You try laughing when you can't swallow...

Real quick - holy crap! So the wife rented me Clerks II. I've (we've) been dying to see it. We're about 20 minutes into it and she needs popcorn. It's hilarious. Sad, simple, crude humor I live for. And I'm having a hard time truly appreciating it due to the simple fact that I can't F'ING swallow without serious discomfort!

Multi-Tasking

When I'm sick I hold up in the basement. Thanks to my new laptop I can do both work and watch an ass load of movies since I can't sleep when I can't swallow. When I was studying for my Fine Arts Degree (I switched to Advertising after two quarters) I did a project where I photographed exploitative films and used stills to wrap a series of judging emotions. I loved the slight blur and warm colors photographing the television produced.

I've recently switched the resolution on my camera to the lowest possible setting. I've starting shooting specifically for online display. While sick, and pouring over work emails, I looked up and became absorbed in a film my wife rented for me - Lucky Number Slevin. Great film. Highly recommended. This shot I grabbed on the fly. I held up the camera and clicked. I find it haunting. More questions surrounding it then provided.

Other films I've been watching while unable to sleep:
Alien Resurrection
The Constant Gardner
Superman Returns
Kingdom of Heaven
Lucky Number Slevin
Scoop bad
The Transformers Movie
The Bourne Supremacy
Multiple Futurama Episodes

Cocaine in a can you say?

I was diagnosed with Bronchitis yesterday afternoon, and this morning I'm having a little difficulty with swallowing - which makes it difficult to talk. I choose to sit out todays radio show which sucks because the topic was all about "drink marketing." SoftDrinks, EnergyDrinks, RegionalDrinks...you name it. I sent Rick a bunch of emails (none of which he responded to on the air), so I downed a hot cup of tea and called in. I had to mention my favorite marketing ploy to date concerning energy drinks: Cocaine Energy. Cocaine in a can. I know it's not politically correct. I know a lot of people are upset by it. From ABC News:

"It's just a bad idea and has all the same downsides of too much caffeine plus a very bad name," says Dr. Charles O'Brien a professor and vice chairman of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania.

The drink touts 280 milligrams of caffeine. I remember when Jolt Cola was all the rage, and that has only 72mg of caffeine.

I might have to drive to Texas and get me some (it's not nationally available yet).

Allison asked me on the show what regional drinks I missed from the East Coast? Saranac Root Beer. Made by Saranac Brewery in upstate NY. They micro brew this amazing root beer. If you ever have the chance to try it, do!

Who says a 911 isn't a family car?

I think we survived Thanksgiving. 2 meals, turkey, ham, rolls, wine, beer, pies, cookies...good god there was an ass load of food. We started the day out at the country and ended it back here for a nice quiet evening of Chiefs football and, you guessed it, more food.

I let the wife have the day after off to spend with a friend. Black Friday.

Kids and I went to the gym, then to drive way too fast on twisty roads, then to the park, then to the lake, then back home for leftovers. Because I had them in the 911, I had to take a bunch of photos (see, I am that kind of dork), so I'll post them to my 89c4.com site later this weekend.

test

My Grandfathers Zeiss

I think it was while I was still in college when my grandfather gave me his Zeiss Icon. I didn't use it much while in school (I tested a roll or 2) because I was too busy in the studios. When I graduated, and became too busy shooting satellites, I was looking for something to spark the creative side. I broke out the Zeiss with a plan: keep it with me till I shoot an entire roll (12 shots on a roll of 120 Ilford Delta) then come home, process it in my basement darkroom, dry it, sleeve it, contact print it, develop it, dry it, scan it, crop it, and load it into a flash site I built - visualencounter.com.

I'm reminded of a lecture I heard where Ken White (I believe) was talking about the "disposable image" philosophy. As photographers (prior to digital becoming the standard) we shoot countless rolls of film. Thousands of frames. I know personally I'm happy when I could get 1 decent shot off a 36 exposure roll. I was going to school during the digital revolution. Now, as opposed to rolls and rolls of film, we had Megabites and Gigabytes full of images. Digital representations of film - to which we held sacred. Now, with the push of a button, we could shoot, check, keep or delete. Gone. Not a drop of chemicals used. Not a series of steps to preview a negative/positive, simply a click of a button. As photographers we had to come to grips with the concept of disposable images.

I came across visualencounter when I implemented recent tracking analytics to a number of my sites. It hit me that what took me hours to accomplish 6 years ago takes me 3 minutes now. I shoot a low resolution image on my Canon 20D, connect via USB to my wife's MacBook, make minor adjustments in iPhoto (sorry, i don't have PSCS2 on her Mac), and upload to my Blogger page. Instant "digital"darkroom. Instant gratification, not unlike Polaroid used to be for those that could afford it (I'm talking SX-70 days).

