Sickles

Detour Ahead ----->>

2006-10-30T19:40:00.000-05:00

Hello Hello! It is my distinct privilege to invite you to visit www.sicklesinsight.com for all future blogging adventures with Jeff! This detour shall serve as both my final post within the blogspot community and my invitation for you to join me on my soon to be publicly released blog.

Please be sure to update all your links to my blog to report to www.sicklesinsight.com. In addition change your favorites so that you can find me. Lastly, if you are a RSS lover, be sure to visit my new site for pertinent information regarding the new RSS feeds. Not sure on RSS?? I'll explain in full detail why you should be using an RSS reader, and I'll even have a recommendation on a simple yet effective RSS viewer that anyone can easily operate.

See you after the detour...

Telephone Banking Systems Recognizes your Voice

2006-10-25T08:53:00.000-04:00

If you refer to this article from Cnet News, it's an interesting concept on voice technologies integrated with security. Technology integration into todays society is simply put as amazing!

The concept is pretty freaking cool, but wait a minute - how does one from the bank load your original voice into the application? Are you saying that if I can socialy engineer a phone operator once the system is implemented, I could in essence lock an authorized user our of their account because their voice print does not match that of mine?! Wouldn't that be something!

I can't wait for the day that I have a cold and am not able to transfer my funds, or report a lost ATM card. Oh well..guess it's time to begin the social engineering on TTY devices. What's RSA got now?

New Tivo Features for Tivo Desktop

2006-10-23T07:33:00.000-04:00

For those of you using a Tivo series 2 or later, I recommend that you check out the latest version of Tivo Desktop 2.3! Download the latest version (2.3a) here. Tivo Desktop has finally added a very necessary feature entitled Automatic Transfer. This means you can tell the software to automatically move a particular series or season to your computer immediately upon recording. This is a much needed feature preventing you from having to manually transfer each recording you wish to dump off the Tivo. This ensures you that your show will be downloaded to your MediaCenter, iPod, or Palm device in plenty of time to run. Don't worry, the old features all still exist. For those of you not familiar with Tivo Desktop, you will also gain features such as streaming your mp3 collection through your TV or browsing through photos on your computer. This is all available for free through tivo. My next feature request to this addition takes it one more step. I would like for Tivo Desktop to automatically remove the recorded program from my Tivo upon the completed and confirmed transfer of the program. Perhaps next time..

And now..for those of you already familiar with Tivo...a few tips I have discovered over time...Some of these are very obvious, others are not. Some are fun, other just entertaining.

1. Remote Control Shortcuts: Did you know that you can use shortcuts on the remote control to avoid browsing through the entire menu. Sometimes you just want to go straight to your destination. Observe the following table.

Button sequence	Menu displayed
TiVo button + 1 (or TiVo + TiVo)	Now Playing
TiVo button + 2	To Do List
TiVo button + 3	Wish Lists
TiVo button + 4	Browse by Name
TiVo button + 5	Browse by Channel
TiVo button + 6	Browse by Time
TiVo button + 7	Record Time/Channel (manual recording)
TiVo button + 8	TiVo Suggestions
TiVo button + 9	Network Showcases
TiVo button + Slow Motion button	Messages and Setup

2. Thirty Second Skip: Hopefully most of you are using this already, no doubt a few aren't aware of this option yet. You can remap the Advance button (the Play arrow with a vertical line at the right edge, just above the numbers), which normally brings you to the end of a program or, if you're at the end, takes you to the beginning. (Also, if you're fast-forwarding, the Advance button will skip you to the next tick mark.) I don't find myself using this feature often. When we're done, it'll act as the 30-second skip. Here's what to do.

Bring up any recorded program or live TV. Then enter the following sequence on your remote:

Select > Play > Select > 3 > 0 > Select

You'll know the combination worked when TiVo rings out three dings of the Thumbs Up sounds Your Advance button will now skip forward by 30 seconds each time it is pressed. Usually 3 to 5 presses will get you right through the commercials. On occasion you'll need to use the back 8 seconds button directly across from it.

Do note one annoyance with this change: Unfortunately this is not permanent. If your TiVo ever needs to be rebooted (after being unplugged or as a result of a power failure) you'll have to reapply the hack.

3. Expensive Clock: Yes, you can post the time on the Tivo. Not sure why you would want to use this, but if you follow the key sequence below, you can place the time in the lower right hand corner of your screen.

Select, Play, Select, 9, Select

Enter the code again to remove the clock.

4. Disappearing Progress Bar: Annoyed with the lingering progress bar at the bottom of the screen? Make it fade out faster by entering the following button combination:

Select, Play, Select, Pause, Select

5. Easter Eggs: There's something about showing off some cute trick your gadgets can do that tempts all of us to push the buttons to see what happens. Many electronic devices and software programs have hidden features, often called "Easter eggs." Easter eggs are tucked away behind obscure keystroke combinations. TiVo is no different. To see a TiVo Easter egg, follow these steps:

Enable closed-captioning display on your TV.
Using your TiVo remote, go to Browse by Name.
Select the characters SHAGWELL.
Press Thumbs Up.

You'll be presented with a short video hidden inside your Tivo.

If you look closely, there are more Easter eggs inside this one.

That's enough for now. Have you found Tivo tips and tricks that you would like to share?

Create a Unique Voicemail Greeting for Each Caller

2006-10-18T21:12:00.000-04:00

I recently found this, although I haven't had time to completely test it out yet. I figured I would let you know about it while it was still free!

Website YouMail is the new voice mail for cell phones. Among many features, it allows you to record unique voice greetings for anyone who calls you, based on their caller ID. Individualize your voice greetings for friends, family or important callers while maintaining a standard greeting for work and unknown callers.

Check your voice messages from any phone or via the web and forward favorite messages to anyone via email. Have fun with the already infamous DITCHMAIL feature that hangs up on unwanted callers after your custom greeting for them is played.

YouMail works with your existing phone and carrier and is easy to trial without risk. YouMail is free for users who sign up now while there are still beta accounts available and easy to change back and forth between your current voice mail and YouMail.

Currently Compatible with:

MIA

2006-10-11T01:18:00.000-04:00

All,

Please pardon my current absence and lack of forewarning of said absence.

I am currently attending Manage Fusion which leaves me little time for internet, creativity, or new findings. The days are long, the nights are too. I find myself quite tired in the end, though there is value in some of the things being learned, and the relationships being made. I will return to posting by this time next week. Have a great week!

AutoSummarize a Word Document

2006-10-03T21:28:00.000-04:00

Did you know that you can summarize a written report automatically with the AutoSummarize feature in Word? This is probably a little known feature to most, but sometimes it can be very handy! Use the AutoSummarize feature in Word to create one of four different types of summaries.

After completing a written report for a science fair project, or an article at work, your thesis, a book, you name it, one can write an abstract of the report by having Word summarize it automatically. This tip could apply to virtually any written report, such as a historical research report. Keep in mind that you will want to edit the summary, but it is definitely a good start to bringing up key points throughout the word document!

How To:

1. Open a Microsoft Word document that you want to summarize.

2. Choose AutoSummarize from the Tools menu.

3. When the AutoSummarize dialog box opens, select the type of summary that you want to apply. You can choose to highlight key points, insert an executive summary or abstract at the top of the document, create a new document, or hide everything but the summary.

4. Click OK to continue. A new document will open and display your summary.

Note: It’s unlikely that Word will create the exact summary that you need. You will need to do some editing of the summary.

That's it - pretty nifty?

Listen to your iPod at Work - Master Volume Consistency

2006-10-02T18:03:00.000-04:00

Ever notice how some CDs are REALLY LOUD and others are very quiet? The sound level is built into the way the CDs were recorded and mastered. Because audio CDs are mastered differently, you may notice discrepancies in volume between songs on different albums. Like iTunes, iPod also offers the Sound Check feature to standardize the volume of all the songs in your music library. This option has been available since iTunes 3. You can turn Sound Check on or off by choosing Sound Check in Settings in the main iPod menu.

Getting Sound Check to Work:

In particular, older CDs often seem to be mastered at low volume levels compared to recent music. This is really annoying when you’re listening to a playlist with songs from various eras.
Luckily, iPod and iTunes have a magic trick that cures this problem: Sound Check. This feature analyzes the volume of songs and adjusts it so that they’re all in the same range. When you play songs with Sound Check, your personal volume choice becomes the way to turn it up or down.

Unfortunately, Sound Check is a little trickier than it needs to be. You have to turn it on both in iTunes and on the iPod. Here are the steps:

1. (Here’s the part most everyone remembers to do.) Turn on Sound Check in iTunes. Choose iTunes ➪ Preferences on the Mac, or Edit ➪ Preferences on Windows. Click the Audio tab, then make sure the Sound Check box is on. After you click OK, iTunes starts rummaging through your music and leveling the volume. iTunes displays its progress in the status area. Once completely updated, connect your iPod to update its music.

2. (Here’s the step people often forget.) On the iPod, go to the Settings screen and turn Sound Check on.

That’s it. If you don’t turn on Sound Check on the iPod, your songs won’t be played at the leveled volume when you hear them on the iPod, and you’ll wonder why the Sound Check feature isn't working.

