Thinking in vain...

My sister came home from work last night and as soon as she opened the door:

Sister: You're at your computer, right?
Me: Yeah.
Sister: Go to YouTube and search for singing, bunnies and skittles.
Me: What?
Sister: One of our IT guys told me about it. Just go do it.

*searching and then watching the Singing Rabbit Skittles commercial*

Me: I've seen that.
Sister: That's hysterical. You have to put it on your blog.

So here it is.



I hope that guy went and got a rabies shot. It's odd, but not as odd as Russian Skittles commercials.

Look I've already started collecting cigars. Alumni Weekend is only about a month away.



One of the GE guys (who also had a birthday earlier this week) had a son born yesterday. His first. He's 9 lbs 1 oz.

And thank G-d the wife won out and named the son. Otto would have been an unfortunate name.

So he's handing out cigars. He said I'd smoke it if I got drunk enough. I refrained from saying something like "oh, you don't know me at all."

Imagine my delight when someone sent me this video this morning (you might not want to have your volume all the way up):

That's Munchkin. She is what made me stop and watch part of the Ugliest Dog Competition on Animal Planet. (I assume it's a she.)

I think she was in the purebred category, but I have no idea what she is.

There were uglier dogs, but she's funny. I didn't actually realize that most dogs in the competition were either abused and/or deformed. Which is really sad and these people are great for taking them in. I still wouldn't want to run into one of them though.

I don't know who won, so if someone knows, tell me.

Oh, and the Bull Dog and the Basset Hound - those aren't ugly dogs. I gotta take a picture of our neighborhood Bull Dog, my sister LOVES it.

So Jetpacks posted an old commercial for Pillsbury Space Food Sticks. And being the curious (and sometimes gullible) person I am, I wanted to taste one.

So I googled it and a place called The Space Store sells them. I bought the chocolate ones. They came in the mail today.

Instead of a long, crayon-shaped stick - they are now bite-sized pieces. And to be honest, they taste like a softer, chalkier version of a tootsie roll. They don't taste exactly like tootsie rolls, maybe more like old tootsie rolls where the chocolate tastes a little off.

There was a comment on Jetpacks' blog about their texture being like

a cross between a Slim Jim and semi-melted crayon. The flavour is even less desirable.

I do think they've improved a little though. Softer, old tootsie roll is much better than that.

I don't think they're giving me "lasting energy to feel alive!" I think they're giving me a headache. But I'm not supposed to have a lot of sugar and those little bite-size pieces have 19 grams of sugar (and I already had a cookie today).

Okay, I've got like 9 pieces left, who wants one?

My camera (yes, the brand new one) is giving me a message: memory card error.

I don't know what to do... see FILM DOESN'T DO THIS!

ETA: Nevermind. I'm an idiot.

ETA 2: Wait, now I have corrupted images. WTF? Reformatting the memory card seems to work, but this is getting a little ridiculous and I'm losing images.

*Warning: This commercial is annoying*



I was subjected to this one while watching The Weather Channel. It seems they sponsor the local forecast.

They actually have a second commercial where the actor/actress says how much they can't stand the commercial - but they love the product. I would think it would make your forehead all greasy.

Mysterious Rock Growing 'Hair' Put on Display in Beijing

On March 16, 2007, an unusual rock went on display in Beijing. This rock has "hair," almost identical to human hair, growing out of its "head."

Name that song and I'll give you some of my "Food Sticks" when they arrive. ;)

How pretty is that?

This 3-D computer simulation, created by the University of Chicago researches and released March 22, shows the death throes of an exploding white-dwarf star the size of Earth. The green sphere represents the extent of the star, and other colors stand for hot temperatures (yellow and orange) and cooler temperatures (blue and red). A flame bubble can be seen emanating from the stars core.

This image was one of 1,600 images France's National Center for Space Studies agency released. If it's not a UFO, that's the coolest lightening phenomenon I've ever seen.

Their server crashed over the weekend because so many people came to look at over "100,000 pages of witness testimony, photographs, film footage and audiotapes from its secret UFO archives."



From MSNBC's March space slideshow

Software Ensures Earth-to-Moon Supply Chain

Now let's see if we can get hydrogen-fueled cars.








(click images for larger view.)

Okay, forgive me. That headline was horrible... but that song's been in my head for about a day now and um, I'm really tired. (That's my excuse anyways.)

So the informal results of the very unscientific poll of my hair color which is not located here was 6 blonde, 1 dark brown, 0 light brown.

Thank you to all who participated and made up my mind for me. I appreciate it.

