Every September 19th is International Talk Like A Pirate Day… I hope you all spend at least a few moments saluting our Pirate brethren!

For those who are pirate impaired, there is a translator available here.  As a matter of fact, let’s try this post in pirate speak!

Arrr, e’ery September 19th is International Talk Like A Pirate Day… Me hope you all spend at least a few moments salutin’ our Pirate brethren!

For those who be pirate impaired, thar is a translator a’ailable har. 

So there ya go, have fun, try not to raid too many ships that sail under the colors!

You know, sometimes you have to wonder what companies are thinking. As if it wasn’t bad enough we have a regional convenience store chain named Kum & Go, and at some point, when exactly, I’m not sure, they added the slogan “We Go All Out.”

We used to have two of these stores, but we’re down to just one now. It doesn’t make it any less of a head shaker though. As I am sure most people can guess, there are some creative nicknames for this chain, none of which are printable in this blog, but for them to bnow latantly play into the sexual innuendo? What were they thinking?

Okay, yes, I do know what they were thinking, but it still doesn’t make it any less offensive. Yes, I know I constantly speak out against censorship, and I still do, but there is also a point where one should exercise “self censorship”. I, for instance, try to keep my cursing on this blog to a bare minimum, I am selective of when I use it, and I always warn when I do. And this is not OVERTLY offensive, but is it really a corporate image one wants to portray for what is essentially a gas & food store?

I even admit it takes a dirty mind to get everything out of it, but when I walk in to pay for my gas, I don’t like the scuzzy feeling the slogan, let alone the name, gives this company. I mean, really, you spell it “Kum”? Were they insane at the time? They had to know how close they were to the slang word for male ejaculate (there’s a term I *never* envisioned saying on this blog), but yet, they went with it. And now the “we go all out.” bull. *sigh* I fear for the future of humanity at times, I really do.

The chain isn’t going anywhere, they’ve been around for what seems like forever now, and I honestly used to ignore them until they started using the slogan more and more. Just really poor taste if you ask me.

One thing about living in a town as small as Kirksville is you know pretty much everyone. Even if you don’t know their names, you see enough faces around that you recognize pretty much everyone.

That being said, the girls in this picture aren’t from Kirksville.

I run into these ads all over the Internet, and they always boggle my mind. Of course it’s just a Javascript reading my IP address to see where I’m surfing in from, but you have to wonder how many people fall for these things. Maybe it works in large city settings, who knows, but they just make me go “Really, I’m supposed to believe this?”

Course, it brings up an interesting point: Why do I never see ads like this showing men? Does the script somehow know I’m male based on my cookies, or do they just assume only lonely men are surfing the web at all hours, and no lonely women? Just something to ponder about the wonders of the web.

Oh, and to be nice, I had to keep reloading the page was on to avoid dirtier pics. While they never showed anything too bad, they sure do like to try.

Bill Maher had a good time mocking things I work with each day on this week’s Real Time With Bill Maher.

Working with Mashable.com, I write daily about technology sites with names that sometimes make me go “huh? What does this name have to do with what this site does?”. Then there is the whining about the price drop of the iPhone that talked about over on BLORGE.com and here. What he said may not be as funny to others as it was to me, but I had to share. (warning: Adult language in transcript and video)

New Rule: Technology businesses must cut the baby talk. It’s 2007. You’re a rapacious, multi-billion-dollar corporation, not a stuffed animal. This week, Yahoo! announced a deal with Bebo, which will help it compete with Google. I had to Wiki Bebo to find out it’s kind of like Friendster and Woofy. Gosh, I hope they can all band together and save Fuzzleton Village from the evil Snorgs! Grow up! If I want to see uncaring money-making machines with cutesy names, I’d go to a strip club.

And on the iPhone

New Rule: Stop bitching that Apple cut the price of the iPhone. Early adopters always pay a premium. “Early adopters” being a business term meaning “dipshits who stand in line for six hours… for a freaking phone. It’s not a price cut. It’s a repeal on the “Nerd Tax.” If you didn’t have to be the first on your block to have the latest gizmo, you’d now have an extra $200 to spend on your imaginary girlfriend.

There is no denying it, I’m still a big kid at heart.  I am sure some of you had figured this out by now.

With that confession out of the way, I have to say I love Boomerang.

This is an off-shoot of Cartoon Network that showed up a couple of years ago and plays classic cartoons, non-stop, 7 days a week.  What commercials there are only for themselves, and pretty limited.  Most of the time while I’m working/writing/blogging, I like some background noise, and I love it when Boomerang does what they call “Boomer Action”.  It’s the perfect background noise for me.

