God Loves you as He Loved Jacob

Welcome to Station 6: The Orchid

More on the Mysterious Casimir Effect, a principle of Quatum Field Theory.

Also, we're thinking of adopting a new dog and naming him Neils Bohr, is that too much?

No D'ohs

On Friday our bosses took the whole office out to see The Simpsons Movie.

It was great. We laughed out loud continually through the whole movie. And not the bad kind of laugh out louds we endured during Spider-pig 3. Even our boss and the Head Writer of Frisky Dingo, Adam Reed, gave it his seal of approval. And that guy might be the toughest critic of comedy I've ever met.

It looks like The Simpson's Movie is doing quite well at the box office. Selling $168 million in tickets during the opening weekend. We didn't expect to hate the movie, and everybody knows the TV show isn't as good as it used to be. We were just surprised by how much this movie felt like the Simpson's of old.

Duderonomy: Rules to live by, and sometimes break

Every year we talk about attending Lebowskifest, and every year we fail to go. Lewbowskifest is a weekend long celebration of the movie The Big Lebowski held in Louisville, Kentucky. The festival includes a bowling tournament, a costume contest, features a bunch of musical performances, and of course a screening of the film itself. It sounds like heaven for any Little Lewbowski Urban Achiever.

Who knows, we may never make it the festival. That doesn't mean that we can't bring a little bit of Lebowski with us wherever we go. Now we have Dudeism.

"The slowest-growing religion in the world - Dudeism. An ancient philosophy that preaches non-preachiness, practices as little as possible, and above all, uh...lost my train of thought there. Anyway, if you'd like to find peace on earth and goodwill, man, we'll help you get started. Right after a little nap.

At the Dudeism website you can check out the Book of Duderonomy. A set of rules that you can choose to live by, or not live by, or even break if you feel like it. You know, whatever man. For instance, Book 3 of Duderonomy: Rule Number 5 says:

"5. Try not to use so many cuss words. Unless they're near and dear to your heart, in which case, fuck it."

You can also become an Ordained Dudeist Priest, check out the Tao of Dude Weblog, or see some of The Great Dudes of History. (via metafilter)

Man VS. Wild CHEATS

We've caught a few episodes of Discovery Channel's survival show "Man VS. Wild" starring Bear Grylls. The show does a good job of grabbing you. Bear parachutes into a remote and hostile location, like deep in a rain forest, or on top of a giant mountain, or even simply out in the middle of a desert.

The show follows him from the point he jumps out of a plane, all the way until he finds a local road or highway of some sort where he can catch a ride back to civilization. The premise is, we follow him as he uses his wits and the few pieces of equipment he has on him to survive these situations.

Only this show cheats. And they got caught.

The show is British, and originally broadcast on BBC's Channel 4, the complaints about authenticity have sparked an investigation. The evidence is pretty damaging, for instance the BBC article has this to say:

American survival consultant Mark Weinert, who was recruited by Diverse Productions, told the paper Grylls claimed to be stranded on a desert island on one occasion.

However, he was actually in Hawaii and spent some of his time there in a motel, Mr Weinert alleged.

Wha?!?
also:

And in a further episode, supposedly "wild" horses rounded up by Grylls had come from a local trekking facility, he claimed.

When you watch the show, you can tell something is fishy. Bear will often scale down the side of a shear rock face while the camera crew sits at the top filming him. When he gets to the bottom, suddenly the camera is there to catch him setting foot on solid ground... How?

It's a real shame because Bear Grylls is charming and smart, and really does know his shit. Why do they need to trick us? How can a show that is entirely about being smart treat it's audience like we're stupid. Man VS. Wild... You Blew It.

Alternatively, The Science Channel has a show called "Survivorman." This show follows Les Stroud, and really seems to be what it advertises.

No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools... no camera crew. One man - alone in the wild for seven days with only his wits and stamina to sustain him.

When Les Stroud films a scene where he walks away from the camera and off into the desert sunset, you know he had to set up his own camera and film the scene. Then he had to walk all the way back and get his camera. He basically has to do things twice so we get to see them.

Master of The Interrortron

Our favorite documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, has begun a series of essays on Photography for the New York Times.

Errol Morris has directed documentaries like Vernon Florida, The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death, and of course A Brief History of Time. He has also invented a 2 way, closed circuit television/camera interview contraption he calls, "The Interrortron." It works by seperating the interviewer and subject and broadcasting the sound and images back and forth. He says his wife came up with the name, and they loved it because it combined the words Interview and Terror.

In this essay Errol discusses his attempts to find "The Truth" in photography. If a photograph is deprived of it's context, will it still tell the truth about it's subject? Errol believes that only after seeing a photo's caption can one begin to ask questions about it.

"The issue of the truth or falsity of a photograph is only meaningful with respect to statements about the photograph. Truth or falsity “adheres” not to the photograph itself but to the statements we make about a photograph. Depending on the statements, our answers change. All alone — shorn of context, without captions — a photograph is neither true nor false."

I would argue that really great photography will work devoid of any context. Because all the context we need should be in the photograph. Our art school was next door to the High Museum of Art here in Atlanta, and we were entitled to free admission to the museum whenever we wanted. Of my favorite works of art in the museum, I've always remembered one photograph in particular. This photo, which sadly is no longer part of the collection, taught me more about photography than either of the 2 photography classes I took in school (and did poorly in) ever did.

It was a photo taken just after a rain storm, you could tell because dark rain clouds could still be seen in the distance. In the foreground sat a muddy puddle of water surrounded by the aftermath of an evidently strong rain storm. Branches and soaked debris littered the ground. Next to the puddle stood a skinny, wet dog. The photo was taken just as the dog was taking a drink of water from that puddle. It's little dog eyes squeezed shut as it's tongue extended down into the water making a little splash.

This photo taught me 2 big things. A good photo provides all the context it needs in of itself. And secondly, a great photo means that you were simply in the right place at the right time, and you had your camera with you.

Folded Thinking

And here I thought I'd never relate to an article from the New Yorker...

The author Simon Rich gives us a sort of super self-conscious and slightly paranoid inner dialogue of what he imagined people were saying about him when he was a kid. Wow...

@ thirteen years of age:
“Hey, look, that thirteen-year-old is walking around with his mom!”
“Where?”
“There—in front of the supermarket!”
“Oh, my God! That kid is way too old to be hanging out with his mom. Even though I’ve never met him, I can tell he’s a complete loser.”
“Wait a minute. He’s scowling at her and rolling his eyes.”
“Oh, yeah . . . and I think I just heard him curse at her, for no reason.”
“I guess he’s cool after all.”

I like to overthink things. I like to build large unweildy and unrealistic bridges of comprehension between things that may or may not have anything to do with each other. A sort of Calabi-Yau space of thought folded in on itself a thousand times until it exists in all dimensions at once. That's how I order lunch. You might think that you are just telling me you are out of onions, but I KNOW WHAT'S REALLY GOING ON.

The Theoretical Calabi-Yau space, a main tenant of Super String Theory, this is also where my brain gets trapped

Here's another example. When I walk into a crowded room I immediately start making imaginary flight paths for all objects that exist in that space. Warning! There is a potted plant... avoid. Caution! A small man has stopped in your direct path, make adjustments. Proximity Alert! There is a group of 3 people walking directly towards you, adjust... adjust... Oh No! They're splitting up! For the love of God!
WATCH WERE YOU ARE GOING!

CUT TO STATIC
SIGNAL LOST...

It's hard work.

Tyler's Ultimate Blunder

We were willing to give The Food Network's Tyler Florence the benefit of doubt as a "Celebrity Chef" even though he's the poor man's Bobby Flay. We even felt like he was a little more charming than the beloved Flay. That is... Until we saw his piss poor Applebee's commercials. Wow what a blunder!

His latest "creation" in the Grilling Fresh line of signature Tyler Florence dishes is Tyler's New Yorker. You see, what Tyler likes to do is start with a New York Strip Steak. (Who doesn't?!) Then he half asses it up a notch by siding it with onion rings. Finally, just to make sure we absolutely KNOW he doesn't give a shit, he rounds it out with a blue cheese salad...

