable happens: Two middle-aged women wearing "Hillary Clinton" stickers and carrying a Hillary Clinton yard sign get on the train. They begin talking to the man next to me:

"Are you a republican?"

Oh no. #$&% no. They're going to start a political conversation about Hillary. I check under my seat for a revolver, lead pipe, candlestick - something from Clue that I can use to end my misery. Maybe I can use the rope and hang myself on the bar with the little hand lassos. Nothing. The brilliant Hillary supporters don't sit down before the train starts moving and get thrown back a couple of steps. I take some smug satisfaction in this.

One of them sits down across from me. I wonder if I should engage her in conversation. I'm extremely curious as to whether or not she really thinks Hillary still has a shot, which is to say I'm wondering if she's delusional.

Charles' Ex is now off the phone.

Wait. She's back on the phone. She's going to get off at 4500 South. Great. That's after my stop.

Now MY phone rings. It's my sister in-law. I answer, and in a voice louder than I should have used, "I'M ON THE TRAIN. SEND ME A TEXT MESSAGE." I hang up.

The Talker gets up and walks past me! I think she may be getting off! No such luck. She stays standing directly behind my seat. "Let's stay on the phone until we find each other." Yeah, that's a brilliant idea. I exchange a knowing look with the Hillary Clinton supporter. Unspoken words were exchanged: this girl is a moron.

Yes, I had a bit of a moment with Ms. Hillary Clinton supporter.

I continue writing this. "Oh yeah! I absolutely love riding TRAX." Ms. Clinton supporter and I look at each other again and this time we start laughing. Out loud. I look around the train. Some people are looking back at me. Are they amused? Are they wondering what I'm laughing at? I think they're in on the joke as one guy has actually taken OFF his headphones to pay attention to the situation.

My stop snuck up on me. Unprepared, I quickly close the laptop and gather my things. As I stand to leave with my armful of stuff, under her breath Ms. Clinton Supporter says, "Lucky you." I grin at her. It turns out Charles' Ex was exiting the train as well, so there was nothing left to say. As I exited the train I thought perhaps I should have told Ms. Clinton Supporter to check TheOtherDrummer.com for a full recap of tonight's events, but considering how die-hard a (soon to be disappointed) supporter she was, I don't think she would have appreciated my aforementioned comments.

What started out as a potentially depressing train ride turned out to be quite entertaining and humorous...and the entertainment and humor came from the most unlikely places.

Yesterday I said "bastard" in a client presentation

I did. Seriously. We were presenting collateral ideas to a client that happens to be an educational institution. I was trying to say "bachelor's and master's degrees" and instead I stumbled over the first two words and said "bastard degree".

My brain went kind of cloudy. I don't think I've ever said "bastard" before in my life and now I'd just said it in front of a client. What to do?? I could clearly hear the voice of my father in-law in my head: take it a step further. But how? Bastard isn't a normal part of my vocabulary. It didn't even "slip out." I just mumbled the perfect combination of words to result in me cussing. I honestly don't remember exactly what I said, but it was something to the effect of, "Did I just say 'bastard'?" Everyone agreed that I did and I went on reading the copy.

Later in the meeting there was another opportunity for me to slip "bastard" into the conversation while poking a bit of fun at myself, which I did.

I've now said used "bastard" seven times in this post. I think that oughtta do it for the next 28 years or so.

Photo courtesy of here.

30 Rock sucked last night

I want to apologize to everyone I've ever told to watch 30 Rock. If you watched last night's episode because of my urgings, I'm sincerely sorry.

It blew.

It wasn't nearly as funny as usual (except the part where the new CEO had the Hot Wheels car in her mouth), a lot of the jokes used sex as a crutch instead of being genuinely funny and the ending was atrocious: it felt like they ran out of time and what they squeezed in didn't make any sense.

I didn't even save it on our TiVo.

Please don't think less of me world. I swear the show isn't normally like that! It's usually funny and subtly hilarious and witty. I know I've passionately extolled the show in the past (numerous times on Twitter) but...but...I'm sorry.

