Just recently found out about this short film done by Dove (hat tip: Tim O’Reilly). First word out of my mouth: “Wow”. The application of massive amounts of makeup for a photo shoot and post photo-retouching are things we all know about and they certainly should come as no surprise, but how interesting that Dove should choose to tackle it head-on. Because really, how complicit have they been in its practice over the years - never mind still are (you still need to apply massive amounts of makeup for whatever kind of ad your doing).

I applaud Dove’s attempts to try to set things right with The Dove Self-Esteem Fund, but it’s a fine line they walk because they’re right in the middle of the problems they highlight. I look forward to see how this progresses.

Caught another short film on YouTube, and on the fund’s website. Check them out!

Got a bit of bad news today - Arthur C. Clarke has died. I was never much of a fan of Isaac Asimov, but Clarke really spoke to me as a young, geeky kid. He had a terrific imagination and a gift for storytelling. He’s also the source of one of my all-time favorite quotes on technology (one of his Three Laws):

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

Thanks, Sir Arthur, and rest in peace.

Wow - I’m finally caught up from my flu hiatus! Whew! Looking forward to just posting one cool thing a day instead of two! That said, I hope you guys (all two of you) are enjoying this project - I know I am.

So Teresa and I are pretty much on the mend from this stupid flu. Of course, this means that I’ve got a lot of catching up to do on the 365 project. I’ll be double-posting every day until I’m caught up (which, honestly kinda scares me as I haven’t exactly been proactively working on this).

Stay tuned for some catch-up work!

Sorry there’s been a hiccup on the 365 project - I’ve got a bad case of the flu and haven’t been much for posting lately. I’ll catch up on the days I run behind, I promise!

I know what you must be thinking (well, if you’re actually reading this) - is this blog dead? I’m happy to say “no”. It may be severely neglected, but it’s certainly not dead. Fact of the matter is, a lot of stuff has come up in the meantime that’s gotten in the way of sitting down to write a post… all sorts of weirdness in at work (and the stuff that usually consequently comes out of that), getting ready for my wedding, then actually getting married, then Honeymoon Phase 1, then trying to get back into the swing of things. Next thing you know, the holidays are upon us and where does that leave everything?

Enough with the excuses. I haven’t been much for resolutions since childhood (when resolutions didn’t really amount to much anyway), but I am planning on getting some things rolling along on a couple of fronts - writing on this blog included. I can’t say that I’ll be as verbose as I once was, but I will be making a more concerted effort to post something on a regular basis.
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That would be our new car - an immaculate 2004 VW R32 (with just over 10,000 miles). This was a limited edition run of a high-performance 240HP, 3.2 liter V6, 6-speed manual, all-wheel drive Golf, complete with Koenig racing seats and a few creature comforts thrown in for good effect - only 5000 were brought into the US. Basically, VW let their engineers run wild to design the “funnest” Golf they could dream up. And man, did I lust after this car in 2004. Unfortunately, times were a little harder for me back then and I resigned myself to never having the pleasure to own one - it didn’t preclude me from test-driving, mind you, but owning wasn’t in the cards for me. At the time (seemingly to add insult to injury), Teresa mentioned that her co-worker Sander coincidentally picked one up himself.
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OK, step 2 with my fiddling is mostly done. The upgrade to 2.0.5 still has a few issues (notice that “Eyes On…” and “Random Bits” sections are on vacation currently. Still working on what I want to get done, so hang tight…

As you can see, my blog now looks like your standard WordPress installation, I’m up to something. For now, it was just updating from 1.5 to 2.0.5. More is coming…

Heck, where have I been? Many apologies for being MIA for so long. A lot has been going on - trips to LA and Montreal for work, a couple of snowboarding trips to Tahoe being big time-eaters. I’ve been meaning on doing a number of posts during this down-time, but for whatever reason, I kept getting distracted. Needless to say, that while a good number of folks were nice enough to send in their thoughts to help with the redesign of this blog - I just haven’t had the time to get to that (not sure when that’s going to be, but it’s definitely on the list!).

It’s almost comical how things have gotten in the way - for instance, I really wanted to write about seeing Philip Glass perform “Koyaanisqatsi” in the Davies Symphony Hall, but leaving for Montreal the next morning and not having ‘net access for the vast majority of the time while up there (despite having forked out an additional fee to Sprint to make sure that I’d be covered up there) put a damper on that one. But now that I find myself with a little bit of time before heading to the ‘Store, at least I can fill you guys in on that.
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I don’t know if you guys heard, but Don Knotts died today. While I can’t say I was a huge fan, I do fondly remember him from days that I stayed home sick from school watching “The Andy Griffith Show”. Of course, there was always his immensely-cheesy Mr. Furley role on “Three’s Company” where I first discovered him after getting home from school - but that role always weirded me out.

All that said, I never expected to read in an obituary article on him anything connecting him to “Space Jam”:

[”The Incredible Mr. Limpet”], the tale of a meek man who is transformed into a fish, has particularly won recent acclaim. Its early mix of live action and animation was a forerunner of later films such as “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” and “Space Jam.”

So my friend Jim, who I’ve known since 8th grade - long enough that we have way too many embarrassing stories to tell of each other (mostly him of me, though), came up with his Top 10 Albums on his alter-ego blog (which he is quick to point out should be classified as an “random outbursts of crap” and he’s pretty much been strong-armed into having one by a close friend). He suggested I try the same. Pretty simple rules though: Albums one could not only play front-to-back without skipping songs, but could also play over and over and over and over…
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OK, even I have to admit that it’s starting to look like a “self-help” blog around here (or, a critic thereof). Kind of an interesting coincidence, especially when tripping across the following two blog articles (postings? entries? anyone?) on self-branding and logo design. While the latter post’s author’s focus on Christianity might take you by surprise (and you folks know that I’m the last person to be linking to a deeply religious site), it doesn’t change the fact that his tips are good (not to mention the logo he created is well-designed given the requirements) and both articles are well worth the read.
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I·ro·ny: You pull an intercostal muscle from going on your first run after having a cold featuring the worst cough of your life. It’s so bad, it hurts to breathe normally, so you go to an Urgent Care clinic. You’re prescribed muscle relaxants and a plan to take them with excessive amounts of Advil. And when applying the cold compress on the pull as instructed, you need to cinch it to the point that the ACE bandage you have holding the compress in place makes it difficult to breathe.
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Every workday I wake up to NPR, get my act together then drive down the hill to the Oakland Coliseum BART station and wait a bit before picking up my commuting buddy, Mafalda. I used to squeeze in a little Air America before her train would show up, but KQKE (the Air America affiliate) blew a great idea before they even implemented it and lost my morning drive-time patronage - they created a local show (good) but put Willy Brown and Will Durst on the air as its hosts (decidedly bad in my book).
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