What exactly did Tyler hope we'd take away from his association with America's most mediocre little neighborhood grill Applebee's? And did he really expect us to believe he "created" a New York Strip Steak with Onions Rings and Salad? I heard he's working on a secret new dish... It's a "twist" on an American classic. Tyler likes to take an all beef patty and then layers one slice of mild, flavorless, white Amercan cheese that is of a medium thickness. Then he tops the burger off by actually putting in a bun! Can you believe it!

We can't wait to try it.

Block Smashing Cake Action

While reading this Boing Boing post about a multi-teared multi-tiered video game console wedding cake it reminded me of the super awesome Groom's cake that my friends made for me when I got married.

I sent the photo along to the guys at Boing Boing and they made a post about it. I wouldn't have had this great cake if not for the hard work of Matt, Jackie, Nat and Sharie. Thanks again you guys!

Clark Howard's Timed Stoplights

Saturday night we saw this month's episode of the Lucky Yates Talk Show at The Vortex Bar and Grill in Midtown. It was another great show, (our monologue jokes bombed as per usual) and featured local hero and Consumer Activist Clark Howard. He's like the nicest guy in the world. After the show we spoke to him about our iPhone! Even though his official advice was to wait for the "next version" he seemed impressed with it's beauty.

Clark responded to a recent article blog post from our local free newspaper, Creative Loafing, that called for the lovable Howard to run for Mayor of Atlanta! (There's a bit of controversy surrounding this story, as it was aped (re-written) by our NON-free local newspaper The AJC who failed in any way to cite the previous article) Clark Howard seemed open to the idea of running for Mayor, but wouldn't exactly commit quite yet. He did have lots of great ideas for fixing some of ATLs problems. (like timed stoplights, and an effort to remind the City workers that they work for US)

Also making a rare appearance that night was the world's only all-bass Rollie Fingers tribute band: Bases Loaded. Their mustaches proceeded them.

Incidentally...

We sat directly behind AJC blogger Rodney Ho who blogged about the show instead of actually watching it. Seriously, he had his Macbook Pro open and was hunched over typing in his blog practically the whole time. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he really couldn't wait? I don't know... Maybe it's no different than a film critic taking notes on a notepad with a little flashlight during a movie. Although it seems much douche-baggier.

Posted from iPhone.

"Let's ROFLMAO!"

We saw Transformers yesterday. It wasn't terrible and I actually had a blast watching it.

The robots looked pretty awesome, even if it was hard to tell exactly what they looked like sometimes. Especially the Decepticons, they barely slow down enough to see them fully.

I totally called who was going to be the first minor human character to die within 3 seconds of meeting them. It's a Micheal Bay film... there aren't too many surprises. Although the acting from the human characters was pretty admirable, considering.

Some of the dialog was laugh out loud bad, but I don't care how good of a writer you are, trying to shoe horn in "There's more to THEM than meets the eye" is going to feel weird no matter what. There is a lot to look at in the film and always something new and shiny just around the corner. So the film is fun and enjoyable and ridiculous and dumb.

In other news:
I also had some time to make a new iPhone desktop.

As a matter of fact it is the awesomest!

Whoa! What a weekend!

We got to the Apple store just after lunch on Friday where we ended up being a respectable 50th in line. Apple employees brought us water and coffee while we waited. We were thanked for our support of Apple several times and rarely made to feel like jerks for waiting in line for a phone. The phones themselves arrived around 4:00pm and we were informed that they had "plenty" of them. And they did! There were stacks and stacks of them!

Where the Great Apple Experience ended...

The flaming tailspin into the inescapable pull of AT&T hell promptly began.

We spent the better part of the entire weekend in various states of AT&T limbo. Nobody could tell us what was going on. Our beloved phone was apparently stuck in a failed activation loop. And a popular instruction from the polite and apologetic but ultimately clueless AT&T agents was "wait a little longer." We believe that AT&T, in an effort to bulk out their work force, hired a bunch of people specifically for the iPhone launch. I spoke to at least 3 people on Friday who told me that this was their first day on the job! Of course they had no clue how to help me, and were easily overwhelmed.

We finally spoke to someone on sunday who told us we would have to have the sim card replaced in our iPhone. Which we did, with the help of the lovely Celena at the Perimeter Apple Store. (She called the nearest AT&T store, and had a sim card waiting for us when we arrived.) Celena at The Perimeter Apple Store really saved our bacon, and was really nice about it the whole time despite the fact that I was totally freaking out, and had been for 3 days solid.

A special thanks also goes out to Chris at the AT&T Perimeter Store, he had our new sim card ready to go and set us up in minutes. (we also know how to get to the sim card now, which is partially hidden on the iPhone)

Our phone works now. And it is the awesomest.

The Phone:
The display is amazing and clear and crisp. The interface is easy as pie and tastes twice as nice.

The 2 megapixel camera takes fine quality photos (given there is enough light) and using the entire display as the camera view-screen is beautiful.

Typing on the touch screen keyboard takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural. Especially when held in the sideways position so the keyboard is bigger. It's a bummer that sideways positioning only works in Safari. I'd love it if all the programs utilized that amazing feature. Especially Mail!
Do it Apple!
seriously, do it.

I'm really looking forward to the web applications that are being written for iPhone's Safari browser. There's a lot of potential there... but I still haven't found any "web apps" out there that I thought were especially great or that I absolutely had to bookmark.

Dudes, the iPhone is my new best friend. As douchebaggy as it sounds, even when Ferris Beuller said it, that doesn't mean it's not true:

"It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

I made a desktop for the iPhone:

It has been recommended that you save iPhone desktops into an iPhoto album and sync it through iTunes under the "Photos" tab. I'll probably be making some more.

Oh jeez, I can't believe I almost forgot about this. Our friends at Nattybumpercar have put together a Special News Report from Coffee Can Alley TV’s News Room all about the release of this great phone. You should check it out.

God Loves you as He Loved Jacob

Welcome to Station 6: The Orchid

More on the Mysterious Casimir Effect, a principle of Quatum Field Theory.

Also, we're thinking of adopting a new dog and naming him Neils Bohr, is that too much?

No D'ohs

On Friday our bosses took the whole office out to see The Simpsons Movie.

It was great. We laughed out loud continually through the whole movie. And not the bad kind of laugh out louds we endured during Spider-pig 3. Even our boss and the Head Writer of Frisky Dingo, Adam Reed, gave it his seal of approval. And that guy might be the toughest critic of comedy I've ever met.

It looks like The Simpson's Movie is doing quite well at the box office. Selling $168 million in tickets during the opening weekend. We didn't expect to hate the movie, and everybody knows the TV show isn't as good as it used to be. We were just surprised by how much this movie felt like the Simpson's of old.

Duderonomy: Rules to live by, and sometimes break

Every year we talk about attending Lebowskifest, and every year we fail to go. Lewbowskifest is a weekend long celebration of the movie The Big Lebowski held in Louisville, Kentucky. The festival includes a bowling tournament, a costume contest, features a bunch of musical performances, and of course a screening of the film itself. It sounds like heaven for any Little Lewbowski Urban Achiever.

Who knows, we may never make it the festival. That doesn't mean that we can't bring a little bit of Lebowski with us wherever we go. Now we have Dudeism.

"The slowest-growing religion in the world - Dudeism. An ancient philosophy that preaches non-preachiness, practices as little as possible, and above all, uh...lost my train of thought there. Anyway, if you'd like to find peace on earth and goodwill, man, we'll help you get started. Right after a little nap.

At the Dudeism website you can check out the Book of Duderonomy. A set of rules that you can choose to live by, or not live by, or even break if you feel like it. You know, whatever man. For instance, Book 3 of Duderonomy: Rule Number 5 says:

"5. Try not to use so many cuss words. Unless they're near and dear to your heart, in which case, fuck it."