So I'm well, blonder. Apparently she could not give me my natural "dirty blonde" hair color because that is irreproducible. Wunderbar. But anyways - I won't bore you with details. It'll be a bit of a process to get the little bit of red out of my hair that the idiot I went to before put in.

My hair is very pretty though, if I do say so myself.

So to do this I took a half a day yesterday. Whenever I take a day off or a half a day, I always have this great notion that I'll come in the next day and have work on my desk.

No. None.

According to my boss in our production meeting we're "as busy as shit." Well, apparently I'm not. I'm going to go see if I can scrounge up something. And if I can't - you'll now know why your blog stats show me looking at your page every 5 minutes.

(*pictures to come later... I couldn't take them of myself this morning and make them in focus. I was having problems.)

Anyone know of a good video editing program? I just need something simple, preferably shareware or freeware.

I took videos of Troy's birthday (his employees and dad got him a singing telegram/balloon lady) and I've got to fix one of the videos.

• If it's 5am and the streets are virtually empty – is it really necessary for the fire trucks and police cars to have their sirens on?

• If you're going 65mph down the Interstate, perhaps it's not the best idea to expectorate your gross chewing tobacco spit out the window.

• It seems a local company is in a lot of hot water this morning.

There's a woman outside of a local surgical clinic, she's been there every morning – rain, snow, freezing cold, broiling hot sun – protesting the clinic because her husband nearly died from a hernia operation. It has something to do with tacks or staples and lousy care and a lot of pain. She's been doing this for well over a year. I've never once seen an article in the local paper, but I thought maybe I'd missed it. I don't think so now.

One of the freelance PR people we use was coming in this morning and she made a comment about her and that's when I told her she'd been out there for quite a long time. Her husband was with her and he'd seen her too.

I, personally, think it's interesting how nothing has been said about the woman. Shows how powerful some doctors around here must be.

But the interesting comment came from my boss. As we walked in she asked what we were talking about. When we told her, she rolled her eyes and she goes, "I know, it's just exhausting."

Yeah, that wasn't my point at all. The woman is out there before 7 until about 10 every day the clinic is open standing on the corner and it's exhausting to you to have to look at?

I hope I misunderstood her comment.

Non Sequitur - today's is pretty good too.

I've read this story at 3 of the blogs I read (Fred's, Seth Godin's Blog, and gapingvoid). I have no real connection to the people or the blogs/sites involved. But it only cements my belief that people just aren't nice anymore.

First off and possibly random, I've never understood the motivation behind trolls on message boards, blogs or any other public forum. 99% of the time they don't know the person they're attacking personally – so if they don't like it, why do they continue to read it?

Secondly, the issue of anonymity reminds me of my high school band director. He couldn't stand anonymous suggestions, which were more often than not criticisms. Parents would contact the school about something he'd done, but ask to have their name withheld. He called them cowards. Cowards couldn't take ownership of their opinions and he therefore would not listen to them.

I think that principle holds true whether you're on the internet or not.

Of course, remaining anonymous isn't always bad - but it does tend to the cowardly side when all your using it for is criticism of another person.

Also, you can't be creative and/or intelligent to say mean things about a person. My great-grandfather had a saying, "it's a sign of a lack of intelligence when the only way you can express yourself is through profanity."

Of course cursing is much more accepted than it was in 1940 when he said that, but I think it translates to more than just cursing.

Everyone (a large generalization, I know) seems to not respect anyone anymore. I saw a clip of a woman coming out of left field and tearing into Jimmy Carter on C-Span. She wasn't disagreeing with policy, she was personally insulting him. I'm not giving my opinion either way on Jimmy Carter, but I don't think anyone deserves that.

I saw a segment debating that exact clip later and the guy defending the woman said we had the right to say whatever we wanted, however we wanted. But wouldn't a intelligent, respectful person disagree in a different way?

I dunno, maybe it's because I live in a small town and I've been handed down a romanticized notion of Southern hospitality and politeness. Who knows. But I still see the rudeness and lack of respect here.

Too much thinking for one night – now I'll return to the regular stuff.

Moths drink the tears of sleeping birds

A species of moth drinks tears from the eyes of sleeping birds using a fearsome proboscis shaped like a harpoon, scientists have revealed. The new discovery – spied in Madagascar – is the first time moths have been seen feeding on the tears of birds.

Roland Hilgartner at the German Primate Centre in Göttingen, Germany, and Mamisolo Raoilison Hilgartner at the University of Antananarivo in Madagascar, witnessed the apparently unique sight in the island state’s Kirindy forest.

