September 2009
68 posts
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People of Walmart →
I’m starting to realize we should be less worried about healthcare reform and more worried about the people who shop at Walmart. When I first started browsing this site I was laughing, now I’m crying.
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WatchConan Hits His Head (via airbag)
This is really frightening. Luckily, he’s okay, but the clip of him falling and the moments afterward are quite scary.
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Social Interactions, Part 328
UPS Guy: Really? Another box from Zappos? How many pairs do you need?
Me: I can never find any that fit!
UPS Guy: So what are you doing with them?
Me: I send them back.
UPS Guy: Wow.
Me: Yeah.
UPS Guy: Why don't you just go to a store, lazy ass?
Me: I love you.
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Vitamin String Quartet cover MGMT’s Kids...
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“Have you watched those Novas on absolute zero? Shit gets crazy.”
– Shawn
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Working at Pixar
Me: You know how Pixar lets each person create their own little house as an office in their building?
Me: I had a dream last night that I worked there, and my office was made up to look like a Chinese underage whore house, with bacon curtains.
Me: No one would take meetings with me.
Me: It was so frustrating.
Shawn Morrison: Specifically underage Chinese whore house decor? I do love that look.
Me: I have to admit, it was quite cozy.
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“Nothing is one hundred percent reliable this side of paradise, except that your...”
– Odd Thomas, in Brother Odd by Dean Koontz
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WatchGlee: Don’t Stop Believing
From the pilot of the show, which I finally sat down and watched today. I then proceeded to watch the other four episodes.
It’s worth mentioning that I’m very much not a musicals kind of person. Musical theatre annoys me and shows like American Idol or So You Think You Can Dance make me want to punch babies. But there’s something about Glee,...
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“I hate your guts. Not because you created that little snippet, but because...”
– Me, in a comment to Joe Lazarus
Joe Lazarus created this little snippet for posting an aggregate of your top five artists from Last.fm in Tumblr. And now thousands of people use it and it’s annoying as shit every week.
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Google: We do not use the keywords meta tag in web... →
Now you can finally send all those stupid clients to a definitive site when they argue with you about adding those 1,000 keywords to their site to “improve SEO.”
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“I can still feel it on my leg, shocking me into full adrenaline-soaked...”
– Shawn on waking up with a cockroach on his leg
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One of the Worst Things Ever Happened to Shawn...
Shawn Morrison: Figured you'd appreciate this. Just woke up because... A COCKROACH WAS CRAWLING ON MY LEG IN MY BED!!!!!!!!!!!!! MY LEG!!!!!!!!! IN MY BED!!!!!!!!!
Me: NO!!!! NO NO NO NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! NOOOOOO NONONONO NOOOOOOOOOO NOOOOO!!!!!nnnnnnnjwuwi
Me: NO NIOOOOOOOOOO NOONOO NOOOOOOOOOOOOO NONONO NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOO NO NO NO DEAR GOD NO NO NO YOU HAVE TO NOOOOOO MOVE IMMEDIATELY NOOOOOO NOOO JESUS CRYING NOOOOOOO
Me: Dude, seriously, I almost just vomited. And I'm going to have trouble sleeping for weeks. Dear god. Was it at least tiny?? And are you burning your bead right now???
Shawn Morrison: YES TO ALL OF IT TRUE SO BAD CRYING SARA CHOPPING OFF MY LEG FOR SAFETY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Shawn Morrison: We're both just sitting here taking turns gagging. NOT TINY. So far from being tiny. I want to leave the United States.
Me: Oh my god. I am so fucking sorry. So fucking sorry. Oh my god.
Me: How do you even deal with this? How do you sleep? How do you LIVE??
Shawn Morrison: Exactly! We don't have answers to any of these questions. We are Googling "cockroach eggs maybe bed why? please no" currently. We might have to burn everything. EVERYTHING.
Me: This is a dark day. A dark day for all mankind. Were you actually asleep? It woke you up?? And did you just immediately empty into your pants??
Shawn Morrison: Had *just* fallen alseep. Felt something on my leg. Leapt out like a ninja and started yelling, "Get out of the bed!" like Jack Bauer. Killed it with a shoe but had to hit it 22 times. I don't know where we go from here.
Me: Isn't it Fall? Aren't we supposed to not have to worry about roaches any more? And also, isn't this 2009? Aren't we supposed to never have to worry about them ON US OR IN OUR BEDS?? Thank god you weren't having sex when it happened. That kind of shit would break you up. From that point on any time you tried to have sex you'd have Vietnam-like flashbacks.
Me: Granted, you'll never sleep again.
Shawn Morrison: Yeah, I'm doing dishes now and Sara is waxing the floors. I don't think I'm even close to admitting we own a bed. What bed?
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Ego 1.4.2 →
After nearly three weeks (and a rejection), Apple has finally approved version 1.4.2 of Ego, which fixes issues with Google Analytics widgets and retires PageRank until Google allows that data to be accessed again.
It has been absolutely painful to wait this long to get a bugfix out to users, so I thank you for your patience. If you have a few minutes and you haven’t reviewed Ego,...
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Google Chrome Frame →
Install this immediately if you have to use Internet Explorer. It will use Chrome (WebKit) to render pages that contain the special Chrome Frame meta tag.
It doesn’t require users to have Google Chrome itself, installs in seconds, and makes using Internet Explorer bearable. You can even prompt IE users to install it.
A nice benefit of this plugin is that it isn’t on by default...
Social Interactions, Part 273
FedEx Guy: Wow, I haven't seen you in a while!
Me: Yeah, I've mostly been receiving UPS packages.
