Take a look at my inbox from this morning:

I mean, come on.

IF YOU’RE GOING TO SPAM ME, LEARN MY LANGUAGE.

How can spammers even sleep at nite, noing how bad they’re grammer and speling is?  its abhoarent and pisses me of. lolz its so bad I just wanna laugh at them cuz they so stoopid. OMG like i have received a new ipad. u didn’t even captalize Apple and every1 noes iPad has a capital P. luzer.  and in the body of the email you said “test apple ipad before it come out” hahaha luzer, it’s “comes out” stupid email person.  good thing you left unusbscribe instructions int he email because i did and you wont be sending me no more stupid emails. well see who the smart one is wont me.

laterz

I saw this link on Twitter a couple of days ago.  Or maybe it was Facebook. Or maybe it came to me while looking at the pattern of bird droppings on my workplace window. 

I’d not heard of Barry Nalebuff before, but I really enjoyed this ~1hr long presentation he gave about innovation, ingenuity and general insights on solving problems.

I can say for sure I’ll never eat a banana the same way again.

Barry & Co runs an Open Source Idea site called http://whynot.net. When I get some more time I plan on spending a little bit over there to participate. I’ve been thinking that idea and innovation could easily be something opened up to the masses, so I’m glad someone acted on it.

For the most part, I’m not a fan of big government.  I don’t like intrusion into privacy, overly regulated industries, or yet-another-piece-of-legislation that makes mankind all the more administratively burdened.  Part of it is the overhead (and therefore, inefficiency) and part of it is a deeply-rooted fear of Big Brother combined with the lack of trust of humans in general, that there is the inherent likelihood that someone in power is going to do bad things to keep and grow their power.

Of course, not all legislation is bad.  There are some (decidedly few) laws that help us prosper, protect the little guy, and direct our nation into becoming a large self-sustaining body of rugged individuals.  Part of the ongoing struggle of a democracy is how we balance the two.

I’m not sure if “Truth in Labeling” is an actual law or not, but it seems I’ve heard something about FDA this or EPA that which required food to have consistent and accurate labeling.  For example, a product could not claim to cure cancer, and even if it did, it couldn’t be a food – it would have to be a drug.  The list of ingredients on a particular food must, by law, be put in order of content such that the first item listed represents the largest percentage of a single component.

In fact, I tweeted a picture recently of a Burger King icing packet and saw how they found all these ways of saying “Sugar”.

Lessee… Four different types of sugar!  liquid sugar, icing sugar, glucose, and… wait for it… sugar.  I feel like Bubba is there extolling all the different ways you can make Shrimp.  Wonka Gump, if you will.

Well, I’m here to tell you that I found a candy maker who is NOT afraid to comply fully with the Truth in Labeling law.  They are NOT trying to hide, obfuscate or otherwise distract you from the TRUTH.  We have here, ladies and gentlebloggers, a company who upholds the honor, integrity and trust we so timidly place in our corporate giants.

I now give you – the – Best.  Wrapper.  Ever.

Since I know some of you respond poorly to pictures of icky nasty creatures found in nature (my tarantula videos and pictures come to mind), I’ll put the other pictures of this Scorpion Sucker in the extended entry, below.

VIVE LA LABELING!

(more…)

I’ve been an AT&T customer for a long time.  A looooong time.  Even back when I had the Telegraph Rollover plan.  I’ve been with them so long, I still have support for my two-cans-with-a-string phone.

Because of this, I’m very familiar with dropped calls.

I have enjoyed Verizon’s “There’s a Map for That” commercials showing the horrible, despicable and downright truthful discrepancies between the Verizon 3G network and the AT&T 3G network

Heh.  There’s even a lawsuit as reported by ZDNet.  The story Sam Diaz wrote is pretty funny and interesting.

Now, when it comes down to it, I really don’t care much about the Verizon map because 99.9% of the time, I’m in one of the dark blue AT&T parts.  Austin is pretty well saturated with 3G coverage, and it wasn’t long ago when I had a BlackBerry 8700C phone, and it only supported EDGE anyway.  Now that I’m on the iPhone 3GS, 3G coverage is more important to me, but in general I’m pretty happy with it.