Tear-feeding moths and butterflies are known to exist elsewhere in Africa, Asia and South America, but they mainly feed on large, placid animals, such as deer, antelope or crocodiles, which cannot readily brush them away. But there are no such large animals on Madagascar. The main mammals – lemurs and mongoose – have paws capable of shooing the moths. Birds can fly away.

But not when they are sleeping. The Madagascan moths were observed on the necks of sleeping magpie robins and Newtonia birds, with the tip of their proboscises inserted under the bird’s eyelid, drinking avidly (scroll down for images). This was during the wet season, so the scientists think the insects wanted salt, as the local soils are low in sodium.

But sleeping birds have two eyelids, both closed. So instead of the soft, straw-like mouthparts found on tear-drinking moths elsewhere, the Madagascan moth has a proboscis with hooks and barbs “shaped like an ancient harpoon”, Hilgartner says.

This can be inserted under the bird’s eyelids, where the barbs anchor it, apparently without disturbing the bird. The team does not yet know whether the insect spits out an anaesthetic to dull the irritation. They also want to investigate whether, like their counterparts elsewhere, the Madagascan tear-drinkers are all males who get most of their nutrition from the tears.

Journal reference: Biology Letters (DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2006.0581)

Via NewScientist.com

Cane toad the size of a 'small dog' found

A CANE toad the size of a small dog has been nabbed in the middle of a "breeding frenzy" at a Darwin suburb.

Dubbed the 'monster toad' by its catchers, the 861g male is the largest to be caught anywhere in the Northern Territory, according to environmental group Frogwatch.

The warty pest was picked up by local volunteers during a community toad bust at Lee Point last night.

Measuring 20.5cm in length, the colossal male was one of 39 toads caught in the middle of "a breeding frenzy", said FrogWatch co-ordinator Graeme Sawyer.

"The biggest toads are usually females but this one was a rampant male," he said.

"He is huge. I would hate to meet his big sister."

The second largest toad to be caught in Darwin was a female measuring about 15cm.

"This monster is another five centimetres long and one third heavier," Mr Sawyer said.

He said it was about the size of a small dog.

First released in Queensland, cane toads have multiplied and spread across Australia, poisoning millions of native animals, including crocodiles in World Heritage-listed Kakadu.

Via The Herald Sun

I do. And I finally got some. Ear plugs are fan-ta-bulous.

I also found out the little brown birds are common sparrows and we have catbirds. Which were mating yesterday (or fighting) and nearly flew into my head.

Usually all it takes for me to like a commercial is a talking animal. Really, I'm easy to please. I like the happy cow commercials, the beaver and the Slowskys. I even like the Gecko (girls really are suckers for an English accent), there's a radio spot where he's not really even talking about insurance – he's talking about Virginia ham. Maybe it's funny to me because he is talking about ham instead of insurance. Anyways.

These guys look fake and creep me out.

Via AdRants.

I'm kinda in shock after watching this.



Via What Sucks...

This was in today's CornerShot. CornerShot is a little blurb on the front page of the Extra section in the lower right-hand corner.

Today's was by a local reporter. Although he seems upset about the repealment of our car tax (which I am not upset about), I think his solution is funny - although prison time for shouting would actually use up the taxes the fines were paying.

Corner Shot

Because we're not allowed to have a car tax anymore, I'd like to present a modest proposal for paying for our roads and bridges: the Car Commercial Tax.

Car dealerships will pay a tax for each commercial each time it airs. The tax will be calculated using the following table:

Speed-reading of fine print: $10,000
Phone excitement over minor holidays, such as Columbus Day: $10,000
Explosions, laser blasts and super-novas: $25,000
Sudden zooming or tilting of camera: $10,000
Appearance by the dealership owner: $100,000
Blaring, but unrecognizable music: $10,000 per second
Use of the terms "pre-owned," "incentive" or "sale-a-bration": $75,000 each.
Shouting: $500,000 plus a minimum 12-month prison sentence.

--Tom Angleberger

As I came in from lunch I heard a "pssst."

I look up and there's Doug looking at me through the bookcases. He then proceeds to tell me that there is a certain fellow with red hair in this office that likes to take jabs at me who is having his 40th birthday tomorrow. And he wanted to give me a heads up so I could get him back.

He then goes, "you didn't hear this from me."

I love it. If anyone has any ideas about what I can do, let me know.

I don't know about anyone else, but I wouldn't want a sheep liver in me, even if it was "human."

I'm playing with my camera - so y'all will have to deal with some pretty spring flower shots. :)

For a while now I've been thinking that I really should get involved in the local Ad Fed group, so after reading Fred's Suggestion #3, I finally decided to make an effort. Saturday I helped out with the Student Portfolio Review.

