Iowa made it on Fark.com

Fark.com reported today that Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack is running for president. They gave it a "dumbass" tag. *smirk*

Here are the transcripts from the meeting in which Microsoft decided how to design the Zune.

Zune sucks.

Zune sucks. Oh, wait that is not news. Everybody is saying it. But here is a very long article outlining what went wrong in making the Zune. The article had to be long to cover it all.
I guess it is no big shock that their ads suck too. WTF is THIS all about? And why does that little penis with legs get an eyeball? Or is that an iBall? I must be missing something. Speaking of ads that suck, check out the girl in this one.
Seems like one of the biggest of many problems with this turd colored iPod wanna-be is that even Microsoft knows it sucks. "Microsoft is going to put tons of money in this over time, much like they did with the Xbox" video game console, she said. "It's not about the first generation (of devices)." So they plan to make a better one in the future. But if the maker says it sucks, why would you buy it? The only slightly cool thing about this thing is that you can (kind of) share music with other Zunes. But if you have the only one around...... After you get done with that you could go out in the yard and play catch with yourself.

KGAN can kiss my ass.

HERE is an open letter from Mike Sullivan, Station Manager at KGAN. It is a lame ass propaganda page telling us why we are going to lose their station on Mediacom cable. Now I have had issues with Mediacom in the past, but of the two I gotta side with Mediacom on this one. Even if KGAN is right in their demands, this page is crap. Instead of facts, it is full of "we believe" and "we can't discuss" statements.

we believe that in certain cases compensation is being paid but is just being disguised in some manner.........
we believe that Mediacom, like all cable companies, routinely pays the owners of the vast majority of the channels it carries for that right........
We believe such fees range as high as $2.00 per subscriber per month for ESPN........
We believe that even channels with a narrow audience appeal, such as Animal Planet and HGTV generally receive monthly per subscriber fees......

Well I believe this is a bunch of crap.

KGAN will pay me $150 to drop Mediacom and get a dish. WTF? KGAN's little station is so hard up for money that they need a dollar month from mediacom for me to (not) watch their station, but they can give me $150 to switch to a dish and (not) watch it on there? How about they just STFU and let me (not) watch their station on my mediacom cable for the next TWELVE AND A HALF YEARS- the amount of time it would take them to recover the $150. What? You say that KGAN is not really paying me $150 and that it is just a rebate from Direct TV? No. You are wrong. Mike Sullivan said "CBS 2 will pay you $150"

I like how he also gave the phone number for Mediacom's Senior Vice President for the division as well as an easy link to launch off a letter to him. Why didn't they post the phone number of the senior vice president of KGAN so I can call and bug him?

I really hope that Mediacom will find a CBS station, perhaps out of Chicago, that wants to expand their base and increase ad revenue. Those who care can still watch football and CSI and most people just watch KCRG news anyway. I don't even know who those people are on the home page for KGAN news so I think I can live without them.

Saturday stuff

Note to Microsoft: This is an example of why you will never be as friggin cool as apple.



Note to Tut: YOU ARE FIRED!
Blink 182

Friday stuff

Ooooh, thank you, Chrysler Great commercial

I mentioned to (not my) cousin Steve and Ranger Rick the other day that they are going to race Avengers next year in the cup series. Steve (who has an Avenger) pointed out that they don't make it anymore. I thought, "oh yea good point"
Looks like the will be making it in January. JALOPNIK
Now THAT is a big ole fish.

I read this today...
Iowa decided to forgo hiring a head coach in 1895 to save money. The plan backfired, as the Hawkeyes limped to a 2-5 record. Iowa football would never again go without a head coach
I thought that was funny since this year we doubled the salary of thier head coach to 2.84 MILLION DOLLARS A FRIGGIN YEAR (plus other perks) and their conference record was 2-6. And if they had actually won a few games he would have made much more. I think he wound up making 3.6 MILLION.
And while this is going on they make it so folks that I know can't afford tickets anymore. They have to make a donation ( a.k.a. extortion) in order to buy the tickets that they have had for many years or even decades. These folks bought tickets and filled the seats even when they sucked ass. But now that we have dumped 80 kazillion dollars into rebuilding the stadium (which really does look nice) instead of moving it away from the hospital so that people don't have to die trying to get to the hospital in an ambulance during game traffic. We double the salary of the coach. Guess what? They still suck. Money well spent.
But the good news is that they will still probably go to a bowl game. Not because they are good, but because of fan support. Fan support means lots of Iowan's love football and lots of them will jump on a plane to go somewhere warm in the middle of an Iowa winter to watch their team get their butts handed to them. They will fill the stands and dump lots of cash in the city. The team will make lots of money for being on TV but they will spend almost all of it sending everyone on the planet, their kids, and babysitters for their kids to the game.

WELCOME HOME, AARON

My brother Aaron is home in TX. Back from his second tour of Iraq. Have not talked to him yet (CALL ME, BRO) but I am sure he is glad to be home and I know the rest of us are glad he is back safe.

On to stupid stuff.... PS3 on sale today. I checked eBay to see how much people are shelling out so they don't have to wait a week or two until Sony "finds" a bunch of them they did not know they had and accidentally created a mob frenzy and media hype of such stupid scale that people are getting robbed in line and shot. I came across this. Some jerk is selling an email address that he created FREE on yahoo. It is so that you will have a "trusted" email address. WTF? I guess whomever bids on this ($280 so far) deserved to take it in the shorts. Oh, wait. Here is the same BS with a gmail account. Some fool payed $280 for a gmail account. A fool and his money....

