BugFrog

It’s pretty funny to me that when I was in an Apple Mac-centric shop, I had a WM6 phone that was always tough to get to sync with everything. Now I have an iPhone and an iPad, and work in a Windows shop, and still don’t have the computer integration that I would hope to have. Life is always interesting with silly first world problems.

It always happens the same way. I have an idea for a post, something that I want to share and that actually might be interesting to someone else, and by the time I get to a device, fire it up, log in to wordpress and get to recording, the idea is gone.
This is the current situation, and I am not happy about it. I am bashing my head trying to find out what was SO important that I had to share it and I come up blank.
I hope this is a normal thing that writers learn to deal with because it bugs the hell out of me, and is one of the reasons I don’t post a lot. (notice the proper use of a lot? I’m a gramatatician.)
In an effort to jog my memory, here are the events of the eve. After a day of building. A very slick desk for my phenomenally amazing wife, I enjoyed. A Memorial Day evening HOLY FUCK I JUST REMEMBERED! See? Writers write.
I hope I remember this by the time I get to the next post and that it is somewhat interesting.

That didn’t work at all. What was it? Did you see it? Hopefully not. A weekly digest of all my tweets as a blog post, automagically generated and posted with no effort from me at all (except to turn it on). Interesting idea, but only if you are saying anything interesting at either location. Otherwise, it ends up being overkillingly dull and lifeless. Who wants that? Not me, that’s probably why I stopped reading my blog.

The point is, it’s gone, and I am back to my random and intermittent schedule of posting, that we all have grown comfortable with. Don’t say I don’t do things for you. I am here to serve.

Hopefully I’ll get some more things going on here and actually be able to provide something of interest. It’s that time thing. I guess if I got up and just did it for 15 minutes a day, and let it fly no matter what, that would be something. That would jam a spike in my procrastination-perfectionist disorder, but maybe that’s a good thing. Worth a shot. What’s the worst that could happen?

Dear Cosmetics Industry,

I have no idea how you do it, but you do. You take a little seed, a fluttering, fledgling of nothing and nurture it into an amazing flower with nothing more than a bit of colored dust, water, and maybe a little whale bile. Whatever it takes. You make us look on the outside like you tell us we look on the inside, and we are so willing to pay you dearly for the chance to bring our little light out from under that rough, hand-hewn wicker basket that is the earthly shell we are eternally confined within.

But what is it about this transformation that amazes me the most? At what moment am I overwhelmed with realizing the magnitude of what it is that you truly accomplish for millions of people each and every day? Is it when I look in the mirror and see the glamor shine through? Is it when the photos look like a poster from the next Hollywood blockbuster? Is it when I see the looks of awe and adoration in the eyes of the men, women, children, and animals (both wild and domesticated) around me? Nay. It is not at these times.

It is when I am removing these aforementioned colored-particulate laden whale-bile products from my person that the vastness of the universal impact of the depth of your influence reaches into my soul and warms the cockles of my organ of respect.

It is then that I realize that you are marketing, advertising, and product placement evolutionary lords, and we should all swim silently before you if we ever desire to emerge from the muck in which we live to be able to one day gaze directly up at you upon your pedestal.

Perplexed? Please, let me clarify. I don’t wear make-up often. A few times a year at best. But what I have discovered is that when I do wear it, as easy as it is to go on, it takes about 10 times more effort to get it off. I wash. I scrub. I cleanse. I rinse. I look up – and it’s still there. WTF? Repeat. Wash, scrub, cleanse, wash, scrub, cleanse, rinse, look – WTF!!! This is the moment I am talking about. How do people do this every day?

I get the opposite side, putting on the make-up makes sense. Masks, imperfections, protection, sure, what ever you need. You get something out of it, so you put in the time at the beginning of your day. Fine. But having to invest ANOTHER HOUR to wash the shit off? These guys are marketing geniuses. How have they convinced so many people that they need to invest this much time into looking like, well, looking like anything? They don’t even say we’ll look like anything! Just not like us! And we get to spend our good money and our good time to do it. I don’t even like to sit too long on the toilet, and that’s something that is actually necessary. If it doesn’t come, it’s going to wait until next time. I’m busy.