There is nothing like an all day marathon of shows like The Herculoids, Thundarr The Barbarian, Super Friends, Space Ghost, and so on.  Sure it’s all silly, thread-bare plotting, stories, but it’s the perfect thing when you don’t really want to pay attention to what’s going on.

Sure they don’t have the art or depth of story of Anime, but they do transport me back to my childhood in a snap.  And if it wasn’t for shows like these, I probably wouldn’t be the “toy expert” some people claim I am.  I guess I could be an ass and label this as “freshening up my research”.

I first heard about this over at Daily Blog Tips (if you blog, and this isn’t in your RSS reader yet, for shame) and then Shari brought it up, so I guess it’s time I discussed it also.

Blog Action Day is the idea that if thousands of blogs all discuss the same subject, on the  same day, that a) it will be hard to ignore us and the subject and b) it will show that blogging is a serious medium.   The event will take place on October 15th, and this year’s subject is the environment.

I am by no means an expert on ecological issues, but I believe in the basic principle of the idea of B.A.D. (… that was a bad idea), and will be joining in for that reason alone.  Blogging can, and should be, a powerful tool for people to express themselves and influence issues.  My only complaint about Blog Action Day is why it’s only scheduled for once a year?  Shouldn’t this be every six months?  Maybe even every three months, but an annual event is too far spaced apart in a place that moves as fast as the Internet does.

That being said, join in and help make this action something of true importance.

I’m beginning to suspect I wasn’t aware of exactly what I was getting myself in to when I decided to start writing professionally again.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m loving it; it’s exhilarating to work on a deadline again, hunting down the story, trying to figure out a new angle.  At the same time, I hardly sleep, it’s leaking in to my day job, and sometimes I feel like I’m speeding towards a cement wall in a poorly safety-rated car.

When I started looking around for work in late June, I set a very modest goal of what I would like to earn per month.  Just some walking around money, maybe enough for a new gadget or some DVDs.  That goal is long and forgotten as I have decimated it time and time again.  Then today rolled around and I did as much in one day as I used to hope I would do in a month.  (and no, that doesn’t mean I am now rich, it just means I can buy more gadgets)

The big problem is that it is starting to effect my day job.  When you’re a freelancer, it’s death to say “no” to a story request because the editor will start to remember those no’s and not ask as often, if at all, if you can take an assignment.  If you want to keep working, you have to say yes as often as possible to the work, and sometimes that means odd hours and interference with something else you’re working on, but if it needs to be done, it needs to be done.

So, why do I bring this up?  Every Thursday I meet a good friend of mine for lunch, and he voiced a question I’ve been asking myself: Would I be better off moving just to writing?

I don’t think I’ll ever do it, though there is a part of me that wouldn’t mind it.  I’ve spent 21 years building my business, deserting it because I’ve had a few good months of writing would be idiotic.  True, I’ve dreamed of being a writer since I was 4, but I also know while I have “a unique voice” (as some friends have labeled it), I lack a lot of basic skills.  My grammar is off, my punctuation is atrocious, and if it wasn’t for Firefox having a built in spell checker, I’d be sunk.

My writing does seem to be getting stronger, and my speed is definitely picking up, but I still have miles to go before I can even begin  to resemble a polished writer.  The odd thing is, though I have written seven blog entries today, and an eighth is in progress, I actually feel re-energized about writing for my own site.  Odd, I know.  My fiction writing is in the dumpster, but it doesn’t pay, so it gets done last.

Was there a point to this post?  Not really, just some random thoughts I wanted to get out about writing and how it’s changing my life.  And no matter how much it may sound like I’m whining, I’m really not, I’m enjoying the hell out of this.  Don’t be surprised if there are more posts about this… matter of fact, they may be a series about interesting tricks I’ve learned.

Well, it’s over for the most part.  Though I’ve watched Big Brother 8 all summer, I’ve refrained from discussing it as I gave up doing reality recaps ages ago.

So why do I say it’s over, when it really isn’t?

The premise of this season was three people came into the house with people they had grudges against.  The two picture here are Danielle, and her estranged father Dick.  Over the course of the season, we learned that at some point Dick had loaned Dani some money, it didn’t go well, she stopped talking to him.  She was less than thrilled to see him come in the house, but they agreed to work together, and seemed to patch up their relationship some.

Well, teaming up obviously worked for them as they are the final two people who will face the jury, and walk away with 1st and 2nd place now.  They were not loved by their fellow houseguests, but, the rub is, now they HAVE to vote for one or the other.  My guess is Danielle will take first as Dick irritated EVERYONE in the house at some point, usually n purpose, and as part of his strategy.

These two  really divided the viewing audience with their tactics, but, I have to say… I backed them.  Their plans came off perfectly, Dick had every one in the house so mentally beat down, they were scared to try to take either of them out, and when they did try, Danielle would keep winning the Power Of Veto.

