I Bought an iPad Years Ago

Here it is. Isn't it awesome?

Friday Funnies XIX

I read on the interwebs this morning that the guys behind South Park and the creator of Avenue Q are teaming up to unleash an off-broadway musical about how stupid the mormon faith is. Needless to say, I am thrilled. And if you want any guidance as to how this could turn out, South Park years ago devoted a whole episode to mormonism, and I nearly cried in laughter. And just since this is Friday Funnies, if you don't want to watch the whole episode just this second (because you're at work and it's bad, bad, bad to do such things ... ahem, ahem) then feel free to enjoy clips from one of my favorite South Park episodes ever (Luke, you know what I'm talking about here) when the kids went to visit the rainforest with Jennifer Anniston. The song is just too damn funny (especially the rocking guitar riff).

Idiot of the Day IX

My morning commute on the Metro has become a wasteland of ineptitude this week. The other day it was idiot lady making her kid be amongst society while carrying the plague. Today, it's creepy sex fiend teens.

These two girls got on the train and started conversing about how girl on the left has a major crush on Mr. Cameron. At first I ignored it and thought about what it would be like for a high schooler to be in love with Ferris Bueller's best friend. As I quickly laughed and tried to get back into the book I am reading, she continues to delve into the details. Like how she stole his cell phone number from his phone bill that was on his desk. How she sent him text messages anonymously just to make sure it worked. how she found out his favorite color ("earth tones, he loves earth tones"). These two girls went on about his divorce last year and how his ex-wife was "so totally mean and a bitch" at school functions. Crush girl went on to ask "How am I supposed to find cute outfits in earth tones to wear for him to class?" and "If I do that often enough, you think he'll figure out it was me who was text messaging him?" I'm glad I got off the train before they started talking about where he lived or if she was going to kill him in his sleep in a jealous rage.

Fucking creepy, man. I thought I was in an SVU episode. Of course, if that means Mariska is showing up, fine my me.

My Friend, The Hater

I don't know why Kelly must hate on UK so much. This is one of my best friends, and he can't even give me a little support for a team I love. It's not like we're dating and I'm a huge Steelers fan or something. Because, you know, that would be way funnier.

Was he beaten up by some UK fans in high school? Is he still mad about when Eric and I gave him shit when we all watched UK beat UC in the Tourney back in 2005? Is he angry that UC has not had a relevant hoops player since Steve Long or Kenyon Martin's right leg? I don't know, but it makes me sad. I cheer for his teams that I don't really care for, and I get nothing in return. I think I'm challenge him to a fight in the gas station parking lot at 3 after school. Yeah, I'm that bitter and childish about it.

It saddens me because he bitches about UK like we've done something personal to him. What also slays me most is he always brings up this "UK fans have such a sense of entitlement" argument, which would somewhat make sense if he wasn't a die-hard Notre Dame football fan. Are you kidding me? Talk about sense of entitlement. Shit, I think ND is Entitlement U. This is a school that thinks it's above every bowl game that isn't a national championship game, so it doesn't play in them (unless it's in Hawaii, in which case Jimmy Clausen gets to show off his manly Bon Jovi locks of hair). Plus, he's the only fan of a team that I know of that once had a banner of his team's national titles hanging on his wall (which would still be there had he not lost it in a bet with an Ohio State fan). I have a bottle opener that plays the UK fight song, no replica title banners on my walls. He used to say that this belief came from growing up in Cincy where all the stations only talked UK and ignored UC. Sounds like someone needs to take that up with the programming people, because I seriously doubt it's UK's fault that the Cincinnati TV and radio stations; again, sounds like an Ohio problem, not a Kentucky problem.