So after last night where I was the pirate guide at the haunted house, and after tonight at the Denver Zombie Crawl, my wife and son understand that for the next few days, I will have some eye make-up hanging around. I’m not gouging out my eyes to get it off. I’m not buying another pot of some other chemical to get it off. And I’m not going to soak my face in warm water for the next 2 hours waiting for the muck to get soft enough to wipe off easily with a moist towelette drenched in denatured alcohol or MEK. When the skin cells fall off, so goes the muck.

I am beautiful. I will swim with my muck and gaze up at the marketing lords of the cosmetic industry, forever in awe of their prowess. And while they have discovered what makes us tick, they will never understand why over 7,000 grown adults will dress as zombies and descend upon downtown Denver. And why we bring our kids. And we love it. So there.

Check out eyeheartbrains.com

Oh, Adobe-muffin, my longtime friend. I understand your frustration at Apple for not allowing Flash to run on their iPhone and iPad. You have worked long and hard on systems that would convert Flash into an iPhone/Pad application, and don’t want to throw all that great programming out the window like a day old placenta. I bet that really burns your bottom in the worst way. Unfortunately, that seems to be the way the cookie crumbles today. But don’t lose heart, you can still plant that placenta under a beautiful rose bush to enrich the already fertile soil you currently tend.

Of what do I speak? What quizzidom of quirkitude of which do I quack? Why your other products, of course. Illustrator, Fireworks, InDesign, Photoshop and many many others, including the wondrous and ever useful Acrobat. What amazing and incredible things!

Maybe now you can make it so that every fucking time I open a fucking Adobe product, I don’t have to fucking download yet another fucking update.

Toodles! Hope you have a great day!

Love,

bg

P.S. Aldus said to tell you “Eat it, Cakeboy.” Not sure what that meant, but he sure seemed to be laughing.

Life is better with sugar. This was our dinner conversation.

Him (out of nowhere with a giant hamburger on a Kaiser roll in his hand): Know what Julius Ceasar’s daughter’s name was?

Me: Classic?

H: No! Julia. Long line of em. Lots of Julias. Ask me anything about Julius Ceasar. Or much ado about nothing. I know that one too.

M: What happened to Julius?

H: Killed him. His wife was sad. Lots of people were sad and wanted to be with him. They said beware the Ides of March. Pegged it too. That’s tomorrow. Told ya! Told ya! Did you listen? Dead. Brutus did it. What’s a kaiser roll?

M: one of these rolls right here. Big fat rolls.

H: what are these rolls?

M: kaiser rolls. Like I said.

H: what are Kaiser rolls?

M: that roll in your hand.

H: these rolls?

M: yup.

H: what are these? These are good. They are too big. Look. I took 3 bites and I’m not even to the hamburger. That’s too big. It doesn’t fit. Small burger, big roll.

M: You usually eat an extra roll. I thought you’d like em.

H: I do. (eats extra part of roll)

M: Did you think any parts of Julius Ceasar were scary?

H: Yes! (swallows whole hamburger) I was Brutus and had a long speech to remember so I switched and was Julius so I could just lay there dead. What’s an orphan?

M: A person with no parents.

H: But how do they get that way? The Animaniacs are orphans and it’s sad because they are so cute. I like Dot. She’s a firecracker. They are the Warner Brothers. And the Warner Sister! Dot always says that. Yakko says We are the Warner Brothers and Dot says And the Warner Sister! She is so cute. I’m staying up late tonight and you are going to bed early.

M: Are you in charge now?