Does this seem harsh? Perhaps. But when you tell people you love something and then they check it out and it turns out to be a steaming bag of poo, people may think you like steaming bags of poo. So let me be perfectly clear: I don't like poo, steaming or not. Bags are fine, poo is not.

UPDATE: I didn't realize it was the season finale! *groan* When does Chuck come back...?

See? I told you I was alive.

OK. So here's the story: work. Actually, I'm not sure why the *&%# I haven't been writing as much lately. Work has definitely been more insane than usual. And by "usual" I mean "than it was last October." Yes, work has been taking its toll and my brain has been mush. And Brain Mush is not conducive to writing.

Honestly, Call of Duty 4 has been my "decompression" activity lately. Yes, sniping terrorists not only is good for world peace but it's much more mindless than writing. Also, writing isn't a spectator sport - to really dig into something I need to shut out everything else and focus. However, my wife will watch me play COD4 and be a second set of eyes which has me promoted to rank of First Lieutenant II. I now have a sweet new assault rife with a red dot scope. Thank you honey!

I'm also getting old and fat, which means getting to the gym is much more important which means getting up early which means getting to bed early which means less blogging. Curse my love handles!! Curse them!

OK. Lunch break is over. Back to the grindstone.

Iron Man v. Batman

I know, I know... but it's funny.

I love the world

For some reason this commercial for Discovery Channel made me smile. Something about the line, "I love the giant squids" is funny to me. And, yes, one of these days I'm going to post something other than a video with a short commentary. I've been busy, OK?

Seriously, I had this same idea. Kind of.

OK, so it wasn't exactly the same, but I thought to myself, "I'm pretty sure my Macbook would fit just fine in an intra-office envelope. And it costs $700 less than a Macbook Air." Well played Lenovo, well played.

Jon Stewart on Hillary's Declining Respect for The Voters

UPDATE: I embedded a new link. It's a bit longer than the previous one. Start at about the 1:47 mark.

P.S. No, I'm still not dead.

My new nickname

I home teach a family, the Whites. They're nice people and my wife and I have become pretty good friends with them. How good of friends are we? Good enough friends that we feel comfortable farting in front of each other without feeling the need to blame it on our kids. Enough said.

A while back, their son Cole (pictured here in all his majesty) decided that I was the home teacher with the teeth. This is an odd distinction to make since my home teaching companion isn't missing any teeth of which I'm aware. I was fine with the name because I'd rather be known as the home teacher with teeth than the home teacher without teeth.

But "home teacher with teeth" isn't my new nickname.

This past Sunday while I was over I asked Cole what my name was. I expected one of two answers: something about teeth, or Jake's dad. (For whatever reason he has no problem remembering my son's name.) What came out of his mouth shocked us all:

"Groin."

Huh?

"Groin."

Pardon?

"Groin."

Come again?

"Groin."

There was no mistaking it. The kid was calling me Groin.

So the whole thing was a bit odd. But what has me more worried is that the name may have stuck. My wife answered the phone, "Yes, Groin?" when I called her a few days ago, and Cole called me Groin again tonight.

Despite its anatomical references, I'm sure "Groin" isn't the worst nickname ever. So I think I'm going to have a little contest: leave word in the comments about the worst nickname you've ever heard (you must have known the person who had it). I'll pick the top three or so for everyone to vote on. The person who submitted the worst nickname gets a prize. Seriously. I'm going to mail something to the winner. I'm not sure what it is yet, but I don't think it will be offensive.

I'm not dead

Just wanted to reassure my loyal readership that I'm not dead. Just fairly pretty really busy. Sorry for not posting in a week and please don't club me over the head for it.

Oh, and to avoid some mild profanity, stop the video about four seconds before the end.

Keep your socks fresh

No, your eyes doth not deceive you. My Fruit of the Loom® socks not only stay black, and are the ultimate for fit and comfort (debatable), but the folks at The Loom have taken sock packaging to an entirely new level by providing a resealable bag. Yes, resealable. Like something your salad would come in. But without the croutons and dressing.

I'm not sure why I'd need to reseal my socks in their original packaging. To my knowledge they don't have a shelf life and don't need to remain fresh. In fact, we'd like the socks to be a little less fresh as, frankly, they reeked. Horribly. Like something that I can't name because I'm not sure what it is. All I know is that it smells bad and is probably ugly. Like this guy. Imagine the scent this little guy would put out when in heat. That's what my socks smelled like. But worse.