And it actually wasn't that bad. Everyone was really nice to me. I don't know if it was just because they really needed my help, but I'm hoping it's because they're nice. Neither of the incoming presidents (I think they're tag-teaming it) were unfriendly. But they actually don't work in agencies, one works for the chamber of commerce and the other is in PR at VT. I sometimes find that I don't get along with the type of girls that seem to get hired at 3 of the agencies around here, but none of them were there Saturday.

While everything went well and I'm looking forward to getting more involved – that wasn't the most interesting thing of the day. The most interesting thing was running into my agency's previous Creative Director.

Now let me see if I can explain this without using names and not confusing everyone.

The previous CD here is now the CD of another agency. He also happens to be one of the best copywriters in the valley. He was fired from this agency because my boss found him freelancing for the competition (although that's not the whole story according to him).

He also happened to be one of the reviewers. Several of the students he was supposed to review didn't show up so he was out there talking to us. He was friendly and he seemed the opposite of everything I'd heard about him.

So frankly, I didn't think he recognized me. He and my now-boss had interviewed me several months after I started work at a law firm. Several months passed, he left, I left the law firm and came to work here. But I was wrong, he knew exactly who I was.

So around lunch he finally asks what I'm sure he's wanted to ask all day - how was life here. I told him it was great. He told me not to lie and that I could tell him. So he spends the next 10 minutes trying to find out what my boss has said about him and what I think of her. I told him she hadn't really said anything and I thought she was very nice to me.

He told me I was no fun and that eventually he'd get me drunk and find out everything. The only thing we could agree on was that I had the best office in the world (his old one).

I thought he was kidding. Then I come in this morning to an email from him.

This is why I don't network - I like to avoid situations like this. I need a bigger porch.



(If you want the details of the conversation, 'cause there's lots more - you'll have to get them over email...)

I've figured out the bird. It's a cardinal. A very loud, fat cardinal.

Of course, I also have a robin, a blue jay (which I thought was a crow), a woodpecker, and these little brown birds that I haven't been able to name yet.

The cardinal is also a bit of a bully, he won't let any of the other birds in the bird bath. He'll chase them all away and then plop himself in the middle and won't move.

So this is what I hear each morning over and over and over again: cardinal song

I did try the forest setting of my noise machine - it worked until I slept with my window open. I think the owl made him very territorial this morning. He was literally sitting on my windowsill "singing."

I even pointed the little guy out to a neighbor walking by and they agreed with me that he was abnormally loud.

Frances got flowers yesterday because her husband's in India or somewhere like that.

So my boss went out and bought some for her desk and put one on my desk so I wouldn't feel left out. And that is why I feel horrible when I complain. Because I shouldn't.

Although, in other news, she gave the paper a new one about the ad. Turns out it wasn't due Tuesday, it was due Thursday like we all originally believed. I like it when things aren't my fault.

We also gave flowers to Carter (the GE guy, and yes... that GE guy) because he's having surgery on his knee today. Frances did it.

For those that don't know we now share our offices with GE sales reps (who now own the building). We're renting until the new building gets finished... sometime this millennia. Troy is the owner of the business and he likes to give me a hard time (who doesn't?).

So this is the conversation we just had – which we, of course, yelled across the hallway to each other.

Troy: That was nice of you to give Carter flowers.
Me: Huh?
Troy: The flowers, that was nice of you. Carter is going to enjoy that.
Me: They're from all three of us.
Troy: Oh, (laughing) that's going to take some of the enjoyment out of it for him.
Me: *pause* Why?
Troy: I just think Carter would enjoy getting flowers from you.
*awkward pause*
Me: Well, I don't know what to say to that, so I'm not going to say anything.

Now Troy and Doug are laughing.

Look, it's my office!

Actually, it looks better today. I threw away all extraneous post-its yesterday.


Found on Twenty Four.

Some of you will appreciate this.



toothpastefordinner.com

This created one of those I-have-to-stifle-my-laugh-so-nobody-knows moments.

That would've been the perfect response to some of the comments I got in undergrad at my senior show.

One of my best friends has asked me to come and talk about advertising with her 7th graders. I jokingly asked her what would I say to 7th graders about advertising. She then told me she had lesson plans for me to use.

I told her I couldn't wait to look over them and see what they said, she then got irritated at me and told me her favorite thing to teach was advertising.

I changed the subject.

I can't wait to see what the lesson plans say, though. I remember this great video about how they really make commercials. I swear it was an HBO special - I loved it... I used to want to watch it over and over again. They told you things like how ice cream was really mashed potatoes and ice cubes weren't ice cubes.