By the way: Don't forget to go download the recently released iTunes 7.0! http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/

Advertising in Your Blog

2006-09-29T15:02:00.000-04:00

In the past, you and I would struggle to keep advertisement away from our personal homepage or blog seeking to have a clean look on the space given for free. Today, more and more people are requesting ads to be put on their site in expectation of payment and relatively easy income.

As if you haven't noticed, I will tell you that I have put up several advertisements on this space. I trust that you do not find this advertisement obnoxious in any form, but bear with me as I experiment with various advertisers and settings within this space. I've been curious for some time as to the options, scalability, and return on such decisions. I've tried to do some research, but most locations come back saying that they can not reveal any detail. I came to the conclusion that I would just have to make an account myself in order to learn. That being said, there are now several advertisements on this site. You have most likely noticed these ads change size, shape, color, and location as I play with various tools. I do not intend to litter my blog with these ads. I hope you will find that they stay out of the way.

Currently jsickles.blogspot.com is fed advertisement via Google AdSense which has proven to be a relatively fast and easy way to display relevant advertisements. Google ads review information found in the viewed page to display advertisement that might be relative to a viewers interest. Interesting, huh? Check out the Internet's Biggest Google Whores by John Chow concerning several sites incorporating Google's AdSense.

I by no means expect to become rich off this idea in my blog, infact - I don't even expect to make a penny off this idea. Just bear with me as I get to play with the concept on my own terms.

Fluctuations

2006-09-28T19:22:00.000-04:00

I had a bunch of Canadian dollars I needed to exchange so I went to the currency exchange window at the local bank. Short line ... just one guy in front of me.

The guy in front of me was an Asian guy who was trying to exchange yen for dollars and he was a little agitated ... he asked the teller, "Why it change? Yestoday I get two hunat dolla fo yen - today I get hunat eighty? Why it change?"

The teller replies, "Fluctuations."

The Asian guy says, "Fluc you white guys too!"

Rebuild a Lost iTunes Library from an iPod?

2006-09-27T07:45:00.000-04:00

Option 1:
Assuming you're moving files legally between your own computers, check out iPodAgent at http://www.ipodsoft.com/

________________________________
Option 2:
The manual way around this problem is to use the iPod in its alter ego - that of portable computer disk drive.

Start with the iPod disconnected from the computer

DO NOT CONNECT THE IPOD YET

Open iTunes
Open iTunes Preferences - this blocks iTunes from seeing an iPod connection; leave the preferences window up and running
Connect the iPod to the computer, wait about 15 seconds before continuing
Open 'My Computer'
Tools menu, Folder Options, View tab, enable 'show hidden files /folders'
Open iPod icon in My Computer
Open iPod_Control folder
You should see a folder named Music
Drag this folder to somewhere on your computer hard drive

After the copy completes, right-click the new Music folder on your hard drive and select 'Properties'
Cear the checkmark next to 'Hidden'
Close that explorer window
Eject iPod from System tray "Safely Remove Hardware" icon. This icon looks like a small gray rectangle with a green arrow floating above it. It's only there when a removable device (like the iPod in this case) is attached to the computer.
Right-click & select 'Safely remove..', then click 'Stop' in the next window, OK in the next window, and then Close to complete the ejection.

Disconnect the iPod from the computer

Go back to iTunes, cancel the preferences window
File menu \ Add folder to Library \ find that Music folder copied over from the iPod

Your iTunes library should be back in action! But wait - there's more!!

Long time forum regular Otto42 has a java script/program that can also retrieve the playlists themselves from the iPod as well. Here are his instructions and a link to the most recent thread discussing this tricky process:

This is really useful when you're pulling all the songs off of an iPod to put them back into iTunes, because you lost your library or anything along those lines.

Download this program:
http://otto.homedns.org:8888/iTunes/iPodGetXML.zip
(If you can't download it, try again later. The connection goes up and down a lot.)

Now, put the iPod into Disk Mode or otherwise access the iPod as a drive. Make sure you can see hidden files, then go to the drive and the iPod_Control folder and find the iTunesDB file. Copy it to your PC.

Put the copied iTunesDB file in the same directory as this program, then run the program. It'll read the iTunesDB, get all the playlists, and create an XML file for each one. Now just import those XML files into iTunes to recreate the playlists.

Notes:
(1) The songs in playlist must already be in the iTunes library. If any one of them isn't there, iTunes throws up an error when you try to import the XML file.
(2) The song names, artist names, and album names in the library all must be identical as to what the iPod has. If you just copied all the music off the iPod and into iTunes, this will be the case, so it's generally not a big deal. but you'll get an error if it can't find the song in the iTunes library, so it's something to keep in mind.
(3) It probably won't be able to cope with unusual characters in song names. Dealing with unicode is way annoying.
(4) Smart Playlists get changed into regular playlists.

And there you have it. I picked these instructions up somewhere along the way, and they've just been sitting here on my computer. I thought someone out there might find these useful at some point in time - I know I will.

Have Extra Time On Your Hands?

2006-09-26T07:18:00.000-04:00

I came across this last week and found it both mildly intruiging and challenging. If you have some extra time and can do any sort of subject/word association, you should have some fun here! Browse out to http://shygypsy.com/farm/p.cgi and start working away!

You will be introduced to the puzzle and greeted with these kind words:

"No single mortal will be able to solve this puzzle alone, so get a few friends and do it together. Good luck!"

If you decide you are no longer going to work at the puzzle, you can click on save game and then merge your puzzle with mine by using the link below. Beware: Upon merging the link below, you will have completed the puzzle. (DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW, rather right click the link, 'copy link location', and paste into the space provided)

Spoiler: Completed Puzzle

Verizon Minutes in Firefox

2006-09-23T12:04:00.000-04:00

A quick FYI to those of you have that have begun to use the verizon extension in firefox showing your minutes used. I previously mentioned this as a cool add-on to quickly view your minutes used on your verizon single line or family plan. After using this extension for some time, I feel the need to point out that the numbers may sometimes inaccurately reflect reality. When your minutes are getting close to their maximum, put your mouse over the number and take a look at the number following 'Off-Peak'. Note that your minutes used are inaccurate by the number following the Off-Peak value. Unless you are billed for night and weekend airtime, you only need to be concerned about the number following 'Peak'. Alas, you have minutes to use now! Go use them. Call me.

Funny Miller Ad

2006-09-23T08:36:00.000-04:00

Mitch Hedberg

2006-09-19T17:33:00.000-04:00

This guy is pretty good - thought you might enjoy the humor like I did! Only problem with this video - the audio is not normalized, thereby leaving some sections fairly quiet, while overpowering at other times. Be sure to watch it and let me know what you think! Length: 11:37

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXMAi5N0IFI

Windows Vista RC1 and VMware

2006-09-14T14:11:00.000-04:00

Windows Vista RC1 and VMware - Stuck at "Windows is loading files..."

It took a while, multiple downloads of the 2.5gb ISO, playing with settings, and getting frustrated. But alas, there is a workaround to allow Vista RC1 to load in a VMware session. Simply add the following lines to the appropriate VMX file. Reboot, whala - the graphics aren't the most impressive, but at least you can get the install to work!

Rumor has it that even though the screen stalls on the black "loading files" page, you can still do a Steview Wonder setup. All the screens are there, and if you can press the right buttons at the right time - you'll have a successful install! Something about the refresh of the screen doesn't work right. Anyway, add the following two lines to the VMX file, and you should be set. You can do the install without Stevie.

svga.maxWidth = "640"
svga.maxHeight = "480"

Funny Stuff

2006-09-09T16:57:00.000-04:00

http://www.ex-parrot.com/~pete/upside-down-ternet.html

My Absence

2006-09-09T16:51:00.000-04:00

So, a while back Google bought out Blogger; but who knows why. In the past several weeks Google apparently integrated a type of single user sign on, meaning your gmail account can now also provide you access with a blogger account already setup to your name. This is a nice feature, but unfortunately it also backfired.

As I tried one day several weeks back to sign in with my user ID (which is similar to my gmail ID), I was welcomed to creating a new account on blogger, and thrown directly into a setup wizard. I tried without success to log in so that I could create new posts under my existing account, but again and again I was directed to creating a new account with my email from gmail. After attempting this two days in a row I just gave up for a while. Figured someone would alert google as to the problem and it would be resolved in time to come. That brings us up to now. Just now I tried to login, and whala! As you can tell, it worked. That's where I've been. As to where I'll go...why don't we just watch and see.

PEACE

Catching Up : Falling Behind

2006-08-03T07:28:00.000-04:00

It has come to my attention that I have not made a "personal" post in quite some time. There was a long period of time that I didn't even sign in to dust off my blog, nor did I post something refreshing or invigorating. Then I started posting again, but it was mostly tips, and interesting features, and things that don't really relate to my personal life, although they did relate to me and my interests. Now I do have to point out that a blog does not inherently mean personal in nature. It is simple a web log of anything the owner of said blog may choose. I often choose to post things that are news, interesting in nature, funny, etc. You will never find this site to contain my emotions on my sleeves or my blog. I have plenty of blogs that I keep up with where the owner (we won't mention any names) writes down every emotion and inward thought. Honestly, some of them could be leashed a little. There are all types, and you know what they are; I'm not going to dull your brain by making mention of them here.