H: I am the exec-u-ment in charge of you! You go to bed. We switched. Much ado about nothing has animals. Julius Ceasar doesn’t. The animals don’t talk, but there are deer, a cat and a dog. Beware the ides of march! Should have said You’ll die, not beware. What’s a kaiser roll?

At this point I figured I should go to bed. We switched. He’s 7. He’ll be fine.

I turned on the default theme so that I could post from the iPhone app. Hope you all like it.

The plan when I got the app was that I would be able to be more flexible and post more often. That hasn’t happened yet, really. Especially with an app that wouldn’t connect to the blog. Odd. But a common problem, at least for me with this app. Hopefully we are past that, and can start fresh. So without further adieu:

The dog exploded all over the floor today. 3 times. 3 completely independent events, each one consisting of a large amount of liquid crap. Really. Didn’t know he could hold that much. Fascinating really. At one point I thought Gene Wilder was going to fall out of there. I’d feel bad for the guy  if he showed any sort of remorse about the whole thing (the dog, not Gene – I’d certainly feel bad for Gene if he fell out of a dogs butt). “Foodman, look how I covered the entire room except for the path you walk to feed me! Aren’t I special? What?”

I’m pretty sure he keeps getting giardia  from the day camp he goes to, but I can’t be sure. Yet. There’s got to be a way to find the source. Need to switch some things around to find out. When the weather warms up, they go play in the pool, and I think he drinks and gets infected again. Poor shit spraying bastard. You know the old saying: Hate the shit, love the shitter. Cleaning the kitchen floor, again, at 10pm isn’t really my idea of a cool evening. I currently smell like bleach (need to kill the giardia) but the floor is clean. The finish on the hardwoods is wearing away at a phenomenal pace, too.

But let’s look on the bright side. The floor is clean (now). He’s generally a good dog. I understand more of what the Untouchable Caste has to deal with daily. He doesn’t do it on the rug anymore. I have a purpose in my life, a challenge to overcome, and new opportunities will arise. And I get to see what the world looks like at 2am and 4:30am when he wakes me up to go out every night.

If anybody can recommend a day camp for dogs, I’m all ears. Or an iPhone app that cleans up liquid poop.

ps. I wanted this post to be funnier, but I have been cleaning shit for the last 2 hours. Badbanana doesn’t have to clean shit up.

This should be easy. A new year, revising goals, a simple plan to go forward. So why does this sit in draft for so long? My first few drafts started off as blah blah blah, resolutions again, blah blah, pain in the ass, blah blah, reasons, or none, why does it matter.

That’s not the way this is supposed to feel. This should be hopeful. A new year, new steps towards something. Batteries recharged and ready to go. Something inspiring that puts heat under the griddle. Wait a minute. Spark, recharging, inspiration. Where is that for me? What brings that energy? Right now, I have no idea. I look at my review post from last year and can’t find that spark, either. All the places that I fell short show the same thing. Just didn’t get the gumption up to get it done, and more surprisingly to me, I’m not too pissed about it. Ah, hold on there, cowboy. It seems the sparks are there, but keeping them going and moving has been the weak point. Putting energy into that spark to feed it. Now that I think back, this is important.

This year I need to figure out how to get recharged. Find an input of energy to replace what goes out. (Disclaimer: I am extremely lucky and very fortunate and thankful. I’m not complaining, I just need to figure this out. Just because my life isn’t a horror show that would make a movie of the week script doesn’t mean I can’t get depressed.) My son is at the age where he wants all my time and energy. I can’t deny that. In a few years, he probably won’t even want to hang out with me. My wife is doing great things with her full time career and her second and third part-time careers, and I fully support those too. I miss her, but I want her to find her happiness. The dog is a year old and wants to play with me as soon as I get home from work until he passes out. He spends 3 days all alone all day every week. Then there’s all the other stuff like PTA that has been a minimal return task since 1897 when it was created. Work has fallen into a minimal return state. Extended family: energy vampires. So all this pulls and pulls and pulls out energy, but where does it come back? What fills the reservoir back up? You know what I’m talking about. You’ve been there, too. We all get there. I’ve been here too long. Way too long.

