The best video on the internet, period.
I don’t usually post things like this on here because what I write here is totally supposed to be all SERIOUS! and THOUGHT-PROVOKING!, but this video is just so many levels of awesome hilarity and pure GANGSTA that I just couldn’t resist.
Other worthy runner-ups:
- The Indian version of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”
- A Bollywood video from the 80s featuring Superman, Spiderman and GOD AWFUL “special effects”
Creative frustration
Have you ever wanted to do something, attempted to do that thing and then found that no matter how hard you tried, you simply couldn’t?
That’s how I feel right now about anything that requires creative energy. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat down with a witty idea or two, only to find that those ideas dancing around in my head simply couldn’t find their way out my fingers. Everything feels forced, and definitely not inspired.
For me, the worst thing about creative frustration is (surprise, surprise!) the “frustration” part. Unlike other negative emotions, I have yet to find a way to channel frustration into something positive. When creative frustration hits me, it crashes the whole operating system of my right brain, sort of like what happens when you try working in Photoshop and Illustrator at the same time while you browse Firefox with 50+ tabs open—I can’t write, I can’t draw, I can’t take photos, and I sure in hell can’t design.
Remember when you asked me not to blog about this?
You know you’ve reached a certain point in your career as a pseudo-blogger when your friends start asking you not to blog about certain things:
The tail-end of a lengthy discussion on those who live life superficially vs. those who don’t (also known as CHANEL, YOU THINK TOO MUCH):
The Friend says: (10:37:11 PM)
You drive me crazyThe Friend says: (10:37:20 PM)
And this is just MSNThe Friend says: (10:37:30 PM)
… Please don’t write a blog on this :P
With more and more of my offline friends, family and acquaintances finding this website (which, admittedly, isn’t hard; all you need to do is google me), the subject of my online writings have never come up more often. Specifically, the question of “You’re not going to blog about this, are you?”
To those offline friends, family and acquaintances, and maybe our mailman: I am on the hunt for my next project and new material. Lock your doors. Maybe even close your windows. But be especially careful what you say or do around me, because you never know—it might just end up on here.
Someone you never talk to is now in a relationship with someone you’ve never heard of
Abstract thought of the hour: Facebook is incredibly creepy and stalker-like when it comes to publishing information about your friends’ every online (and in some cases, offline) move.
And while we’re on that topic: Has anyone ever noticed that Facebook’s feeds are a new breed of passive gossip? I’m reminded of one of the first things anyone ever told me about Facebook mere hours after I joined:
When a couple breaks up, Facebook knows about it before they do.
What is the strangest thing you’ve ever learned (intentionally or not) about any of your friends through a social networking site like Facebook?
An open letter to the technologically dependant
Older generation, I have a bone to pick with you.
Look, I understand you didn’t grow up with “The Internet”. Or computers. Maybe they make you a little nervous. Maybe they make you feel completely stupid, because your five year old grandson can use your computer ten times better than you can. That’s okay. I too remember the day my second grade teacher announced that our next assignment was to research something on the internet - it was terrifying, believe me, I know.
But let me explain something to you. You see, the world is changing. The internet is a great place, really… You can shop online, talk to people all over the world, learn about anything (and everything)… and oh my god, you can even do all your banking in your UNDERWEAR. Preposterous, you say? I know.
I understand that the older you get, the harder it (typically) becomes for you to change—and that’s okay. If you don’t want to use computers, don’t. If you still want to send all written communication via fax (what’s that?) or mail, that’s fine. If you still want to do your payroll by hand, that’s dandy. If you still want to run down to the bank before 3pm to pay your bills, more power to you.
However.
If you find yourself desiring to do dirty little 21st century things like sending emails, shopping online, reading weblogs and the likes, don’t rely on “the younger generation” to do everything for you.
The first month: Things I’ve learned about owning a Mac
It’s been just roughly a month since I bought my Mac and officially became part of The Dark Side—Or, as my father would call it, the lonely and caffeinated club.
So far, so good. I haven’t brought my Mac anywhere near a trendy coffee shop, and amazingly enough, my social life has remained as fabulous as ever—But I have picked up a couple things in the last thirty-some days, and I’m here to impart my newfound knowledge.