You can also become an Ordained Dudeist Priest, check out the Tao of Dude Weblog, or see some of The Great Dudes of History. (via metafilter)

Man VS. Wild CHEATS

We've caught a few episodes of Discovery Channel's survival show "Man VS. Wild" starring Bear Grylls. The show does a good job of grabbing you. Bear parachutes into a remote and hostile location, like deep in a rain forest, or on top of a giant mountain, or even simply out in the middle of a desert.

The show follows him from the point he jumps out of a plane, all the way until he finds a local road or highway of some sort where he can catch a ride back to civilization. The premise is, we follow him as he uses his wits and the few pieces of equipment he has on him to survive these situations.

Only this show cheats. And they got caught.

The show is British, and originally broadcast on BBC's Channel 4, the complaints about authenticity have sparked an investigation. The evidence is pretty damaging, for instance the BBC article has this to say:

American survival consultant Mark Weinert, who was recruited by Diverse Productions, told the paper Grylls claimed to be stranded on a desert island on one occasion.

However, he was actually in Hawaii and spent some of his time there in a motel, Mr Weinert alleged.

Wha?!?
also:

And in a further episode, supposedly "wild" horses rounded up by Grylls had come from a local trekking facility, he claimed.

When you watch the show, you can tell something is fishy. Bear will often scale down the side of a shear rock face while the camera crew sits at the top filming him. When he gets to the bottom, suddenly the camera is there to catch him setting foot on solid ground... How?

It's a real shame because Bear Grylls is charming and smart, and really does know his shit. Why do they need to trick us? How can a show that is entirely about being smart treat it's audience like we're stupid. Man VS. Wild... You Blew It.

Alternatively, The Science Channel has a show called "Survivorman." This show follows Les Stroud, and really seems to be what it advertises.

No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools... no camera crew. One man - alone in the wild for seven days with only his wits and stamina to sustain him.

When Les Stroud films a scene where he walks away from the camera and off into the desert sunset, you know he had to set up his own camera and film the scene. Then he had to walk all the way back and get his camera. He basically has to do things twice so we get to see them.

Master of The Interrortron

Our favorite documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, has begun a series of essays on Photography for the New York Times.

Errol Morris has directed documentaries like Vernon Florida, The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death, and of course A Brief History of Time. He has also invented a 2 way, closed circuit television/camera interview contraption he calls, "The Interrortron." It works by seperating the interviewer and subject and broadcasting the sound and images back and forth. He says his wife came up with the name, and they loved it because it combined the words Interview and Terror.

In this essay Errol discusses his attempts to find "The Truth" in photography. If a photograph is deprived of it's context, will it still tell the truth about it's subject? Errol believes that only after seeing a photo's caption can one begin to ask questions about it.

"The issue of the truth or falsity of a photograph is only meaningful with respect to statements about the photograph. Truth or falsity “adheres” not to the photograph itself but to the statements we make about a photograph. Depending on the statements, our answers change. All alone — shorn of context, without captions — a photograph is neither true nor false."

I would argue that really great photography will work devoid of any context. Because all the context we need should be in the photograph. Our art school was next door to the High Museum of Art here in Atlanta, and we were entitled to free admission to the museum whenever we wanted. Of my favorite works of art in the museum, I've always remembered one photograph in particular. This photo, which sadly is no longer part of the collection, taught me more about photography than either of the 2 photography classes I took in school (and did poorly in) ever did.

It was a photo taken just after a rain storm, you could tell because dark rain clouds could still be seen in the distance. In the foreground sat a muddy puddle of water surrounded by the aftermath of an evidently strong rain storm. Branches and soaked debris littered the ground. Next to the puddle stood a skinny, wet dog. The photo was taken just as the dog was taking a drink of water from that puddle. It's little dog eyes squeezed shut as it's tongue extended down into the water making a little splash.

This photo taught me 2 big things. A good photo provides all the context it needs in of itself. And secondly, a great photo means that you were simply in the right place at the right time, and you had your camera with you.

Folded Thinking

And here I thought I'd never relate to an article from the New Yorker...

The author Simon Rich gives us a sort of super self-conscious and slightly paranoid inner dialogue of what he imagined people were saying about him when he was a kid. Wow...

@ thirteen years of age:
“Hey, look, that thirteen-year-old is walking around with his mom!”
“Where?”
“There—in front of the supermarket!”
“Oh, my God! That kid is way too old to be hanging out with his mom. Even though I’ve never met him, I can tell he’s a complete loser.”
“Wait a minute. He’s scowling at her and rolling his eyes.”
“Oh, yeah . . . and I think I just heard him curse at her, for no reason.”
“I guess he’s cool after all.”

I like to overthink things. I like to build large unweildy and unrealistic bridges of comprehension between things that may or may not have anything to do with each other. A sort of Calabi-Yau space of thought folded in on itself a thousand times until it exists in all dimensions at once. That's how I order lunch. You might think that you are just telling me you are out of onions, but I KNOW WHAT'S REALLY GOING ON.

The Theoretical Calabi-Yau space, a main tenant of Super String Theory, this is also where my brain gets trapped

Here's another example. When I walk into a crowded room I immediately start making imaginary flight paths for all objects that exist in that space. Warning! There is a potted plant... avoid. Caution! A small man has stopped in your direct path, make adjustments. Proximity Alert! There is a group of 3 people walking directly towards you, adjust... adjust... Oh No! They're splitting up! For the love of God!
WATCH WERE YOU ARE GOING!

CUT TO STATIC
SIGNAL LOST...

It's hard work.

Tyler's Ultimate Blunder

We were willing to give The Food Network's Tyler Florence the benefit of doubt as a "Celebrity Chef" even though he's the poor man's Bobby Flay. We even felt like he was a little more charming than the beloved Flay. That is... Until we saw his piss poor Applebee's commercials. Wow what a blunder!

His latest "creation" in the Grilling Fresh line of signature Tyler Florence dishes is Tyler's New Yorker. You see, what Tyler likes to do is start with a New York Strip Steak. (Who doesn't?!) Then he half asses it up a notch by siding it with onion rings. Finally, just to make sure we absolutely KNOW he doesn't give a shit, he rounds it out with a blue cheese salad...

What exactly did Tyler hope we'd take away from his association with America's most mediocre little neighborhood grill Applebee's? And did he really expect us to believe he "created" a New York Strip Steak with Onions Rings and Salad? I heard he's working on a secret new dish... It's a "twist" on an American classic. Tyler likes to take an all beef patty and then layers one slice of mild, flavorless, white Amercan cheese that is of a medium thickness. Then he tops the burger off by actually putting in a bun! Can you believe it!

We can't wait to try it.

Block Smashing Cake Action

While reading this Boing Boing post about a multi-teared multi-tiered video game console wedding cake it reminded me of the super awesome Groom's cake that my friends made for me when I got married.

I sent the photo along to the guys at Boing Boing and they made a post about it. I wouldn't have had this great cake if not for the hard work of Matt, Jackie, Nat and Sharie. Thanks again you guys!

Clark Howard's Timed Stoplights

Saturday night we saw this month's episode of the Lucky Yates Talk Show at The Vortex Bar and Grill in Midtown. It was another great show, (our monologue jokes bombed as per usual) and featured local hero and Consumer Activist Clark Howard. He's like the nicest guy in the world. After the show we spoke to him about our iPhone! Even though his official advice was to wait for the "next version" he seemed impressed with it's beauty.

Clark responded to a recent article blog post from our local free newspaper, Creative Loafing, that called for the lovable Howard to run for Mayor of Atlanta! (There's a bit of controversy surrounding this story, as it was aped (re-written) by our NON-free local newspaper The AJC who failed in any way to cite the previous article) Clark Howard seemed open to the idea of running for Mayor, but wouldn't exactly commit quite yet. He did have lots of great ideas for fixing some of ATLs problems. (like timed stoplights, and an effort to remind the City workers that they work for US)

Also making a rare appearance that night was the world's only all-bass Rollie Fingers tribute band: Bases Loaded. Their mustaches proceeded them.