The other thing I remember from the program is that Guess Who commercial where they made the pieces talk and all these poor little kids thought their board game was going to talk and move. I tried to find the name of the program but no luck, Google isn't cooperating with me today.

Pyramid's Secret Doors To Be Opened.

Took him long enough.....

I saw this this morning at Twenty Four... I thought it was great.

I have a bad blonde habit of doing something I didn't want to do in real life and then mentally trying to hit apple + z.

Like the time I had to scan in some negatives for a client and they'd marked them with sticky notes. Well, I tore off the sticky note without paying attention to the image and I went to, well, "undo" it and then realized I couldn't.

Yeah, yeah... I dye my hair so no one knows. I don't know if it's a sad commentary on me or how much I use a computer.

And I don't mean that as a bad thing.

I went out to lunch today with some friends and we were distracted by a little boy in the restaurant. Turns out, his mother told us, that it's his 1st birthday today.

It's a small restaurant so you have to pay at the cashier counter and while the woman and boy were waiting in line, they talked to us.

When the two of them got ready to pay, the woman behind the counter informed them that their meal had been paid for by the woman in front of them because it was the little boy's birthday.

Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy...

I'm posting this because yesterday sucked and it's one of my favorite things in the entire world.

Man Survives Brush with Death
A Jeep crashed through his wall early Tuesday morning and pinned Dean Blevins in his bed until firefighters could get him out.

The thought that most occupied Blevins' mind while he was hemmed in beneath the Jeep was how much he wanted to get even with the driver, he said.

"If I'd a had my gun," Blevins said, "I'd a probably shot him."

I'd think that too if I was pinned under a jeep....

"If you're not hated, you're not doing your job."


Is that really always true? Or only true when you're working with 18 - 21 year-old college students?

Rowing Team Arrested for Illegal Entry


How much would that suck? There you are minding your own business, rowing, then you're arrested.

This is cool. I found it on advertising for peanuts.

It's a shame some things are dying out because of technology. I love doing Polaroid transfers. Besides, they're fun and instantaneous.

Sally Mann has some beautiful large format Polaroids - none of which are on the internet (I looked).

Random tip for anyone who actually still wants to buy Polaroid film: Don't buy Polaroid film that's not laying flat (& preferably in a refrigerator).

I used to work at Ritz and everyday I would take the Polaroids down and lay them flat and put the extras in the fridge – and the manager would always take them out of the fridge and then put them back hanging up.

Don't buy film from them – they don't know what they're doing.

I'm a Charter Member of Hands Across The Porch.


(I dearly love porches... )

Nes, I thought of you when I saw this... however, I'm not sure how many of the rest of you are privy to the ads geared towards the female persuasion of our species... but I get them a lot as I log in and out of MySpace.

I got hit with this one when I logged on actually. It's good to know they screen for those "marrieds." I'm going to start using that. "Yeah, my friends there, they're 'marrieds,' dunno if you want to hang out with them."

They're one-upping the local paper. We had a feature every Thursday with the areas "Most Eligible," they had to stop when one of them turned out to be an actual felon.

Guys get the good ones. They get headlines like "fresh hot singles." Girls get corny lines like "waiting for you" and "boyfriend season is right around the corner."

What the hell is "boyfriend season" anyway?

But their MySpace page is hysterical (albeit a little sad).

Last comment: "Thanks for the add. What I wanna know is this...do any of the girls in your ads have MySpace pages? Especially the blonde in the short black dress...she has to be one of the hottest women I've ever seen. Let me know!"

No, they don't have MySpace pages or profiles on Match.com, coz like Jetpacks pointed out - their real boyfriends would kick your ass.

There, the first thing I could take a picture of. I don't have a very big porch, but it's a nice one. I really like the camera... I somehow missed it was refurbished, but whatever.

I got a book.

I didn't order it... I doubt some place like Corbis would've sent me a book for free. But it's addressed to me (and my name is spelled right) and sent to the agency.

It's a very nice book and it still has that freshly printed smell... mmmm.

Oh, and it's all photography so it's extra fun for me..... I hope it's not a mistake. I like looking at it.

I'm full and that's because we have good food here. Even if the New York Times doesn't think so.

That arrow is either right over my head or dissing some good North Carolina Bar-B-Que. Well NY can keep the likes of their $1,000 pizza (file that under extravagant).

And they can kiss my grits.

(Yes I realize that last line was dumb, but I amuse me, and that's really all that matters)

According to UPS, my camera has been delivered...

That made my Monday... well, that and Jimmy Dean commericals, (procrastination courtesy of Freelancefred).

