Feel Me Don't You

Or call it Fists for Jesus…

Religion never ceases to amaze me. Churches are really creating MMA-style leagues to convert more young men? Apparently so, click on the link above and read through the article. Some of my favorite quotes from the article:

“Blessed are the face beaters, for they shall inherit all the publicity.”

“People tend to forget that Jesus hung out with prostitutes, drunkards, and tax collectors.”

“But many young men truly feel that church has become effete, something for women.”

Perhaps one of the first invitees to a Fight Club for Jesus could be Larry David. It seems he’s pissed off enough people who might want to pummel him into “the light”. I wonder what the rules might be for Fight Club for Jesus. There are some intelligent, witty people who visit here, so let’s see what we can come up with.

#1 – The first rule of Fight Club for Jesus is, you must talk about and recruit for Fight Club for Jesus – go door to door if you must.

Most of you know I’m usually late to the game on many subjects. What can I say other than I’m just not the internet equivalent of the Western European backpacker? Anyway, I finally had time to look into some things that had been annoying me about the blog – specifically re-posting the links to various social networking sites. A little digging on the WordPress site and I came across this handy little plugin CR post to Ping.fm (click the pic for the link to Ping.fm) which allows you to setup various posting groups. Once you configure your site with the Ping.fm API, all you have to do is publish your WordPress post and PingFM does the rest. Pretty handy, huh? Perhaps I’ll apply this to Tantrum’s site too, hmmm…

I love this video if for no other reason than it doesn’t spoon feed you like the original. Oh, I miss diving too.

Please join me this Saturday as I assist the gang at The Fish Tank with the Haiti Fundraiser for Global Orphans Project – long name, amazing res… oops wrong slogan. The contributing performers will be Some Technical Difficulties, Improv-Abilities, Those People, CounterClockwiseComedy, and a “Special Guest”. Who is that special guest? Is it a brand new troupe of all-star improvisational heavy-hitters? Is it a one-man show featuring yours truly in Viva Los Huevos? Is it a one-woman show featuring “improv guru” Trish Berrong in Spite The Hand That Feeds You? Come to the show to find out! All proceeds will be going to the aforementioned charity. If you haven’t been able to donate until recently for whatever reason or even if you have already donated, here’s a chance to get something in return for your generosity.

Welcome to February 1, 2010. It’s Black History Month, Major League Baseball is just around the corner with lots of talk regarding recent Royals acquisitions both on the radio and between friends, and today at lunch – tying it all together in the bow of synchronicity – was The X-Files season six episode #20 entitled The Unnatural. Three days ago I happened to grab this X-Files season off the top of a stack of DVD’s that had recently been returned by my brother, Nick. I have been watching the shows in order, I didn’t just skip to this episode because it fit into any sort of blogging agenda (sorry Mr. B). There’s really no other point to this post other than I was struck by how odd it felt to me that all these connected the way they did.

If you’ve been online to any of the news, gadgets, or social media sites the over past couple days, you’ve likely noticed the plethora of posts regarding Apple’s new unveiling of the iPad. The tag line for those who can’t be bothered to click the link:

Our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price. Starting at $499.

Most advanced? Really? Magical? Seriously? $499? Are you out of your mind?

Those are quite lofty descriptions for the Rain Man of new gadgets. Why Rain Man? Because the new iPad in its current incarnation cannot multitask. It can only do one thing at a time. Judging by the video on Engadget, it does that one thing well enough – when it does work – in the traditional Apple-pretty way. If you’re expecting an update from your favorite social media page and you want to listen to music while you wait, you’ll have to close down your iPod/iTunes and go to the web browser and then go back again when you’re ready to listen to music. Allegedly, multitasking is on the horizon for future versions, but for now, one thing at a time. It’s possible that there are people out there who don’t care about multitasking and doing one thing at a time would suit them just fine. I still think there are better options available.

Let’s dig into some of the above assertions, shall we?

Most advanced:

Safari: It comes with the Safari browser and allows you to “see web pages as they were meant to be seen — one page at a time” and to navigate the web using “the most natural pointing device there is: your finger”. So how is that different from any of the latest generation phones already on the market like the Nexus, Droid, MyTouch, Hero, or (say it with me) iPhone? Seems there’s nothing new here.