Incidentally...

We sat directly behind AJC blogger Rodney Ho who blogged about the show instead of actually watching it. Seriously, he had his Macbook Pro open and was hunched over typing in his blog practically the whole time. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he really couldn't wait? I don't know... Maybe it's no different than a film critic taking notes on a notepad with a little flashlight during a movie. Although it seems much douche-baggier.

Posted from iPhone.

"Let's ROFLMAO!"

We saw Transformers yesterday. It wasn't terrible and I actually had a blast watching it.

The robots looked pretty awesome, even if it was hard to tell exactly what they looked like sometimes. Especially the Decepticons, they barely slow down enough to see them fully.

I totally called who was going to be the first minor human character to die within 3 seconds of meeting them. It's a Micheal Bay film... there aren't too many surprises. Although the acting from the human characters was pretty admirable, considering.

Some of the dialog was laugh out loud bad, but I don't care how good of a writer you are, trying to shoe horn in "There's more to THEM than meets the eye" is going to feel weird no matter what. There is a lot to look at in the film and always something new and shiny just around the corner. So the film is fun and enjoyable and ridiculous and dumb.

In other news:
I also had some time to make a new iPhone desktop.

As a matter of fact it is the awesomest!

Whoa! What a weekend!

We got to the Apple store just after lunch on Friday where we ended up being a respectable 50th in line. Apple employees brought us water and coffee while we waited. We were thanked for our support of Apple several times and rarely made to feel like jerks for waiting in line for a phone. The phones themselves arrived around 4:00pm and we were informed that they had "plenty" of them. And they did! There were stacks and stacks of them!

Where the Great Apple Experience ended...

The flaming tailspin into the inescapable pull of AT&T hell promptly began.

We spent the better part of the entire weekend in various states of AT&T limbo. Nobody could tell us what was going on. Our beloved phone was apparently stuck in a failed activation loop. And a popular instruction from the polite and apologetic but ultimately clueless AT&T agents was "wait a little longer." We believe that AT&T, in an effort to bulk out their work force, hired a bunch of people specifically for the iPhone launch. I spoke to at least 3 people on Friday who told me that this was their first day on the job! Of course they had no clue how to help me, and were easily overwhelmed.

We finally spoke to someone on sunday who told us we would have to have the sim card replaced in our iPhone. Which we did, with the help of the lovely Celena at the Perimeter Apple Store. (She called the nearest AT&T store, and had a sim card waiting for us when we arrived.) Celena at The Perimeter Apple Store really saved our bacon, and was really nice about it the whole time despite the fact that I was totally freaking out, and had been for 3 days solid.

A special thanks also goes out to Chris at the AT&T Perimeter Store, he had our new sim card ready to go and set us up in minutes. (we also know how to get to the sim card now, which is partially hidden on the iPhone)

Our phone works now. And it is the awesomest.

The Phone:
The display is amazing and clear and crisp. The interface is easy as pie and tastes twice as nice.

The 2 megapixel camera takes fine quality photos (given there is enough light) and using the entire display as the camera view-screen is beautiful.

Typing on the touch screen keyboard takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural. Especially when held in the sideways position so the keyboard is bigger. It's a bummer that sideways positioning only works in Safari. I'd love it if all the programs utilized that amazing feature. Especially Mail!
Do it Apple!
seriously, do it.

I'm really looking forward to the web applications that are being written for iPhone's Safari browser. There's a lot of potential there... but I still haven't found any "web apps" out there that I thought were especially great or that I absolutely had to bookmark.

Dudes, the iPhone is my new best friend. As douchebaggy as it sounds, even when Ferris Beuller said it, that doesn't mean it's not true:

"It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

I made a desktop for the iPhone:

It has been recommended that you save iPhone desktops into an iPhoto album and sync it through iTunes under the "Photos" tab. I'll probably be making some more.

Oh jeez, I can't believe I almost forgot about this. Our friends at Nattybumpercar have put together a Special News Report from Coffee Can Alley TV’s News Room all about the release of this great phone. You should check it out.

God Loves you as He Loved Jacob

Welcome to Station 6: The Orchid

More on the Mysterious Casimir Effect, a principle of Quatum Field Theory.

Also, we're thinking of adopting a new dog and naming him Neils Bohr, is that too much?

No D'ohs

On Friday our bosses took the whole office out to see The Simpsons Movie.

It was great. We laughed out loud continually through the whole movie. And not the bad kind of laugh out louds we endured during Spider-pig 3. Even our boss and the Head Writer of Frisky Dingo, Adam Reed, gave it his seal of approval. And that guy might be the toughest critic of comedy I've ever met.

It looks like The Simpson's Movie is doing quite well at the box office. Selling $168 million in tickets during the opening weekend. We didn't expect to hate the movie, and everybody knows the TV show isn't as good as it used to be. We were just surprised by how much this movie felt like the Simpson's of old.

Duderonomy: Rules to live by, and sometimes break

Every year we talk about attending Lebowskifest, and every year we fail to go. Lewbowskifest is a weekend long celebration of the movie The Big Lebowski held in Louisville, Kentucky. The festival includes a bowling tournament, a costume contest, features a bunch of musical performances, and of course a screening of the film itself. It sounds like heaven for any Little Lewbowski Urban Achiever.

Who knows, we may never make it the festival. That doesn't mean that we can't bring a little bit of Lebowski with us wherever we go. Now we have Dudeism.

"The slowest-growing religion in the world - Dudeism. An ancient philosophy that preaches non-preachiness, practices as little as possible, and above all, uh...lost my train of thought there. Anyway, if you'd like to find peace on earth and goodwill, man, we'll help you get started. Right after a little nap.

At the Dudeism website you can check out the Book of Duderonomy. A set of rules that you can choose to live by, or not live by, or even break if you feel like it. You know, whatever man. For instance, Book 3 of Duderonomy: Rule Number 5 says:

"5. Try not to use so many cuss words. Unless they're near and dear to your heart, in which case, fuck it."

You can also become an Ordained Dudeist Priest, check out the Tao of Dude Weblog, or see some of The Great Dudes of History. (via metafilter)

Man VS. Wild CHEATS

We've caught a few episodes of Discovery Channel's survival show "Man VS. Wild" starring Bear Grylls. The show does a good job of grabbing you. Bear parachutes into a remote and hostile location, like deep in a rain forest, or on top of a giant mountain, or even simply out in the middle of a desert.

The show follows him from the point he jumps out of a plane, all the way until he finds a local road or highway of some sort where he can catch a ride back to civilization. The premise is, we follow him as he uses his wits and the few pieces of equipment he has on him to survive these situations.

Only this show cheats. And they got caught.

The show is British, and originally broadcast on BBC's Channel 4, the complaints about authenticity have sparked an investigation. The evidence is pretty damaging, for instance the BBC article has this to say:

American survival consultant Mark Weinert, who was recruited by Diverse Productions, told the paper Grylls claimed to be stranded on a desert island on one occasion.

However, he was actually in Hawaii and spent some of his time there in a motel, Mr Weinert alleged.

Wha?!?
also:

And in a further episode, supposedly "wild" horses rounded up by Grylls had come from a local trekking facility, he claimed.

When you watch the show, you can tell something is fishy. Bear will often scale down the side of a shear rock face while the camera crew sits at the top filming him. When he gets to the bottom, suddenly the camera is there to catch him setting foot on solid ground... How?

It's a real shame because Bear Grylls is charming and smart, and really does know his shit. Why do they need to trick us? How can a show that is entirely about being smart treat it's audience like we're stupid. Man VS. Wild... You Blew It.

Alternatively, The Science Channel has a show called "Survivorman." This show follows Les Stroud, and really seems to be what it advertises.

No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools... no camera crew. One man - alone in the wild for seven days with only his wits and stamina to sustain him.

When Les Stroud films a scene where he walks away from the camera and off into the desert sunset, you know he had to set up his own camera and film the scene. Then he had to walk all the way back and get his camera. He basically has to do things twice so we get to see them.