I collect these cameras to remind me of where photo has come from and where it's headed. I also just like old cameras. The simple truth that I can pick up any of these cameras today and find film for them, process them using chemicals I can get via mail order, and print them on silver based paper is amazing. The way things are headed, that simple truth will be a story I tell my kids when they ask "so, you used to soak paper in chemicals to get pictures??"

Sony Trade Up

I need to do this. I started the process last time and let it fade. I need to do this. Do this. DO IT TONIGHT FOOL!!

Chinese Dogs

From CBS News:

Touching off the demonstration were new restrictions that limit households to one dog and ban larger breeds. Police in recent days have gone through city neighborhoods, seizing unregistered dogs and beating some of them to death, witnesses said.

I heard about this on the drive into work on NPR. My favorite was the claim that the Chinese Government had gone and erased online positing, bloggings, and any references they could find.

I'm going to get Sammy a nice treat on the way home tonight. Talk about f'ed up.

How I am greeted when I return home

Seems when you turn a camera on my wife, she gets all "provocative" and stuff. It could just be me. Or, it could just be the camera. Or, it could just be the smell of sick kid and husband to drive that animal hunger alive. Or she could just be drunk (as she usually is by 10:30am).

Family Fun Day

Seems like we did a lot of stuff for a family of 2 sick kids (me being the other kid). The game was on, we actually ventured out for a walk, and at one point during the game C, K and T started building towers to see just how high they could build them. Kind of a cool shot here with the tower just starting to fall.

Bull Baby

So my son has taken to practicing shooting darts. We have a board in the basement. He can't shoot from the line yet (well, he can, but he hits my wall), so we have him at half distance. Last night, while I was zoning out feeling sorry for myself (still sick), he proclaims:

I hit a bulls eye! My first BULLS EYE!!

Needless to say, the pride I feel pales the endless knowledge he seems to absorb, the countless kind acts he performs, or the respect he has for both K and I - no, the proudest moment I can recall is that my son has hit his first bulls eye!

Back to sleep.

Damn Moles

This is what the moles have done to my front yard. I mean, come-on. I'm used to the tunnels, but a huge mound of dirt? Little f'ers!
And let's not forget the two huge mounds in my backyard! Man, it's all because of the freaking new development behind my house. Why the hell do I have the problem and not my neighbors!?
So I bought three. One for the front (shown) and 2 for the back. These better work or I'm pulling a Bill Murray from Caddyshack.
Seriously, it's not that I'm trying to be "safe" or I don't want them to die, I've been told this is THE way to get rid of them. We'll see. They cost $30 a pop!

Sick Sucks

I'm sitting here, on the couch in the basement half watching The Thing, half running reports, half answering work e-mails, half trying to get back to sleep, while hoping the rumbling in my stomach settles down from the chicken and rice soup I'm trying to keep down. I lied by the way; leaving all the sites alone to get a baseline - I couldn't help myself. I needed to add new content. It was driving me crazy.

I'm waiting on a package that should be here today - an electronic solution to move all the god-damn moles out of my yard into my neighbors. They've been destroying both the front and back. Little bastards.

I actually wrote out an XMAS list for my parents. As my wife puts it "what the hell are you, 5??"

Random stuff here people. My head is pounding, I have limited attention right now, and I think I finally have become tired enough to get some rest.

Google Analytics

I've just recently tagged all my relevant sites to begin testing varying seo initiatives. I'm going to leave all sites alone and get a base line for the second half of November (kind of a crappy month thanks to the potential 4 day weekend for Thanksgiving). I have additional content for 89c4.com, 66912.com, slant32.com, flawlessphoto.com that will need to wait to be updated first part of December. And I need to get off my ass and get southwestproject.com up and running. Lets not forget about the actual relevent client websites that will benefit from the research and testing - cause they will. You'll see...

Listen...you smell something?

ScentAir is a cool little Flash site. ScentAir has a cool little concept - bring custom scent experiences to retailers to help them sell more crap. I dig it. I want to have my shopping experience enhanced by the smell of gunpowder when buying my UZI. I'd also like that when I'm buying tobacco the store smells like, well, tobacco...but doesn't it already? You know, that might work for all the KC Bars and Restaurants: pump in the smell of cigarettes to make you feel at home, but not the second hand ill effects...will we start finding second hand smell is killing us faster then cigarette smoke?

Know your neighbors

So I'm up early the other morning (Wednesday, I believe) about to hop in the shower. From my bathroom window, I can see out to the rest of the streets (we live on a corner, so I can see 2 streets from my front lawn). I look out and see a person I don't recognize. Not a big deal, I don't know all my neighbors, so I don't think much of it...till it hits me - it's kind of cold for a walk, the person has a parka on with the hood up, and their not jogging but shuffling up the street. Then I get concerned when this person start talking to my house from across the street. Not at me, not at someone on my lawn, just the general direction of my home. Huh. So I continue to watch this person start looking into people's windows, looking into cars on the street, picking up things off the ground and putting them into their pocket...

