I'm feelin' it. Along with some other negative emotions. I so want to be the person in the crowd who is never bothered by anything. You know the one... you forget their birthday and they don't seem to notice. A month later you realize it and they shrug and say "no worries" and they really don't look worried about. If I could buy that, along with a helping of self control, I'd pay big bucks for it. There's a market for it! I have at least downgraded from all out angry outbursts to silent seething disgust, which I do think is progress. On an upnote, I have a new crush and he can do no wrong becuase he's dreamy. : ) AND he talked to me today. He said "oh, looks like rain," to which I replied "grunt" and shuffled off for a walk in the impending rain.

Same old stuff going on, so not much point detailing all over again. Time for ONE (single) glass of wine and then down to bidness. Though a nap would really be ideal. Oh! Had a horrible nightmare last night:

From SXSW - Austin
Jennifer Helm

We always hear that it is the young are who are leading this journey into the technology age, and in particular, when it applies to marketing. This panel discussion was from the mouth of babes and what they respond to, how they use technology in their daily lives, and what really drives them nuts.

The speakers were a group of kids ranging in age from 12 to 17. They described their core needs online were socializing and expression. Their favorite sites were the obvious: Facebook, Myspace, and music sites, but what I found interesting is that game sites were an afterthought. Yes, they all go to the game sites, but only when they had time to waste. From the sound of it, they were too busy with homework, sports, and friends to really spend a lot of time gaming. Ruinscape and Swinky came up with the younger kids, and Halo with the older crowd, but those were only explored when they had extra time.

First Panel Discussion - Mobile Media
Lots of information, but if you are into mobile, it's good stuff. A bit text heavy, and a lack of who-said-what, but the ideas are there from some very smart people.

Panel Members:
Alice Kim – MTV Networks
Marc Davis – Yahoo!
Anmol Madan - MIT Media Lab
Bob Schukai – Turner Broadcasting

Moderator:
Joshua Green, Research Manager of the Convergence Culture Consortium at MIT

Mobile Media

What is so important about mobile media? On a global scale, by 2010, 4 billion people (which is most of who will ever be connected) will be connected to the Internet, most by phone, according to Davis.

Success, ladies and gentlemen, is all in how you define it. Success can be a six figure salary or a luxury sedan or one of those robots that vacuums your house, that is, until the robot turns on you and vacuums your children's faces while they sleep. Success is winning the World Series, or, if you're the Kansas City Royals, success is when someone can name three players on your team without looking them up in the media guide. Success is, as best I can tell, achieving your goals. So let me say that this week has been a giant success: it's 1 o'clock and I'm wearing a robe.

Which isn't to say that I've been completely unproductive. No: I've dealt with bills, made phone calls, ran errands I could run in my slippers. I even looked for a job (more on this later). But my goal this week was to attain a level of sloth known only by hyper-obese World of Warcraft junkies and, when your big achievement is not breaking the yolk on the over-easy eggs you just made, well: success.

Ah, viral and buzz marketing. Good stuff. Remember the personalized phone messages Samuel Jackson sent out to your friends' cellphones to let them know about Snakes On A Plane two years ago? Well get ready, because The Dark Knight is taking their guerilla/buzz marketing campaign a few steps further.

Pure genius.

Excellent post by Mack Collier over at Viral Garden (via Customers Rock):

I am sorry I have been laxed in posting. A lot has been going on over the last couple of weeks. My mom, cousin and aunt came to stay with me the last week of February to help prepare for my baby shower. They were really sweet and helped keep the house picked up so that I didn't have to. The shower went off without a hitch with about 21 of our nearest and dearest friends in attendance. Baby got a lot of cool loot to keep him clothes and entertained. One of our friends actually quilted a baby blanket to look like the pieces from the Carcassonne game. Needless to say Dan was seriously coveting the blanket. He also was in love with the Organic stuffed monkey. The weather was really great that weekend so we went for a picnic and walk at Zilker Park. Later that night after we had all gone to bed my uncle called to tell us that my grandmother had passed away. My mom and I were up most of the night talking. The next day my mom and aunt were on their phones with my family up North trying to coordinate all the details of my grandmothers passing. They flew back to Arizona's to get some clothes and their husbands before flying to Detroit and driving to Ohio for the funeral.