Lets see, quick background...Sometime in the early weeks of June I became sick with a nasty cough. Docs and chest xrays said that it was most certainly viral and thereby there was nothing I could do but tough it out. Well 6 weeks of "toughing it out", and I was hurting. I went back to another doc who said that the viral infection may have slipped, as is common, into a bacterial infection. He gave me some meds, and they seemed to have helped. I just finished my medication Monday, and though I still have a slight nagging cough left from being sick, I would say I am 98.14% back to "normal" - NO SNICKERING.

I'm not sure about you, but this thick muggy heated air is quite a burden. I can barely look out the window from my airconditioned office without breaking into an unbecoming pool of sweat. I arrived home last night and took off my shorts to find a line of sweat that had made a river of sorts down my back which then became absorbed by the shorts. I felt as if I had just jumped out of a swimming pool with all of my clothes on. I couldn't even stand still without every single one of my sweat pours opening up to dispense gobs of perspiration; I felt like a cartoon character that drank a glass of water after getting shot several times. Of course, take away the pain of being shot, and the cartoon characteristics, and the floppy ears, the repetitive backdrop, the ringing ears from the shot being fired, and the elmer fudd voice. Thats what I felt like. Yeah, that was it. Can you picture it?

This shall begin the end of this post, because I know most of you are checking out mentally even as you read this line. Too many lines, too many words, and too many people check out after 60 seconds of reading. So with that - I've been really busy with weddings, friends, work events, etc planned nearly every spare minute of my summer life. Summer is whizzing by at unbelievable rates. Perhaps that's it. Perhaps the time whizzing by so quickly is creating an abnormally high heat build up from the friction induced by such speeds. Ah ha, I could be on to something. Forget global warming, it's speeding time that is causing this round ball of so-called earth to warm. Perhaps this is the portal to time travel; and we are just getting started!

I feel like the small ant that you once bullied with the magnifying glass on sunny days when you were younger. I'll post less about more in a few days. I'll give this one a little time to be ignored and sink in. Have a cool day, buy an air conditioner!

Stop PDF Files From Opening in Firefox

2006-08-02T07:41:00.000-04:00

For the firefox users out there, quick tip - I am always clicking on a PDF document and then gritting my teeth as it crashes firefox attempting to open. I wait as if it might actually work this time, and then clench my jaws as all of my open tabs crash and burn because the firefox plugin wasn't able to handle the PDF document. This is a problem for sure, even when it does handle the PDF document, it takes forever and a day to open still. To get around this obnoxious problem, follow these simple steps.

Go to the "Tools -> Options" menu
Select the "Downloads" tab
Open "View and Edit Actions..."
Enter "pdf" in the "Search" box
Select "Change Action..."
Change the selection from "Use this Plugin" to "Open them with the default application", which should point to Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Acrobat Reader, or your favorite PDF viewer.

And that's it - an easy solution to a pretty irritating problem.

This was originally written by someone else from somewhere else. But it's good information regardless - so stop right now and put it to use. Ok, if you are reading this still, you didn't stop to apply those changes, so you had better have a good reason - like you hate firefox or safari is your lover, or something to that effect. See ya.

Verizon Minutes in Firefox Extension

2006-07-18T18:27:00.000-04:00

This is a really neat plugin for Firefox that I ran into on Lifehacker. I thought I would share it with you, since it has been working quite nicely for me. Let me know what you think!

Verizon Minutes Used Firefox Extension Version 0.84

In light of the latest discussion on Digg, I have a few things to clarify.

I have had no problem hosting the extension on the Mozilla update site, until Verizon complained about the extension. I fixed a problem they claimed to cause excessive load on their servers, talked to Verizon and they said they were ok with the newer version. However since then, all my contacts with Mozilla were lost -- they never returned my email and refused to re-host the extension. I couldn't publish any update to the TMobile extension either.

I never intended to write a program to spam Verizon/TMobile's servers. Unfortunately there is no more "efficient" way to pull the data from Verizon. Ideally if wireless providers really wanted to provide consumers with this kind of data (not just #min, which is too passive and with no alert capabilities), they could have easily provided some efficient APIs to do it.

Having said that, I do agree with some readers that the default 5 minute interval is probably too frequent under the current circumstance. Therefore I have updated the latest version 0.84 here .(save the file locally and then open it from Firefox: File->Open File...)

Coca-Cola

2006-07-15T15:47:00.000-04:00

Busy, busy my life is! Not that I'm complaining. I guess I've neglected by blog yet again. It happens. In order to fulfill at least some time, I will pass this article that I read several days ago. Perhaps you'll like the story as much as I did. I'm a Coca-Cola fan, but hats off to Pepsi for their good attitude. Summary: A sting uncovered an alleged scheme to sell secret Coca-Cola recipes to rival Pepsi for $1.5 million. Read on...

Thursday, July 6, 2006; Posted: 12:00 p.m. EDT (16:00 GMT)

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Three people accused of trying to sell Coca-Cola secrets are set to appear in a federal court Thursday morning.

A Coke employee and two men were arrested in Atlanta, Georgia, after offering samples of a new product and its packaging to rival Pepsi for $1.5 million, federal prosecutors said.

Pepsi tipped off Coke who called in investigators and the FBI launched a sting operation, said David Nahmias, the U.S. attorney in Atlanta. (Watch for the drama of 'Dirk,' an Armani bag and the Girl Scout cookie box -- 2:43)

Undercover agents negotiated with the suspects, who allegedly provided classified documents and even promised a sample of a secret new drink, officials said.

"Phone records and further investigation allegedly showed the source of the information was Joya Williams, an executive administrative assistant at Coke in Atlanta," Nahmias said on Wednesday.

The 41-year-old Williams was arrested along with Ibrahim Dimson, 30, of New York and Edmund Duhaney, 43, of the Atlanta suburb of Decatur, Nahmias said.

All three are charged with wire fraud and unlawfully stealing and selling trade secrets from The Coca-Cola Company. They will have an initial court appearance before a federal magistrate in Atlanta on Thursday.
Plot revealed

Dimson, using the alias "Dirk," allegedly sent the initial letter to Pepsi using an official Coca-Cola envelope on May 19. He later gave an FBI undercover agent 14 pages of Coca Cola documents marked "Classified - Confidential" and "Classified - Highly Restricted," according to Nahmias.

Coke officials confirmed the documents were tightly held trade secrets, he said. "Dirk" then requested $10,000 for the initial papers, accompanied by a letter promising to provide further documents on request, Nahmias said.

"I can even provide actual products and packaging of certain products, that no eye has seen, outside of maybe 5 top execs," the letter states.

"I need to know today, if I have a serious partner or not. If the good faith moneys is in my account by Monday, that will be an indication of your seriousness."

"Dirk" provided other documents to the FBI for $5,000 and agreed to take $75,000 for a highly confidential product sample from a new Coca-Cola project.

A surveillance camera placed in Williams' office videotaped her "going through multiple files looking for documents and stuffing them into bags," Nahmias said.

"She also was observed holding a liquid container with a white label, which resembled the description of new Coca Cola product sample before placing it into her personal bag. Coca-Cola later verified the sample was genuine and is in fact a product being developed by the company," he said.

On June 16, a FBI undercover agent met with Dimson at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Dimson handed over a bag containing documents marked "highly confidential" and a glass bottle with a white label containing a liquid product sample, Nahmias said.

The undercover agent paid Dimson $30,000 in $100 and $50 bills stuffed in a Girl Scout cookie box, he said. The agent also agreed to pay another $45,000 after successful testing of the product sample, he said.

After the exchange, agents followed Dimson as he drove to Duhaney's home in Decatur, he said.

The three suspects were arrested July 4, the day they were supposed to be paid $1.5 million for the rest of the Coke secrets, he said.

"Theft of valuable trade secrets will not be tolerated, not by the Justice Department and not even by competitors," Nahmias said.
Rivals respond

Neville Isdell, Coke's chairman and CEO, said the company is reviewing its security procedures in the wake of the arrests.

"While this breach of trust is difficult for all of us to accept, it underscores the responsibility we each have to be vigilant in protecting our trade secrets. Information is the lifeblood of the company," he said in a letter to employees.

Isdell also thanked PepsiCo officials for alerting their competitor "to this attack."

A Pepsi spokesman said the company was glad to help.

"We did what any responsible company would do," the spokesman said.

"Competition can be fierce, but it must also be fair and legal."

The Back-Logged Life

2006-05-08T07:27:00.000-04:00

I was talking with Ethan Kaplan the other day and his pants kept vibrating. I have that effect on people.

No, no, sorry. I mean, his Blackberry is set to ping him every time an e-mail arrives, and the man gets five hundred messages a day. It was like he had a small, coin-operated hotel mattress strapped to his belt. He's got the palm-in, wrist-up Blackberry unholster motion down.

But does anybody really need to be that connected? Are those messages so important that they can't wait for him to finish being bored by me and get back to his desk? No, of course not. That's not the point. It's not the importance of the messages that demands they be checked immediately, it's the volume.