Except in this one place.

This ONE, solitary intersection. 

This ONE AREA where I drive every day to and from work. 

THIS SPECIFIC DOT ON THE MAP WHERE I DROP MY CALL NO MATTER WHAT.

Yes, I’m sore about it.  A little.

I had heard that you can report to your cell provider dropped calls or problem areas, and if they have enough reports, they’ll investigate.  Who knows, they might actually DO something to fix it.

So I called in, waded through the options to figure out which one would help (hint: it’s zero, then zero again) and talked to the nice lady.  She did say that yes, I can report it and confirmed what I had heard.  So I reported it.  She let me know that she checked on the map and there was a transition point right there where calls would switch towers, and “sometimes calls drop when switching towers.”

Thanx for letting me know.

I also submitted the following email to their support team to hopefully hit home a little more.

This issue is not related to my specific phone, but I couldn’t find the option in the drop down. This issue involves dropped calls at a specific intersection. The intersection is Anderson Mill road and Millwright Parkway in Austin, TX, 78750. I’ve driven in this area for 20+ years, and ever since I’ve been with AT&T (8+ years), coverage at this intersection is spotty and usually results in dropped calls. It does this with my iPhone (3G), blackberry 8700C(edge), motorola RAZR, and the various phones I’ve had over the years. Since I drive this every day to and from work, I can count on a dropped call at that intersection.  It is very annoying. I’d love it if it could be tweaked to not drop calls every time.

YOUR MISSION, should you choose to accept it, is to also contact AT&T and let them know calls drop at this intersection all the time.  If you’re not in the Austin area, just say you were talking to Wayne and got dropped, and it annoyed you greatly.  If you’re not an AT&T customer, tell them you’d consider becoming a customer if they fixed that intersection.  You can contact them at http://www.att.com/wireless/contact-us/ or call 800-331-0500.

With our loud Internet voice, we can bring change!

This message will self-destruct in 10 seconds.

(more…)

As I’ve grown older, I’ve grown more skeptical. 

I hear politician’s lies, and I sigh.  I pick apart their carefully chosen words and attempt to figure out “the real truth” based on the specific choices they make with their adjectives and “clarifying words”.  It’s like the Devil is speaking, because as Piers Anthony put it in his great book “For Love of Evil”, the best lies are sandwiched firmly between two truths.  The Devil doesn’t always lie; he actually tells the truth most of the time.  It’s when he lies that makes the difference.

In fact, one can tell the complete truth and still effectively lie.

As they say, the Devil is in the details.  It’s in the qualifying words one uses to further distinguish and refine the meaning, even to the point where it makes it more vague.  Be it a pronoun that can be taken multiple ways, or an unspoken assumption; there are countless ways to hide the truth.

Remember Pirates of the Carribean?  Curse of the Black Pearl?

At one point in the film, Captain Barbossa agrees to Will Turner’s terms of surrender, which is to set his companions free.  When it appears to Will Turner that Barbossa went back on his promise, Barbossa quickly explains he promised to set them free, and he’ll keep to his word (because not keeping your word will bring back luck to your ship), but it was Will Turner who failed to specify when or where.

Classic. In his case, it’s the lack of qualifying details that gives Barbossa what he wants without lying about it.  However, sometimes you can get information (or at least more healthy suspicion) from the details that are provided.

Take this milk carton for instance. 

Seems like a harmless, instructive carton of milk that makes you feel safe that no nasty hormones were used with the cows that produced the tasty treat contained inside.

With the keen, skeptical mind I possess, however, I dissect the Growth Hormone badge they presume to use to make me, the consumer, more at ease with my purchase.  But it just makes me wonder what the real truth is.

Here are my thoughts when I see this kind of badge.