It's further sad to have Kelly hate the Cats when besides his weak "entitlement" excuse is our new head coach, John Calipari. I won't defend Calipari's past shit. It's not worth it, the NCAA already did that. Plus, we beat UMass in the Final Four in 1996 and won the title, so I'm just fine with it, and unless I was secretly on the hiring committee, I have to accept whatever head coach UK hires (though I would have certainly kept Tubby and never gone down the Gillespie road but that got rectified and he can continue drinking himself silly back in Texas). Oh, but don't bring up drinking and head coaches, because you might just have to bring in the poster child for that, which would be Bob Huggins. Remember him? The coach who was arrested for driving under the influence in 2004, and was videotaped during the traffic stop by police and aired on national tav. Among the gems he stated were, "Do you know who I am," and "You can't do this to me." The cops said Huggins had vomited on his car door, and that his excuse as to why he was out driving hammered was that he had been with a recruit. That's probably not helping your case there, dude. At least Gillespie had been fired by UK before he got busted doing pretty much the same thing.

In fact, Kelly should love Calipari. He's exactly what Huggins is: a coach who gets questionable players to play well and occasionally runs into NCAA trouble (lest we forget that Huggins got UC put on probation in 1998 for "lack of institutional control" or whatever the hell that means; could have been all the arrests his players got). So don't hate on UK dude, we're not bad people. We're just happy our team is relevant once again, and we're just wanting to see some success from one of the only good things that state produces, besides illegal drugs and incompetent politicians.

Idiot of the Day VIII

If it was earlier in the morning and I was feeling pissy enough, I would have taken a full photo to show this girl's idiot mother. But they were moving fast and I was still getting motivated for my day of work and couldn't snap a full photo of this duo.

I have zero, none whatsoever, respect for people who trudge their sick children into public spaces and have them hacking all over the place and threatening to get me sick. Pisses me off. It's one thing if you are an adult and are sick; you can make the conscious decision to spare your fellow man the potential of picking up whatever the hell is ailing you. But when your kid is sick? They haven't quite developed rational thought yet, so you've got to be wise and help them out.

First step, KEEP THEM THE FUCK HOME IF THEY ARE SICK. Luckily, I have the immune system of a mother of 12. I get sick once, maybe twice a year tops. And if I do come down with something, I put so many vitamins into me to make a CDC tech proud. Second, I never go to work and potentially infect others, especially when it involves riding mass transit.

This poor girl was hacking and wheezing and all mommy could care about was shoving that PopTart down her throat (eating is illegal on the trains, no less) and making sure Little Miss Wheezy wasn't falling too far behind on the educational video game she was forced to play. Nevermind that the game was clearly about 4 years too advanced for her, because she had no idea what the hell she was doing. This mom was an idiot, pure and simple.

Game On: Week of Jan. 13

My column from a couple weeks' back. The games I reviewed were Darksiders and Divinity II.

Friday Funnies XVIII

This clip gets a Friday Funnies nod from me for several reasons. I gave Kelly a rug because it was rolled up serving no purpose in the house, and we joked all weekend in Chicago about how it ties the whole room together in his condo. Brilliant. Plus, a Pixelated Nod to Jeff Bridges for winning a Golden Globe (although it's one of the biggest BS awards out there). Lastly, Big Lebowksi is just a kick-ass movie. Enjoy.

When PR Companies Go Crazy

Oh. Hell. Yes.

Those are frickin night vision goggles my friends. And they are real.

Last year I wrote about a PR company for a video game that went a little haywire with its promotional materials. That was an instance where a PR company went crazy in a bad way (though my coworkers have all seemingly enjoyed their abundance of plush toys on their desks). This is one of those instances when they did right by me.

Up to 100 feet of visual range. Hands-free. Good battery life. Looks good with my hairdo. All signs point to success in my book. I had a dinner party and had some friends test them out, and I got thumbs up from everyone. If nothing else, I think this solidifies my place on Team Lurker when the end times come around. Also, now I can become the most high-tech Peeping Tom in the neighborhood, or Takoma Park's version of Jame Gumb.

Or not. Nevermind. Bad idea.

Game On: Week of Jan. 5

My column from the first week of the new year. The games I reviewed were Bayonetta and Final Fantasy: The Crystal Bearers.

My Childhood, Bastardized

Holy crap, I'm gonna have to start a whole new blog purely dedicated to all the ways Hollywood is screwing around with my childhood in the present day. Previously I've discussed the Karate Kid remake, the new Robin Hood movie and even older topics like the GI Joe movie and Transformers. Today's desecration of my childhood: the new A-Team movie.