I love how when I do pro bono work, the clients are always about 200x more demanding than the clients that pay us.

"When would you like these posters?"
"Actually if we could have them to the printer by the end of the day... "

Perfect.

Wow, I sound like a b!tch this morning.

I'm a little late on this movie, I know.

I stayed up way too late watching The Boondock Saints last night (the edited version though, I might have to go rent the full one).

Now I get it, that movie is awesome.

Okay, well... yesterday the story was a unicorn was driving.

But today, it turns out it was a mix-up

The mixup occurred when a deputy prosecutor misunderstood an e-mail from a colleague who used the phrase "unicorn defense," thinking it was an actual statement from Holliday, Paxinos said. "Unicorn defense" is a slang term used by prosecutors when a defendant blames some mythical person for a crime, he said.

From the San Francisco Gate.

Personally, it was much more interesting when the unicorn was driving.....

Provided to me by my friend Gary when I told him I'd never had Guinness:

1. If a pub has guinness on tap, and they fill the glass to the top in one pull, find a new pub (they are serving you muddy water)

2. If a pub has guinness on tap, and they don't have to let the pint settle for at least 2 or 3 minutes, find a new pub (the guinness is watered down)

3. If a pub doesn't have guinness on tap, but has the draught bottles or cans, make sure the bartender pours the guinness IMMEDIATELY after opening said bottle or can.

4. If a pub doesn't have guinness on tap, and doesn't have the draught cans/bottles, but has the extra stout, compliment them on their good taste.

5. If a pub doesn't have guinness on tap, and doesn't have the draught cans/bottles, and doesn't have the extra stout, take a long look in the mirror and ask yourself why you are there in the first place.

Well, it's almost St. Patrick's Day and today target="blank">Kegs & Eggs 8 is going on in DC (put on by DC101).

DC101 streams their station, so I went to listen as I usually do since I'm not ever in DC for it. Not that I really would want to, people line up at zero-dark-thirty to get in. And I, personally, find it hard to drink before noon even if it is a holiday (as much as St. Patrick's Day is a holiday).

Anyways, my point. I have one. Before the stream started I had the joy to watch a local gem of a car commercial for Easterns Automotive Group.

Here in SW Virginia we have car commercials like the ones Jetpack describes. They have the George Bush and Arnold impersonators too, but we also have Andy Griffith and the one currently in rotation that I hate - Rodney Dangerfield ("I said I wanted a deal, he brought me a burger and fries, he thought I said meal" *cue laugh track*).

But I wish we had car commercials like the one I saw, and luckily someone put it on YouTube.

*Warning: The jingle is still in my head - watch at your discretion, but you know you want to. There are lots more too for your viewing pleasure.*

Logos sent to me in Word

Thinking today is Friday

The hiccups

I was doing an image search for brains this morning, but I got this.

Apparently they feel like touching a warm candle... ew.





Kohonas

I finally have one. I bought a digital camera.

I was holding out for a sweet camera like this. But that'll have to wait a little bit. Especially since what I would really love is an 8x10 view finder camera (Dream big or go home).

But I got a Canon A540 (thank you Freelancefred for the suggestion), just so I'd have something. I think I'm going to have a lot of fun...

Pictures to come when it arrives in the mail.

Taking a break from the most recent episode of "please make this ad as ugly as possible," I did my usual rounds.

First, it's good to know that some people use Google as much as I do. I swear I get random calls from friends asking me to "google" things.

And

U-Shut Up. I laughed too loudly in my office at the title. And secondly, the video is great. Not only does it cause one to draw too much attention to oneself (Doug just yelled at me: "What are you laughing at?"), but it's informative as I was myself wondering how I went from AT&T/SunCom to Cingular and now I'm going back to AT&T.

I'm not the first to hear about things, and usually another blog I read who's author is more experienced articulates my opinion much better.

But I do occasionally come across some local/regional gems. At least I think so.

NVhomes.com was sent to me by a client who likes the header at the top of the home page.

Maybe it was the fact that I'd have carbs for lunch and my thyroid didn't like it or something but it took me a while. Course I'm not quick with the abbreviations... it took me way too long to figure out that "ne1" was "anyone."

"Failure to Launch" was recommended to me for one reason. Because the main character's room mate has a mockingbird outside her window that keeps her up all night.

And she tries to kill it... I can't kill mine. 1) I could never do that and 2) I live in a bird sanctuary.

I don't think I have a mockingbird, in fact I'm now on a mission to find out exactly what kind of bird it is exactly.