FedEx Guy: Oh.
Me: Not to avoid YOU or anything.
FedEx Guy: Right.
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Shure SE420-K Mini-Review
The SE420-Ks are very similar to another pair of Shure earbuds I reviewed before, the SE310-Ks, but a few things distance them from the lower model: Price, comfort and sound.
The SE420-Ks sound terrific. Bass is strong and smooth, highs and lows are clear and overall the entire sound is very, very nice. I didn’t think there’d be as much difference between the 310 and 420 models, but...
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iTunes Visual Redesign by Brandon Walkin →
For the most part, I think this is a great melding of the two visual styles. I disagree with the “display” redesign, though, since I think the iTunes 9 style is finally more modern and matches the iPhone’s loading bars better. Other than that, these are all good ideas.
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Baseball Stadiums
Shawn Morrison: What occurred to us is that for all the money we save on ticket prices [going to see the Red Sox in Baltimore], we add so much in travel cost that we might as well put it towards buying good seats at Fenway.
Shawn Morrison: Or maybe I should take all the money I normally spend on the Sox and hire a de-programmer to turn me into a Mets fan.
Me: Yeah, that second one is a good idea
Shawn Morrison: Granted, then I'd also need a therapist.
Me: I bet you could get the owner's box at Shea for the price of a weekend of rental car to go to Baltimore.
Shawn Morrison: True. Especially since they knocked Shea down 7 months ago.
Shawn Morrison: They are literally selling the seats on eBay for $30 a pop.
Me: The new stadium isn't still called Shea?
Me: Oh, it's Citi Field.
Me: How corporate.
Shawn Morrison: Exactly. But give it 30 years and everyone will be like "No! You can't name it Corpotech field, we need to preserve the Citi legacy!"
Shawn Morrison: My co-worker gave her daughter the middle name "Shea" after the Mets. Whoops!
Shawn Morrison: Hopefully she doesn't suffer the same fate as my old goldfish "Manny Ramirez".
Me: It's not fair that insane people get to name their children just as normal people do.
Shawn Morrison: At least it's a middle name and has some plausibility as an actual name should her daughter attempt to hide its origins.
Shawn Morrison: Better than like "Safeco" or "Comerica" or something. But yes, rather unfortunate.
Me: My first child will be Thomas Safeco Murray.
Shawn Morrison: Not as good as mine. Nicholas Everything Bagel Morrison.
Me: That kid is going to be president.
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“The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent...”
– Bertrand Russell (via tinyblip)
Shawn and I talk about this sort of thing a lot, especially when it comes to filmmaking. We spend so much time over-thinking and over-analyzing what we’re doing, worrying if we’re making good content, wondering what we should be doing instead, spending...
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Tip: Pin Your OS X Dock to the Corner
A friend asked me the other day if it was possible to pin the Dock to the corner of the screen without using an app or a hack. It’s actually very simple. In Terminal, use the following:
defaults write com.apple.dock pinning -string start
Where “start” is which side you want the Dock to align with. The values are “start”...
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WatchNudge
Awesome little Flash-based mixing board for creating repeating music, which you can embed (try the crappy song I made above, it should play) and send around. I love these kinds of apps.
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App Store Complaint #23,493
Today, after 15 days, Ego version 1.4.2 was rejected due to an HIG violation. It was a simple violation and I fixed and resubmitted immediately. While it’s frustrating to be rejected, what makes this so much worse is that it took 15 days. That’s half a month.
Now that I’ve resubmitted I’m at the back of the line again, and it could easily take another 15 days to be...
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WatchDangerous Condom Applicator
One of my favorite College Humor originals to date.
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Social Interactions
Laundromat Owner: When do you need it?
Me: I dunno, when's the soonest it will be ready?
Laundromat Owner: You tell me.
Me: What?
Laundromat Owner: When do you want it for?
Me: I want it as soon as it's ready, so whenever that can be?
Laundromat Owner: You tell me when.
Me: I don't--you're doing it, I don't know when you'll--
Laundromat Owner: It can be any time, you just ask.
Me: Okay, I don't see how--well, to be honest, if everything's equal, I'd like it an hour and a half ago.
Laundromat Owner: Tomorrow, 2PM work okay?
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Music Purchases, September 2009
Veckatimest by Grizzly Bear
My Old, Familiar Friend by Brendan Benson
Middle Cyclone by Neko Case
Fox Confessor Brings the Flood by Neko Case
Ellipse by Imogen Heap
9 by The Impossible Shapes
Infinite Light by...
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“On a history test we were asked, ‘Who was Michelangelo?’ I answered,...”
– Unknown Poster (via Paige)
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Letterbox β4 for Snow Leopard →
Thank god for Aaron Harnly—I can finally use Mail in Snow Leopard without vomiting. I don’t know why Apple hasn’t switched Mail to widescreen yet, but it was probably the most painful thing about upgrading to 10.6. Thankfully, Aaron’s Letterbox plugin is 64-bit and works, and works quite well.
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Screenr →
I’m absolutely shocked this works, and quite well actually. They even create an iPhone-compatible M4V version, so you can watch your screencasts on the go.
The whole site and application are well designed and work beautifully. By default, you share your screencasts via Twitter, but you don’t have to—you can simply link to them. Very well done.
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Spot
In 1992, our family cat (who my sister had been allowed to name Catwoman) gave birth to a litter of five kittens. We gave four of them away, but I was allowed to keep my favorite: A black-and-white-spotted male cat I named—quite ingeniously—Spot.
Aside from Spot’s mother Catwoman, who, after giving birth, turned into quite the little jerk, we had a sheltie collie dog named...
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