With the amount of crap being vomited up by his Ethernet connection -- all day, every day -- it's tough to walk away from the spigot for fear that he'll return to waist-deep water. Ethan reads his mail in real-time to avoid being greeted by a hundred-message pile-up when he gets back from lunch. Bringing the computer with you is the only way to keep up.

My entire life has devolved into an endless, grinding slog through my back-log. Everything I do is about catching up, doing the stuff I didn't get done the day before, plowing through some other goddamned thing that needs my attention. Ending the day without actually adding to the total aggregate is a victory. There are times when it piles up faster than I can shovel it away.

And the computers are at fault, of course. Always the computers.

The tools I use to manage information have evolved to the point where I can abdicate the tedious process of gathering it all together to them, and they now do a very diligent job of making sure that it's all brought to my attention. Endlessly. Maddeningly.

Years ago, someone phoned you and you weren't home, you missed the call and they had to try back -- now, the messages queue up in voice-mail. TV shows used to slip unwatched by unless you were there to suck them up them in real-time -- today, my TiVo has hours of mindless crap that it's faithfully holding for me. The Web originally required me to actually go out and do something as quaint as visit sites to read them -- these days, my feed reader pulls down megabytes of data -- a large portion of it, of course, cat pictures -- and piles it up, forever. Each of these swollen reservoirs of data silently mocks me with my inadequacy.

The statistics are terrifying. All this is currently pending:

Voice-mail messages at work: 3
Voice-mail messages at home: 2
Voice-mail messages on my cell: 1
SMS messages on my cell: 4
Hours of television on the TiVo: 13
E-mail messages at home: 15
E-mail messages at work: 28
Items in my feed reader: 313
Books on my nightstand: 8

This doesn't even count various to-do lists scattered on my desk, next to my bed, in the car and -- you think I'm kidding here -- in the bathroom. And compared to some people I know, I run a pretty tight ship get-to-it-wise.

I mean, holy crap.

It's all hard stuff, too, the sedimentary layers at the bottom of my various in-boxes. One e-mail message can imply a month of work. One feed item can be hours of reading. A single voice-mail can be days of back-and-forth. It's all stuff that I will realistically be able to do right after I get all the rest they promise when I die.

The proper solution, of course, is to further improve the tools. There are plenty of rants out there about how to fix feed readers and e-mail clients and DVRs, or to allow community filtering and sort-by-affinity and Bayesian ranking. And that's all great, and I'll heartily welcome the day when Outlook is smart enough to simply trash the messages that I'm going to trash anyway, before I even see them. (Rule: "From: Boss" to "Deleted Items".)

But I'm not waiting until then. As of now, my fancy-pants, community-generated, emergent-behavior data-sorting heuristic is: a calendar. If I haven't gotten to something in a week, it dies. Stick that in your attention economy and smoke it. I'm re-booting. Feed list: empty. In-box: empty. TiVo: OK, OK, I still need to watch "24." But other than that: empty.

So screw you, info-glut! I'm not going to be the responsible info-citizen I'm expected to info-be anymore. If I get to it, I get to it. If I don't, well, then it couldn't have been very important in the first place. I suspect that burning children and drowning buildings will still get the attention they need. But the year-old e-mails that are stinking up the bottom of my in-box? The month-old "Daily Shows"? The three dozen Waxy Links that I've flagged and sorted and pinned to a corkboard for further study some day? Gone. And good riddance.

You're on notice, Entirety of Human Knowledge. You get a week. If you can't get my attention in that time -- and it's plenty of time -- then you're tossed, junked, thrown away and forgotten.

Call me back if it's important.

Borrowed from well spoken Greg Knauss

My Hero

2006-04-19T22:36:00.000-04:00

I just wanted to share this with you. Not much else to say at this moment.

If we just had one of these

Psychopath

2006-04-13T18:02:00.000-04:00

I am relieved that very few of you appear to be a psychopath. Or some of you are doing a really good job at hiding it! Your answers ranged from expected to most entertaining - but very few answered correctly - and this is a good thing!

If you haven't read the question yet, skip to the post below this one before reading the answer.

Answer:

She was hoping the guy would appear at the funeral again. If
you answered this correctly, you think like a psychopath. This
was a test by a famous American Psychologist used to test if one has
the same mentality as a killer.

Many arrested serial killers took part in the test and answered
the question correctly.

If you didn't answer the question correctly, good for you.

If you got the answer correct, I will be calling the psychiatric institution of your choice.

Response Required

2006-04-07T00:13:00.000-04:00

Alright, I have a fun question for all.

First off, ways this remains a fun question:
1) You don't cheat and try to research (I'm talking to you Becky Blackmon, and everyone else)
2) You actually answer in the comments section no matter what (I'm talking to you Ali Biebl, and even those of you in the UK and Texas and other random locations that have been visiting)
3) You don't read others comments and responses before posting your own formulated opinion. (yes that means you Krystal Espeland, and everyone else)

I am now going to share with you a short story. Immediately following this story, click on the Comments and leave your answer.

A woman, while at the funeral of her own mother, met a guy whom
she did not know. She thought this guy was amazing. She believed him
to be her dream guy so much, that she fell in love with him right
there, but never asked for his number and could not find him. A few
days later she killed her sister.

Question: What is her motive for killing her sister?

Once in a Lifetime

2006-04-04T08:46:00.000-04:00

Becky Blackmon sent this to me this morning. I found it intriguing. Considering that by the time I post this tonight or tomorrow morning, it won't be nearly as cool in the past - I had to post it immediately! Check it out:

On Wednesday of this week, at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be:
01:02:03 04/05/06.

That won't ever happen again. (except for at 1:00 in the afternoon)

Snipe Anyone?

2006-03-29T07:28:00.000-05:00

A snipe hunt is one of a class of practical jokes that involve experienced people making fun of newcomers by giving them an impossible or imaginary task.

Inexperienced campers or hunters are told about a bird or animal called the snipe, as well as a (usually ridiculous) method of catching it - such as running around the woods carrying a bag, or making strange noises. Since the supposed snipe doesn't exist, the hunt never succeeds, no matter how foolishly the newcomer acts.

To extend the joke, there actually is a species of bird called a snipe. The success of the joke depends in part on the victim's ignorance of this, as the snipe is found primarily in wetlands and the joke is invariably played in wooded areas.

Another variation of this type of practical joke, called a fool's errand in the UK, involves sending newcomers on a work site to fetch nonexistent tools, such as a left-handed screwdriver, a can of striped paint or a tube of elbow grease.

In the Boy Scouts of America it is common for first-time attendees at a camporee (a large weekend event) to be sent after a "left-handed smoke-shifter," supposedly a branch with a fan on the end used to deflect smoke from a campfire. In the Air Force a variant involves new airmen being sent to the commissary to purchase a bottle of prop wash.

A traditional variation of this in UK schools involves a teacher sending a pupil—usually picked for being annoying as much as for gullibility—to another teacher for "a long stand". When the pupil arrives and delivers the request, they are asked to wait—usually in full view of the class: this is their "long stand".

This past weekend Kristawas not a pupil in a UK school, certainly not a boyscount, she was however on a mission to discover the snipes outside her apartment. With small amounts of help from Alan and myself, Krista discovered the delight of snipe hunting! Words can not do the next 10 minutes justice, you will have to refer to the pictures below for the best understanding of this story.

With pot and spoon in hand, and of course the official snipe hunting Steak & Shake hat on the head - Krista is ready to depart for a night of snipe hunting!

She looks close and far; She looks high, and she looks low, but the snipes don't appear to be out tonight. Deep into the woods we go...

Clang Clang....Clang.....clang... We must have used the wrong sound..."Any snipes under there?" ...."Any snipes under where?" Yeah...you just said underwear...

Tonight the snipes are hidden well, so we retreat inside for Krista google the best snipe hunting method. If only we could have caught her expression when she read the same paragraph you read above. We didn't catch her reaction, because the camera was too busy focused on Lori's expression of her disatisfaction concerning the simple entertainment Alan and myself provided with a simple mix of pots, spoons, a Steak & Shake hat, and Krista's good spirit. oh...and snipes!

Well that brings us up to speed on current events. I saw Inside Man this weekend as well, pretty good, I would reccommend you viewing it if you get a few extra minutes. This week and next week are going to be extremely busy as it is musical season once again. I will be doing sound for Honk, the musical of choice for CU. Things are shaping up fairly well, and tonight is day number one with an audience. Hopefully we'll get all those cues, effects, and everything else in place!

I guess that's all for now, some of us must go work. Then go to the musical and work some more. Oooh, sounds like a long day - anyone want to trade? Quick..before I

Recent Unrisky Activity

2006-03-23T07:19:00.000-05:00

In recent discussions with my roommates we compiled a quick list of accumulated hard disk storage capacity between the four of us. This conversation surfaced after Ryan found a steal on 200GB hard drives at just 40 dollars! After I purchased one, and Paul two - we realized we were disk store crazed! Truthfully though, I believe we are using the majority of the disk space we own. The list below is what we added up. This equates to almost 3 Terabytes of disk storage. That's a lot of disk! For not so tech adept, that's equivalent to the storage of 100 of those shiny silver computers from CU (dell D600 @ 30gb). Wow, imagine if we had the processing power of 100 D600's. Hmmmm..... And for you nerds, yes I mentioned hard disk above, but the following may include small quantities of flash memory. There I prefaced, now you can't complain about the invalidity of the list.