Anyhoo, the socks are OK. We've washed them a couple of times now and only a little stench remains. Unfortunately, it was enough for one of these little critters to find me and start trying to make more little critters with my foot. It was awkward. I'm looking forward to summer when I can stop wearing the romantic socks and sart wearing flip-flops.

Smelly animal pic from here.

NKOTB are back!

I can hear the phone call now: "Jordan, stop! Don't cut your mullet - we're getting the band back together."

Why is this monumental news? Here's some background from their website:

... People...now see our place in pop history. We’ve read that we `begat the boy bands” like Backstreet Boys and N’Sync.... But hey, what about New Edition? There would be no New Kids without them. And of course, the Jackson Five begat New Edition. So I guess we were really just the first white boy band.

That's right. The first ever white boy band is getting back together after fifteen years. Fifteen long, empty, meaningless years.

Image courtesy of here.

Apple sued: lied about displays in iMacs

Apple told consumers that both the 20-inch and 24-inch iMacs displayed "millions of colors at all resolutions."

Apparently that's not the case.

"While Apple describes the display of both the 24-inch and 20-inch iMacs as though they were interchangeable, the monitors in each are of radically different technology. The 20-inch iMacs feature 6-bit twisted nematic film (TN) LCD screens, the least expensive of its type," according to the lawsuit.

What?? Apple produces overpriced hardware amidst hype of it being the greatest thing to ever be produced since the Ten Commandments? I find that hard to believe. But not really.

Full story here.

T-Mobile sues Engadget for using magenta in their logo

Seriously. No joke. See here. Apparently the higher-ups at Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile USA's parent company in Germany) don't want Engadget to use "their" color of magenta because such usage "could lead to confusion in the marketplace."

I'm not sure how many people are confusing Engadget Mobile with T-Mobile. Are people trying to sign up for cell service with T-Mobile through Engadget Mobile? If you are, you're stupid. Almost as stupid as the people who think people are that stupid. Like the higher ups at Deutsche Telekom.

Meanwhile, Engadget Mobile has taken a page out of my father in-law's book by taking it a step further. They changed their logo today to this:

Others have taken up the cause of thumbing their noses at Das Man by trying to get as many people as possible to use the color magenta that has DT's panties in a wad. Here's my contribution to the cause:

Thanks to Veronica for the tip.

Gmail introduces "Custom Time" - send e-mail to the past

Using Google's revolutionary "e-flux capacitor", you can "Just click 'Set custom time' from the Compose view. Any email you send to the past appears in the proper chronological order in your recipient's inbox. You can opt for it to show up read or unread by selecting the appropriate option."

Very handy indeed! Now on Saturday when I remember my dad's birthday was Friday, I can send him an e-mail and using Custom Time, have it show up in his Inbox like it arrived on his birthday! I can even "mark as read" so he thinks he looked at it and forgot!

For more information on this feature, click here.

Google, what will you think of next? By the way, what's the date today?

Irony: Hillary can't pay healthcare costs

Oh snap! Hillary owes $292,000 in unpaid health care costs for her campaign employees. (See above photo of her getting the bill.) And, yes, her campaign is about $8,700,000 in the hole. Yeah, she sounds qualified to turn the economy around. Vote Hillary in 2008!

This just in: Hillary Clinton's full of crap

"I was told we had to land a certain way, we had to have our bulletproof stuff on because of the threat of sniper fire. I was also told that the greeting ceremony had been moved away from the tarmac...Now that's my memory of it."

One time, when I was a kid, I was playing in this nature park near my house. There's a river running through it and my friends and I were throwing rocks in the river, or something, and this drowning kid comes rushing past us in the water. My friends freeze, shocked. Fortunately, I kept my wits about me and I jumped in.

Being an Eagle Scout, I was able to position myself behind her to keep her from dragging me under. The current was fierce and it was sweeping us down river - fast. I could hear my friends yelling as they chased us along the side of the river. I'm not sure what happened next (everything happened really fast) but somehow we made our way to the bank where my friends hoisted her ashore.