Behold, things I have learned about owning a mac, in no particular order:
Two things: An experience in geekery
I did two things today, two things I never expected to do anytime in the near future:
- Removed and installed RAM.
- Did a “live chat” with an online HP technician.
The RAM part was a bit tricky. There were bundles and bundles of wires in the way, preventing me from accessing the card - it took about 10 minutes to find it, and another 40 to replace it. I think I’m starting to get an idea why computer repair guys charge insane amounts of money to do seemingly nothing.
The live chat was interesting. “Patmon S.” was clinically polite and helpful, albeit a little too robot-like. I initiated the chat half expecting nothing to happen, like, wow? someone actually does this? It’s the little white guy who lives in my computer! He speaks! OH MY GOD, HE (she?) WILL HELP ME SAVE MY COMPUTER FROM THE REPETITIVE BEEPING NOISE!
And before you ask: I had nothing to do with the breaking of this computer. Honestly.
Mac users are lonely people
“I walked into Starbucks and they. were. everywhere.”
“They who?”
“The macs. Everyone was on a mac.”
Snorts. “They all had Macs?”
“Every single one. Their little apples were glowing and everything.”
“No Windows? Anywhere?”
“Well there was one blue-glowing Dell in the far corner…”
“But how can that be?!”
“They’re lonely people, those Mac users.”
“I hope you don’t turn out lonely.”
“Thanks, dad. Thanks.”
Grab your ice skates, Hell is about to freeze over.
So my laptop finally cracked - literally.
First the left hinge rivet snapped clean. Two weeks later, the right rivet snapped clean. Now my screen doesn’t stand up by itself. As my friend Brandon so aptly put it, “Your laptop had a stroke. Now you own a paraplegic laptop.”
But like being handicapped in any way (like say, HAVING NO LAPTOP, which might happen if don’t stop abusing my current one, who’s screen is hanging by wires), this is no laughing matter. In fact, this is bad. Really bad. Enormously bad. Gigantically bad. Colossally bad.
As a result, I feel this all might be a sign from God - A sign that it’s time to come out of the closet. Whether I was actually even in the closet is debatable, but according to Tom, I’ve been hiding in there for years, only to come out ever once in awhile to touch his shiny new Apple toys.
It might be true. Maybe.
Regardless, I think it might be time to make the switch. I’ve had my beloved Windows laptop for years and we’ve been through a lot; 1 pair of hinges, two internal hard drivers, and three A/C adapters, not to mention the brutal murder of its sidekick, the external hard drive.)
It’s time for me to move on. I’m sorry, baby.
It was easy to fight against flaming mactards back when their OS really was a piece of shit. But as of lately (read: two years, give or take), it’s all become fairly level playing field. Plus, on a Mac, I can run Leopard and XP simultaneously on the same machine, and avoid Vista altogether!
Whatever happens though, you have my solemn promise: I will NOT become one of those yappy mac lovers who can’t STFU. Or a mindless, talentless, pseudo-artsy flaming Mactard.
All in all, I’ve been giving the 15″ Macbook Pro a lot of thought lately. In fact, the only really big switching problem I can think of should be fairly obvious to any Windows user who has ever used a mac: THE WORLD MIGHT JUST EXPLODE WITHOUT THE CHOICE OF A SECOND MOUSE BUTTON.
Content quality, advertising, and a lesson from Dooce®
If you’re even an inkling aware of what’s happening on the internet, you should know that making money with your website—not your company’s—is vastly becoming a huge thing. Ten years ago, pretty much nobody knew what a blog was. The same cannot be said today. Between the large availability of blogs (think blogger, livejournal, myspace blogs, etc.) and the rising spotlight on them (think celebrity bloggers, Fortune 500 companies, etc.), it seems that these days everyone and their cat has one.
So what about making money on your personal website?
If you’re anything like me, when you think about making money on a blog where you write about your personal life, you automatically think Google ads or Pay Per Posts. It is a general consensus among most blog circles I frequent that “those kinds of things” on personal websites are undesirable.
However, of those asked about their feelings towards advertisements, many of them used Dooce.com as an example of a personal website with ads that they didn’t mind. Curious, because as popular as Dooce.com may be, it is still a “personal” website. So what makes hers any different from Joe Regular’s?