Master of The Interrortron

Our favorite documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, has begun a series of essays on Photography for the New York Times.

Errol Morris has directed documentaries like Vernon Florida, The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death, and of course A Brief History of Time. He has also invented a 2 way, closed circuit television/camera interview contraption he calls, "The Interrortron." It works by seperating the interviewer and subject and broadcasting the sound and images back and forth. He says his wife came up with the name, and they loved it because it combined the words Interview and Terror.

In this essay Errol discusses his attempts to find "The Truth" in photography. If a photograph is deprived of it's context, will it still tell the truth about it's subject? Errol believes that only after seeing a photo's caption can one begin to ask questions about it.

"The issue of the truth or falsity of a photograph is only meaningful with respect to statements about the photograph. Truth or falsity “adheres” not to the photograph itself but to the statements we make about a photograph. Depending on the statements, our answers change. All alone — shorn of context, without captions — a photograph is neither true nor false."

I would argue that really great photography will work devoid of any context. Because all the context we need should be in the photograph. Our art school was next door to the High Museum of Art here in Atlanta, and we were entitled to free admission to the museum whenever we wanted. Of my favorite works of art in the museum, I've always remembered one photograph in particular. This photo, which sadly is no longer part of the collection, taught me more about photography than either of the 2 photography classes I took in school (and did poorly in) ever did.

It was a photo taken just after a rain storm, you could tell because dark rain clouds could still be seen in the distance. In the foreground sat a muddy puddle of water surrounded by the aftermath of an evidently strong rain storm. Branches and soaked debris littered the ground. Next to the puddle stood a skinny, wet dog. The photo was taken just as the dog was taking a drink of water from that puddle. It's little dog eyes squeezed shut as it's tongue extended down into the water making a little splash.

This photo taught me 2 big things. A good photo provides all the context it needs in of itself. And secondly, a great photo means that you were simply in the right place at the right time, and you had your camera with you.

Folded Thinking

And here I thought I'd never relate to an article from the New Yorker...

The author Simon Rich gives us a sort of super self-conscious and slightly paranoid inner dialogue of what he imagined people were saying about him when he was a kid. Wow...

@ thirteen years of age:
“Hey, look, that thirteen-year-old is walking around with his mom!”
“Where?”
“There—in front of the supermarket!”
“Oh, my God! That kid is way too old to be hanging out with his mom. Even though I’ve never met him, I can tell he’s a complete loser.”
“Wait a minute. He’s scowling at her and rolling his eyes.”
“Oh, yeah . . . and I think I just heard him curse at her, for no reason.”
“I guess he’s cool after all.”

I like to overthink things. I like to build large unweildy and unrealistic bridges of comprehension between things that may or may not have anything to do with each other. A sort of Calabi-Yau space of thought folded in on itself a thousand times until it exists in all dimensions at once. That's how I order lunch. You might think that you are just telling me you are out of onions, but I KNOW WHAT'S REALLY GOING ON.

The Theoretical Calabi-Yau space, a main tenant of Super String Theory, this is also where my brain gets trapped

Here's another example. When I walk into a crowded room I immediately start making imaginary flight paths for all objects that exist in that space. Warning! There is a potted plant... avoid. Caution! A small man has stopped in your direct path, make adjustments. Proximity Alert! There is a group of 3 people walking directly towards you, adjust... adjust... Oh No! They're splitting up! For the love of God!
WATCH WERE YOU ARE GOING!

CUT TO STATIC
SIGNAL LOST...

It's hard work.

Tyler's Ultimate Blunder

We were willing to give The Food Network's Tyler Florence the benefit of doubt as a "Celebrity Chef" even though he's the poor man's Bobby Flay. We even felt like he was a little more charming than the beloved Flay. That is... Until we saw his piss poor Applebee's commercials. Wow what a blunder!

His latest "creation" in the Grilling Fresh line of signature Tyler Florence dishes is Tyler's New Yorker. You see, what Tyler likes to do is start with a New York Strip Steak. (Who doesn't?!) Then he half asses it up a notch by siding it with onion rings. Finally, just to make sure we absolutely KNOW he doesn't give a shit, he rounds it out with a blue cheese salad...

What exactly did Tyler hope we'd take away from his association with America's most mediocre little neighborhood grill Applebee's? And did he really expect us to believe he "created" a New York Strip Steak with Onions Rings and Salad? I heard he's working on a secret new dish... It's a "twist" on an American classic. Tyler likes to take an all beef patty and then layers one slice of mild, flavorless, white Amercan cheese that is of a medium thickness. Then he tops the burger off by actually putting in a bun! Can you believe it!

We can't wait to try it.

Block Smashing Cake Action

While reading this Boing Boing post about a multi-teared multi-tiered video game console wedding cake it reminded me of the super awesome Groom's cake that my friends made for me when I got married.

I sent the photo along to the guys at Boing Boing and they made a post about it. I wouldn't have had this great cake if not for the hard work of Matt, Jackie, Nat and Sharie. Thanks again you guys!

Clark Howard's Timed Stoplights

Saturday night we saw this month's episode of the Lucky Yates Talk Show at The Vortex Bar and Grill in Midtown. It was another great show, (our monologue jokes bombed as per usual) and featured local hero and Consumer Activist Clark Howard. He's like the nicest guy in the world. After the show we spoke to him about our iPhone! Even though his official advice was to wait for the "next version" he seemed impressed with it's beauty.

Clark responded to a recent article blog post from our local free newspaper, Creative Loafing, that called for the lovable Howard to run for Mayor of Atlanta! (There's a bit of controversy surrounding this story, as it was aped (re-written) by our NON-free local newspaper The AJC who failed in any way to cite the previous article) Clark Howard seemed open to the idea of running for Mayor, but wouldn't exactly commit quite yet. He did have lots of great ideas for fixing some of ATLs problems. (like timed stoplights, and an effort to remind the City workers that they work for US)

Also making a rare appearance that night was the world's only all-bass Rollie Fingers tribute band: Bases Loaded. Their mustaches proceeded them.

Incidentally...

We sat directly behind AJC blogger Rodney Ho who blogged about the show instead of actually watching it. Seriously, he had his Macbook Pro open and was hunched over typing in his blog practically the whole time. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he really couldn't wait? I don't know... Maybe it's no different than a film critic taking notes on a notepad with a little flashlight during a movie. Although it seems much douche-baggier.

Posted from iPhone.

"Let's ROFLMAO!"

We saw Transformers yesterday. It wasn't terrible and I actually had a blast watching it.

The robots looked pretty awesome, even if it was hard to tell exactly what they looked like sometimes. Especially the Decepticons, they barely slow down enough to see them fully.

I totally called who was going to be the first minor human character to die within 3 seconds of meeting them. It's a Micheal Bay film... there aren't too many surprises. Although the acting from the human characters was pretty admirable, considering.

Some of the dialog was laugh out loud bad, but I don't care how good of a writer you are, trying to shoe horn in "There's more to THEM than meets the eye" is going to feel weird no matter what. There is a lot to look at in the film and always something new and shiny just around the corner. So the film is fun and enjoyable and ridiculous and dumb.

In other news:
I also had some time to make a new iPhone desktop.

As a matter of fact it is the awesomest!

Whoa! What a weekend!

We got to the Apple store just after lunch on Friday where we ended up being a respectable 50th in line. Apple employees brought us water and coffee while we waited. We were thanked for our support of Apple several times and rarely made to feel like jerks for waiting in line for a phone. The phones themselves arrived around 4:00pm and we were informed that they had "plenty" of them. And they did! There were stacks and stacks of them!

Where the Great Apple Experience ended...

The flaming tailspin into the inescapable pull of AT&T hell promptly began.