She wasn't breathing.

On the verge of panic, I gave her mouth-to-mouth and thankfully, it revived her. It was a frightening experience to be sure, but such a relief to know that everything turned out OK.

The little girl, Sarah, is now in a doctorate program at Johns Hopkins and is believed to be six to eight months away from finding a preliminary cure for diabetes. We still keep in touch with the occasional e-mail and text message.

Wait. Hang on. OK, she's not really at Johns Hopkins and, so far as I know, nobody is close to finding a cure for diabetes.

But everything else is true.

Except the part about the drowning girl in the river.

But that's irrelevant, because now that's my memory of it.

Android or iPhone? Discuss.

Knowing what we do about Android (see here for the SDK demo, if you can stay awake past Sergy's intro) and what Google has up its sleeve regarding national broadband via whitespace, would you rather have an Android-powered device or an iPhone with AT&T service?

The poll is on the right and the comments are open. Have at it.

CNN Headline: Snake eats family dog as kids watch

True story. Their yippy little Chihuahua dog was devoured by a 16-foot python. And, like any good parent, mom let the kids (5 and 7 years old) out in the yard to watch.



"Now see how the snake is squeezes tighter each time Yippy inhales? That way Yippy can't exhale to take a breath and will slowly die. Stop crying! This is nature!"



As if that weren't bad enough, the family knew the snake had been hanging out in their yard.



"It actively stalked the dog for a number of days," said Stuart Douglas, owner of the Australian Venom Zoo.



"The family that owned the dog had actually seen it in the dog's bed, which was a sign it was out to get it," he added.



Thanks for that tip Mr. Snake Expert.



If I'd seen a python coiled up where my dog slept, I would probably keep my dog (and kids) indoors. Then again, I'm a new parent so I'm probably overly-cautious about such things. Maybe once you have a few kids the idea of them playing in the yard with the dog and the scrub python isn't such a big deal.



CNN story here. Image from here.

Your medium is dying

Glenn Beck: Too bad, Michigan and Florida

Glenn Beck has written a fantastic editorial piece on how we, as individuals and a country, need to step up and follow the rules, and accept the consequences for our actions when we don't. Specifically, the leaders in Michigan and Florida.

From the article:

What do these stories all have in common?

A woman who says she lost more $1 million gambling in Atlantic City sues some casinos for $20 million, claiming they should've stopped her compulsive gambling.

People who bought houses they couldn't afford with loans they didn't understand want their lenders to change the terms.

Congress authorizes a war and then tries everything it can think of to get out of it.

Our country gets addicted to oil and then blames OPEC when it doesn't like the price.

These stories prove how personal responsibility has all but vanished in America, and our government is leading the way.

It's definitely worth reading the rest of the article here.

$5 bounty on stray cats? Sign me up!

So this city in Iowa is having problems keeping their stray cat population under control. The city council decided to pay alert, proactive, responsible citizens (you know, people who don't have cats) five bucks for each stray cat they bring in.

Unfortunately, it appears that you have to bring the cats into the vet alive so the vet can do what? Kill them. Seems like you could follow Jim's example (see above photo) and save some money - a .22 round is cheaper than a shot at the vet.

Dang it. I thought I could retire early. Rob, our dream will have to wait.

Photo from here. See the original CNN video here.

Woman Faces $1,000 Fine For Pink Poodle

Seriously. Joy Douglas from Boulder, CO decides to dye Cici, her poodle, pink to raise awareness for breast cancer. Unfortunately for her, the city's code states, "No person shall dye or color live fowl, rabbits, or any other animals." It's an odd law to have on the books, but apparently it's to keep people from dying bunnies pink at Easter. Whatever.

I have issues with this woman for a number of reasons.

1. She named a poodle "Cici".

2. She owns a poodle. Nobody takes people with poodles seriously.

3. I'm aware that breast cancer exists. Dying a poodle (or anything else for that matter) pink is not going to make me more aware. I also believe I am not unique in my awareness of breast cancer - most people have heard of it. In fact, I'd say awareness of breast cancer in the U.S. is probably hovering around the 99% mark.

