Had to repost this one! Ask me again why I stayed on it for all of one week…

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25 rando​m thing​s about​ Faceb​ook
It’s not a compu​ter virus​,​ but it sure is start​ing to feel like one – By Helen​ A.S. Popki​n – msnbc​.​ com

It’s not a compu​ter virus​,​ but for some Faceb​ook membe​rs,​ it’s start​ing to feel like one. It’s calle​d the “25 rando​m thing​s,​ facts​,​ habit​s,​ or goals​ about​ you,​”​ and it seems​ all the kids are doing​ it. The Faceb​ook notif​icati​on pops up in your e-​mail or Faceb​ook “​wall”​ with instr​uctio​ns to list these​ 25 thing​s and tag 25 of your own “frie​nds” to do the same.​

The only thing​ lacki​ng in this dubio​us invit​ation​ is the dire threa​t of a chain​ lette​r — that failu​re to compl​y means​ certa​in death​ in say, the next 25 days.​ Well,​ turna​bout is fair play.​ Let’​s see how YOU like it, Faceb​ook!​

1. Faceb​ook foste​rs the illus​ion that every​ perso​n you know actua​lly cares​ that you left your Nikes​ in the locke​r room at Crunc​h.​

2. Nobod​y cares​ that you left your Nikes​ in the locke​r room at Crunc​h.​

3. If you join Faceb​ook to find out what your kids are up to, you might​ actua​lly find out what your kids are up to.

4. You don’t​ want to find out what your kids are up to.

5. Unles​s,​ of cours​e,​ you want to find photo​s of your 19-​year-​old daugh​ter makin​g out with anoth​er 19-​year-​old coed for the edifi​catio​n of a bunch​ of 19-​year old dudes​ doing​ beer bongs​.​ (​That’​s age 19, if you’r​e lucky​.​)

6. You can annou​nce your divor​ce on Faceb​ook via the heart​ icon thing​y.​

7. Don’t​ annou​nce your divor​ce on Faceb​ook.​

8. Don’t​ annou​nce your divor​ce on Faceb​ook for a numbe​r of reaso​ns,​ the least​ of which​ is that all your “​frien​ds”​ will respo​nd on your “​wall”​ with sympa​thies​ that in a diffe​rent era would​’​ve been deliv​ered in priva​cy.​ You would​n’t conso​le someb​ody by shout​ing acros​s a room full of peopl​e.​ Why are you doing​ it on a Faceb​ook “​wall?​”​

9. You peopl​e take Faceb​ook way too serio​usly.​

10. A woman​ was kille​d after​ chang​ing her relat​ionsh​ip statu​s on Faceb​ook.​

11. Remem​ber that Burge​r King “​Whopp​er Sacri​fice”​ appli​catio​n that alleg​edly offer​ed a free Whopp​er coupo​n for every​ 10 frien​ds you dumpe​d?​ Well,​ you proba​bly shoul​dn’t have dumpe​d a coupl​e of your oldes​t frien​ds,​ two of which​ are hardc​ore vegan​s.​ At least​ one of them didn’​t find it hilar​ious at all and now they won’t​ “re-​frien​d” you.

12. If you join Faceb​ook to find peopl​e you used to know,​ you’r​e just as likel​y to find your middl​e schoo​l BFF Jill as you are to reign​ite the passi​ons of that one guy from Photo​graph​y class​ who has been stalk​ing you since​ junio​r colle​ge.​

13. “​Don’t​ Get Botox​”​

14. Faceb​ook can get you fired​.​ Yes, you. Just like you are not that one perso​n who can drive​ safel​y while​ talki​ng on a cell phone​,​ you are not that one perso​n who is in no dange​r of getti​ng fired​ for somet​hing stupi​d poste​d by or about​ you on Faceb​ook.​

15. What’​s more,​ your boss is on Faceb​ook.​ If you join,​ you’r​e going​ to have to decid​e wheth​er to accep​t his or her “​frien​dship​.​”​ If you accep​t,​ you risk losin​g your job for somet​hing he or she stumb​les upon.​ If you attem​pt to play it safe by not accep​ting your boss’​s “​frien​dship​,​”​ you risk losin​g your job for offen​ding him or her.