The city of New York is rightfully famous for its cuisine. New York is where bagels taste like bagels, where pizza can make you cry, and where hot dogs that fester in off-colored water are somehow appetizing. When Sinatra sang "if I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere," he wasn't talking about success, he was talking about food. He also wasn't talking about burritos.

Because, see, New York burritos are shit. Sloppy Joe meat inside inside a leather tortilla does not a burrito make. That goes for you too Michigan, and you Chicago, and Ohio, please, Ohio, don't make me come over there. The rule, essentially, is this: if your state isn't touching Mexico, I will not eat your Mexican food. It's that simple.

So when our producer Tom arrived from New York that first week, I wasn't that surprised to hear him hankering for a burrito. I wasn't too surprised the next day when, less than twenty hours later, Tom wanted another. I wasn't all that surprised when we returned for the third and then fourth days in a row. In fact, it's hard to say when I really did feel surprised. I suppose it was when Tom's head turned into a burrito, somewhere during the third week.

I've never been one of those misanthropes who, upon each of life's many screwjobs, throws up his hands at the overall idiocy of humanity. "Everybody's an idiot," is one of those things you'll never hear me say---it's like that saying: If you meet ten assholes today, maybe you're the asshole. To wit: if you think everyone's a dumbass, I'd recommend checking your criteria.

Unless you're at U-Haul. Then everyone's a dumbass.

Do you have an old computer or monitor lying around that you don't know how to dispose of? An ancient laptop, keyboard, cell phone, or television? (I'll bet there'll be a glut of old TV's when the country makes the switch to full digital broadcasting next February!)

We had an old CRT monitor. I went to Earth 911, selected "Monitor", entered my zip code, and it returned a number of locations where I could drop it off.

Staples charges a fee for monitors (the one near me wanted $10), but takes smaller peripherals like mice, keyboards, and speakers free of charge. The Goodwill near us took our monitor for free.
________

I'm here on my couch, simultaneously unemployed and yet wearing a suit, an incongruous situation owing to a morning spent impersonating a low-rent mobster for a corporate team building scavenger hunt. This, apparently, is my life. So be it. At least I look dapper.

I'm also typing on a computer that, as of this time yesterday, was not working. I had just finished watching The Young and the Restless---which, first off, is a sentence I hoped I'd never write, at least not until I transmogrified into a brandy-soaked grandmother and second, a sentence I need to explain at the asterisk*---when I was greeted with the unsettling aroma of melting plastic. Since I hadn't been smoking crack out of an Evian bottle lately, I was understandably perplexed. Burning plastic is an unholy smell, a smell I'd really only dealt with once, when, as a high schooler, I bought lawn seats to Ozzfest so I could see the 98th Black Sabbath Reunion Tour, and a bunch of countrified rubes made a bonfire out of disposable cutlery and liter-size Pepsis. It literally took my breath away, in a "wow, I can't effing breathe" sort of way. I learned two valuable lessons that day: thou shalt not burn plastic and thou shalt sing the guitar solo to "War Pigs" with thousands of inebriated longhairs. But I digress.

I woke up this morning with the cold howling around inside my bones. But looking out of the window everything was all white and beautiful and brilliant, the sun like pearl behind white sky, and everything glittered with frost. It looked quite magical. I love mornings like this. Give me this over rain any day. I went to a pantomine the night before last, and the fairy godmother in it was fantastic, really throwing herself into the part, tip-toeing around the cast waving her wand and whispering good into everyones ears. That's what it felt like this morning, waking up to all this whiteness, as if someone had tiptoed through the night - over rooftops and hills, through the trees, up and down streets and alleyways and parks, waving a magic wand, turning the land this clean, silvery-white. I felt happy just laying there thinking it. I turned up the on the music on the CD alarm — the Late String Quartets again!

CARE TO GUESS?
Which of five networks is said to have been forced to hire extra people to handle all the calls flooding in from angry fans demanding a fair deal for writers? Our source says an assistant to the CEO of the network's parent company contacted a fan site that posted the CEO's phone number and pleaded, "What do I have to do to get you people to stop this?"