Look at the breakdown:

Owner	Capacity	Device
Josh	40	Laptop
Josh	5	Desktop
Josh	15	Ipod
Josh	1	PDA
Jeff	500	Mac
Jeff	510	Server
Jeff	300	Xbox
Jeff	200	New Drive
Jeff	30	Ipod
Jeff	30	Desktop
Jeff	1.5	Flash Memory
Jeff	0.256	Phone
Jeff	40	Tivo
Jeff	80	Work Laptop
Jeff	60	Personal Laptop
Paul	30	Ipod
Paul	4	Ipod
Paul	200	Desktop
Paul	400	New Drive
Paul	40	Laptop
paul	20	portable
Paul	2.5	Flash Memory
Paul	0.512	Flash Memory
Ryan	250	External Drive
Ryan	60	Desktop
Ryan	40	Laptop
Ryan	2	Flash Memory

TOTAL: 2.86TB

Alright, yeah I'm a nerd. Whatever. Go ahead and say it. Now that that's out of the way, I am thoroughly pleased at my recent winnings of $23,744!!! After counting the total of my winnings I sat there for a moment imagining what I could and would want to do with all that surprise capital. Several more seconds of that amount of cash in hand and I returned the money to the designated monopoly banker. Several weeks ago I won a timed game of Monopoly involving Paul, Krista, Brittnay, and myself. All demanded a rematch, and so we set out to play until full monopoly Monday night. Just under four hours later I monopolized the entire board for an end cash equivalent of the above total. It was a good game, tight game, and very much enjoyable. I wonder if there will be a third match coming down the road.

Last night I went through the day very much anticipating a challenging game or Risk later in the evening. If you can't tell, I enjoy the challenge and competition involved in strategy types of games. Well, 6pm rolled around and persons 1,2 and 3 were already there. Persons 4 and 5 arrived, and then person 6, and 7. Wait, what seven? Dang it. Risk is a 6 player game! At the risk of injuring friendship for the sake of keeping the game on target, I relaxed and reluctantly chimed in for an undemanding straightforward game of Phase 10. I guess it turned out alright, Persons 3 and 5 weren't really all that into the risk concept anyway. Hmmm...perhaps they should have played phase 10! Nearly three hours later we completed the 'game.' I'm fairly confident someone could have conquered the entire Risk board in that amount of time. Oh well, another night, another Risk.

That's all for now, enjoy today!

Toosdeigh

2006-03-14T20:46:00.000-05:00

Hello All,

I am currently sitting on my luxurious hotel couch somewhere on the East side of Ohio, relaxing after a long days work. Not a whole lot of the news front. The weather has been absolutely outstanding reaching nearly 70 degrees a few days in a row, until the sudden change this morning plunging temperatures to the 30's. Had to bring the winter coat back out for that one.

Yesterday this part of Ohio experienced much rain accompanied by rolling thunder and intense flashes of lightning that lit up the entire sky and ground. It reminded me how much I really enjoy those types of storms. I stood outside and watched as it was so peaceful with rain steadily falling, cooling the air - then interrupted by the nearby flash of lightning and threatening claps of powerful thunder! After a while I went back inside, but I made sure to leave my window open a crack so I could hear all that was happening.

This week has been challenging at work as it seems that this particular location lacks a little communication and organization. But whatchya gonna do? I'll do my best to accomplish like I have the rest! Push forward and work hard.

I think that's all I have for now. I know it's not much, but I'm trying to keep up with a MINIMUM of weekly updates here. That's my hope anyway. One last thing - Krystal has joined the blogspot community today switching from her xanga. I shall make mention of it here so as to distribute the news more quickly. Go check it out!

That's all - enjoy Patch Tuesday!

Pulse

2006-03-06T21:24:00.000-05:00

Have you used Facebook? If not, you should! You can find a link to my facebook on the right hand side of this webpage. If you are a Facebook user, have you ever ventured to view the statistics compiled by Pulse. These are stats brought together by the usage and responses from those using facebook. If you haven't looked at it, you can find some intriguing and sometimes funny truths and trends. If you use facebook, but haven't browsed Pulse, be sure you go! While displaying all these compiled numbers, Pulse also shows a "Did You Know?" column with statements that may be intriguing to you and I as the reader. Of course these are only as accurate as the facebook user makes themself to be. But truthfully the last statement made me laugh. Maybe it should be making me cry...

As I was reading through some of the results offered up by Pulse, I noticed that Cornerstone as a whole was typically one off with favorite shows, books, movies, etc. For example - if the Number One Favorite Person in the World (NOFPW) to the entire facebook community were Jeff Sickles, then Pulse would report NOFPW as Jeff Sickles. However, Cornerstone would be one off and report Jeff Sickles as NTFPW. NOFPW would be replaced with something like...God. This is what I found. Well, Cornerstone listed the number one book as...any guesses? The B-I-B-L-E. Well, suffice to say, one should expect that this Great Book would also be the number one read? Right? Am I right here? Well, this is why the statistic to the left made me laugh so hard! Pulse reports back with the Bible as the number one book, yet it also reports that 1.2% of Cornerstone reads the Bible. I found this most entertaining - then again, I guess it doesn't take much sometimes.

This weekend passed by most quickly resulting in fairly low productivity. I did however enjoy a riveting game of Monopoly with a few friends who ultimately had to give me the Monopoly award at the end of our 3.5 hours of solid game time. I will now have to discover how I can profit $11,000+ in just several hours in non-monopoly money. I figure if I can do it on the gameboard, I am halfway through the problem.

Popcorn

2006-03-01T21:48:00.000-05:00

Well, today proved to fly by at work. Also found out that somehow I owe 200 dollars from an emergency room visit in February of 2002. Seems they couldn't locate me for 4 years somehow. Turns up on my credit report here in 2006, even though the doctors somehow had "no information" on me. This is the first time I've ever even heard of the charge. I'm gonna have to go figure out if I was in the ER in 2002... Dang..its difficult enough to get insurance to cover charges when they happen, how am I going to explain something from over 4 years ago?! Wish me luck!

Now I would like to share with you a poem written for me this week by a good friend (she had popcorn in her hand).

Popcorn

From kernels you have transformed, to transform me.
From munchies and hunger you have made me free
No wonder the Spanish call you
little doves.... palomitas
- Megan Jack (NY)

Google Video and YouTube

2006-02-28T07:31:00.000-05:00

Google Video is a great tool, and a fun toy - and why have I not utilized this before? For some unknown reason I have never ventured into googlevideoland until just this past week when Ryan reminded me of the site, it's capabilities, and why I should use it. Well of course! So now I am looking for video to upload for others to entertain themselves. I've already discovered Becky's phonebooks, the peanut prank, the calvin vs cornerstone parking video, and an oldie but goodie - Wendy's drivethru. You'll have to browse over to google and search for those, that is..if you want some entertainment! I'll also be nice and provide you the links to the videos mentioned above.

It's amazing, online for fewer than 4 days and already over 300 views on these 4 videos! I guess people really enjoy simple entertainment...

Also I've discovered the enjoyment of YouTube - a very popular video site. Below you will find links to the locations of Google Video and embedded links to YouTube.

While you are on these sites, try seraching for other fun topics - pranks, jump, fall, stupid....you never know what you might find! :) Happy Viewing!

Becky Blackmon and her Phonebooks

Becky returns to her car at 8:40pm to find phonebooks piled high from the floor to the top of her seats in her car (Front and back). Along with this she finds her horn blaring for no apparent reason (hard wired to the battery).

Enjoy the footage along with commentary overlay from Becky herself as she tries to explain to me exactly what happened just minutes after she returns to her room.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2405464444260209974

Cornerstone vs Calvin Parking

Cornerstone University VS Calvin College parking situation. Video is a little blurry as the entire film was shot on a small digital picture camera. This was made in response to a large quantity of complaints on the discussion board and CUBE concerning the overwhelming walk from the commuter lot to gainey and Bolthouse.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=945355451920830213

Peanuts Office Prank

Styrofoam peanuts prank on a Helpdesk worker in Cincinnati. Peanuts fall surprisingly beautifully from drop ceiling. This is revision one with audio track to the blueman group. A must see with amazing humor!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6675536650481334407

Wendys Drivethru

A selfmade scavenger hunt left us as freshman at a drivethru asking for someone on staff to sing "How Much is that Doggie in the Window." At the ordering screen we simply stated that we needed someone to sing, they were more than willing to participate..the video begins just after our "order." What you see is the result of just such an event! Simply entertaining...
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1666330290516585266

The EMove

2006-02-25T07:53:00.000-05:00

Yes, I have decided to move to blogspot! I know that many of you doubt my commitment to a new blog, simply because it has been 6 months 24 days and 2 hours and 17 minutes since I updated my original blog. I dunno - time will tell and prove to all. I like the blogspot because it is a bit more simple in its looks and feel - and I like simple in such an occassion as formatting a blog. One of the best things - I don't have to use those eprops any more - never did like the eprops! You won't find any eprops here - no sirreee.