Mail: You can get email. *GASP* Will the marvels of modern technology never cease? Ok, I suppose it has one thing that my current phone (the quickly becoming antiquated T-Moile Dash) doesn’t in that it will allow you to see an emailed photo in the message and will allow you to save it to the iPhotos app. I can save any emailed image, though. I don’t know about any of the other newer smart phones, but I would assume they would allow you to also see photos in email. Someone please correct me if I’m wrong.

Photos: You can organize your photos into albums and do the standard pinch and expand to manipulate the size, view pictures as a slideshow, or you can use it as a digital photo frame even if it’s docked. My current phone doesn’t allow me to do anything but view a picture or watch a video, so I’m hoping someone with a more current phone can verify whether theirs has that capability. I believe that they do, but I’m not 100%.

Video, YouTube, iPod, iTunes, App Store, iBooks, Maps, Notes, Calendar, Contacts, Home Screen, and Spotlight Search: With the exception of YouTube, iTunes, App Store, iBooks, and Spotlight Search, I have all these items on my current phone and I know that most if not all are available on newer phones. From you iPhone-philes out there, does the iPhone have the Spotlight Search that allows you to search over everything on your phone? If not, then that’s another potential new innovation.

All in all, I’m not seeing the whole “most advanced” as being too terribly accurate here since you can get these items on a tablet PC, laptop, or smart phone. So, is it advanced because you can alter the viewing orientation? No, your smart phones can do that and so can a PC tablet.

Magical:

I’m very curious what they deem magical about this device. Is it that all these features are packed into a sleek, pretty package that’s sports a high-res 178 degree viewing angle surface that measures 9.7″ diagonally – slightly smaller than a magazine – is only .5″ thin and weighs 1.5 lbs? Maybe. Unlike your phone, however, this baby isn’t fitting into your pocket or anywhere else on your person. Now if they could get it to shrink and expand into and out of your pocket, that would be magical.

Starting at $499:

There are cheaper and more expensive “tablets” on the market. Ultimately, everyone’s price point is different in what you’re willing to spend on what. I’m very curious, though, to know how many people are willing to fork out $500 for a device that will only handle things like photos or videos (or other non-online activities) or $500 plus the $30 per month for the data package to do it all. Is there truly that large of a market that craves something that fits between a laptop and a smart phone?

Anyone here feel the need to rush out an buy one of these bad boys or care to discuss your thoughts?

(continued from fo0)

… Microsoft has loosed ‘pon this mortal coil, Songsmith has got to be at or near the top. The concept is simple: sing into a microphone and Songsmith will build a song around it (see the final video below for the commercial). Then again, can you blame the software for the evils perpetrated by humanity? Blame the craftsman? Blame the tool? Blame the tool maker for providing such an awful tool? Download the demo and decide for yourself (fair warning – that page takes so long to load it might not be worth the effort).

This is what started all the “rage”.

(/nod Nick – Happy Birthday to you, dad, Clay, and anyone else celebrating their birthday today)

Climate change – it’s one of the relatively new buzzwords that grabs people’s attention by both ears and directs them where they may or may not want to go. Whether you personally believe in the topic or don’t, whether you think the world is giving you the shaft or feel there needs to be more vigorous attention as we play back and forth over this hot button topic, people are becoming frenzied as the situation builds towards its inevitable climax.

Perhaps American’s just want to lay there and ignore the situation or perhaps they are exuberantly screaming as they force the rest of the country’s collective face in it. In either case, CBS wants to ensure you know Congress is screwing you and this is where your money is being shot. Read the article. Please.

How can Americans not be at least angered by this situation? Those individuals posting defeatist comments like “this is nothing new, it’s been going on for years and will continue for years to come” have placed themselves in the “part of the problem” category as far as I’m concerned. Things that jump out at me from that article…

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., is a key climate change player. He went to Copenhagen last year. Last week, we asked him about the $2,200-a-day bill for room and food.

“I can’t believe that,” Rep. Waxman said. “I can’t believe it, but I don’t know.”

But his name is in black and white in the expense reports. The group expense report was filed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. She wouldn’t talk about it when our producer tried to ask.