You see, when your business is keeping viewers and advertisers happy, there IS such a thing as bad publicity.

"So I was wondering, what is that exact point where a company stops caring? Stops paying attention to their customers? Stops with the phenomenal customer service? Is it when they reach a certain sales figure? A certain number of employees?"

Yes, we are hearing the same rumors you're hearing. Repeat: rumors. And last time we all got too excited by such unsubstantiated expectations, well, you know.

So as you get your third email and/or phone call from the guy who knows somebody who talked to the woman who heard from a person "who knows people who know," take a deep breath and read Ray Richmond's column yesterday on The Huffington

Call me a nerd, but I've wanted to do a labyrinth walk for years. I have no idea why.. it's just one of those things (like the nautilus) that I see and I like and then I become semi-obsessed with. I have dreams of building my own labyrinth in my side yard out of rocks and flowers. But tonight, I actually walked one! There's a church in Portland, probably 2-3 miles from where I work that has a labyrinth on a canvas and they open it up to the public once a month or so. Now, I'm not religious at all and I've probably stepped foot in a church a total of 10 times in my life (half of them at a daycare center when I was a nanny, once I went with a boyfriend on Christmas, a few times I went wtih friends when I was kid, and once to a wedding in a catholic church). Oh, and once I blew a tire on my car when I veered trying to avoid a squirrel and hit the curb... wanted to see if they had a phone but the door was locked - typical!

Making resolutions for a whole year seems so daunting... Which is probably why so few of us ever actually see them through.

Let's see... Lose weight. Stop smoking. Eat better. Learn a foreign language. Take the dog to the park every day.

Yeah, right.

If there's one thing we can probably all agree on about Western culture today, it's this: More often than not, we tend to bite off a lot more than we can chew. (Often, literally.) We supersize everything: Houses. Cars. Shopping malls. Credit. Meals... and yes, even New Year's Resolutions.

kcobain cons
Originally uploaded by benbarren is when u drop your blackberry in a rock pool.
and u lose always on email.
no longer respond in real time.
where r u.
the phone company said the fix would be more than a new unit.
insurance said just pay the $250 excess.
u beauty.
so i wait 10-14 days.
they need to "process the claim"
need another 10-14 days.
then there will be a laboured delivery process.
always off email : 24-7-31 days off.
cold turkey crackberry.
customer satisfaction down.
mobile tweets no more.
i need my fkn blackberry now.

Yesterday, April second, marked the first day of the baseball season, a swath of time that signals the end of spring, the beginning of summer, and a collection of horrendous goatees that even a Korn fan would be embarrassed by. It was also Birdmonster's first real day off since a good two weeks ago, and a day I spent half-ill before an evening of red wine and that new Will Farrell movie worked like twin panaceas. (And, full disclosure here: I really enjoyed "Blades of Glory," but it must be known I was cackling far harder than the other dozen or so people in the theatre. Of course, I'd laugh at Farrell if he was giving me a brain cancer diagnosis, so, like I said: take that recommendation with a grain of salt. Or ten).

The thing about focus - call it a flaw if you will - is that you cannot focus on any one thing for very long. Every once in a while, you have to take a step back, either clear your head or look at the big picture, and return to whatever you were focusing on when you are ready to focus on it again.
"Sustained focus" is a very finite proposition. On a long enough timeline, all focus eventually fades and dies.
And unless you're a chameleon, you can't focus on more than one thing at once.
Therefore, you have to look at focus as a limited (see finite) endeavor.
I am currently working on a project that has taken weeks of analysis and twisted creative strategery - one could call this project my "focus" - yet if a little focus timer were to be switched on every time I "focus" on this project and off when I get interrupted, I would be surprised if it indicated that I actually spend more than 4 out of an 8-hour workday truly focusing on it.

Art Cards from today
Originally uploaded by m.Lee From yesterdays printing session. Here are some of the strongest art cards I have made in awhile. Sure, they might induce an acid flashback in some but I love the colors. Not really what I had in my head but that is half the fun! I never can anticipate exactly what I am going to end up with. Expect these and more working their way into my shop in the next few weeks.