4. I think the money spent on dying her dog could have been put to better use. Like, I don't know, contributing it to cancer research.

5. She got fined for the wrong thing. I don't care if she dyed her dog - wearing those tights has to be breaking some kind of city ordinance.

The article states that this isn't the first dog she's dyed. Apparently "Lulu" had been dyed before, but has since died, making Lulu a dyed dead dog. Did Ms. Douglas dye Lulu black for her funeral? We can only speculate.

Now some choice quotes from Ms. Douglas:

"I have a personal connection to my animal, I would never hurt my animal, I have a business full of little beautiful animals that are treasures for not only myself but the community."

"Cici is being stripped of her civic duty, and I don't plan to take it sitting down."

"The police department claims that we dye our dogs. We do not dye our dogs. We color the dogs."

This was the first time I'd been made aware that animals could have civic duties. Huh. For the original story, as well as some video footage of this staunch activist and her little dog too, click here.

Non-Photoshopped Hillary/Satan picture

Turns out the picture I posted earlier of Hillary at her campaign headquarters had been doctored by her crack staff of graphics experts. While they couldn't get Lucifer's Watermark out of the background, they were able to touch up Hillary a bit. Fortunately, I was able to get the original, undoctored version:

Creepy, I know. My sources tell me this picture was taken while she was channeling information from Beneath, something about her health care plan. More as this develops.

McCain, too, supported by Prince of Darkness

A quick-witted photographer (Tami Chappell, Reuters) snagged this picture of John McCain appearing at a press conference. From an eye-witness report:

"Everyone was waiting for for him [McCain] to show up when there was this popping sound and a dark flash. We all turned to the stage in time to see McCain suddenly standing in the middle of some kind of unholy black flame."

Boy, this is unnerving. I'm sure it's only a matter of time before similar pictures of Obama surface. I'll keep you posted.

Hillary Clinton endorsed by Lucifer himself

See below picture taken at Hillary's headquarters. I hear if she doesn't win the primary she's going after his job.

New poll: how do you prefer to dry your hands in public restrooms?

Just something I got thinking about while I was washing my hands just now. This is the kind of deep stuff I think about all the time. Really, I should be in some kind of think tank where they observe people's brainwaves to figure out how they think of such brilliant things. It'd probably have to be a government-sponsored think tank because my thought patterns could be a threat if they fell into the wrong hands. That's how radically advanced and ground-breaking they are. Seriously, the power I hold between my ears could revolutionize the world.

Also, I forgot to put on deodorant this morning.

How my friend was fired from KSL

As if getting canned via e-mail wasn't bad enough, check out what the guy said.

AT&T works in more places billboard - hacked

Freaking brilliant. Every day I feel better and better about unlocking my iPhone.

For those of you not in on the joke, click here.

Image from here via Digg.

Keming

Courtesy of here.

Southwest is at it again: were these girls "too pretty to fly"?

Oh, Southwest. What do you have against young, "attractive" women using your airline?

Recently, two girls (see photo, above) were escorted off a Southwest flight after pounding on a bathroom door ("HURRY UP IN THERE! I HAVE TO CHECK MY MAKEUP!"), yelling at another passenger and being generally obnoxious. After all this, the flight attendant only rebuked them, not the other passenger(s) involved.

Oh, yeah. And when one of them asked for bottled water when she got on the plane she was told she'd have to wait until they served the beverages to everyone else. *Pout*

Southwest says they were being disruptive and even went so far as to have them escorted off the plane by uniformed officers when they reached their destination. The girls say they were discriminated against because they were young, good-looking and (in one of the girl's own words), "Nobody else on the plane, really, looked like us."

The reporter asks, "Did being pretty get them kicked off the plane?"

Let me answer that question for you: HECK NO. Because at least one of the women involved looks less like she does in the first photo, and more like this:

Normally I try not to judge people on physical appearance. But when the whole incident is allegedly based on looks, you gotta take it into account.

You can see the full video at CNN's site.

Firefox memory leak: using 1 GB+ RAM to surf the web

This screen shot was taken today from my Core 2 Duo iMac with 2 gigs of RAM:

Yes, you're seeing that correctly. It's Firefox 2.0.0.12 using over a half the available memory on my machine. *sigh* I really can't wait for the final release of Firefox 3.

