Understanding Me, The Fan Boy
A very good read on how companies and their marketing departments produce loyal customers. I contend there’s more to it than just the branding push by companies, but it does help to explain why dorks like me are slaves to Apple (Or Nikon or Volkswagen or Nike or…) I’m glad my wife didn’t read anything along these lines before she…
How To Use An Apostrophe
I’m thinking about using my next check from work to print a few hundred of these to distribute, randomly. How To Use An Apostrophe It reminds me of the days when I worked in a warehouse. After paying my dues and working there, oh, for five years or so, I moved to the night shift and got to spend a…
Worth A Look
As you might imagine, I’ve been thinking about the last ten years a lot lately. I’m nothing if not a sucker for the end of decades, since they are loaded with opportunities to make <em>best of</em> lists, consider the ways life has changed, and in general have an excuse to remember the past. What I’ve been struck by while thinking…
Required Reading – Vaccines
Below is a link to an article I think all parents should read. It addresses a very important subject I think many of us have some fears about. An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All To be clear, there is no credible evidence to indicate that any of this is true. None. Twelve epidemiological studies…
Journalism Is Not Dead
Maybe I should move the family to remote northwest Australia. It seems like there’s exciting stuff to write about there. This is not necessarily safe for work, although it is from an allegedly legitimate news source.* No oral sex, says ute crash waitress ”It may have looked bad when police first arrived as my girls were hanging out all over…
I Suck
A book a week? Big freaking deal. Try a book a day. Our Towns – For Nina Sankovitch, a Book a Day, Every Day In a time-deprived world, where book reading is increasingly squeezed off the page, it is hard to know what’s most striking about Ms. Sankovitch’s quest, now on Day 350, to read a book every day for…
Way Back Machine
When I hear about people staying up all night to play video games these days, it kind of makes sense, since modern games offer so much depth and possibilities for play. Looking back, why the hell would we play Atari all day? Those games sucked. Need proof? Check out Atari’s 1978 catalog. Things only got slightly better before the 2600…
Benefits Of Not Fouling Up Three
Imagine if Memphis had managed to foul Sherron Collins before he shoveled the ball to Mario. Talk about a mess. It makes me even more glad that the NCAA was responsible for approving Darrell Arthur’s eligibility, thus their lack of interest in taking a second look at his high school transcript. If Mario misses, is KU vacating wins now and…
Genius Social Experiment
Give a 13-year-old a Walkman for a week and see what happens. I remember my first Walkman well. It was actually a knock-off, since those early Walkmans were quite expensive. And it was the obvious knock-off: had some crazy decals on it and, worse, a pull-out antenna for the AM/FM tuner. But I loved that thing. Giving up my iPod…
Bubblegum Cards
As my generation approaches middle age, we’re going to have to start answering for some of the things we’re responsible for. Example: ruining baseball cards. It’s not all our fault. The Baby Boomers, as always, deserve some blame. They were the ones who started the nonsense, paying insane amounts for cards from their youth. And they were the ones who…