Roll Over » Just Stuff

Best Use Of Business-Speak In Comment Spam

brent — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 13:08:32 +0000

Over on the escfactory blog, we recently got this wonderful comment spam for the post “New games on the factory horizon“:

Substantially, the article is really the greatest on this deserving topic. I fit in with your conclusions and will thirstily look forward to your upcoming updates. Just saying thanks will not just be sufficient, for the wonderful lucidity in your writing. I will directly grab your rss feed to stay abreast of any updates. Good work and much success in your business dealings!

Two Short Films by Cameron Mair

mike — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:33:49 +0000

My nephew spent last week with us in New York. Last summer he attended the New York Film Academy tweens program, so this summer we thought it would be fun to make some actual short films. Cameron directed each of the shorts, and I wrote the music. Our good friend Emily Otto even joined us in Washington Square Park very early one morning to star in “Only One Spoon”. Enjoy!

And don’t miss this from the “Special Features” section of the DVD:

Reminder: Set your blogs ahead too

brent — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 15:04:55 +0000

About the only thing left in my world that doesn’t adjust itself to Daylight Savings Time are my WordPress installations. So, along with that wall clock and old VCR, don’t forget to set your blogs ahead one hour, too.

In your control panel, go to:
Settings > General

…and choose a timezone value that is +1 your current setting. (i.e. Eastern Standard Time is “UTC -5″, so for the summer you need to set it to “UTC -4″).

Happy 1234567890!

brent — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 23:31:02 +0000

Unix time clicked past this magic number today at 6:31:30 PM EST. I use Unix time alot in PHP, so this means something to me at least.

And some other people.

Voting in NYC

brent — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 12:43:57 +0000

We got up early today to vote, evidently so did much of our ‘hood.

It’s taken nearly 45mins to walk the sidewalk along Hayden Hall, and we’ve yet to turn the corner. Maybe a machine is broken… we always have the pull-lever kind, tho much of NYC is supposed to be on electronic machines by now. Not sure which kind I trust more anyway.

There is a district with hardly any residents in line, and they all get to go immediately to the front. There is talk of our building seceeding to that district. Watchout 80th, revolution is afoot!!

Demo Reel of Children’s Theme Park Show Music

brent — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 15:50:28 +0000

For three summers now, FatLab Music has supplied soundtracks to theme parks for IAAPA Award-Winning medley shows, fireworks spectacles, and lately, more and more kids’ shows. We provide original theme songs, reinterpreted arrangements, karaoke-style transcriptions, audio editing, pre-tracked vocals, and so on.

We are the “music guys” for two great companies: RWS & Associates Entertainment, Inc., whose live entertainment character properties include the CBS Television lineup and HIT Entertainment’s portfolio (“Thomas and Friends”, “Barney”, “Bob The Builder”), and Manhattan Creative Group.

Our shows are wrapping up their summer season, so we thought it was a good time to share a demo reel of some of our Children’s Show work to-date.

[0:00] “Beyond The Castle Walls” – Original music and lyric
From Beyond The Castle Walls (RWS)

[0:39] “Garfield The Great” – Original music and lyric
From Garfield The Great & Friends (RWS)

[1:04] “Believe” – Arrangement
From The Spirit of Christmas (RWS)

[1:18] “Kidapalooza” – Original music
Lyric by Stephen Tomac
From Kidapalooza (RWS)

[1:35] “Rockin’ on Route 66″ – Original music and lyric
From Rockin’ on Route 66 (RWS)

[1:53] “Who Left My Bologna In The Sun?” – Arrangement
From The Hopsicals (MCG)

My URLphabet

brent — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:01:22 +0000

In a blank browser window, type each letter of the alphabet and record the first autofill result returned.

Mine as of June 26, 2008:

What I learned about the French tonight

brent — Sun, 25 May 2008 04:13:20 +0000

Real French people are unaware that Americans consider these things “French”.

Starbucks’ sandwiches will not be missed!

brent — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 04:58:39 +0000

Howard Schultz Transformation Agenda Communication #3, I love you.

By the end of fiscal year 2008, discontinue warmed breakfast sandwiches at our North American stores

…We made this decision because, in short, the scent of the warmed sandwiches interferes with the coffee aroma in our stores.

If by “scent of the warmed sandwiches” you mean BURNING PAPER, then yes, it interferes. I was one of the complainers myself, thinking it would get the schmos at Waverly & 6th to fix their toaster. Turns out it wasn’t just them. The sandwiches were blamed for stinky Q1 FY08 results and the mighty SBUX is dumping them in an attempt to return to their roots. The oven company, TurboChef Technologies, fell 15% after the news came out. :(

The only sandwich I dared to stomach was in a moment of desperation while stuck on Long Island. It was the unfortunately named “Reduced-Fat Turkey Bacon, Cholesterol-Free Egg, Reduced-Fat White Cheddar Oven Roasted Breakfast Sandwich” and isn’t that much fun to order. (Nevermind that despite the qualifications, it’s still higher in fat and calories than the unsuspecting “Spinach, Roasted Tomato, Feta & Egg Wrap”.)