Top five reasons February doesn't suck

This brilliant list was pulled from the ShoeboxBlog (you know, Shoebox, that tiny little division of Hallmark).

The Top Five Reasons February Doesn't Suck:

1. The weather. No, that’s wrong.
2. Summer vacation is just around…no it’s not.
3. You can start wearing…wait. No you can’t.
4. Valentine’s Day was happy. If you were already happy.
5. It’s two days shorter than the other months. But not this year.

*sigh* At least in March Daylight Saving Time begins and we can start enjoying longer days.

Serbians torch our embassy, blame us

Turns out I was right: Serbians are jerks. They went and got their panties in a bunch (it's not widely known that most Serbian men wear women's underwear) over Kosovo's recent declaration of freedom from tyranny, terror and thongs. So what do they do? Blame it on us and storm our embassy!

According to my extensive background in international relations and diplomacy (*cough* Casino Royale *cough*) you aren't supposed to mess with other people's embassies. Especially when "messing with" becomes synonymous with "burning to the ground".

And you wonder why the good people of Kosovo wanted out? Fetchers.

Punctuation DOES make a difference

Courtesy of Duchess.

Hillary plagarizes part of her debate after bashing Obama for the same thing [Video]

Tsk, tsk Hillary. First Hillary calls out Obama for reusing part of a speech that was originally given by a friend of his. The lines were used with permission (and as a suggestion) by said friend. For me, a near non-issue: he should have credited the source.

Here's a video from last night's debate of Hillary using some lines from a John Edwards speech. Bad form Hillary!



It's amazing how much I can't stand this woman.

Original story here.

No. 500

This is it. My 500th post. Yep. It was going to be a big deal. I wanted to do something really special so I kept putting it off, waiting for some brilliant idea so I could really acknowledge the milestone in style, complete with fireworks and a visit from Lady Liberty.

I waited. And waited some more. It's been a few days and I have some ideas for posts saved as drafts, but none good enough for my glorious 500th post! So I continued to wait for the inspiration worthy of the occasion.

Then I realized I should just post something and be done with it.

So that's what I've done.

Happy 500th post, The Other Drummer. Here's to many more design changes, URL changes, posts about technology that nobody reads but that I love to write (anybody want a freelancer?), rants and the fictitious stories I kinda-sorta try to pass off as being legit (those are my favorite).

R.I.P.H.D.D.V.D.

The Second Format War has ended (the first being Beta v. VHS) with Blu-Ray coming off victorious. Toshiba, the main backer of the losing format, has bowed its head and backed out of the race after having lost millions in product development, promotion and advertising. (Hopefully Hillary will do the same.)

I was rooting for Blu-Ray if for no other reason than I like the name a lot better. "HD-DVD" is just too clunky to say.

I don't imagine this is going to drive a lot of new Blu-Ray sales. Of course, those waiting out the battle will be able to go out with the knowledge their purchase won't be for naught. Granted, they're sill paying a premium $300+ for the player and $30+ for each movie. Not something I'm ready to do. I'll wait until you can get players for less than a hundred and the movies come down to current DVD prices.

Of course, I will need an HD TV first. Hmmmmm.

P.S. This is post 499!

Thanks to Tombstone Generator for the pic.

Congraulations to Kosovo, the world's newest country

On behalf of America, or at least a few people I know, I'd like to personally welcome Kosovo and its citizens into the world. It's strange to think that yesterday they weren't Kosovoians. They were Serbians. And Serbia, as we all know, is entirely peopled with criminals. Apparently there were a lot of people who didn't want to be criminals. They are now Kosovoians. Good for them!

The downside of the whole "freedom and liberation from war lords and dictators" thing is that now I need to buy a new globe. *sigh*

I suppose it's worth it. Besides, check out the above picture! People joyously waving American flags in celebration! It's nice to see that everyone in the world doesn't hate us.

For more information on our former-Soviet-bloc brethren, see this CNN article.