16. Oh, and you’r​e also at risk of alien​ating​ your oldes​t frien​ds by bumpi​ng their​ rank in your “​Alway​s show these​ frien​ds”​ box. We’re​ talki​ng your adult​ frien​ds,​ like,​ in their​ 30s and 40s, with jobs and kids and all kinds​ of grown​-​up respo​nsibi​litie​s.​

17. Your other​wise grown​-​up frien​ds are angry​ at you for bumpi​ng their​ “​Alway​s show these​ frien​ds”​ rank becau​se obvio​usly you’r​e tryin​g to commu​nicat​e some kind of super​ secre​t Faceb​ook messa​ge along​ the lines​ of, “I value​ your frien​dship​ two-​peopl​e less today​ than I did yeste​rday.​”​ It’s like watch​ing your frien​dship​ stock​ plumm​et.​

18. The estee​med widow​ of forme​r Emper​or of Malaw​i did not just send you a “​frien​d”​ reque​st,​ nor is she beari​ng a uniqu​e and prosp​erous​ offer​ strai​ght out of Niger​ia just for you.

19. And while​ we’re​ on the subje​ct,​ I’VE JUST BEEN HELD UP AT GUNPO​INT IN LONDO​N AND I NEED YOU TO SEND ME $600 NOW!​!​!​!​!​

20. Faceb​ook is most conce​rned about​ Your Priva​cy.​ (And the Tooth​ Fairy​ and Easte​r Bunny​ are frien​ds!​)​21.​ Don’t​ conne​ct your Faceb​ook and Twitt​er accou​nts.​ Peopl​e you haven​’t heard​ from for, like,​ seven​ years​ — peopl​e you never​ thoug​ht you were frien​ds with — will leave​ lame and annoy​ing comme​nts on your Tweet​s.​

22. It’s like,​ hey, if you want to rekin​dle the frien​dship​ I never​ thoug​ht we had, call me or at least​ send a priva​te e-​mail.​ Jeez.​

23. OK, the cool thing​ about​ havin​g your Faceb​ook and Twitt​er accou​nts conne​cted is that your Tweet​s show up as your statu​s updat​es.​ But then,​ if peopl​e respo​nd on Twitt​er and maybe​ ask you somet​hing,​ and you respo​nd via Twitt​er,​ it shows​ up as your Faceb​ook statu​s,​ and that’​s annoy​ing.​

24. While​ you’​re sendi​ng zombi​e chall​enges​ to all your “​frien​ds,​”​ there​’​s a guy in Egypt​ using​ Faceb​ook to fomen​t democ​racy.​

25. Event​ually​,​ someo​ne will post photo​s from your high schoo​l yearb​ook.​ Dang,​ your hair was big.

Naw, but serio​usly.​ You kids are aweso​me!​ Come “​frien​d”​ me on Faceb​ook!​

© 2009

Okay, so doing a survey for a new client (a religious supply store) I was walking around taking measurements and photos and my eye couldn’t help but go to this lovely item….and then Prince came flowing into my mind!

Do you know how hard it is to talk to a client while this song is playing in your mind and a 48″ tall statue of the latest Pope is above you on a store display rack?

I think that folks who run puppy mills need to be put into restrictive cages themselves, fed only when you remember to, don’t let them out to toilet and see how they feel after a week…let alone all their lives. This news article from today just riled me up…..

Mom, daughters ran filthy kennels
By Casey Norton & KOMO Staff

SKAGIT COUNTY, Wash. — A mother and her two daughters ran two suspected puppy mills in two separate counties from which investigators have seized nearly 600 dogs, according to newly-obtained court documents.

Investigators have declared the Mountain View Kennel in Mount Vernon a “nuisance.” The kennel belongs to Marjorie Sundberg, the accused mother.

According to court documents, Sundberg’s unlicensed kennel has been the subject of constant complaints since 2005.

Last week deputies seized nearly 450 dogs from Sundberg’s kennel. The dogs were found living in deplorable conditions. Many dogs were standing in their own feces without access to food or water inside.

Four of the dogs were found living next to seven dead dogs. Veterinarians later determined some of dogs were suffering from coccidia, an intestinal disease.

Officers said the dogs found there were mostly small dogs, including chihuahuas, Shih Tzus, poodles and Yorkshire terriers. There was also a room that was housing approximately 20 female dogs that were nursing litters of pups.

Investigators first learned of Sundberg’s operations after serving search warrants at the homes of Sundberg’s daughters, Renee Roske and Mary Anne Holleman near Snohomish.

At one of the homes, deputies found “several hidden compartments built into the house to hide dogs,” court documents state. Thirty nine dogs were found in the two homes; however, none of those dogs were seized.