We spent the better part of the entire weekend in various states of AT&T limbo. Nobody could tell us what was going on. Our beloved phone was apparently stuck in a failed activation loop. And a popular instruction from the polite and apologetic but ultimately clueless AT&T agents was "wait a little longer." We believe that AT&T, in an effort to bulk out their work force, hired a bunch of people specifically for the iPhone launch. I spoke to at least 3 people on Friday who told me that this was their first day on the job! Of course they had no clue how to help me, and were easily overwhelmed.

We finally spoke to someone on sunday who told us we would have to have the sim card replaced in our iPhone. Which we did, with the help of the lovely Celena at the Perimeter Apple Store. (She called the nearest AT&T store, and had a sim card waiting for us when we arrived.) Celena at The Perimeter Apple Store really saved our bacon, and was really nice about it the whole time despite the fact that I was totally freaking out, and had been for 3 days solid.

A special thanks also goes out to Chris at the AT&T Perimeter Store, he had our new sim card ready to go and set us up in minutes. (we also know how to get to the sim card now, which is partially hidden on the iPhone)

Our phone works now. And it is the awesomest.

The Phone:
The display is amazing and clear and crisp. The interface is easy as pie and tastes twice as nice.

The 2 megapixel camera takes fine quality photos (given there is enough light) and using the entire display as the camera view-screen is beautiful.

Typing on the touch screen keyboard takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural. Especially when held in the sideways position so the keyboard is bigger. It's a bummer that sideways positioning only works in Safari. I'd love it if all the programs utilized that amazing feature. Especially Mail!
Do it Apple!
seriously, do it.

I'm really looking forward to the web applications that are being written for iPhone's Safari browser. There's a lot of potential there... but I still haven't found any "web apps" out there that I thought were especially great or that I absolutely had to bookmark.

Dudes, the iPhone is my new best friend. As douchebaggy as it sounds, even when Ferris Beuller said it, that doesn't mean it's not true:

"It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

I made a desktop for the iPhone:

It has been recommended that you save iPhone desktops into an iPhoto album and sync it through iTunes under the "Photos" tab. I'll probably be making some more.

Oh jeez, I can't believe I almost forgot about this. Our friends at Nattybumpercar have put together a Special News Report from Coffee Can Alley TV’s News Room all about the release of this great phone. You should check it out.

God Loves you as He Loved Jacob

Welcome to Station 6: The Orchid

More on the Mysterious Casimir Effect, a principle of Quatum Field Theory.

Also, we're thinking of adopting a new dog and naming him Neils Bohr, is that too much?

No D'ohs

On Friday our bosses took the whole office out to see The Simpsons Movie.

It was great. We laughed out loud continually through the whole movie. And not the bad kind of laugh out louds we endured during Spider-pig 3. Even our boss and the Head Writer of Frisky Dingo, Adam Reed, gave it his seal of approval. And that guy might be the toughest critic of comedy I've ever met.

It looks like The Simpson's Movie is doing quite well at the box office. Selling $168 million in tickets during the opening weekend. We didn't expect to hate the movie, and everybody knows the TV show isn't as good as it used to be. We were just surprised by how much this movie felt like the Simpson's of old.

Duderonomy: Rules to live by, and sometimes break

Every year we talk about attending Lebowskifest, and every year we fail to go. Lewbowskifest is a weekend long celebration of the movie The Big Lebowski held in Louisville, Kentucky. The festival includes a bowling tournament, a costume contest, features a bunch of musical performances, and of course a screening of the film itself. It sounds like heaven for any Little Lewbowski Urban Achiever.

Who knows, we may never make it the festival. That doesn't mean that we can't bring a little bit of Lebowski with us wherever we go. Now we have Dudeism.

"The slowest-growing religion in the world - Dudeism. An ancient philosophy that preaches non-preachiness, practices as little as possible, and above all, uh...lost my train of thought there. Anyway, if you'd like to find peace on earth and goodwill, man, we'll help you get started. Right after a little nap.

At the Dudeism website you can check out the Book of Duderonomy. A set of rules that you can choose to live by, or not live by, or even break if you feel like it. You know, whatever man. For instance, Book 3 of Duderonomy: Rule Number 5 says:

"5. Try not to use so many cuss words. Unless they're near and dear to your heart, in which case, fuck it."

You can also become an Ordained Dudeist Priest, check out the Tao of Dude Weblog, or see some of The Great Dudes of History. (via metafilter)

Man VS. Wild CHEATS

We've caught a few episodes of Discovery Channel's survival show "Man VS. Wild" starring Bear Grylls. The show does a good job of grabbing you. Bear parachutes into a remote and hostile location, like deep in a rain forest, or on top of a giant mountain, or even simply out in the middle of a desert.

The show follows him from the point he jumps out of a plane, all the way until he finds a local road or highway of some sort where he can catch a ride back to civilization. The premise is, we follow him as he uses his wits and the few pieces of equipment he has on him to survive these situations.

Only this show cheats. And they got caught.

The show is British, and originally broadcast on BBC's Channel 4, the complaints about authenticity have sparked an investigation. The evidence is pretty damaging, for instance the BBC article has this to say:

American survival consultant Mark Weinert, who was recruited by Diverse Productions, told the paper Grylls claimed to be stranded on a desert island on one occasion.

However, he was actually in Hawaii and spent some of his time there in a motel, Mr Weinert alleged.

Wha?!?
also:

And in a further episode, supposedly "wild" horses rounded up by Grylls had come from a local trekking facility, he claimed.

When you watch the show, you can tell something is fishy. Bear will often scale down the side of a shear rock face while the camera crew sits at the top filming him. When he gets to the bottom, suddenly the camera is there to catch him setting foot on solid ground... How?

It's a real shame because Bear Grylls is charming and smart, and really does know his shit. Why do they need to trick us? How can a show that is entirely about being smart treat it's audience like we're stupid. Man VS. Wild... You Blew It.

Alternatively, The Science Channel has a show called "Survivorman." This show follows Les Stroud, and really seems to be what it advertises.

No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools... no camera crew. One man - alone in the wild for seven days with only his wits and stamina to sustain him.

When Les Stroud films a scene where he walks away from the camera and off into the desert sunset, you know he had to set up his own camera and film the scene. Then he had to walk all the way back and get his camera. He basically has to do things twice so we get to see them.

Master of The Interrortron

Our favorite documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, has begun a series of essays on Photography for the New York Times.

Errol Morris has directed documentaries like Vernon Florida, The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death, and of course A Brief History of Time. He has also invented a 2 way, closed circuit television/camera interview contraption he calls, "The Interrortron." It works by seperating the interviewer and subject and broadcasting the sound and images back and forth. He says his wife came up with the name, and they loved it because it combined the words Interview and Terror.

In this essay Errol discusses his attempts to find "The Truth" in photography. If a photograph is deprived of it's context, will it still tell the truth about it's subject? Errol believes that only after seeing a photo's caption can one begin to ask questions about it.

"The issue of the truth or falsity of a photograph is only meaningful with respect to statements about the photograph. Truth or falsity “adheres” not to the photograph itself but to the statements we make about a photograph. Depending on the statements, our answers change. All alone — shorn of context, without captions — a photograph is neither true nor false."

I would argue that really great photography will work devoid of any context. Because all the context we need should be in the photograph. Our art school was next door to the High Museum of Art here in Atlanta, and we were entitled to free admission to the museum whenever we wanted. Of my favorite works of art in the museum, I've always remembered one photograph in particular. This photo, which sadly is no longer part of the collection, taught me more about photography than either of the 2 photography classes I took in school (and did poorly in) ever did.

It was a photo taken just after a rain storm, you could tell because dark rain clouds could still be seen in the distance. In the foreground sat a muddy puddle of water surrounded by the aftermath of an evidently strong rain storm. Branches and soaked debris littered the ground. Next to the puddle stood a skinny, wet dog. The photo was taken just as the dog was taking a drink of water from that puddle. It's little dog eyes squeezed shut as it's tongue extended down into the water making a little splash.

This photo taught me 2 big things. A good photo provides all the context it needs in of itself. And secondly, a great photo means that you were simply in the right place at the right time, and you had your camera with you.