TED Talks

I was recently introduced to TED Talks, although I can't remember by whom (Hugh?). TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It's an annual conference that, "Brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes)." Don't let the acronym fool you - it covers much more than those three topics and every speaker is remarkable.

More from the site: "We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we're building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other."

I can't recommend TED Talks enough - I've never listened to one and thought, "Eh. That was a waste of time." Quite the opposite. I've embedded one of my favorites here. It's a talk by Rick Warren, author of A Purpose Driven Life. It's insightful and thought-provoking. Please take a few minutes to watch it.



You can subscribe to TED Talks through iTunes, or you can download them directly from the site, TED.com. They're available with the full video or audio only.

I went and got me one of them iPhones

Yeah. So as I reported earlier in the year, my wife was kind enough to give me a 16 gig iPod Touch for Christmas. I returned it, and have now purchased an iPhone which I promptly unlocked using this very, very easy (and fast) program. Honestly, I set the iPhone on the dock, clicked "Free my iPhone" and two minutes later it was unlocked. I turned it off, put my T-Mobile sim card in and ta-da. An unlocked iPhone that works perfectly.

Yeah. It's pretty cool. No new activation fee. Same "low" monthly T-Mobile bill. No contract. It's a very nice arrangement.

So huge "thank you" to my generous wife who is far kinder and generous a person than I am afraid than I will ever be - and for many more reasons than this gift.

UPDATE: And a not-as-huge "thank you" to Danny for letting me use his Windows machine to do the unlocking.

Republicans aren't going to win

Looking at this article in USA Today we learn that Skippy Obama has been raking in more votes than BOTH the Republican candidates combined. So, if we assume the race is going to go to a Democrat, as a moderate Republican I face a hypothetical moral diwemma:

Do I vote for the person I may want to win (McCain), or do I vote against the person I don't want win (Hillary) by voting for Obama?

I say hypothetical because I need to do more research on where McCain and Obama stand on the issues, McCain in particular as his website is the less comprehensive of the two.

One thing is for certain, I think I'd vote for Big Bird before I voted for Hillary.

More choice pictures of The Nose Picker can be found here.

Blast and wretch! Some TV shows won't be back until Fall - and other news

Chuck, in particular, is said to not be returning until Fall. @!#$$@#! Chuck is the ultimate show for geeks and wanna-be-geeks, such as myself. Brilliant little references to stuff only a geek would know and love (like a mention of "backseat perking" while playing COD4) make this show one of my favorites.

While Chuck my have the summer off, reports are saying that The Office has a script or two almost complete which means it may be coming back sooner than others. Same with 30 Rock. Nice.

In other news, some friends of ours forced us, under duress, to watch the Lost pilot this weekend. Maybe it was the fact that it's been built up so much, or maybe it was that I'd heard enough tid-bits here and there to spoil it but...it was good. Not addictive good, but good. I know Matt will be thrilled to hear I watched it but gnashing his teeth in unholy rage that I didn't instantly become a believer.

In other-other news, I'm quickly approaching my 500th post for The Other Drummer (this is post no. 494). Yay me. My sister in-law said she wants to throw a very exclusive party in honor of the event, but since she's in Idaho at school I'm doubtful it will happen, although I appreciate the sentiment. To that end, gifts and cash donations are always welcome. (I don't yet have a PayPal account, but if you wanted to give me money I'd set one up.)

Jumping back a topic or two, which shows are you most excited to see back on the air? Leave word in the comments.

Chuck image from here.

Apple could take a note out of Microsoft's book

Apparently Microsoft announced special edition, red, 80 gig Zunes to be available just in time for Valentine's Day. (Who knew?) However, the players are more popular than expected and there have been some delays in shipping. Here's an abridged e-mail from Microsoft to those waiting on their oh-so-romantic Zunes:

We wanted to provide you with an update on your order status. Due to some issues in our fulfillment center there remains a chance we will miss getting your Zune to you by February 14th. We are working hard to get your order to you as quickly as possible...

Our goal is to provide a smooth customer experience for ordering, customization, and delivery. We sincerely apologize for not meeting that goal in this specific case. We will be refunding the entire amount of your order, which you should be able to see on your credit/debit card within 7-10 days. We hope you love your Zune and that you will accept our sincere apology.

