A few years ago, I was remembering a sketch I had seen on TV, and I wanted to see it again. Well, about a year and a half ago, I determined that it was probably a performance by Rowan Atkinson, and asked for the appropriate video (available only on VHS), for Christmas. I got the video, and it was the right one! Woo-hoo!
The sketch is called “A Final Bash.” Just in case you had spent the last few years wondering.
Since reading all of Reid’s blog, I’ve been thinking about the days when I used to be a more prolific blogger. I used to complain profusely about silly things (because I thought it was funny), and skip over the stuff that really bothered me. Recently, something happened to me that is totally something I would have complained about.
Last night I came back to my apartment to find my Airport Extreme unresponsive. I tried finding it in the Airport Utility. No joy. I unplugged it. I tried a hard reset. I unplugged it again and let it sit for a while. I tried it in a different outlet. I tried everything, and eventually not even the status light would turn on. So, I made an appointment for the Genius Bar. Tonight, I drove up to Palo Alto for my appointment. After waiting for 20 minutes, they plugged in my Airport. I wondered if it would magically work since it was unplugged for a day. I opened my computer and it recognized the Airport. Everything was working. Ugh.
Because of my limited culinary skills and the comfort I find in consistency, I have a habit of eating the same food every day, often for weeks in a row. In college, I ate spaghetti for dinner almost every night that I was left to cook on my own.
Recently, I had some people over for dinner, and Nelson made potstickers. I’ve been around potstickers plenty of times, but have never tried them. But I didn’t want to be rude, so I took one. I now cook potstickers (from Trader Joe’s) instead of spaghetti.
Over the past couple of years, I’ve been accumulating coins, just as we all do. There are still a few scattered throughout my apartment, but I collected many of them in a plastic bag that just sat in a drawer. I planned on converting them into a more useful form of currency later. At home, my bank had one of those coin-counting machines, so I could just deposit there, but I didn’t see one in my bank out here. And I knew of Coinstar from seeing them in the stores, but I didn’t ever try that because I knew they must charge something for the service.
Nelson, the guy who knows all sorts of random things about various services, recently let us know that he’s a big fan of Coinstar, and he doesn’t get charged for it. At first, I accused him of using the infamous “pull the plug” hack to prevent the machine from connecting to the Internet. But Nelson’s a nice guy, even if he does steal bikes, so I was of course wrong to do that. What Nelson does is convert his coins into an Amazon gift certificate, which has no counting fee. Coinstar presumably gets a commission from Amazon for these transactions. Since Amazon credit is as good as cash, it sounded like a great idea to me.
Tonight, I finally carried my bag of change into the store. Here’s what I had:
Dollars: 17 (probably change from buying stamps) Quarters: 154 Dimes: 100 Nickels: 63 Pennies: 133
This brought me to a total of $69.98! I’ve already applied it to my account, and it will sit there until it comes as a nice surprise next time I place an order. Thanks, Nelson.
Reid recently imported his old Xanga entries into his blog, and I’m in the process of reading/skimming all of them in chronological order. Thanks, Reid for adding the previous/next links to the entries at my request. Great job responding to user feedback.
I figured I’d let you all know that’s what I’m up to, so you can understand why this blog may become a bit journalish as I’m influenced by Reid. Hopefully this phase will pass quickly when I finish reading about Reid’s past.
Today, I took my car in for regular maintenance, and to get the passenger door fixed so that it can be opened from the inside again. It hadn’t been working properly since someone smashed my window. I got there at 11, and they told me that the car would probably be ready around 4. I didn’t have a plan for killing time, so I decided to walk back to my apartment since it was less than two miles away. I stopped at Quiznos for lunch, which was nice since I haven’t been there in a while. I was reminded of two things during this errand:
I like nature. For most of my childhood, I lived in houses surrounded by woods, and I liked to explore them. I even went to an Audubon camp in Maine for two summers to hike and check out puffins. But spiders terrify me. Tonight, I was just sitting on my couch minding my own business, when I noticed a small spider crawling on my shirt. Fortunately, it crawled away from my face, and then onto my laptop. I was about to blow it off when it scurried under my laptop’s keyboard.
Watching the keyboard very carefully, I did what any reasonable arachnophobic blogger would do. I opened up a new blog entry and prepared to quickly announce my departure from the Internet, at least until I could get to another computer. But before I could even tap out a one-liner, the spider came back out, narrowly missing my fingertip and causing me to leap from my seat. As I was in mid-air, with gravity doing what gravity does best, I had to quickly act to balance three very strong emotions, all vying for priority: Fear of spiders, love of my MacBook Pro, and respect for my coffee table and body, which were about to collide.
I cannot remember what happened during the time between the realization of this situation and the moment I returned to the ground, but I ended up on my feet, laptop safely in my hands, and spider harmlessly on the floor. Oh, and my heart was beating about a zillion BPM.
Tonight I got paid to hang out with nerds and be entertained by Flight of the Conchords at Google I/O. I love my job.
Paraphrased:
“Murray is fictional. That must be confusing for you because you probably thought we were fictional. But we’re real. We’re from New Zealand. We play at all the major search engine functions.”
I’m sitting in the Philadelphia Airport waiting for my flight and I thought I’d test out posting via email with a couple of pet peeves related to air travel. They all focus on selfish passengers not caring about others. Of course these people are everywhere (ever seen a crowd told “no flash” or “only take one item” without enforcement?), but for some reason I notice them the most when traveling.
1. Lining up at the gate before one’s zone/row is called. It’s seriously gotten to the point where by the time they announce pre-boarding, the entire room is standing around the door. I sometimes have to ask, “Are you standing in line or next to the line?” As a result, people end up boarding in a random order and it can take 45 minutes to get everyone seated.
2. Putting small items which could fit under one’s seat in the overhead bins. This causes delays and inconvenience.
3. Headphone volume so loud that it may as well be playing through the P.A. system. The worst part is these people can’t take a hint, even if the “hint” is “Your headphones are too loud.”
4. Grabbing on to my seatback as you walk down the aisle. This has interruped my sleep, pulled my hair, and sent me into a general state of annoyance. If someone can’t make it down the aisle without assistance, they should raise their hands another couple feet and use the bins. Just like the flight attendants.
Note: Post by email did not work. Getting PHP errors.
Earlier, I complained about plastic clamshell packaging. Seth Godin has figured it out. I hope people also pay attention to the sticker thing. The first thing I do when I get a camera is remove the stickers and turn off the beeps.
And in case you were curious, here’s the reply I got from the toothbrush manufacturer after complaining:
[We] recently started enclosing replacement heads in PETG plastic so customers could “see” what they are purchasing. The plastic, which is approved for recycling, also ensures retailers that our products are secure. We do realize, however, that the plastic packing can be difficult to remove, and we are continuing our effort to develop packaging that is “friendly” all around-to the consumer, the retailer and the environment.
We want you to know that our customers mean a great deal to us, and we take your feedback seriously. I will forward your comments to the appropriate department.
Please follow the below steps to open the package of the heads.
1. Hold package with front of package facing you. Using a sturdy pair of scissors carefully cut at the bottom right hand corner on the left side of the sealed edge going up.
2. Once you cut over the edge and about two inches up, insert lower blade of scissors between the opening that separates the package front and back.
3. Continue cutting the single layer of plastic in an upward direction until you pass the top of the toothbrush.
4. Then, turn and cut in a single layer across the top of the package to the left.
5. Now separate the front and back of the package layers to remove the brushes.Let us know if we can help you in the future.