• “Our Farmers Pledge”
  Ah, the promise of a promise.  Note they they don’t come out and say “This product has no growth hormones” or even the shorter “No growth hormones.”  They say that their farmers pledge that there aren’t any.  For one, what’s a pledge, anyway?  Secondly, do the farmers go about injecting hormones, or do scientists?  Since when do farmers know anything about chemicals?  Farmers farm.  And as far as we know, the hormones might be in there, but the farmers just don’t know about it.  If the company is found out to have the hormones, it’s the farmers that get the shaft, not the scientists or executives.
• No artificial growth hormones
  So then I hit the word “artificial” and wonder why they stuck that word in there.  Did they add it to increase confidence that something bad (presumably anything artificial) isn’t in there, or is it that growth hormones ARE given to the cows, but the hormones just aren’t artificial?  Are they putting in natural hormones instead?
• Asterisked
  The almighty asterisk.  How many lies have been sold to the public with this unwitting ally?

I just don’t know what to believe.  I did a little googling (probably one of the most dangerous things on the planet to someone who thinks they know but know nothing (I’m talking about me here) ) and found this tasty little nugget.

The hormone of greatest concern to critics and whistleblowers is not bovine growth hormone, however, but insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), which occurs naturally in both cows and humans. IGF-1 causes cells to divide and is one of the most powerful growth hormones in the body. Cows injected with rbGH have higher levels of IGF-1, and elevated levels of the hormone have been linked to cancer.

And it goes on

A Harvard study of 15,000 white males revealed that those with elevated IGF-1 levels in their blood were four times more likely to get prostate cancer than the average man. The report says, “administration of GH [natural human growth hormone] or IGF-1 over long periods…may increase risk of prostate cancer.”

Somehow I wonder if the people responsible for making this “natural growth hormone” are the same people making prostate pills.

There’s even a lawsuit against the people who use this label by the one producer of artificial growth hormone.  Imagine that – suing over deceptive labeling.

I now open up the comments to anyone wanting to submit a good cow or milk pun.

I’ve got a mobile home (double-wide, to be exact) to fix up and sell. 

As some of you know, we recently moved to a new home here in Austin and now I need to prepare the old homestead for sale and move-out.   (pics and video are forthcoming, I promise).

Good thing I have the promise of knowing that hardworking, honest people who care are out there.  And it’s nice to know they are painfully honest.

I have an appointment with a handyman to come out next week and give me a bid on doing some work here and there – power wash the outside, rebuild a couple sections of flooring that got wet, fix some walls, lay down some vinyl tile - you know… stuff.  

Stuff I’d do myself if I had time.  Don’t even get me started on the cleaning that has to happen.

You see, the work itself is something I find fun and rewarding, but I just don’t have the time.  I’m the type of guy who likes to learn how to do something – just about anything - once.  I’ve changed my own oil – once.  I’ve rebuilt a carburetor – once.  I’ve laid tile, installed carpet, put up a dividing wall, poured concrete, dug a fire pit, changed my tires, installed a garbage disposal, painted a house, replaced heating elements in a water heater, built a computer from as scratch as you can get, installed a level brickstone walkway, resurfaced furniture and raised a couple of kids (well, halfway so far).  These are things I’m glad I know how to do, but I don’t want to do them every time, or very often.

Once is enough for most of it.

Now that I think about it, it’s not just about the fact that I don’t have the time.  It’s about efficiency, too.  Sure, it’s good to know how to do a lot of things… it helps you learn, you become smarter, more self-reliant, and if nothing else, you know how to spot a bad job when you see it.  But people who do things for a living are usually better, faster and more efficient than someone who just does it the first couple of times.  So while I know how to change my own oil, when *I* do it, it’s a mess and it takes me about 5 times as long as someone who does it every day.

About the only thing left is to figure out how to set up little mini-services for people who A) absolutely have the time to do a specific chore and B) have the money to pay for the chore to be done but C) want no part whatsoever in doing the chore (or) might do a horrible job at it. 

The example I’m thinking of right now is puppy dog poop stains.  I just want to call someone out to clean it up and clean it up right.  Sure, I have the time.  Sure, I have some of the right equipment.  But I know that there are people who are much better at doing that kind of stuff and won’t leave such a stain.  They can go door-to-door with a backpack-steam-vac and make the carpets look like new instead of like mushed up plastic swirlies.

Sigh. I guess it’s the price I pay until we can get a doggy door installed at the new house.

He sure is cute, though.

Over the last month or so, I’ve gotten a new job and a new house.