Folded Thinking

And here I thought I'd never relate to an article from the New Yorker...

The author Simon Rich gives us a sort of super self-conscious and slightly paranoid inner dialogue of what he imagined people were saying about him when he was a kid. Wow...

@ thirteen years of age:
“Hey, look, that thirteen-year-old is walking around with his mom!”
“Where?”
“There—in front of the supermarket!”
“Oh, my God! That kid is way too old to be hanging out with his mom. Even though I’ve never met him, I can tell he’s a complete loser.”
“Wait a minute. He’s scowling at her and rolling his eyes.”
“Oh, yeah . . . and I think I just heard him curse at her, for no reason.”
“I guess he’s cool after all.”

I like to overthink things. I like to build large unweildy and unrealistic bridges of comprehension between things that may or may not have anything to do with each other. A sort of Calabi-Yau space of thought folded in on itself a thousand times until it exists in all dimensions at once. That's how I order lunch. You might think that you are just telling me you are out of onions, but I KNOW WHAT'S REALLY GOING ON.

The Theoretical Calabi-Yau space, a main tenant of Super String Theory, this is also where my brain gets trapped

Here's another example. When I walk into a crowded room I immediately start making imaginary flight paths for all objects that exist in that space. Warning! There is a potted plant... avoid. Caution! A small man has stopped in your direct path, make adjustments. Proximity Alert! There is a group of 3 people walking directly towards you, adjust... adjust... Oh No! They're splitting up! For the love of God!
WATCH WERE YOU ARE GOING!

CUT TO STATIC
SIGNAL LOST...

It's hard work.

Tyler's Ultimate Blunder

We were willing to give The Food Network's Tyler Florence the benefit of doubt as a "Celebrity Chef" even though he's the poor man's Bobby Flay. We even felt like he was a little more charming than the beloved Flay. That is... Until we saw his piss poor Applebee's commercials. Wow what a blunder!

His latest "creation" in the Grilling Fresh line of signature Tyler Florence dishes is Tyler's New Yorker. You see, what Tyler likes to do is start with a New York Strip Steak. (Who doesn't?!) Then he half asses it up a notch by siding it with onion rings. Finally, just to make sure we absolutely KNOW he doesn't give a shit, he rounds it out with a blue cheese salad...

What exactly did Tyler hope we'd take away from his association with America's most mediocre little neighborhood grill Applebee's? And did he really expect us to believe he "created" a New York Strip Steak with Onions Rings and Salad? I heard he's working on a secret new dish... It's a "twist" on an American classic. Tyler likes to take an all beef patty and then layers one slice of mild, flavorless, white Amercan cheese that is of a medium thickness. Then he tops the burger off by actually putting in a bun! Can you believe it!

We can't wait to try it.

Block Smashing Cake Action

While reading this Boing Boing post about a multi-teared multi-tiered video game console wedding cake it reminded me of the super awesome Groom's cake that my friends made for me when I got married.

I sent the photo along to the guys at Boing Boing and they made a post about it. I wouldn't have had this great cake if not for the hard work of Matt, Jackie, Nat and Sharie. Thanks again you guys!

Clark Howard's Timed Stoplights

Saturday night we saw this month's episode of the Lucky Yates Talk Show at The Vortex Bar and Grill in Midtown. It was another great show, (our monologue jokes bombed as per usual) and featured local hero and Consumer Activist Clark Howard. He's like the nicest guy in the world. After the show we spoke to him about our iPhone! Even though his official advice was to wait for the "next version" he seemed impressed with it's beauty.

Clark responded to a recent article blog post from our local free newspaper, Creative Loafing, that called for the lovable Howard to run for Mayor of Atlanta! (There's a bit of controversy surrounding this story, as it was aped (re-written) by our NON-free local newspaper The AJC who failed in any way to cite the previous article) Clark Howard seemed open to the idea of running for Mayor, but wouldn't exactly commit quite yet. He did have lots of great ideas for fixing some of ATLs problems. (like timed stoplights, and an effort to remind the City workers that they work for US)

Also making a rare appearance that night was the world's only all-bass Rollie Fingers tribute band: Bases Loaded. Their mustaches proceeded them.

Incidentally...

We sat directly behind AJC blogger Rodney Ho who blogged about the show instead of actually watching it. Seriously, he had his Macbook Pro open and was hunched over typing in his blog practically the whole time. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he really couldn't wait? I don't know... Maybe it's no different than a film critic taking notes on a notepad with a little flashlight during a movie. Although it seems much douche-baggier.

Posted from iPhone.

"Let's ROFLMAO!"

We saw Transformers yesterday. It wasn't terrible and I actually had a blast watching it.

The robots looked pretty awesome, even if it was hard to tell exactly what they looked like sometimes. Especially the Decepticons, they barely slow down enough to see them fully.

I totally called who was going to be the first minor human character to die within 3 seconds of meeting them. It's a Micheal Bay film... there aren't too many surprises. Although the acting from the human characters was pretty admirable, considering.

Some of the dialog was laugh out loud bad, but I don't care how good of a writer you are, trying to shoe horn in "There's more to THEM than meets the eye" is going to feel weird no matter what. There is a lot to look at in the film and always something new and shiny just around the corner. So the film is fun and enjoyable and ridiculous and dumb.

In other news:
I also had some time to make a new iPhone desktop.

As a matter of fact it is the awesomest!

Whoa! What a weekend!

We got to the Apple store just after lunch on Friday where we ended up being a respectable 50th in line. Apple employees brought us water and coffee while we waited. We were thanked for our support of Apple several times and rarely made to feel like jerks for waiting in line for a phone. The phones themselves arrived around 4:00pm and we were informed that they had "plenty" of them. And they did! There were stacks and stacks of them!

Where the Great Apple Experience ended...

The flaming tailspin into the inescapable pull of AT&T hell promptly began.

We spent the better part of the entire weekend in various states of AT&T limbo. Nobody could tell us what was going on. Our beloved phone was apparently stuck in a failed activation loop. And a popular instruction from the polite and apologetic but ultimately clueless AT&T agents was "wait a little longer." We believe that AT&T, in an effort to bulk out their work force, hired a bunch of people specifically for the iPhone launch. I spoke to at least 3 people on Friday who told me that this was their first day on the job! Of course they had no clue how to help me, and were easily overwhelmed.

We finally spoke to someone on sunday who told us we would have to have the sim card replaced in our iPhone. Which we did, with the help of the lovely Celena at the Perimeter Apple Store. (She called the nearest AT&T store, and had a sim card waiting for us when we arrived.) Celena at The Perimeter Apple Store really saved our bacon, and was really nice about it the whole time despite the fact that I was totally freaking out, and had been for 3 days solid.

A special thanks also goes out to Chris at the AT&T Perimeter Store, he had our new sim card ready to go and set us up in minutes. (we also know how to get to the sim card now, which is partially hidden on the iPhone)

Our phone works now. And it is the awesomest.

The Phone:
The display is amazing and clear and crisp. The interface is easy as pie and tastes twice as nice.

The 2 megapixel camera takes fine quality photos (given there is enough light) and using the entire display as the camera view-screen is beautiful.

Typing on the touch screen keyboard takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural. Especially when held in the sideways position so the keyboard is bigger. It's a bummer that sideways positioning only works in Safari. I'd love it if all the programs utilized that amazing feature. Especially Mail!
Do it Apple!
seriously, do it.

I'm really looking forward to the web applications that are being written for iPhone's Safari browser. There's a lot of potential there... but I still haven't found any "web apps" out there that I thought were especially great or that I absolutely had to bookmark.

Dudes, the iPhone is my new best friend. As douchebaggy as it sounds, even when Ferris Beuller said it, that doesn't mean it's not true:

"It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

I made a desktop for the iPhone:

It has been recommended that you save iPhone desktops into an iPhoto album and sync it through iTunes under the "Photos" tab. I'll probably be making some more.