Over the past week, several showrunners have stepped forward and set up raffles for fans of their shows who participate in Pencils2MediaMoguls. Here's a rundown of all the prizes so far.

For LOST fans:
Showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse write:Please join us and support all the writers of your favorite TV shows. So many of you guys have asked what you can do to help and this is it! We're gonna offer three prizes (chosen at random) -- Every box you buy [and enter "LOST" in the "show you're supporting" box] gives you one shot at the raffle.

GRAND PRIZE: A personal thank-you call from us (Carlton and Damon) AND Matthew Fox where we shall do our bestest to answer your questions about the show's mysteries AND a Season 3 DVD set.

FIRST PRIZE: A signed finale script by writers Damon and Carlton and a surprise cast member!

I have yet to solve this puzzle known as employment. Last post dealt with the wondrous lessons I learned as a temp, most of which reflected a certain bitterness after a day spent in the closest thing I've got to a business suit, passing out folders to European doctors who looked at me like I had some sort of contagious fungus on my face. Two days later, I got to play a faux mobster in a scavenger hunt and make sixty dollars talking about how my cousin got himself flattened under a parade route's worth of elephants. Yet, since then: nothing. We're about 4 days away from signing up for electroshock studies. $100 for 3 hours of voltage-induced agony, eh? Do they pay for parking?

The give and take is this: no work equals no money but no work equals no stress. Call it the reverse Puff Daddy corrolary; if mo money means mo problems, no money means no problems. After all, food and shelter: highly overrated.

Every tour has its stupid nickname. I remember the "Respect Your Opinion Tour" of aught six, where us four Birdmonsters resolved to stop bickering over the merits of Don Henley's catalogue, the proper Waffle House ordering strategy, or the intrinsic value of Street Fighter The Movie. Other tours have been defined by exploding transmissions (the "Arizona Hates Our Face Tour") or novel experiences (the "Baby's First Tour; Hello Both of You"). This time around? It's the "'San Francisco' is Code For Gay Tour."

I'm not sure why this hasn't gotten any attention in the U.S. - perhaps it will hit the fan shortly - but researchers in the UK have created what the BBC is calling a "part human, part animal hybrid embryo. Actually it isn't really. What they did, as far as I can tell from this scientifically illiterate story, was to use somatic cell nuclear transfer to place a human nucleus (the story just says "human DNA" but that doesn't make sense) into a cow ovum. They allowed the embryo to develop into an early stage blastocyst. I'm a bit surprised it did actually, but there you are. Previous attempts at somatic cell nuclear transfer with human material have resulted in embryos that would not grow past the 8 cell stage, so if this is correct, it's much more of a breakthrough than the BBC reporter seems to realize -- it really is the first human clone that appears to be viable.

Anyway, if I'm interpreting what happened correctly, the embryo is not really a human/animal hybrid. It's human except for having bovine mitochondria -- the endosymbiotic descendants of ancient archea that do the essential work of cellular metabolism. Were such an embryo to be allowed to grow into a human, I would expect it to appear entirely human and show no more abnormalities than a clone made with a human gamete.

via CNN

Quite a story. A graduate student at Berkeley- James Buck- was in Eygpt covering some anti-government protests. He and his translator were nabbed and tossed in jail, and with a one word tweet ("arrested") his network lit up and started taking action to get him out. This may be one of the more powerful examples I've ever seen of how the networks we establish for ourselves online can benefit our lives.

Some excerpts from the story (but check the whole story for all the deets):

"Buck, a graduate student from the University of California-Berkeley, was in Mahalla, Egypt, covering an anti-government protest when he and his translator Mohammed Maree were arrested April 10.

On his way to the police station, Buck took out his cell phone and sent a message to his friends and contacts using the micro-blogging site Twitter.

Here it is, your recap of the OMMA Mobile Conference's afternoon session last Thursday...

(See my report on the conference's morning lineup, my disclaimers about not being a media guy, my Swingers reference, and my oozing excitement over the potential and possibilities of mobile marketing here.)