I call the local police and report a suspicious person walking around my home. I give them my name, my address, and my phone number. I tell them I don't need an officer to come to my house, but that I would like a drive by to see what this person is doing.

My wife wakes up and listens to my conversation with the local police and looks outside. She sees the person. She turns to me and says "I bet that's *BLANK*'s mom...she's Bi-Polar, had issues with the police before, I bet that's her". Great. I just called the police on my neighbor.

Let's back up a little bit here. We have a young man by the name of *BLANK*. He roams the streets at all hours of the day and night. There is something wrong with this young man. He's had control issues, impulse issues, rage issues, and possibly some slight retardation. Nice enough, but annoying at times, and as a father who has witnessed him interacting with other kids in the neighborhood, I like him to keep his distance from my family. His mother, supposedly has her own problems. Alcohol, Bi-Polar, depression...so I have been told.

Last night, after my wife and I had a lovely evening out, while she is dropping off the babysitter, the doorbell rings. It's 9:45pm. I assume it my wife because the garage door opener must be broken. It's a little, almost confused woman who begins to introduce herself - "Hi, my name is *BLANK*. I live down the street. You have a lovely home. This is a nice neighborhood. What a beautiful daughter, what's her name? Have we met? My name is *BLANK*. I just wanted to introduce myself. I won't bother you again".

So, lets recap shall we: I see a "stranger". I call the police. My wife and I determine it might be *BLANK*'s mom from down the street. *BLANK* comes to my door to not mention a single THING about the cops, but to introduce herself. Even if I had known who she was, she was so bundled up I wouldn't have recognized her.

Crazy.

CCD

Let it be known that when asked "...and what are you thankful for Chloe...", my daughter responded:

"ummm...my daddy..."

Much to the horror of my lovely wife, I will forever remember this day as Daddy's Little Girl Day.

Carry on.

So, my headache could get me a bloody mouth?

From WashingtonPost.com:

"A major manufacturer of store-brand acetaminophen recalled 11 million bottles of the pain-relieving pills Thursday after discovering some were contaminated with metal fragments. There were no immediate reports of injuries or illness."

The article goes on to say:

"Consumers who swallow any of the contaminated pills could suffer minor stomach discomfort or possible cuts to the mouth and throat, the FDA said, adding that the risk of serious injury was remote. Anyone who suspects they have been injured should contact their doctor, the agency said."

So doc, I had this back ache, but you don't know the half of it - I take some over the counter pills and I start bleeding from my mouth! Should I be worried? Is this, dare I ask, a normal side effect that I just missed on the warning lable?

How the hell do you get "metal fragments" into your pills? What's next, feces in our burgers - of yeah, too late.

Dove | Evolution

The other video clip we talked about on todays show - the Dove Evolution spot. 1.7 MM views since it launch on YouTube.

Paxil | YouTube

I talked about this on todays radio show - I do not know why, but I find it hysterical. Enjoy.

Testing From Email | Posting 2

lets try something other then a .png

Nope, doesn't support image attachment display. Ok, back to researching what the hell is wrong with the setup I did for my mobile image posting...

Testing From Email | Posting

I've been having issues with mobile postings, so I thought I'd try email posting...lets see if it works.

And it does, except it doesn't display attached images...or perhaps it was the .png file format...lets do another test to see...

Hour and Half Slow??

Attempting to keep current on the daily tech buzz I head over to Wired. A snippet like this just had to grab my attention:

"What better way to let off steam after raking in millions each year than pushing top-shelf Ferrari's to their competitive limits?"

Mr. Capps describes his experience in his lent Ferrari 612 Scaglietti for a rally in CA. Fun article. My favorite part:

"Looking at our time sheet, the checkpoint monitor just shakes his head. "Jesus," he says, peering in the window with disgust. "You guys are almost an hour and a half slow...."

ChatCreator

Not that I have enough people that frequent my site to warrant this, but ChatCreator is a cool service. From the site:

"To create your chatbox which is easily embedded in any web page, type in the desired name of your chatbox which will appear on top. Select the desired color scheme. Write in the desired size in pixels and click GENERATE."

It's simple, clean, easy and sets up in seconds. I originally read about it over at Cnet.

Print your Camera

What a cool idea - the people over at Linatree have created a downloadable paper camera. It's a pinhole camera. Download a PDF, print it, build it, and pop in a roll of 35mm (you remember what that is, don't you digital kids?). Talk about cool.

As part of my final photo project in college I attempted to create a fisheye lens. I wasn't successful in making a fish, but I did make a workable lens out of warped plastic to mount onto my Canon EOS Elan. Images had a, well, plastic optics feel to them - kind of like a Holga.