Lets see, really not much to say at this moment - I just wanted to introduce the blog, say hello, and claim my ground with my seventh attempt at a username. That means there's a lot of other people out there that think like me. I'll get into that later...

For now..check back in, leave comments (I love comments) and enjoy the weekend!

Wait a minute... no one knows about this site..who's going to read it? Someone will find it...

MoMo

2005-07-31T21:43:00.000-04:00

peaceful. relaxing. dull. lifeless. tedious. humdrum.....a bore. these are all things that do not describe my recent weeks of life on earth. currently i have the most remarkable opportunity - nasa discovery commander eileen collins asked me to join her team of six for this space flight. pending the repair of the tears in the foam, i should be returning to gr shortly. ok not really, but that would be a noteworthy experience to blog. just the same, life has been just the opposite of the aforementioned adjectives. ranging from weddings to wedding videos and work to running sound for bob segar tribute bands, ny wedding receptions, more work, any anything else you can think of - i've kept my schedule on the go, but i'm certainly ready for a break. yes i'm ready for a break, even though i just returned from a glorius vacation in virginia beach with my family. i think it is the time off that makes me want more time off. we spend a full week right on the beach. nothing but hot sun, schorching sand, and cool waves for a full week. as it's been said before - even good things must come to an end. this week i've already attended two going away parties. becky's before she departed for florida and megans the day after - before she goes to nyc. meanwhile i missed a visit from tracy and krystal. next time you guys have to stay in gr longer. and maybe i'll actually be in town! we came back today just in time for me to head to columbus for work for a full week. i'm going to fit 40 hours into 4 days though - then i come back to gr to work on the film 'doggie bag' friday, saturday, and sunday. the week following won't be that much of a picnic either. don't worry - i'm keeping busy. (as if you were worried) many of you may have found that this past week's emails and even im's have not contained capital letters. i dunno why - i just haven't had the desire to use the 'shift' key. (with the exception of the currently used parentheses and exclamations)! there may be a few other exceptions found, but i found some odd enjoyment out of the attempt to use all lower case letters in all texted communication. i haven't much else to say at the moment, but i had to be sure to get my post in before the calendar struck aug 1. i will end this with a picture i've had since may. i wanted to display it a lot earlier, but time didn't allow. this picture goes out to one person - they should know who they are - you should too. took this one just for you momo. had to run back to get it!

see ya in a month - maybe sooner!
js

Highlights and Lowlights

2005-06-23T00:41:00.000-04:00

In this post I am not going to comment as to my inability to post, my lack of posting, or the fact that I haven't posted in one month and one day. That aside, June has been a rapidly fleeting month with work, weddings, birthdays, bachelors, bachelor parties, friends, and Pistons. Work has kept me busy all over the place - that's just crazy! friends have kept me having fun - that's just crazy! And the Pistons won...now that's just crazy! The weather has been beautiful, and my room kept hot. The new living quarters is good, although I still have yet to clean up all of my boxes scattered throughout (refer to the craziness above for explanation) Want to come clean them up for me? What's everyone doing for the fourth of July? Any crazy/fun/wacky plans for the weekend? Anyone planning to light themselves on fire or blow up their tibulas? Just wonderin. That's just around the corner, and soon after that I'm going on family vacation. We will all meet in Virginia July 16 and spend the next 9 weeks there. That will be a nice vacation. Won't have to worry about work or anything. Just me, the sand, the water, my family, some cold drinks, good food, and my dreams. Dreams..yes..it will only be one week this time around, but one day it will be 9 weeks!! I will dub that day 'bliss'.

In 'light' of the fact that I update so INfrequently - I have decided to look into the future and give you some 'light' on upcoming events. Then its not so mundane as reading one days post to cover 30 days of PAST wild adventure. This way you can write me and pester me on posting about one of these topics during their happening. Perhaps then I will return more frequently. It's sad when I have complete strangers writing to me asking me to post.

Here's the light...

Upcoming Highlights
Virginia July 16
Rogers/Heath Wedding July 15
Erin is coming home July
Company Cookout August 6
Filming August 13
Going home September 2 for a weekish

Upcoming Lowlights
Krystal is leaving GR for home
Tracy is leaving GR for home
Megan is leaving GR for NY
Becky is leaving GR for FL
Erin is leaving GR for VA
Emily is leaving GR for TN
Denver is leaving GR for OH

WHERE THE HELL IS EVERYONE GOING - and WHY?

QUESTION OF THE NOW: (fill in the blank(s) - do it!)

If I had a million dollars, I'd ___________________________________.

Creative Answers thus far:
1. Buy you a house
2. Help everyone out
3. Stay in Grand Rapids
4. Buy a million things
5. Buy 200,000 Dominoes Medium 1-topping Pizzas

Quick Review of the Month

My Half birthday party where Liz and Lindsay were convinced it was my birthday. They put candles on this great dessert and I got to blow them out. They were very disappointed to find out it was only my half birthday.

Moving day went well, very fast. Thanks to a great crew who helped get the work done quickly and efficiently!

That's all for now. I'm tired. I'll be back...

A Night in GR

2005-05-21T22:53:00.000-04:00

Admittedly, and not for the first time, I am ignorant of my very own xanga. I faithfully pore over my subscriptions - emailed to me daily, but seldom do I find the time to enter my own thoughts. Frequently during the earlier hours of the day, I will think to myself - that would be worthy of jotting down, or - this event would make for an entertaining entry. It is times such as that, where I wish I could zip something straight out of my head and upload here - there would be no transposing and deciphering between my synapses, down to my fingers and out to the proper keys. No time dedicated to typing all of those thoughts in a coherent fashion. I wish I could just snapshot my thoughts and then bada boom, bada bang - voila - you have yourself an entry. I could probably make 15 a day easily! Boy would you be tired of reading them then! The problem boils down to this: I can't just stop in the middle of work and share this story, no - I have to try to remember it into the wee hours of the night, among all the other events of the day. By the time I'm home, I want to sit and relax. And by the time I'm relaxed I'm tired. And by then I have no desire to post, nevermind the foggy memories of that once "great story"! Reasoning myself out of typing anything, I put it off until tomorrow. Well, I have successfully gone through these steps for just over a month now. I figure that 30 days later entitles you, and me, to one good post. This is probably about the time that many will trail off. You figure, I've read one paragraph of not too useful information, that's enough for me. That second paragraph down there doesn't look all too inviting. Suite yourself - good bye.

To those still lingering, the people who left after the paragraph above, probably weren't so far off. There really isn't much of value sitting here. Just a few more ramblings from my fingertips. These past weeks have been insanely busy by day, and really busy by night. Weekends are virtualy nonexistent. I view a weekEND as an end to something, but nothing has ended, so its all one smashed together blob of a week. Now you can understand my neglect.

These past two weekends I have filmed for weddings that John Pottenger is the photographer for. It's fun, good practice, and free food! It's enjoyable, but it takes most of the Saturday away. Last week I was able to see Ami and her boy Ryan - here's a fun picture we took downtown GR...

And then I think this one is really cool...Reflections are neat things...(this phtograph is unedited...this is how it was taken)

I'm looking forward to this next weekend - my brother is coming into town on Thursday - He'll be spending the memorial day weekend here. Friday I'll be headed with him and others to Chicago for a night on the town, stay over, day on the town, and then the Blue Man Group on Saturday night, followed by another night on the town. Hopefully some fun pictures from that, maybe I'll share one. You've noticed by now that I like pictures - they really do tell a million words. So now you know why most posts here will contain a picture (if possible). And since I update every 30 days, I'm bound to find a picture in that time that is suiting to something!

Oh, how could I forget about the short film that a few of us made for a 24 hour film festival. We had 24 hours to make a short film and turn it in. Thirty teams competing for the prize - we made third place because of a silly rule. We are finalizing a DVD this week, come watch it sometime - complete with interviews and everything!

Well, I think that's enough for tonight. Thanks for going the distance and reading. I hope you didn't skip to the last paragraph....Have a great month! Just kidding..I'll try to update soon.....I'll really try! REMIND ME!

Gnight...

Time Flies

2005-04-16T22:45:00.000-04:00

Hello, no I have not died, or forgotten completely. These past few weeks have been near insanity between traveling for work and now the musical. I was in Detroit for a full week shortly after my last post, and then straight to Vegas for a week. Vegas was fun, but very busy - we barely had time to sit and rest, but I was able to get out on the strip one night and take a look around. Definitly not where I would want to stay, but fun to visit. It was really fun watching the massive singing fountain in front of the Belagio. I took a picture so that you could try to enjoy it as I did. See if it works...

I was able to experience the MGM Grand with my own room on the 12th floor -but sadly not internet in the room, at least not without paying 12 dollars a day. Although I love being able to chat or email, read the news, or post here - it was not quite worth the money, especially since my time spent there was 1am till 7am most mornings. Although the event gave us an internet cafe outside the grand hall, I didn't have the time to stop and post, only to check emails from work that shouldn't go ignored. Here's where I was....