So enough of the woe is me bullshit. This year, the one goal is to find out how to recharge my batteries. If I can do that, I’ll improve the rest of my life, and then I can really give something special to the people around me. See? You can benefit from this, too. It’s a win-win.

Towards this one goal, I’m going to try lots of different stuff.

1. Re-ignite date night with Aimee – we need to get back to having recharge time together.
2. Be the role model for Declan.
3. Exercise twice a week – This is supposedly good for depression.
4. Write or draw 3 times a week – I like to do it, so I should. Do it with the goal of doing it well. You may be exposed to some of this.
5. Train Poe better – When he is comfortable, he is much less demanding, and he’ll be able to come out more, keeping him happy. Cycle of joy.
6. Finish JoyTo.Us and LinkChop.com – I’ve been letting my part drag too long. Just finish it.
7. Learn AS3, CSS, 3D, Unity and all that work stuff. Learn it well so that I am proud of what I do, not so it is just good enough.
8. Avoid the stuff that annoys me. Politics, sorry. You waste my time. I’ll pay attention and vote, but I don’t want to talk about you any more. You attract uninformed morons. Entertainment gossip. You suck. Go film yourself. News in general, I am giving you notice. More often that not, you are useless and irrelevant. I don’t need that.
9. Find more people that inspire. Hunt them down. Work to be worthy to hang out nearby. Then take that inspiration and pass it along. Inspire others.
10. Travel. Travel. Travel. See other places. Go camping. Weekend getaways with the family. Overnights to anywhere. Just go. And travel light.
11. Get more inputs – Movies, art galleries, books, stuff that makes me think. Search through Facebook, Twitter, and friends to find the good information, and ditch the stuff that just sucks time.
12. Find good music. Search it out. It makes me happy. When Indie 101.5 was running, life was better. Find that source again, and be willing to pay for it. Support the artists that provide it.
13. Create a cycle. Take inputs, filter them, and push it back out as something. Anything. I am not stagnant pool. Let things flow through.

So that’s the plan. I’m hopeful.

If you’ve read this far, let me know what you think. Change is in the air, and it smells funny.

I get that IE 6 is still out there. Fine. Question: What sites are these IE 6 users going to and using? If it is a big corporation that still has IE 6 for security and implementation issues, wouldn’t make sense that those same corporations would be the ones to limit the sites their people can access?

Could we deduce information about the current users of IE 6? Is there a demo profile that we could generate? I’ve seen lots of reasons people may still have it (company policy, old machine, afraid to upgrade, whatever), but what does this do to the way they use the internet? Is their expectation and dependency on the net different than users who have the most modern stuff?

Another question: How do we get a good overall stat on browser version usage? Tech sites are going to draw an audience that has more up to date browsers. A knitting site may not (not sure, you knitters don’t flame me, just comment and let me know). Google has theirs, but do they report the stats (that they used to tell us) on the google search page, or on the gmail page? Yahoo and Google may a lot of users who maybe come there just because they have nothing else to look at, so their users could be skewed the other way.

It’s a fun question to wrestle with if you don’t have a site yet. If you have a site, look at your stats (find out how to get stats) and see, and then make your decision on what to support. The main point: Stats are a pain in the ass, but a lot of fun.

There are huge studies of people who have cancer from specific environmental or generic causes. What is the common thread that unites these people so that they all get cancer?
How about this question: What is the common thread that prevented all the others from getting cancer? Wouldn’t those be worth studying? Maybe the human natural system has already found a cure for it, but we are looking for the cause. I know someone much smarter than me is already doing this somewhere. They’d better be. I don’t think I can find the time to go to medical school just to prove my point.
How would you approach this problem?And then let’s discuss the effectiveness of crowdsourcing medical research. Sound good? Go.