At Holleman’s kennel in Gold Bar, deputies found 155 dogs, 87 of them of them stashed in an attic, living in ghastly conditions so horrific that it shocked even veteran animal control officers, officials said.

Officers said the odor from the feces and urine was so overpowering it could be detected well outside the residence. A large commercial dumpster stood in the yard overflowing with dog waste.

Medications and used syringes, used to treat sick animals, were found scattered in front of pens and in a refrigerator.

Investigators seized all the dogs from the property, as well as four dogs and three parrots.

Deputies found Jason Larson feeding the animals at the kennel. Larson was afraid to talk to them.

“He could be killed,” the affidavit said,” we were dealing with millions of dollars a year in revenue.”

“Both these subjects are well known in Snohomish County for operating illegal and unlicensed kennels for the purpose of mass production of puppies for sale.”

Snohomish County deputies alerted Skagit County officials when Roske admitted she moved several dogs to her parents’ home in Mount Vernon.

Sundberg and her husband told Animal Control officers “their daughter…does most of the sales of dogs they produce…a lot of their sales are over the Internet.”

An animal rights activist, who only wished to be identified as “Shelly,” has been tracking the family on the Internet and through their registered kennel’s ads. She said Roske has posted ads for 16 different breeds of puppies for sale at a time.

“She has 16 different breeds of dogs listed in those six ads. If that doesn’t tell you what’s going on, I don’t know what will,” she said.

Shelly said she’s been trying to alert investigators since she visited the Gold Bar kennel weeks ago.

“Her business license goes back to 1998 and as time went on, she just got out of hand. It turned into a huge puppy mill operation, and this is bigger than any one I have ever seen,” she said.

Shelly is afraid of what the family members might do if they lose their income from puppy sales.

“There are litters of puppies being born every day or every other day. Some of these dogs go from $700 to $1,200 for some of them,” she said.

Shelly said she has posted warnings on Craigslist to warn buyers about the puppy mill investigation.

Prosecutors in the two counties are collaborating on the case, but plan to file separate charges.

5 yrs ago, when my spouse was deployed to Iraq for a year he made a decision to return one of our cars (of which we had ownership of for less than a year), in case he got killed and didn’t want to leave me strapped with a car payment.

Needless to say, BofA screwed us on it, messed up his credit, provided fraudulent info the credit bureaus and refused to fix it, which hurt us in more ways than you would realize, until we finally found an attorney in another state to take the case on for us. And won it by the way.

Hyundai has figured it out and has decided to fill a necessary gap that our failing American auto industry has overlooked in their persistent incompetence and greed. Leave it to a foreign company that understands the concept of taking care of folks and providing a way for their revenue to increase. One of the most important rules of marketing a product – figure out what the customers pain is and provide a solution to them that involves your product.

I am including their policy below:

In this economy, they have figured out that even though the consumer takes an immediate $4,000 hit on a car’s value the moment they drive it off the lot, if taken care of and not abused in that first year, the car can be resold at a good price and they can still get the difference in value without suffering the hassle and administrative cost to recover a car that has been defaulted on. Not to mention the fact that many folks who know they are going to have their vehicle re-po’d, don’t take care of it as well as they would normally.

Now, this isn’t going to make me go out and buy one of their cars, because I am happy with the one that I own outright and the other we are paying on,but damn it Ford, GM & Chrysler – figure it out and quit making us pay for your idiocy. Or at least, have the decency to give us, the American public, a reach around….

1. Get up at 8am to let in ceiling removal guys for the neighbor’s unit – check
2. Walk the dog – check
3. Feed the neighbor’s fish before the ceiling guys show up to rip up the condo- check
4. Schedule installs, removals and notify vendors – check
5. Get dressed for client meeting, showroom visit and business dinner afterwards – check
6. Tell plumber he has wrong unit and direct him to correct unit when answering the door – check
7. Tell “special” neighbor that you are getting ready to go to a meeting, but thanks for asking if I wanted to go with him to Fred Meyer because I always ask him – check
8. Stop by vet’s first to get dry prescription dog food – check
9. Find parking by showroom within 2 blocks of venue – check
10. Have meeting and go to dinner- check
11. Drive client to hotel – check
12. Unload car and take up 2 flights of stairs these items – computer bag, box of all versions of POP samples, 20lb bag of dog food, purse and mail – check
13. Install new electronic combo lock in front door because 5″ setback came via UPS today free from the Manufacturer – check
14. Catch up on emails missed between meeting and dinner – check
15. Blog about the day at 10pm – check
16. Go take out contacts, put on glasses and change clothes – check
17. Zone out to bad TV for an hour or two – check
18. Go to be and try to sleep in tomorrow……

Daft Punk vs. Adam Freeland – “Aer OBAMA” from Gold Greendot on Vimeo.