Oh yeah, the jackasses in Hollywood, ever starving to make a quick buck, have taken a once-beloved 80s TV show and turned it into a crazy lunatic fringe of a movie. I have fond memories of the A-Team, most notably thinking George Peppard was the coolest leader a group of renegades convicted of a crime they didn't commit could have. Soldiers of fortune, what a great line. I had the truck and my Mr. T action figures and Face and all the team. They didn't rank about Transformers or the Joes, but they were a solid TV crew and they were real actors, not cartoons, so that gave them some extra cache for me. Much like The Greatest American Hero. Yeah, I think we're starting to see a pattern of why I sucked as a student from age 6 and beyond.

Even at my old job at SHNS, we laughed at the A-Team. I'd play the theme song anytime Sheila would get pissed at someone because she needed to hear that gunfire and that corny theme song. Good times. Now, they'll probably have Justin Timberlake do a hip hop version of it and it will sound like ass.

So here's the trailer to the movie. Looks rather dumb to me, especially when you throw in gratuitous naked Bradley Cooper just for the ladies to think this movie might have some appeal to them (trust me, ladies, it won't). And I don't give a crap how popular that IFC/MMA bullshit is, Quentin Jackson is no Mr. T and that is just a shame. Don't get me started on Liam Neeson replacing George Peppard. I weep for lo George. He was cool.

First, the original:


Now, the remake:

My Work, Realized

I've been working on this project for more than a year. Among the hundreds of pieces of designed work I do and the conferences and everything else, one project for CFED has been on my plate since December of 2008. And that is the redesign of our website.

Finally, at 9:30 p.m. Friday, we launched the new site.

I cannot tell you how exciting it is to see this finally go live and now become a living site that we can work with. When I first came to CFED three years ago, during my interview I said that redesigning the website would be a project I could see worthy of my attention. This was because, in researching for the interview, I had no freaking clue what CFED did. I couldn't understand a damn thing that was published on their old site (the old front page is at right).

The navigation sucked. The pages were running wild with words that had no organization and little meaning to the untrained eye. When my coworker Kristin ran a test on the site, it was determined that the site was only worthy of those with an advanced degree or more. Or more?? Shit, most websites (at least those that want to attract people to them that are not porn or gambling) try to aim a tad lower than that in order to make sure people can understand what the hell it is you have on there. The site also lacked any visual aids whatsoever. Seriously, you see that front page? Those were about the only photos or graphics on the WHOLE DAMN site. It also had no bells and whistles. And I'm not talking about pop-up ads and other schmaltz. It just lacked feeling, emotion and connectivity. And those are things a nonprofit's website should be doing first. At least we had depth down. Ohh did we. Like abyss levels of depth.

Anyway, a team of four have been working on this ever since. There were ups and downs, and there were some months when I didn't know if my hard work was ever going to see the light of day. But in November the hammer got put down. We were going to bust our asses and get this new site launched by the end of the year. You would have thought we were putting man on the moon for the first time. Coworkers were freaking out and there were times when I wanted to break things regularly because, when you come from a newspaper mentality where deadlines are strict and often, it's sometimes a tough adaptation to a new sector where speed and timeliness give way to collaboration and hand-holding. I'm not judging, just sayin.

We missed our end-of-year deadline, but not by much. The four of us took a well-deserved break over the holidays and came back with renewed vigor. And in five days we had the thing ready to go. We were set to launch in the afternoon until I made a colossal screwup in moving our DNS to another company because our IT director and I read the web hosting company's site incorrectly. So we were delayed for about four hours while we solved that little hiccup. But we solved it as any good tech people do: with time spent on customer service calls, some htaccess redirects (yeah, you know what they are!) and a bottle of Jim Beam (not Kentucky's finest, but it was free, in-house and bourbon, so I was happy).