But relief is coming soon. I look forward to the time when Christmas Blend is next ushered in and the sandwiches are kicked OUT!

Coldplay huge in NYC, says Facebook

brent — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 05:37:09 +0000

Look what appeared in my Facebook News Feed tonight:

I knew they were popular, but a whole genre? Wowie.

Btw, it’s evidently just New York City. Brooklyn was over them a long time ago. Word is, Coldplay was *too* big, so it was no longer cool to like them.

I happen to still have a soft spot for Coldplay, for those quiet, introspective, brooding times. When I want a happy medium, I turn to the Thin White Duke:

Coldplay – Talk (Thin White Duke Mix)

Enjoy. Stuart’s “Mr. Brightside” is also good, not to mention that little project he did with Madonna.

Hello Facebook

brent — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 15:48:03 +0000

I’m trying out a new plugin/Facebook app combo called Wordbook to cross-post from this blog to Facebook.

So far so good!

Hairy Christmas from Mike and Brent

admin — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 16:28:30 +0000

… and Roscoe, Charlie, & Frankie too.

Easy opt-out of catalog mailing lists with CatalogChoice.org

brent — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 06:17:52 +0000

After receiving 23 mail-order catalogs in three days, I started hitting the customer service websites, sending a saccharine plea to help me reduce the amount of paper mail I receive, how much I love their products, but prefer to shop online.

This approach got me responses in almost every case, including a few who thanked me for sharing their concern with saving the environment.

It is however, tiring. Hardly any site offers a dedicated mailing list removal form, instead requiring writing to the Customer Service “Contact Us” people or combing their Privacy Policy for removal instructions. Exceptions are Gumps and Brookstone, which each feature the vague subject “Mailing List” as a Contact Us concern; Signals, who goes a step farther and offers “Remove from Postal List” as a subject; Lands’ End, whose Privacy Policy has a whole paragraph subtitled “Removing your name from mailing lists”, and Eddie Bauer, who will remove you if you write online and ask, even though their site asks you to call them or pay $1 to get on the DMA Do Not Mail list.

But then tonight, the local news introduced me to CatalogChoice.org, a free, non-profit service that has done everything exactly right. Wowie, what a great site. It’s concise, cute, has fast ajaxy navigation with slick-but-not-distracting transition efx, and is really really usable.

After getting an account, you just Find Catalogs. I haven’t found one yet not listed (tho if you do you can suggest it be added). When you find a catalog to decline, a Lightbox-esque form pops up where you select your name and address matching the catalog’s mailing label, and enter your Customer Number, if any. Your profile can hold multiple names and multiple addresses, so I can easily pair either Mike or myself with all variations of our address that appear.

Best of all, they do all the work and notify the companies for you! All your declined catalogs are listed on one page, which is also the page where you report anyone who still sends junk after 10 weeks. Each company’s name has a hotlink to their online store, so you can continue to shop at the places you love, but hate their paper waste.

Mozilla.com reports Firefox always current, regardless of version

brent — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 14:55:28 +0000

Turns out no matter what version of Firefox you have, their whatsnew page kindly tells you it’s the most current. Seems a little lazy to me. ~~At least they don’t already have a page waiting for 2.0.0.9.~~(Well of course they do now.)

See here:

…and so on. You actually don’t even need to be on Firefox. Try it!

Can I touch your iPhone?

brent — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 19:48:00 +0000

This is what I’ll be saying come Saturday. I don’t think I’m buying one (yet). Even if I wanted to, check out these guys. Sheesh. With that kind of competition, why bother. It kills me that I’ll be *that guy* asking to play with your new baby, but you should probably expect it for awhile.

I’ve been a bleeding-edge buyer of a 1st gen Power Mac G4, iPod, 17″ PowerBook G4, and MacBook Pro. While they were all insanely great products, I was left insanely jealous when the next rev came out. Given the kind of early-adopters Apple has, the 1st gen products are always just enough to make a splash, but the 2nd gen is when the speed bumps, price drops, capacity increases, bugs get fixes we don’t even hear about (see MacBook Pro motherboard revs).

I’m really fine with the speed things change in the computer world. Planned obsolescence is hardly malicious anymore, things can change faster now besides the realities to keeping the marketplace interested. But when it comes to 1st gen iPhone, I’m counting to ten as I sit this one out. :(