“Empire of the Sun”…loved the movie with a young Christian Bale (when I first fell in love with him), and now an Aussie Band with the same name as the movie.

Best Scene from the Movie

They are so reminiscent of a great funky early 80′s band with catchy tunes and great lyrics and talk about fun image schtick!!!

Here are a few videos from their album…
“Walking On A Dream”

“We Are The People”
We Are The People

I have a “date” tomorrow afternoon with my neighbor from the first floor. I told you all about him earlier – he’s the OCD guy who’s place we spent a month cleaning.

I have been hired by his brother to help the neighbor during the week – monitor how well he does his ABC’s,
(does he shower every 2 days, change his undies, take out his garbage – ALL OF IT etc) keep tabs on his overall mental health, cleanliness etc. Take him shopping, get his eyes checked, bring him along on errands to give him social interaction with someone other than the other hoarders in the complex.

I think the folks at the local Hallmark store appreciate it too – he likes to go down and set off all the talking cards and dancing displays…a lot. It’s great when the stores have a new holiday, because you can just take him to the seasonal aisle in Dead Fred’s, and he’ll be amused for about 15 minutes easily. (It’s a fun way to start any shopping trip really, if you’ve never tried it!)

So, tomorrow we are going to do lunch at Coscto (he likes the chicken bakes that I had him try the last time we went for his eye exam) and then after that, we are going to Michael’s craft store to see what we can see. Because of his OCD, one of his fun collections consists of 8 + large Folgers cans full of wine corks. Instead of making him throw them away (which would be easier for us but a major stressor for him and would make him shut down and push us out), we are going to see if we find something for him to do with those items. He also has a crapload of beads – like those hair beads.

We (his brother and I) figure if we have a craft hour, and he makes fun items to GIVE TO FRIENDS, then we are successfully getting rid of the collected items, while keeping him busy, and showing him that if he collects items he can DO SOMETHING WITH THEM (instead of keeping them in coffee cans on the top of his kitchen cupboards collecting dust and cat hair). It’s also a passive aggressive way for us to get him to clean out the crap.

His pals re-gift items to him that he’ll never use (case in point one gal gave him a chocolate fondue set to which he said he would just buy the chocolate and eat it – thus providing yet another free something to sit in the house unused and collect dust)

I’m going to suggest he make HER a little gift that SHE can then figure out what to do with!

I bet you are all jealous! We’ll see how it goes…

So, usually I am not one to participate in online or random email surveys from one of my service providers, but every once in a while I feel like I have something to contribute.

Today there was one from my cell phone provider that came through my email address with a personal link to respond to – takes 10 minutes to complete yadda yadda.

So I think to myself “Why not?” Maybe I can get $20 for being chosen to participate in a live online interactive session regarding my service and phone choice and provide my impressions.

All seemed to be going well until I get to that infamous last question…. multiple choice of course… “Which of these professions do you currently belong to?”.

Me being me, I automatically choose the Marketing/Advertising button, because THAT’S WHAT I DO! That’s when I get rejected. It’s not a big rejection, but a very nice “Oh we’re sorry. You don’t qualify to participate in this event/discussion. Thanks for answering though.”

I should have lied and said student…except then my answers wouldn’t have meshed up with what I was claiming and in the “live” session it might become one of those lies that eventually catches you up.

I don’t want to lie to be allowed to participate in a feedback session.

What is it about us Advertising/Marketing/Graphics folks that make the Advertising/Marketing/Graphics who created these surveys automatically eliminate us? Are they that threatened we will not provide positive and possible helpful perspective and angles regarding the product/services in question? Maybe they think we would steal some aspect of their survey and use it somewhere else? I would think that our professional opinions might actually BE helpful and put forth in a way that the “survey” folks would understand and appreciate… I would hope.

I just wanted to provide feedback.,..for a product and service I like…as an adult with perspective and a valid use for said products…. oh well.

They can all bite me!

This would be the destination most required we visit:

The Prince & Skyline Museum in the Nagano Prefecture.

I’d like to visit a few other places…. but if we only had a day….