So, whatever you thought of them, they played their game, and it worked.  Congrats to them both.

My 6th gen, 160GB iPod got here on Monday!

Now comes the question: How long does it take to load 119.41GB of music on an iPod? (thanks to my friend, “M”, for the image suggestion of the Tootsie Roll owl vs my new iPod) Before we get down to the load time, let’s do a review of the 6th gen vs my 5th gen, 60GB. (I skipped the 5.5 gen)

So let’s get this ball rolling… it’s shiny. I like shiny things. Shiny things make me happy.

It actually feels lighter than my 60GB 5th gen iPod. Not by much, but a bit. Also, it’s not quite as thick, much to my surprise. The clickwheel is even more recessed into the housing, and is a little disconcerting in just how smoothly it registers your movements.  The screen is noticabely brighter, but I know that actually happened with the 5.5 gen.

Overall physical appearance, I love. It just APPEARS sturdier than any previous model, and I’m not sure why, but I’m not going to argue with it.

Here’s a couple of images, my 5th gen is on the left in both, 6th gen on the right.

So, the physical aspect out of the way, how is the software and load times? Well, here’s an image of the time when I started loading. As the subject line says, I have 119.41GB of music to get loaded on this puppy, and as of 4:15 PM (when I started writing this), it’s at 13.35GB. This is going to take forever. I will probably be leaving it here all night to sync, and come back before I head to bed to grab it.

I know everyone thinks I’m nuts for wanting my entire music collection with me all the time, but I had a perfect example the other night. I really dig the new White Stripes album, Icky Thump. While I was writing, I flipped on my iPod and… apparently I had removed the White Stripes playlist for something else. D’OH! So, yes, I know it seems silly to carry around so much music at one time, but sometimes, you just get a hankering for that one stray song, and it would be nice to have it with you.

UPATE:But, low-and-behold, it didn’t take as long as I thought it would! It was all done loading by 9:03 PM, so just about 5 and a 1/2 hours on the nose. I had to do a reset to get it to work, and I wasn’t aware I had that much video, but oh well.

As for the actual software, now based on Mac OS X, well… it’s pretty. The overall look is nice, very smooth and rounded, but you have to wonder how much battery life all the prettiness is costing you.

I will say the big let down is “Cover Flow”, it just does NOT make sense with a click wheel.

So, what do I do with my 5th gen now? It’s going to make a nice, permanent, alarm clock via my new iHome IH8SR. Nothing like waking to random punk music!

All-in-all, I’m glad I upgraded, and I’m sure in a year’s time, Jobs will make me drool again.

This is how I choose to remember.

Not the smoldering remains.

Nothing patriotic.

Just simple, to the point, and one of my favorite ways to see the city.

It’s actually my favorite way to view any city, but in particular, I have always loved New York at night.

This year means more to me for a lot of reasons, but just trust me, it does.

I thought I would have a lot more to say actually, but, really, the picture sums it all up for me, it truly is worth a 1,000 words.

Okay, is it just me, or does the reasoning in the Ebay auction for Fergie’s (the girl from The Black Eyed Peas) H2 Hummer seem screwed up to anyone else?

After performing at Live Earth and realizing everyone has a role to play in protecting the environment, Fergie decided to sell her HUMMER and donate all the proceeds to Global Green USA. Auction Cause is also donating carbon emission credits for 10 years to help offset the impact.

I don’t care how many “carbon emission credits” you give, if you really care so much about the environment, get the damned car off the road! Make the donation to Global Green USA, CRUSH the car, and forget these stupid “credits”.

I don’t know why, but her “trying” to do the “right thing” is irking me more than it is making me think “Oh, you go girl!  You show us all how to save the planet by getting rid of your gawdy, over-priced car that you only put 7,341 miles on in 2 years!  You, are an inspiration to all of us Fergie!”

I know my family owns SUVs, but here’s a newsflash, we live out in the country.  A place where we have to pull neighbors out of ditches, move bails of hay, haul off fallen trees… you know, the actual uses for a SUV/truck.  Fergie, I am guessing lives in LA.  Last time I checked, I doubt she ever did any of those things.

I can remember the first Hummer I ever saw owned by an individual was in New York City back in the mid-90’s… I still wonder what in the world they “needed” it for.

But, I digress: Fergie… you’re a moron.  I don’t care how much you were inspired to save the planet, this is just an idiotic idea that really accomplishes nothing except clearing your conscience.

We built the dogs a makeshift crate at work that we can lock them up quickly when the UPS man comes. Patrick likes to lay on top of things, why, I have no clue, but he does. So, it took him no time at all to figure out he could jump in a chair and then on top of the crate, and lay down.

We’ve since blocked his access.