Dang. An official apology, full refund and they get to keep the product? I didn't get that kind of love from Apple when my new iMac broke. In fact, I had to wait a month to get it back, without any updates, and in order to get any kind of reimbursement I had to write a letter to Stevie J. himself and work through their "executive customer service". Even then, my experience was nowhere as good as this.

Get the full story here.

Writer's strike may be over

According to this article on USA Today as well as some other rumblings around the Internet, it looks like the writer's strike could be over as soon as Monday. Unfortunately, many shows won't be on for another four to six weeks. Lame. I'm having Chuck and 30 Rock withdrawals. Not so much The Office for some reason.

Oh yeah. And that could mean we see an Arrested Development movie coming out within the next year or two. NICE.

A friggin' huge shark

"I have to admit after being down in a sub and spending time looking at video feeds from ROV's, the crazy animals I see from the deep start to become commonplace. That is why the below video is absolutely off the freakin' hook! Dr. Eric Vetter was in a submersible off the coast of Moloka'i when a 6-gill shark, at an estimated 17ft, swam within feet of the sub." - Deep Sea News

12 hour days with no end in sight

Lots going on you know. Long hours at the office this week - big pitch coming up in addition to being insanely busy to begin with. Didn't get home until about 10:00 last night and tonight's not looking any better. But while I always prefer to spend time with my family, there's definitely a satisfaction that comes from working long and hard on something. It feels good.

That being said, The Other Drummer has been neglected. Poor blog. There's no time to write about my first experience voting (doesn't seem quite as anonymous as I'd expected...but then again, the poll worker never asked to see my ID so who's to say it was really me who voted that way?) and last night's Super Tuesday primaries (I'm baffled that anyone is taking Hillary Clinton seriously).

I will, however, be making updates to my Twitter feed (it's much faster than writing a whole post) so check that out here or in the sidebar of this here blog under "What I'm Up To".

Meanwhile, here are some of my favorite posts: the place where I record the funny stuff we all say, the completely fictitious story about the first and second Thanksgivings, my fan mail, and my idea for a Broadway musical involving Don Cheadle.

Wish me luck, and see you on the other side.

Paperwork image courtesy of this site from across the Pond.

My five favorite Super Bowl Ads

In no particular order (although I liked the ETrade "Clown" the best):











Agree? Disagree? Check out all the ads at Hulu.com and let me know what you think.

Microsoft aims to buy Yahoo

Wow. Microsoft just kicked in Yahoo's door and offered them over $44 billion for their company. Three thoughts:

1. That is a LOT of money.

2. Does that mean Microsoft will screw up what Yahoo has managed to do well? Such as Flickr? And semi-well, like Yahoo Mail? I kind of like Yahoo. It's the one non-Microsoft and non-Google company out there and that, for some reason, is reassuring. Sort of, "If Google starts being evil, I can always jump back to a Microsoft alternative."

3. Isn't Microsoft a software company? Why the heck are they trying so hard to get into search? Granted, it can be a lucrative business, but it's not their business. Personally, I think they would be much better served by focusing on improving their software *cough* Vista *cough* and innovating in that arena than trying (repeatedly) to get into search. That's not to say Microsoft shouldn't have an online presence. They should. If I were Microsoft and saw what Google Docs was becoming, I'd be wetting myself on a regular basis trying to figure out a model to get their software to be available as an online app. But that's not search.

Here's a quote from Microsoft's Steve Ballmer, the guy who's going to replace Uncle Bill (or, as Fake Steve Jobs calls him, Beastmaster) when he retires:

"Today, the market is increasingly dominated by one player who is consolidating its dominance through acquisition." Let's stop there and think about who just said that. Microsoft, right? OK. Just wanted to clarify. Read on. "Together, Microsoft and Yahoo! can offer a credible alternative for consumers, advertisers, and publishers."

Soooooo... being a huge, dominant player who maintains its dominance in a market through acquisition is bad, so we (Microsoft) are going to offer to buy (acquisition) the second-largest search company (consolidation).

Pot. Kettle. You know.

Thanks to Engadget for the image. More reading can be found here or here or just about any news site on the Internet.