Next on the blog redesign hitlist is the ever-expanding list of blogs I write for. I’d love to find a convenient and easy way to incorporate that stuff here. I imagine it involves something with RSS feeds, but I’m a writer and not a techie so we’ll see what works.
Until that happens, let’s hit some of the big numbers…
Have you heard what the folks at PETA are up to? Being a parent and needing to think about responsible parent type things, I’m trying to figure out what they’re thinking. I don’t normally, or um, ever, link to porn, but it’s a necessary evil of discussing what they’re doing, so here we go.
They put together the State of the Union Undressed (WARNING: Link contains full frontal nudity), a video spoofing the state of the union speech featuring a woman touting PETA’s accomplishments while she strips–and she takes it all off.
Now I know PETA is a little out there. I like animals as much as the next guy, and can sympathize with their cause, but I also recognize they go a little overboard. This would be a good example of ‘a little overboard’. I’m trying to figure out how this plan could have seemed like a good idea.
Continue reading Is PETA’s ‘State of the Union Undressed’ Porn?
Well, I started redesiging my blog today. It’s actually less of a redesign and more of a ‘throw it at the wall and see what sticks.’ I added a new plug-in to show Flickr photos in the header (yes, we say goodbye to the fun, randomally loading pictures. It was too much work to add new ones) and tested that a bit to make sure it worked, but this morning I just went nuts and threw a few things together to mess with the layout.
It’s not a drastic change, but the header is vastly different and you can say goodbye to the left sidebar (I added it primarly for ad space, but I don’t need it and that location wasn’t that effective, so it went). I’m still toying with some ideas, but for the moment I’m finished. So if you see anything goofy, please speak up. I’m not exactly doing error-checking or taking a look on multiple browsers. This is my personal blog and I’m just too busy to care about that stuff.
We’ll see if the name ‘thoughts’ still sticks, or if gravity and the churn of time slowly peel it from the wall. I was thinking of maybe calling it Frank.
Our house has been on the market for 31 days. We’ve had 19 showings and two open houses.
Weary doesn’t begin to cover it.
But today we’ve received an offer. And there’s potential for a second offer.
We’re preparing to dance in the streets.
We’re entering the negotiating phase right now, which is a little wild. It’s hard to believe that literally thousands of dollars are being tossed back and forth as the offers and counter-offers fly. I try not to think about that.
Update: We settled on an offer last night and now it’s just pending inspection!
So Steve Jobs threw down the gauntlet and said that digital rights management (DRM, the digital copyright protection that keeps anyone from buying a song from iTunes and giving it to everyone) is a requirement of the record companies and if they’d be willing to get rid of it, Apple would drop it in a heartbeat. In one smooth step Jobs redirected any ill will towards Apple for the cumbersome DRM to the feet of the record labels.
I comment on this because in his argument Jobs points out that the vast majority of music are sold with no DRM whatsoever (CDs). And while CD sales are declining, it doesn’t appear that this lack of copyright protection is bringing down the industry–nor are the record labels moving to add DRM to CDs (perhaps because every attempt has made them look foolish).
So while we wait for the record labels to realize that draconian rules about sharing music don’t work, they have other solutions. Like the latest Fall Out Boy CD, Infinity on High.
Continue reading Fall Out Boy & the Record Industry’s Botched Incentives
Last Thursday I decided to start waking up early and taking Mazie for a walk. She’s hyper and needs the energy release and as a sedentary mouse-jockey any amount of exercise is good for me.
Last Thursday also happened to be the beginning of below zero weather in Minnesota. “Arctic” is the new favorite word among weather people and newcasters.
Today I finally put on long underwear before my sub-zero walk with Mazie. So I’m either that immune to Minnesota cold or I’m stupid.
But I’m not stupid enough to go outside in my pajamas in sub-zero weather to smoke a cigarette, like my neighbor did this morning. That’s quite a habit.
I’m frustrated with blogging right now. I had a few months of lackadaisical posting and now that I’m getting back on the wagon I’m frustrated. I don’t know if it’s the design or the format or what. But I need a change.
After reading the interview with Jason Kottke the other day and drooling over his blog design, I stumbled across this line:
“Tools are important. So is the format. It’s not as important as what people use them for, but tools and formats shape the environment in which they are used.”
In a world where Hollywood marriages have a shorter shelf life than milk, I think we should all applaud pop star Christina Aguilera and her music exec husband Jordan Bratman. This month they’ll celebrate an astounding 16 months of continuous matrimony. Their secret?
“We have something called ‘naked Sundays,’” Aguilera told Ellen DeGeneres during an interview for DeGeneres’ show. “You have to keep marriage alive, spice it up.”
The rest of us could learn from their heroic efforts to keep their marriage spicy after so many, many months.
Speaking of spicy, Aguilera and DeGeneres then had this exchange:
“We do everything naked. We cook naked,” says Aguilera
“You cook naked?” asks DeGeneres.
Aguilera replies: “Yeah, we cook naked.”
“Nothing with grease–that could splatter,” says DeGeneres.
“Well, unless you want the grease,” Aguilera replies.
The best radio station on the planet, 89.3 The Current, has a new Song of the Day podcast. You get a fancy new song delivered to you each every day. Sweet.
Today’s song, “The Sons of Cain” by Ted Leo and the Pharmacists from their forthcoming album is killer. Go download it now, before it’s gone (songs remain available for five days).
If you subscribe to the podcast with iTunes (like I did), getting the song into your music library isn’t exactly obvious (Yes, there’s a difference between your podcasts and your music library. If you want “The Sons of Cain” to show up with your other Ted Leo songs, it needs to be in your music library.) Here’s how you do it: Just right click on the song and click “Convert Selection to AAC”. It’ll convert it for you and put it into your music library.
Mmm… free music. Go the Current.
Movable Type (the blog software I use) is plugging a series of interviews with high-profile bloggers who use their product and the interview with Jason Kottke is worth a read. I’ve followed Kottke’s blog for a while and enjoy the undefinable nature of his collection of content.
I enjoy his simple-yet-functional design (check out this riff on too much meta; interestingly enough, I had a terrible time finding the link for the MT interview with Kottke thanks to poorly designed metadata) and would love to do my reviews the way he does his books and movies. I might actually get around to doing them if that were the case.
Here are a few of the money quotes from the interview …