(my room is somewhere on the right side near the peak of that circular roof, and no I won't be waving - I was taking the picture!)

Last Saturday until this Saturday has then been completely booked with the Jane Eyre the musical. Setup, rehersal, and now shows. Working all day, driving back to GR and then working the musical. Hectic, but enjoyable. I would definitely suggest coming to see Jane Eyre if you can stop for a minute to do so. (**not REALLY a minute, more like 150 minutes**) We have another show tonight, and then next weekend Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I've seen it six times now, tonight will be seventh, and I really enjoy it!

Well time is short, and I've spent my first waking moments writing here before it was ignored any longer. Now more things call, like cleaning up around my desk, eating, showering, doing my laundry, and finding the sheet that I lost from my bed a week ago. You know when your sheets and covers get all messed up on the bed, and then if its completely dark it is hard to find them. Well everytime I get home to go to sleep, someone or everyone is sleeping already, so I don't want to turn on the lights - without turning on the lights, it is quite hard to find those missing sheets. So now, a week later, it is time to go find the MISSING SHEET!

Wish me luck..

Give me a Leg

2005-03-28T18:01:00.000-05:00

Monday it is. I made it back to Michigan safely. The weather today was absolutely beautiful day with temperatures up to 60 degrees for a very brief time. The mere fact that it is now - 6pm and the temp is 54 degrees - that makes it a nice day! I like that the temperature is going up. As much as I like things going up...I am NOT fond of the gas prices. Anyone been to the pump recently? I offered four fingers (I figured I could live with two missing from each hand), but the attendant only pointed to the sign.

Luckily I still have one tenth of my arm.

Airport Excitement

2005-03-26T21:37:00.000-05:00

Currently I'm at home in Connecticut for a surprise Easter visit. Unfortunately I'm leaving tomorrow (Sunday) afternoon after arriving only the evening before last. Short stay - but enjoyable none-the-less!

My trip here included a two hour layover in Philly where I went to Jet Rock Bar and Grille located in concourse B. Seemed like a decent place to sit for two hours as the atmosphere allow for plenty of activity - and I do enjoy watching people. The walls and ceilings were lined with at least 40 televisions, and the area was noisey. Perfect place to sit for two hours. I tried to order a sandwich, but apparently they had been open the entire night before, and their food order for Thursday had not arrived. I'm just glad I wasn't flying yesterday, apparently many delays! Finally I settled on a fajita chicken wrap. Squeezing myself, my backpack, and my suitecase to a wall booth seat was not an easy task, but I made it and began eating - unfortunately the wrap was premade. Tasted kinda bad, I ate only 3/4 of it and chomped down the fries. That's what you get for $9.84 in an airport. I figure if you are going to open a chain - be sure to get in the airport. Seems you can charge an arm and the leg and still get away with it. Just a thought of advice. I'm sure the rent is higher, but cmon - this place had records and guitars signed by anybody and everybody hanging on the walls. If you can afford things like this, you must be doing well! There wasn't a seat in the place for the majority of the time there.

I quickly became aqquainted with Kurt, Jeff, Alicia, Heather, and Ali who were sitting next to me. They were quite entertaining and we had our fun and laughs as they too had to wait two hours for their flight. Luck for them, they were headed to West Palm for a nice vacation - myself to another cold state. We had our fun and laughs, and more quickly than expected 8:00 rolled around. Wanna hear something crazy - two hours, some food, and a few drinks later - their tab came to just over $200! OUTRAGEOUS! They hadn't even boarded the plane yet. That's gonna be one expensive vacation. See what I mean about opening a restaurant in the airport?

My plane was boarding at 8:05, so I made my way out of Jet's and proceeded to B30 - the place my plane was leaving from. Go figure - the gate had switched. In a quick panic that it would be clear across the very large airport I ran for the monitors. Scanning the large bank of monitors I finally found Hartford. ok...location..flight...time....gate.....B31. Well that was lucky, it was the gate next to the one it was leaving from. Right, that would be too easy. B31 was tucked in an odd spot. After finding the gate it turned out that we had downsized planes and EVERYONE needed to go to the front counter and be reseated. To make a very long story short, it took near an hour, several duplicate seat bookings once on the plane, and one very angry guy (not myself). We finally made it to Hartford.

I've been home since Thursday night at 10pm. I'm very tired now and tomrorow is Easter. Happy Easter everyone - wish me better luck when I board the plane tomorrow afternoon. Again I'll have the two hour layover in Philly - I wonder what good will come of this one!!!

Good Night.

"Homework"

2005-03-23T17:29:00.000-05:00

Monday I come home to find Justin and Krista in the apartment - not very unusual. I also find myself quickly stripping my clothes because the thermometer was reading somewhere above its display capabilities - I think high 70's - needless to say, I'm a comfortable cool climate creature.

*FLASHBACK* The day earlier I had attempted to test the wittyness of Justin and Krista by placing a lit candle slightly below the furnace regulator. This would in turn keep the furnance at a mild pace, perhaps allowing the rooms to remain cooler (a normal 70 degrees). Justin quickly realized my little trick and gave me a strange look - I'm still not sure what it meant. Krista took the candle and placed it far on the other side of the room as if it still might have some power to keep the rooms cool. At least while I was warm, it would smell good. *END OF FLASHBACK*

Upon arriving home I went to the back room (our office) to check my email and IM's to see what nice things people had said to me that day. Very shortly after my sitting down at my desk both Justin and Krista got up to do homework somewhere else. Slightly odd - perhaps I smelled or something. Justin went to the living room to do homework in my big comfy chair, and Krista went to do homework on Justin's bed. Not even five minutes later I went to ask Justin a question and found him doing homework. Apparently in his dreams:

Thinking I would go talk to Krista I entered into the bedroom and found this:

With that I had only one conclusion - Man I wish I had homework to do!

Xangat

2005-03-17T09:42:00.000-05:00

ok...so I really suck at updating my "xangat," and it's not as if I have the time to do it right now. I thought I had better put some words on here, else one of you may come after me with some sort of weapon. This week is flying by, keeping busy is good. I'm across the state today for a film seminar followed by a film festival showcasing all sorts of neat ideas. I'll let you know how that goes. I'm upset beacuse I'm going to miss my roommate Justin's piano recital this evening (due to late planning and announcement of his date and time) - but he held a private showing last night. At least I was able to still hear it!! I enter this weekend excited about an upcoming short film project that I'll be working on and the TK^2 project that is in planning stage - can't wait to go full throttle with that. And that depleats my time and words for this morning - Outside looks like a beautiful day - I'm about to go enter it. Have a great one!

Legal Resident

2005-03-06T19:07:00.000-05:00

Seems to me its been a long time coming that I write something here. Although I have nothing fascinating to say, I will attempt to write more frequently, never neglecting my "xangat" longer than a week. The best I have to share with you right now is my new found residency. As of now I am officialy a Michigan resident, however the pop will always be soda.

Here is my proof:

Let me tell you, this was not an easy thing to come by. Ask me about the story sometime. It's too long to type out here. Stupid SOS.

I like the caption on the bottom left. "See back for medical information, anatomical gift". I have chosen not to make myself an anatomical gift. Are you an anatomical gift?

Seems Blackmon got a new license too...

Falling Behind

2005-03-05T12:39:00.000-05:00

You are the fifth from the bottom of forty-one people on my subscription list. That means only four other people on my list have neglected their Xanga more than you. Therefore:

UPDATE THIS!
Posted 3/4/2005 at 1:12 PM by GeekyMonkey

Let me add that two of those people pretty much never update anymore, and the other two only have their xangas to comment to friends.
Posted 3/4/2005 at 1:13 PM by GeekyMonkey

In light of this news, I will update THIS WEEKEND! Check back.

Jeff

Update Mister

2005-02-15T21:08:00.000-05:00

[Tuesday 21:05:19] cukrystal: you need to update your xanta

VERY TRUE...sorry guys...i'll um...catch up soon...maybe..

Commercial

2005-02-15T21:04:00.000-05:00

Perhaps one of my favorite SB commercials:

Ameriquest

Also see the rest of them:

http://dyn.ifilm.com/superbowlads/

Sunday Night Summary

2005-02-06T23:55:00.000-05:00

Going Home Friday

2005-02-03T22:32:00.000-05:00

Ok, I really could not resist this one. I just got this in an email from my brother.

(it wouldn't be a bad idea to turn your volume up)

: : LINK REMOVED : :

So it's Like That

2005-02-02T00:27:00.000-05:00

Have you ever looked outside to find someone shoving snow in the front seat of your car because it just so happens that you front door doesn't properly lock? (yes I said that outloud to you) Well it seems that someone entered my car in the parkinglot at school was caught by campus safety as my alarm was going off and they couldn't do much but look good. As safety left they threw some snow in the car and ran off. I bolted out of the building to catch them and question all that happened (not knowing yet that there was snow in the car, but knowing SOMETHING had to have happened, else they wouldn't be walking away). Catching up with the three I targeted the one to be blamed the most and made sure she had some close interaction with the snow (nothing terrible, just a little snow on the head, and siting in it). Anyway, it was an eventful evening when I should have been home SLEEPING because this week has been so long and it's only Tuesday night. Again I ask, have you ever approached your car to find some snow inside? I can think of one other person that can also answer that question positively. (ssshhh...she doesn't know yet)

Have a great night, and don't forget to come to the superbowl party this Sunday. Arrive anytime after 5pm - see ya then.