The new job? AWESOME.  I love the new challenges, the new company, the new product, and the future that comes with it.

The new house? AWESOME.  All four of us (ok, six including the dogs) have something we absolutely LOVE about the new house.  For me, it’s the 3car garage with a workbench + 2 attics.

I’m also attending a Transformation Boot Camp twice a week that should land me a new body in a few months.  I’ll let you know how that works out. (get it? work out?  HAHAHAH)

My old commute was right about 12.5 miles.  There were other ways I could travel to possibly avoid some traffic, but it usually ended up right about the same length of time – 25-30 minutes.

The new commute is… actually, right about 12.5 miles also. 

Today’s rain turned the commute that’s normally 20-25 minutes into a 50-60 minute one.  In fact, I never got higher than 3rd gear on the way in.  You know it’s going to be a long 12.5 miles if you never hit 4th gear.

Which brings me to the clutch.  Every time I change into 5th gear, it grinds.  The mechanic told me I’d probably have to consider replacing the clutch soon, so I guess I’m not too surprised.

So, I guess that’s my point for today.  I have a car that grinds when it gets into 5th gear, and the Universe threw me a nice rainy day that made sure I never got close to using it.

Thank you, Universe.

I have a relative who has a Prius.

You haven’t lived until you actually realize a car is driving up to you and you didn’t even hear it until the gravel crunches under its tires.  Man, that’s freaky. 

…but cool at the same time. I think it’s high-time we had electric vehicles (I had always imagined a car that ran on water, but electricity is still cool).  I still long for the Back to The Future-style floating skateboards (and cars of course), because I can totally see me tricking Biff into a truckload of manure.

You can’t see me in this picture, but I photoshopped myself onto the skateboard right behind the camera.  I look awesome in my life preserver jacket.  I also photoshopped Malorie in there with me because, well, she’s hot.

Anyway, Back To The Story, when I experienced the sensation of a huge car rolling up to me without any kind of engine sound, I instantly thought “I bet someone ends up faking the sound of an engine.”

And sure enough, this morning I hear on the radio something about safety concerns about hybrids and electric vehicles, and the fact that children might not hear them and end up getting squished.  I’m not sure of the details, but it sounded like someone was lobbying the car makers to make some artificial engine noise, and even have the sound increase along with the accelerator pedal.  You know.  For the Children.

I’m all for no-squish kids.  But fake engine noises?  Really?  Won’t we just be replacing real pollution with noise pollution?  Why can’t we just learn to live with silent cars and, oh I don’t know…. BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OURSELVES A LITTLE?!?!?!  Look, I can see having sensors that can notify the driver or even honk the horn or something, but constant noise doesn’t seem like a good answer to me.  You know what it seems like to me?  It seems like an answer someone came up with that is responsible for making the fake engine sound modules to sell to the auto manufacturers, and they happen to have a friend in the Legislature, and then they play the “it’s for the children” card and then we all pay for something that really wasn’t needed.

Anyway, Back To The Story II, I thought about ring tones.  Yeah!  RING TONES!  I figured – if we end up being forced by the government to pimp out our rides with noise makers, I might as well make a few bucks on it.  If we can put custom ring-tones on our cell phones, why not custom drive-tones on our cars?  I could make a website that sold custom driving ring tones for people’s cars and *SMACK* kiss the working day good-bye!

I’m sure NO-ONE HAS THOUGHT OF THAT BEFORE.

So I go look. 

cartones.com: taken.  drivetones.com: taken.  electrictones.com: taken. drivertones.com: taken.  carrings.com: taken. carringtones.com: taken.  mobiletones.com: taken.  mobileringtones.com: taken.

Distraught, I take a break from the domain searches and try to compose myself.  I look out the window at the cars zooming by. I can hear them outside on Mo-Pac because, well, most of them are non-electric earth-killing death cars.  I close my eyes and imagine – what would I want to hear instead of pistons pumping and exhaust being spewed out into the sky?  What would *I* as a hybrid owner, want my car to sound like?  If I could choose any sound in the world…  what tone would I want to identify myself as when I drive up to someone. 

