CITGO says GO, I say boycott

I was browsing the tubes when I came across this:




I wondered why in the world would a major corporation advertise about being in business in Florida, if it was pretty aparent they were there already. I mean, we see CITGO stations everywhere, why let us know who owns them in a Google add?

CITGO Boycott - http://citgoboycott.org/


So CITGO is owned by Hugo Chavez, kinda makes me wanna head to BP and support the Brits.

The Web and What's Coming Up

Just wanted you all to know that Burn Notice is coming back to showing this Winter 2009. Sorry I haven't been blogging. Sometimes when all of the sudden you think no one is listening, trying to say something isn't so interesting anymore.

I do know, however, that it let me release emotionally - which is always important. Since I can't talk too much about my job, it kinda seemed a moot point. Also nothing seemed to be going on that is that interesting to report.

Wrath has descended upon WoW and been keeping up with that. Well, at least I do pretty good DPS, you're welcome to check it out yourself. I also have been updating my comic regularly sometimes.

Oh, and I got an iPhone. And yes I have AT&T. I don't know why people complain about their service so much. Time and again when I'm next to other people with other carriers I'm the one with signal. That said, their customer service isn't to shine for.

And I'm gonna end on that. Look for more updates. Comment if you want to know anything in particular.

Tis the Season

...to want ridiculously overpriced items that you have no business owning.

Mine is a Nikon DSLR 90.

Not really sure why I do this to myself, because in all honesty I couldn't bring up a hobby of photography seriously. A.) It's really expensive. B.) I don't go to enough places to warrant anyone interested in seeing (really want that to change). and C.) The money could be better spent. D.) A lesser object would serve my purposes better. Like a subcompact, something for the web, and something with a large LCD screen.

A girl can dream, though.

Bandwagon

Everyone loves a winner.

This is, truthfully, the reason why I think the bandwagon phenomenon exists. There seems like a simple answer to how it comes about, but with the Rays winning, getting there has been complicated. For awhile now I have never been interested in baseball; at least watching it on television. But that has changed as of late and been excited in seeing the Rays go to the World Series for the first time.

My roommate is pissed at the sheer number of people writing in the Bulletin portion of Myspace talking about how excited they are about the Rays' win. And I admit, I've watched almost every game of the Red Sox series myself and right there with everyone excited to see history in the making. I saw a total of one entire Rays season game. And I think the part of her point is valid (or maybe my interpretation of it) is that the people excited now who didn't care about baseball don't understand the struggle it was for the Rays to achieve what they did, yet they go to Dick's Sporting Goods and get championship shirts and other shwag. The part that gets me though is that its very generalizing. I don't have to watch 180 games or even understand the minutiae of the sport to be proud.

The cool thing is, vindication for long sports fans of the team, like my best friend Jay, loves/loved the Rays since he was a teenager ever since they first opened the franchise and I'm kind of excited for him because he finally feels like what I've felt with the Colts ever since they were Super Bowl Champs.

When your home team wins, its a kind of pride that's always good to feel. 9 = 8

Calm Before the Storm

This is pretty much how it is before any expansion, really, because everyone is sick of running Kara and PvP is as unbalanced as Heath Ledger in the Dark Knight. The good news is that MMO Champion has all the juicy new details of the beta in case you sold your key, and even better the 3.0 is coming out in mid-October so we'll be in the fun soon enough.

I just hope that feral druids are as awesome as they were when the first expansion came out.

For Dummies

No Bad Press

I think Penny Arcade pretty much sums it up right here. The link to the picture is the news post for the comic on Penny-Arcade's website.

And if you're late to the game:



then

Humpty Dumpty

As more banks are failing, I'm becoming more and more disenchanted with the Republican stance on commercial or economic success, or better put how to go about it.

Free markets are a nice thing to have. And as general of a statement that was, it's subvertly saying 'When it works, it works wonderfully.'

Myth #1: Companies want to give you low prices because they want to obtain business.
Fact: Companies get large enough or create enough partners to become a oligopoly or cartel, they don't need to worry about your business because they'll get it one way or another.

See Wal-Mart, OPEC, Time-Warner/Comcast


Myth #2: Giving tax breaks to the wealthy helps the poor by the upper class creating more jobs for the proletariat.

Fact: People with tons of money will put it where they think they get the most reward vs. risk, whether that be business, commodity, housing, or even other financial institutions. Economic downturn is a correction on high prices of a given object, unless artificially inflated and sustained.


Myth #3: An elected President is the one who drives the economy one way or another through policy.

Fact: While having sway over the national party, the President doesn't make the financial calls, Congress does. You want more fiscally responsible government? Then worry about the chuckleheads in your local district on Capital Hill. The problem is they are too busy listening to lobbyists then to their own constiuency, but your email will get read on their Blackberry while they're waiting on their steak paid for by Pfizer, right? Wrong.


Call me a pessimist but there seems to be a lot more work to be done then just to say you're a maverick who votes with the party 90% of the time, or someone who has pretty Change! posters but not enough plan to enact on.

BTW Republicans: Not even your own pundits like Palin.

The War of Attention

Getting software to work for you, the way you want it to.

That's really the goal of anyone who uses software or computers. And to be quite honest, when it comes down to it it's a question of what works for you. I still seem to be at this crossroads with my software solutions, not because of not having enough good choices, but having far too many.

Microsoft, Apple, and now Google all have great applications that beg for your use and attention. Microsoft, bringing functionality to the table, comes feature packed and allows you to do what you will, as long as it's all Microsoft. Same for Apple but the emphasis is not only features but user experience, at the cost of flexibility. And finally Google, where it has no real presence anywhere finds presence everywhere with it's incredibly amazing Email and Calendar services along with anything on the web one would need.

Microsoft's options are the least familiar to me, only because they don't matter much anymore to me. I hated Outlook for Email and Calendar and I have no idea what web services they offer to allow over the air syncing with calendars and contacts.

Apple, having inherited a niche following with high expectations and a panache for excellence in marrying user experience to computing do almost everything you'd want it's services to do. And swear up and down everything it can't are trivialities until they incorporate it into design. For me, I want my Email, Contacts, Calendars, and Documents to sync. When I make a change to one, I want a change to all on any device, connected or not. Apple's solution is an outstanding one called MobileMe. It does the sync of the first three, leaving my documents to the iDisk function where it acts like an open FTP server. (And not to forget web galleries for pictures)

Where it comes short is where Google steps in. Nothing tops Google Docs. Sure both iWork and even Office have amazing templates to do what you need and much more beautifully, but Google Docs, being online, is backed up - to the second - every 3 seconds. And not only to your computer but on their server. Same goes for email, photos, calendar. The downside is you have to be online (with Google Gears picking up the slack in offline mode). Also Google's RSS reader runs circles around Mail.app or Safari and works anywhere I log in. I also really hate Mail applications probably. I've always used webmail, and with Gmail being the best, there isn't really a contest there.

I can't decide. I guess that's the price I pay for wanting my cake and eat it too.

Married and Gaming

(Pictured are Tiffany and Jacob Sanders)