My bed is about 4 feet from a very large window... abnormally large on the second floor of my house. Right outside my window is nature's own apartment complex for bird's - a holy bush. Directly beside my window is the roof to our front porch. Birds like to perch there too.

I can not sleep past about 6:00, restfully. And this morning the bird was up extra early about 5.

So far a pillow over my head and a white noise maker at max volume to drown out this little bird has not worked.

I read about this over on FreelanceFred's blog this morning and then another blog I read suggested that everyone spread the story and tag your entries with BBDO, Helm and Cingular.

I'm still learning, but I know I don't like Cingular and have been patiently (sometimes impatiently) waiting for my 2-year contract to run out, so that I can cancel. I just don't have the patience to deal with the CSRs and I've only got 2 months left. And this only adds to the fire.

I have no reason to post this other than I thought it looked cool as hell.



Nasa - Stereo Eclipse

I saw this commercial last night on the History Channel, while I was watching "Digging for the Truth."



I thought it was a mistake so I tried to remember to look for it this morning and went to the website at the end.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't think the average person who tries this stuff is very funny, and we certainly don't need more idiots slamming themselves into fences...

When is Hawass not irritated about something....

Pyramids must rise above poll, says irate Egypt

I voted..., but I can see his point. The Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty aren't really on par with the Giza pyramids.

I didn't go... we didn't win anything.

I feel a little bad that I don't really care - nothing we entered was really mine though. My boss tried to make me feel better about it (or herself), she said that it's not rigged but unless you're very involved in Ad Fed you're not likely to win anything.

Do they judge the ADDYs differently than the student ones? Because when I helped out with those, the entries stayed anonymous.

My mother thinks if the Geico cavemen can have a sitcom, so can the turtles from Comcast.

I had to Google them to make sure I was getting the name right, I had no idea they had a blog. I bet they have a MySpace page too......

William Shatner used to annoy me - until I saw him on Boston Legal, where I think he's hysterical. Somehow, I imagine him to be like his character... and I'm going to go with that since I can now stand him in the Priceline commercials.

So this from Where's My Jetpack made my Monday morning.

Oh... and go watch the Bilbo Baggins thing - there are no words to describe it.

Cat's even warming up to William Shatner. She hates all things Star Trek because of me. I was a horrible (twin) sister and would make her watch that ear wig part in "The Wrath of Kahn." She's never forgiven me.

We dropped by one of the County elementary school (Ashley's mother needed her purse) and they were having like an indoor Field Day (that's what we called them) but it was called something else.

Along the walls the kindergarteners had a writing assignment about what they would do as POTUS. Most of them would give the world ice cream - which of course, I'm all for. One girl would stop biting because her sister bites her all the time. One boy would stop all technical difficulties with Direct TV. Another very wise young boy would tell everyone to ignore each other.



But my favorite would wear a three-cornered hat.

And I have very little to do. My boss keeps promising things will pick up, I hope so because I can only read blogs for so long and listen to Coast to Coast (btw - some guy is suing Boeing because he says that there are explosives that can be remote detonated in the planes).

Where's My Jetpack: Resist the Onslaught

That reminds me of our client who was targeting twenty-somethings with "club med" type condos. I thought it looked dumb. He thought it looked cool. My opinion, however, didn't count (despite being, what I thought, was the desired demographic).

The creative brief said the logo should be... groovy.

toothpastefordinner.com

Make the logo bigger.

Maybe people really do need this much help figuring shit out.


Yes. They do.


On the radio this morning they had a contest where adults had to answer questions from 5th grade level SOL tests and they had to get more right than the 5th grader. I came in late, but 2 of the 3 adults thought that George Washington wrote the Declaration of Independence. Oh, and one person thought that the moon gave off it's own light (I believe that was how the question was worded).

And then I realized that the prize was for Nascar tickets. And people around here wonder why they get stereotyped....

So I don't usually loathe/hate anybody. But over the last few years I've developed a hate for one person. She embodies everything I usually don't like in people and she has managed to perfect each of those characteristics into one horrible personality. She's deceitful, untrustworthy, jealous, and lazy... among other things.

And I can't stand her.

But in reality, can I go out of my way to exclude her from an organization I'm part of/president of? Which I have been. Should I not do that as president of the organization?

I think there's something wrong with us a gender. We don't help other women, really... especially younger women who need the guidance. We may congratulate ourselves on developing organizations that teach young women to be better people but it's all crap. Every one of those organizations is a 7th grade gossip session at it's core.

Okay, maybe there are some, and if there are point me in that direction because the ones I'm a part of suck.