Just as a ringtone defines who I am when my phone rings, I would want to customize the sounds my car makes – not only when I’m driving and I revv up the engine, but also when I start the car.  When I’m idling.  When I stop the car.  When I’m walking up to it (it would sense my bluetooth-enabled iPhone).  When I want to honk at a cutie pie at the light.  When I want to honk at a jerk trying to fiddle with his car ring tones at the next light.

I GOT IT!

tonemycar.com: available?

Not any more! SUCKAS!

Now to make the website…. heh heh heh.  I’m already counting the money.

[time passes]

Anyway, Back to The Story III, anyone know how to make a website?

We’ve been in the middle of a little roofing ordeal recently.  In short, we had hail damage to our house back in April.

 
(click pictures to embiggify)

The Durango got a little bit of damage, and you can see on the railing above that some of the lights got smashed.  We didn’t really think much of it in terms of our house until some roofers were going through the area and offered a free inspection of our roof. 

After a quick survey, they said the roof was totalled and we should get our insurance company out here.  So we did and they confirmed an entirely new roof needed to be put in, and that they’d pay for the whole thing minus deductible.

(click to embiggify)

Our deductible is actually quite low (compared to friends going through the same thing) so I was pretty happy to get a new roof for such a low amount of money.

I’ve heard bad stories about door-to-door roofers, so even though the traveling shingle seller was a bringer of blessings, I stayed away from them and besides, they were headquartered out of town, which didn’t necessarily add any feelings of security.  Instead I asked my friends who THEY used, if they liked them, etc.

One coworker said HIS roofer was all that and a bag of chips, so I called him up, had a nice conversation and scheduled a visit.  My coworker was right – the guy was honest, forthright, helpful and just about everything I could hope for in a contractor.  We scheduled the roof installation and waited.

About a week later, the roofers showed up early in the morning and proceeded to remove the existing roof.  I left to run some errands with my daughter, knowing that it would be half a day before the roofers were done.

Then it started raining.

HARD.

My wife called while we were out and said that it was leaking in the house, and that Jaden was putting out bowls and pans to catch the dripping water.

(click to embiggify)

Good thing for us this roofer maintained his honesty and integrity, and is working with us to fix all the damage before we pay him for the roofing repairs.  He’s also maintaining the responsibility to pay for all of it.  In his words, “I want you to be happy with the inside of the house before you pay me a penny on the roof.”  Man, it’s refreshing to have this kind of customer service.

Plus, the roof looks real good from the outside

Our problem right now is that these types of internal repairs are more difficult than you’d think, since we have no attic or crawl space.  Water damage is NOT a fun thing.  We gotta get someone with powerful vacuums and mold treatment sprayers and have about 2 feet of the roof taken off along both long edges.  Then it takes 2-3 days to do it all, since they have to take out all the blow-in insulation, wait for it to dry, then treat it with bleach, vinegar and water (or something like that), and then wait for it to dry as well.  Then they blow in the new insulation and put the roof sections back on. 

Needless to say, we hope it doesn’t rain those 2-3 days.

Meanwhile the house stunk of wetness, but that went away after about 5-6 days.  We’re hoping the replacement of roof insulation will be the last of it. We also hope our exposure to mold or mildew wasn’t too bad – we all stayed at a friends house for 2-3 days right after it happened just to be sure.

Be honest.  Would you trust this person?

Taken by itself, this portrait looks like one of those Most Wanted poster shots in the Post Office.  Look at his grainy skin.  The stark black and white features.  The thick eyebrows.  Barely existent beady eyes.  Thinly veiled smile that surely belies a terrorist heart ready to jump out at you just for looking at him cross-eyed.

I’m not surprised that they use that format on wanted posters.  Ain’t nobody can look too good in those conditions.

This is what it looks like when you get your picture taken for our elementary school’s visitor badge.

I volunteered this morning and you can hear more about it by listening to my utter:

But take my word for it either way – if you have children in elementary school, take time to volunteer. Even if just once; even if just for 30 minutes; even if to just sit in class and watch. It’s worth it!

PS: A BIG Thank You to Ms Suarez, Jaden’s teacher.  You are incredible!  And patient. And helpful.  Did I mention patient?

And.

fully.

awesome!