Alive

2005-02-01T00:18:00.000-05:00

Yes I'm alive. Yes I'm really really busy. I'll get back here soon with something more than two short statements. Wait three.

Good night.

A Puzzle

2005-01-25T23:02:00.000-05:00

Here's a fun puzzle for you!

1) Pick a number from 1 through 9

2) Subtract 5 from the number. (Negative results are ok)

3) Multiply the result by 3

4) Sqaure the result (Multiply the number by itself)

5) Add the digits of the results until there's only one digit (Ex: 64 6+4 = 10)

6) If the result is less than 5, add 5; if not, subtract 4

7) Multiply by 2

8) Subtract 6 from the result

9) Locate the corresponding letter in the alphabet (1=A, 2=B)

10) Pick a country that begins with that letter

11) Note the second letter in that country's name. Think of a mammal that begins with that letter.

12) Now think of the color of that mammal. What do you have?

Without looking at the comments, post YOUR answer. No looking until you've posted yours. PLEASE. :)

~ Happy Tuesday Night ~

I Love Snowy Days

2005-01-22T23:51:00.000-05:00

Oh what a great day! All the snow, oh the fun. Here's a few pictures - incase you didn't make it out of your dwelling.

This is what I was greeted by as I stepped out my door

Then I had to get into my snow covered car

Driving around proved to be interesting, but I enjoyed the challenges, along with Justin

Seemed everyone was getting stuck

Perhaps that's why this guy was out

Storms like this should come more often

Too bad they dont.

That's all for now. Go throw a snowball!

General Disarray

2005-01-19T16:21:00.000-05:00

I just had a dell tech here to replace my system board and bottom latch on the battery bay. I was having the system board replaced because I thought that it might eliminate the annoying 60hz buzz heard when plugged into the alternating current wall outlet. Now you know there's a funny story here, because otherwise I wouldn't have just told you that useless piece of information. (had to start somewhere).

Upon completing the replacement, she had to update the information in the BIOS. This is normally a simple job of pressing the 'Y' twice to agree to the changes, and you have to enter the service tag of the computer. She looked really confused and I laughed as I told her that Becky Blackmon had switched my letters around (she knows Becky from CU tech support). Soon later I hear several error sounds as she is getting frustrated. I went over to see what was wrong, and she was pressing the represented 'y' key, but in actuality it was the letter 'm'. This resulted in an error every time she hit it. She didn't realize that only the physical plastic was changed, and not the corresponding key character. She laughed again and was quite baffled as she scanned the top row - unsure of what key to press. She thought it might be the 'l', but the 'l' represented the letter 't'. I told her to hit the 'q', and sure enough a 'Y' appeared on the screen.

She asked, has that girl ever been cussed out? LOL, Better watch out becky, you made unisys tech mad! :) ha ha

Anyway, this is something I must deal with every day that I touch my keyboard. Fortunately for myself - I know how to type without looking. However I will admit, that if I do look, it actually confuses me. I think I might have just discovered a new way to teach typing! Hmmm...I'll get on that.

Thanks Blackmon for the funny words on my keyboard. It consists of the word MIX on the left side, below that in the home row is the word SPUD, and below that the word WAR. On the upper right is the word KNOT, and beneath that in the home row is my name JEFF. The rest of the letters are randomly placed. Anyway - fun times! Anyone other than Blackmon notice anything strange about these words? Anyone?

Goodnight World

2005-01-16T00:09:00.000-05:00

Tongiht was my companys holiday party. It's a little beyond the holidays, but it certainly is nice to not worry about the party during the stress and craze of the actual holiday season. It was held in a really neat older building in Kalamazoo. Much fun, great food, lots of laughs, good rewards - no complaining.

Last night was a success in four tandum and one repeat TP marathon. My favorite would be Krystal and Tracy as we barged into their third floor apartment at nearly 2am as they were watching a movie. Both of them on the couch in shock, mouths opened as several people entered the room and left just as quickly I wonder what movie they were watching - didn't hang around long enough to find out. Here's a quote from my IM conversation this evening:

[Saturday 23:35:05] krystal Herbert: hm, well.. seems we got TP'ed last night.. not our cars, not our apartment, but tracy and i

Now how can you not laugh at that? Definitely felt nice to be back in the prank business for an evening. I was left with the threat that it is on. We'll see what gets on, we'll see what comes around and what goes around - if you know what I mean. The identities of the team will still remain at large.

Snow has begun falling, perhaps I'll wake up to a beautiful 12 inches tomorrow morning. For now its off to bed - some of us have to be up by 6am.

Goodnight world.

Horace Walpole

2005-01-15T16:13:00.000-05:00

I don't feel much like writing at the moment, so I'll leave you with this until later:

The world is a tragedy to those who feel, but a comedy to those who think.

- Horace Walpole

Blogphile's

2005-01-13T19:44:00.000-05:00

Are you a Blogphile?

Blog
[a.k.a. blogger -or- blogrolling -or- weblog -or- Web log -or- blogosphere]
A blog is basically a journal that is available on the web. The activity of updating a blog is "blogging" and someone who keeps a blog is a "blogger." Blogs are typically updated daily using software that allows people with little or no technical background to update and maintain the blog. Postings on a blog are almost always arranged in chronological order with the most recent additions featured most prominantly.

-phile or -phil suff.
1) One that loves or has a strong affinity or preference for: audiophile.
2) Loving; having a strong affinity or preference for: Francophile.
[New Latin -philus, from Greek -philos, beloved, dear, from philos, beloved, loving.]

So I must ask, are you a blogphile? I must not be - I haven't posted within the past 24 hours, I have most definitely been neglecting my blog. There's probably enough blogphiles in the world, I certainly don't need to be one. Till next time.

Remeniscent Scavenger Hunt

2005-01-12T00:13:00.000-05:00

Well, I was sifting through some old VHS tapes when I came across this. After laughing quite a bit, I digitized it and with much ado (yes WITH) placed it here for you to view. Thank you to Becky Blackmon for helping me by letting me use her site as a warehouse.

This is what happens when crazy freshman go out on a crazy video scavenger hunt. We made our own hunt, split into teams, and came back to watch the excitement. Here was just one of the funny events caught on video tape. You can imagine the questions we had to ask. Just watch, its worth it.

The direct link is below (it will pop up on your own computer) or you can try the embedded player, although I've been having some difficulty with it. Sorry for the poor audio/video quality - that was to keep it small enough for your benefit. Let me know what you think!

::This file no longer exists in this location::

::This file can now be found at Google Video::

It's a Monday

2005-01-10T23:16:00.000-05:00

Today was a Monday - an average Monday. The DOW Jones was up 17, Sunday was yesterday, and I bought zippo lighter fluid at Meijer. Those are just some of the factors that made this Monday an average one. Today was going to mark the day I started working out again at the Powerhouse Gym, but I was quite tired and simply not in the mood to motivate myself once I finished with work. Hopefully I'll start the routine tomorrow. What's the rule of thumb? I think 6 weeks to make a habit - right? I use to work out regularly, apparently that's a habit I broke. I'll have to try to get back to that routine - besides, it will give me more energy. It may mean goodbye to the average Monday.

I was secretly hoping for some snow today, that would have made it a better average Monday, there's nothing like snow to make you feel happy. Well, at least for me that's the case. I'm sure there are plenty of you who hate the snow with equal or greater passion. I have one word for you - Michigan. Seems to me you are the one living in this state. I remember my freshman year (2000) when it snowed every day from Thanksgiving to Easter. That was a great year for snow! Still haven't been SBC (Sledding Behind Cars) yet this year. Been slightly busy, and lacking a good firm base with an overlaying soft snow. Someone is going to hate me for saying that. Oh well, perhaps the end of this week we'll be greeted with a great snow.

That about does it for me today - Hope the day finds you well.

The Beginnings

2005-01-09T21:19:00.000-05:00

Well folks, four out of five voices in my head say go for it. Four out of five people also say go for it.

After posting the question "To xanga or not to xanga, that is the question" in my AIM profile, I was slightly overwhelmed with the level of interest. I didn't even know that my profile was viewed so often by so many people! Comments including "you should xanga...its fun, I even xanaga", "I would have to say that a Xanga created by you would be...entertaining", "go for it", and "everyone xangas" were the beginning of convincing statements. And now here I am, xangaing.

This weekend was a long and busy one as I attended my friend Jeff's wedding as one of his groomsmen. He is now married and on his way to Cancun with his wife Lauren. My parents, being good friends of he and his parents were also in town, so I was able to spend some time with them. Twas nice indeed.

So I think that is enough for a first entry. Wouldn't want to tire your eyes right off the bat. I have no idea what this will turn out to be, but as often as you check back - I'm sure we'll see. Be sure to leave plenty of amusing comments - I look forward to them!