So now it's launched, and I hope you will take time to browse through it and check out all the great information and links we have in there. It's full of excellent background on all the work we do and you get a real understanding of how we are working to make real change, both in the policy world and on the ground, in the lives of low-income families across the country. It's certainly not a perfect 100% site. We'll probably find and fix a broken image or link, maybe even catch a misplaced comma or misspelled word. Happens all the time with brand-new websites, so I'm not expecting the world. I hope you'll take the time to check it out. It's been a part of my life for 13 months now, and it's wonderful to see it working and hearing people's reactions to it.

What I've Read (sorta): Where Men Win Glory

Another holiday tradition I get to partake in is killing through books during those 10 days. Seeing that I drove back to Kentucky again this year, this gave me plenty of hours of knock off a book on the ride back to the bluegrass. On the way to Kentucky, the book was Jon Krakauer's "Where Men Win Glory."

I am a huge Krakauer fan. If you have not read any of his books, shame on you. They are excellent reads and since they are nonfiction, they kick ass in the entertaining and learning world. So you can feel good about yourself later, if that is what you need in order to get through a book.

This book is much different than his previous works. He choose a politically sensitive topic and a subject matter that seems to have longed played itself out and was not really timely any longer. I was completely wrong, however, to take the story of Pat Tillman's life lightly because of what I had already known about the subject. What the book also is is a hard look into the history of U.S. interventions in Afghanistan, and a searing take on the military and its treatment (or lack thereof) of friendly fire.

I won't get into the whole story, but basically (for those who don't know), Pat Tillman was an NFL player who quit the league in order to join the armed forces after 9/11. He was celebrated as a true American hero, and the Bush White House did everything it possibly could to make him a posterboy for American ideals. Naturally, as so often was the case in the Bush administration, everything they did was tinged with a high dose of lies and bullshit, and so in the end they turned Tillman into another pawn until they got busted on it, at which time they decided to act like nothing ever happened.

Krakauer doesn't spend the entirely book reciting this. Instead, what he does it put it in context with so many other friendly fire events and Iraq war mishaps that show a strikingly larger theme. He lays out how Tillman was a product of the Jessica Lynch saga, and how the military is so hellbent on acting like friendly fire doesn't exist (or so rare as to be considered nonexistent) that I was stunned at how military families get screwed over by the military once their sons and daughters die on the battlefield.

And don't even get my started on the Afghanistan issue. It's a United States problem, pure and simple. Every president from Carter to Obama has continued to screw this up, and in some ways I cannot entirely blame any one individual because things have been screwed up for so long that there is hardly a right way or wrong way anymore. Read the book and listen to the history of all the ways we have helped that country, screwed over that country, helped it somewhat and then screwed them over again, and I don't know what the right thing to do is, other than flood the nation with humanitarian aid and shower the people with so much help and assistance that eventually they have no choice but to start liking us again. But it's hard to do anything there, and I end up scratching my head knowing that neither Republicans nor Democrats have got the answers. It's just a crazy situation.

Where Men Win Glory is an exceptional book, even though nothing about it ends happily. Even in death, Tillman's family is left with unanswered questions and probably never have them resolved. It's a enigma just like the war is, and while it's better to have read it and know the facts instead of the perceptions, it doesn't leave me any closer to knowing the end game. But definitely read it, for knowing the truth behind Tillman and everything else in this story is better than not knowing at all.

Friday Funnies XVII

Last weekend as I prepared for returning to work, I ended up watching Goodfellas twice. Normally I think the funniest scene in the movie is when Ray Liotta pistol whips the hell out of that guy. But for some reason I found this scene wildly hilarious, when Pesci does his best crazy guy schtick. I laughed out loud at the end of the scene when Pesci jumped on Liotta. Plus, Liotta's laugh is just too damn funny.

Oh. Crap.

I am not a superstitious guy. At least, I don't think I am. But this is going to test me for sure. If you don't know, there is a theory called the Sports Illustrated Cover Jinx. And now I really only care because John Wall has made the cover of SI. And if this means he blows out a knee (a la Derrick Anderson) or something else bad happens, I might just start believing. A loss wouldn't count because the Cats are not good enough to go undefeated.

But he can't get hurt, right? Right? RIGHT?!?!?!?!! This jinx has to have been replaced by the Madden Curse by now, right?

No doubt, I'm going to be tentative watching the next few games.