Pelosi’s office did offer an explanation for the high room charges. Those who stayed just two nights were charged a six-night minimum at the five-star Marriott. One staffer said, they strongly objected to no avail. You may ask how they’ll negotiate a climate treaty, if they can’t get a better deal on hotel rooms.

So is it blind ignorance or unmitigated arrogance on the part of these government officials? Do they not care about the cost or do they simply not pay attention? Both are dangerous situations. Who are the geniuses who agreed to pay a “six-night minimum” rate when they knew they would only be there for two? Regardless of the star rating of an establishment, would you pay for four nights at a hotel where you weren’t staying? That’s just the first level of stupidity/arrogance. How in the world were these expense reports given the okay? Ms. Pelosi? Hello? Why isn’t Gene L. Dodaro stepping in and saying the US Government isn’t reimbursing them for that? How long do you think this extravagant spending would continue if the money had to come from these representative’s own pockets?

How do you think the Marriott chain will fare in all this? I realize that in the world of capitalism a business has the right to charge whatever they deem for their product or service. How can the Marriott, in good conscience, justify sticking these people for nights that they weren’t there? Am I missing something here?

Flights weren’t cheap, either. Fifty-nine House and Senate staff flew commercial during the Copenhagen rush. They paid government rates — $5-10,000 each — totaling $408,064. Add three military jets — $168,351 just for flight time — and the bill tops $1.1 million dollars — not including all the Obama administration officials who attended: well over 60.

Wait a minute! Government rates for a commercial flight ranged from “$5-10,000 each”?! Why they didn’t portray that cost as $5k – 10k or $5,000 – 10,000 , I don’t know – it seems sloppy or misleading the way it’s written. I digress. So, the U.S. bails out the airline industry in 2001 and this is what they get in return?

There’s just so much blame to go around here! Perhaps if enough people peruse that list of representatives – and their spouses/daughter – they might be angered enough to write and complain at the least or get them out of office when the time comes. I’m very curious what the backlash from this will be.

Ugh, I feel violated. “Excuse me, what’s that U.S. representatives? Just leave the money on the dresser? Ok. When can I see you again?”

(/nod PTM)

Tantrum gathered last night for our ‘09 Christmas party – we just couldn’t get it coordinated with seven different schedules in December. Our conversational topics ran the gamut over the course of the evening until it got later and Dennis began talking about Conan O’Brien’s last show and all the drama surrounding that situation. We figured it would be worth it to check out his final (at this point anyway) Tonight Show hosting appearance to see what outrageousness he had in store. We were not disappointed. If you missed it, you can watch it here while it’s still available.

There were many truly hysterical, laugh out loud moments, but the thing that really stuck with me was his honest, heart-felt sentiments regarding his tenure at NBC and personal credo on cynicism. Check it out while it lasts.

What a class act!

*EDIT*
It just struck me that there are likely still many people out there – as hard as it may be to believe – who have no idea what is going on with the recent late night wars and how it all got started.
David Letterman sums it up nicely.
Craig Ferguson speaks on the topic.
Jimmy Kimmel explains.

I’ll add more as I find them. You’re welcome.

With the way 2009 ended so dismally, I wasn’t very optimistic regarding the job market. With the holidays, no one was really interested in interviewing for positions let alone posting them on any of the usual job sites. For someone on the verge of desperation, it was quite depressing especially in light of these statistics. After getting past the first week of the year, however, things have definitely picked up and may even point to this recession beginning to turn around – at least for IT positions. So far I have interviewed with two new tech recruiters and had 3 others contact me. One of those “out of the blue” recruiters even landed me an interview with a telecom this past Tuesday.

The interview seemed to go well as we discussed various points of the job as well as what I would bring to the position. We discussed the interviewer’s managerial style and philosophy which included some, shall we say, uncharacteristic phrasings. It made me feel like he was quite comfortable with me during the interview and I took that as a positive. He had a few more people to interview and is making a decision very soon. So, hopefully I will learn on Monday if I will be working for one of the nation’s largest telecoms or striving for an interview and job with someone else.

/fingers crossed

For those of you with unfulfilling jobs, you might check this article out.