And I have nothing to do right now... so... if you read it great, if not it'll be like a dream diary... I have some weird ones:

This time I was in Blacksburg and I was going to follow my older sister back to Roanoke, but I stopped at the bank for money first... but I didn't actually get the money because some sketchy guy was standing there outside the ATM (a Wachovia ATM, where I don't bank) and I was convinced he would mug me for my $20, so I drove out of the parking lot. Sketchy man then walked away and into the mechanic/tire shop that was in the same parking lot. Which, of course, proved to me that he was going to mug me and since I was not going to give him the chance he walked away.

So I turn out of the parking lot and go up a hill (btw, Blacksburg looks a bit like bad parts of Vinton... but I'm in Blackburg)... except it's not a hill it's a draw bridge. Is that what they're called? The ones that open for ships. Anyway, of course I'm driving up it when it's going up, and it goes vertical. Now I'm hanging out the passenger side (??) of my car onto a railing, which is of course keeping me and the car from plummeting like 600 ft to the ground. And I hold on until it's back down.

And I am on this HUGE body of dark water... surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains. Like the Valley got filled with water and I'm in the car but I'm not, it's kinda like a raft, but it's a car, very odd. And there are these men walking around (I don't know if the water's that shallow, or they're on a platform) and they're on either side of the bridge and it's their job to reconnect it, because now the bridge isn't exactly stable it moves a lot and more floats than anything.

I start to cross and this is when I fall out of the car, I think, and into the water and am holding on for dear life as one of the men try to help me out of the water before I drown (because I can't swim... in the dream). I then asked him if there was any place I could turn around because I've gone the wrong way and all I see ahead of me is a ton more bridge and water (there's some sort of like half-way station that connects sections of the bridge). He told me no that I could only turn around when I reached then end and that was another 2 - 3 miles.

Then the alarm clock woke me up.

So apparently my subconscious likes putting me in dark water that's like 800 feet deep or on top of super high mountains standing on some sort of not-so-safe bridge. I wonder what it's trying to tell me.

I may do this often, the other night I dreamt I killed some sort of Mafia hit guy who was coming after my mother for her medical bills, then he turned into a doll.

I guess I'm being a bit hypocritical by posting this and changing my page to green a week before the 17th, but it's still funny. Especially since I love Guinness commercials (I rarely see them, so I think they're hysterical), but I kinda think drinking it would be gross. I've only had it once and that was in the form of a car bomb so I didn't really taste anything.....

Where's My Jetpack: St. Patrick's: A Day - Not a Season


St. Patrick's: A Day - Not a Season

BBDO has been doing the Guinness "Jib-Jab" styled TV spots, with the two cutout brewmeisters bopping around in crude South Parkian fashion, falling into Monty-Pythonesque slapstick mishaps as they congratulate each other with "Briliant!"

They're fine, funny spots most of the time, except this time of year, when Guinness and BBDO try to sell us on the notion that "St. Patrick's Season" is forthcoming.

Shut up. We have reason enough to hate Hallmark and Wal-Mart for the ways in which they make up seasons and reasons to buy crap. We don't need to hate an Irish brewery, too. St. Patrick's is a day. March 17th. Always was. Always will be. Don't pretend to extend this celebration just for the sake of selling what only a select few can stomach.

I won't go on about the awful taste of this warm sludge, the color of untreated wastewater. In America, we've come to expect that beer was meant to be served one degree above freezing, with a lime, on a beach, with your woman, maybe with some nachos. Warm beer and buttered brown bread may suit you and your mates in the smokey pubs of the Old Country, but this is the New World, and our St. Patrick's celebrations involve wearing a bit of green for one day. That's all.

Disclaimer: The author of Where's My Jetpack? is an equal opportunity blogger and fears for his life when insults of products might be misconstrued as insults of entire countries or cultures. Some of my best friends are Irish and I've even been known to enjoy a couple of U2 songs. I believe in an individual's right to choose his or her own beer without regard to color or creed, but rather on the content of the beer's character. You are free to buy and drink your liquid bread, or your porkchop in a glass, and I will defend that right as I toast you from the beach, hoisting a chilled, crisp Corona Light. With a lime.

I can't really believe I'm going to write a blog any other place than MySpace. I don't write, I draw... kinda.

I'm the type of person who tries to start a diary and then two weeks later reads some of her previous entries and then tears the thing up.

Although, I do like odd things (Coast to Coast AM) and we have some GE characters in our office. One of them just called to me and told me I had to come look at something... he told me he wanted to be just like me. He's bought an iMac. I told him he could only hope to be as cool as me.

So Kara, now you can see what's going on, since you never get on MySpace... and so can Nanook, if he reads blogs.......