Here is a guy with money that is not a fool. Check out his garage.


And finally this: "Herro I'm a Mac" commercial.

easy steps for installing Zune software

Here is what you need to do to get your POS zune to work. Or whatever it does.

This is old, but really good. How M$ would package the iPod. Very well done.

zune zune

Well M$ finally released the zune. In keeping with the M$ tradition, they went out and copied somebody elses idea and did a poor job making an ugly product. Usually the either buy out a company that creates something cool, or drive them out of business. They can't do that with Apple because they need Apple around so they can get a vision of what they should try to make software look like a few years later. So you get the Zune. The best part is that if you are a M$ loyalist and have been buying songs from sites supporting M$ crap, you get to start all over again because they won't play on this thing. Good luck with that. I think they one reporter nailed it in the very end of the video. "why don't they (M$) hire some decent design people to make things look better?"

still moving.. even more

We are still trying to get the last of the stuff out of the old house. There is an open house tomorrow.
Ranger Rick came by yesterday and took away the Daytona. That was really sad, but mostly a very happy thing. We had finally given in to the idea that I we needed to let her go. I was ready to call the junk yard a while back and it just broke my heart. Ranger Rick and his cousin Steve came over the other day and loaded it onto a trailer and took her away. Rick is going to fix her up and Steve will paint it later on.
The Daytona was kind of special to us because it was the only new car we have ever bought. We got it when we did not have a lot of money, but damnit it was cool and we wanted it. But then we had twins and about the same time the band broke up. (for a while) At that time, we really could not afford it, but we loved it and if we sold it we would not come out ahead. When the kids were tiny, we had to load the car seats backwards, but I could not drive with the seat up far enough for that so Mary had to sit in the back for a year or two. So through all of that, we kept her. When Tim was about 2 he loved that car. "Daddy go by-by in 1989 blue dodge daytona es turbo" he would say.
So it has been a part of our family for a long time and I am so glad to see that it will be saved.
Mary had a job interview today. Kind of weird situation. 2 of the Lawyers she works for are leaving. They have both gotten her interviews at other firms. The one today was with the lawfirm that one of them is taking a partnership in. So she left her job to go to an interview, and when she got there her boss was there to interview her. Needless to say it went well :-)
I have been off since Tuesday moving stuff out of the shop to the house. It was SO nice. About 70 most of the time. Yesterday 70 degrees. Today rain, sleet, and snow.
Go figger.

wow. I thought Carousel Motors SUCKED

You gotta read this. I thought carousel motors in iowa city SUCKED ASS. These guys are even worse then Carousel Motors in Iowa City, Iowa. Can you tell that I think Carousel Motors in Iowa City is run by crooks?

This is just brilliant. A great remix of Office Space trailer.

see through concrete and other stuff

Wow. Who woulda thunkit? (CLICK)

Hey, woodworker/geeks check out this gadget. There is a demo video. Very cool. Oddly enough Sears sells a version of it.

OMG THIS is great. A bunch of photos a home inspector took of DIY stupidity. Makes me feel better about myself.

stuff

Pretty cool Marshall radio. And yes, it goes to 11.

And here are some retro tv's that Steve will probably want. Check out the cursor on the site, nice touch.

And if you have not seen the giggly baby video by now you should really check it out. Very cute.

This video is not so cute. A new Eleanor Mustang (beauty) being driven through a wall.

Still moving.

Well here it is Wed. and we are still moving. The weekend was crazy. Tim's friend Jerry came over with a truck and helped a ton. We loaded the 2 trucks and ran them back and forth. Got a lot done that way. Sunday Ranger Rick brought over his cousin Steve's trailer and big ass 2 wheel dolly. Tim had a couple of friends come over and help move the bowling ally out of the shop. Even with all of those guys it was really not very much fun. Rick and I got the Unisaw into the basement. That was not as bad as I thought it might be. Don't know how we would have done it without the B.A Dolly though. Then Dwight and the crew came over with his truck and we loaded up trucks some more and ran them home.
I always tell people that you find out who your friends are when you move. I found out I have some good friends that bailed my butt out of a mess. It has still been a nonstop adventure and we have a ways to go, but I can't imagine how we would have gotten to this point without them. THANKS!
I had the day off and spent it loading stuff out of the shop. Got quite a bit done way more to go.
Can anybody get anything right around here? Mary called last week and told the mail, cable, and phone to change over on Friday. The very next day I went to get the mail and there is a slip in our box saying that we had moved. WTF? So I go to the new house. Same slip. Cripes. The phone is STILL not changed over. The cable guys said they could not do it Friday but could be over on Tuesday. Great. No TV or internet for four day, but what can you do? So Tuesday comes, but naturally it is one of the few days a year I have to work late. So Mary takes time off work to be there. Nobody shows. I call and they say the guy came and could not find the house. He called the primary and nobody answered since the phone company sucks too. So he went home. Today I went in and told them they needed to fix this TODAY and she said they could come over Friday. We went back and forth and I pointed out that if he had called the other number instead of just giving up he would have gotten me on the cel. She did not budge so I said I wanted to see her supervisor. She said I could not but she would call him and then I saw her write "rick" on her page. I asked Rick's last name and she said she could not tell me. I asked if it was Karnes, and she said yes. SCORE! Rick was a good friend of mine about 20 years ago at the hospital. I told her to have him call me. He called me back about five min. later and 2 hours later we had cable. The guy that came over could not find the house either. But get this... he got out a FRIGGIN MAP AND LOOKED. Crazy, ain't it?
So that is where we are now.
But Here is a pretty amusing clip about the 68 R/T charger.