Oh jeez, I can't believe I almost forgot about this. Our friends at Nattybumpercar have put together a Special News Report from Coffee Can Alley TV’s News Room all about the release of this great phone. You should check it out.

God Loves you as He Loved Jacob

Welcome to Station 6: The Orchid

More on the Mysterious Casimir Effect, a principle of Quatum Field Theory.

Also, we're thinking of adopting a new dog and naming him Neils Bohr, is that too much?

No D'ohs

On Friday our bosses took the whole office out to see The Simpsons Movie.

It was great. We laughed out loud continually through the whole movie. And not the bad kind of laugh out louds we endured during Spider-pig 3. Even our boss and the Head Writer of Frisky Dingo, Adam Reed, gave it his seal of approval. And that guy might be the toughest critic of comedy I've ever met.

It looks like The Simpson's Movie is doing quite well at the box office. Selling $168 million in tickets during the opening weekend. We didn't expect to hate the movie, and everybody knows the TV show isn't as good as it used to be. We were just surprised by how much this movie felt like the Simpson's of old.

Duderonomy: Rules to live by, and sometimes break

Every year we talk about attending Lebowskifest, and every year we fail to go. Lewbowskifest is a weekend long celebration of the movie The Big Lebowski held in Louisville, Kentucky. The festival includes a bowling tournament, a costume contest, features a bunch of musical performances, and of course a screening of the film itself. It sounds like heaven for any Little Lewbowski Urban Achiever.

Who knows, we may never make it the festival. That doesn't mean that we can't bring a little bit of Lebowski with us wherever we go. Now we have Dudeism.

"The slowest-growing religion in the world - Dudeism. An ancient philosophy that preaches non-preachiness, practices as little as possible, and above all, uh...lost my train of thought there. Anyway, if you'd like to find peace on earth and goodwill, man, we'll help you get started. Right after a little nap.

At the Dudeism website you can check out the Book of Duderonomy. A set of rules that you can choose to live by, or not live by, or even break if you feel like it. You know, whatever man. For instance, Book 3 of Duderonomy: Rule Number 5 says:

"5. Try not to use so many cuss words. Unless they're near and dear to your heart, in which case, fuck it."

You can also become an Ordained Dudeist Priest, check out the Tao of Dude Weblog, or see some of The Great Dudes of History. (via metafilter)

Man VS. Wild CHEATS

We've caught a few episodes of Discovery Channel's survival show "Man VS. Wild" starring Bear Grylls. The show does a good job of grabbing you. Bear parachutes into a remote and hostile location, like deep in a rain forest, or on top of a giant mountain, or even simply out in the middle of a desert.

The show follows him from the point he jumps out of a plane, all the way until he finds a local road or highway of some sort where he can catch a ride back to civilization. The premise is, we follow him as he uses his wits and the few pieces of equipment he has on him to survive these situations.

Only this show cheats. And they got caught.

The show is British, and originally broadcast on BBC's Channel 4, the complaints about authenticity have sparked an investigation. The evidence is pretty damaging, for instance the BBC article has this to say:

American survival consultant Mark Weinert, who was recruited by Diverse Productions, told the paper Grylls claimed to be stranded on a desert island on one occasion.

However, he was actually in Hawaii and spent some of his time there in a motel, Mr Weinert alleged.

Wha?!?
also:

And in a further episode, supposedly "wild" horses rounded up by Grylls had come from a local trekking facility, he claimed.

When you watch the show, you can tell something is fishy. Bear will often scale down the side of a shear rock face while the camera crew sits at the top filming him. When he gets to the bottom, suddenly the camera is there to catch him setting foot on solid ground... How?

It's a real shame because Bear Grylls is charming and smart, and really does know his shit. Why do they need to trick us? How can a show that is entirely about being smart treat it's audience like we're stupid. Man VS. Wild... You Blew It.

Alternatively, The Science Channel has a show called "Survivorman." This show follows Les Stroud, and really seems to be what it advertises.

No food, no shelter, no fresh water, no tools... no camera crew. One man - alone in the wild for seven days with only his wits and stamina to sustain him.

When Les Stroud films a scene where he walks away from the camera and off into the desert sunset, you know he had to set up his own camera and film the scene. Then he had to walk all the way back and get his camera. He basically has to do things twice so we get to see them.

Master of The Interrortron

Our favorite documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, has begun a series of essays on Photography for the New York Times.

Errol Morris has directed documentaries like Vernon Florida, The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death, and of course A Brief History of Time. He has also invented a 2 way, closed circuit television/camera interview contraption he calls, "The Interrortron." It works by seperating the interviewer and subject and broadcasting the sound and images back and forth. He says his wife came up with the name, and they loved it because it combined the words Interview and Terror.

In this essay Errol discusses his attempts to find "The Truth" in photography. If a photograph is deprived of it's context, will it still tell the truth about it's subject? Errol believes that only after seeing a photo's caption can one begin to ask questions about it.

"The issue of the truth or falsity of a photograph is only meaningful with respect to statements about the photograph. Truth or falsity “adheres” not to the photograph itself but to the statements we make about a photograph. Depending on the statements, our answers change. All alone — shorn of context, without captions — a photograph is neither true nor false."

I would argue that really great photography will work devoid of any context. Because all the context we need should be in the photograph. Our art school was next door to the High Museum of Art here in Atlanta, and we were entitled to free admission to the museum whenever we wanted. Of my favorite works of art in the museum, I've always remembered one photograph in particular. This photo, which sadly is no longer part of the collection, taught me more about photography than either of the 2 photography classes I took in school (and did poorly in) ever did.

It was a photo taken just after a rain storm, you could tell because dark rain clouds could still be seen in the distance. In the foreground sat a muddy puddle of water surrounded by the aftermath of an evidently strong rain storm. Branches and soaked debris littered the ground. Next to the puddle stood a skinny, wet dog. The photo was taken just as the dog was taking a drink of water from that puddle. It's little dog eyes squeezed shut as it's tongue extended down into the water making a little splash.

This photo taught me 2 big things. A good photo provides all the context it needs in of itself. And secondly, a great photo means that you were simply in the right place at the right time, and you had your camera with you.

Folded Thinking

And here I thought I'd never relate to an article from the New Yorker...

The author Simon Rich gives us a sort of super self-conscious and slightly paranoid inner dialogue of what he imagined people were saying about him when he was a kid. Wow...

@ thirteen years of age:
“Hey, look, that thirteen-year-old is walking around with his mom!”
“Where?”
“There—in front of the supermarket!”
“Oh, my God! That kid is way too old to be hanging out with his mom. Even though I’ve never met him, I can tell he’s a complete loser.”
“Wait a minute. He’s scowling at her and rolling his eyes.”
“Oh, yeah . . . and I think I just heard him curse at her, for no reason.”
“I guess he’s cool after all.”

I like to overthink things. I like to build large unweildy and unrealistic bridges of comprehension between things that may or may not have anything to do with each other. A sort of Calabi-Yau space of thought folded in on itself a thousand times until it exists in all dimensions at once. That's how I order lunch. You might think that you are just telling me you are out of onions, but I KNOW WHAT'S REALLY GOING ON.

The Theoretical Calabi-Yau space, a main tenant of Super String Theory, this is also where my brain gets trapped

Here's another example. When I walk into a crowded room I immediately start making imaginary flight paths for all objects that exist in that space. Warning! There is a potted plant... avoid. Caution! A small man has stopped in your direct path, make adjustments. Proximity Alert! There is a group of 3 people walking directly towards you, adjust... adjust... Oh No! They're splitting up! For the love of God!
WATCH WERE YOU ARE GOING!

CUT TO STATIC
SIGNAL LOST...

It's hard work.

Tyler's Ultimate Blunder

We were willing to give The Food Network's Tyler Florence the benefit of doubt as a "Celebrity Chef" even though he's the poor man's Bobby Flay. We even felt like he was a little more charming than the beloved Flay. That is... Until we saw his piss poor Applebee's commercials. Wow what a blunder!

His latest "creation" in the Grilling Fresh line of signature Tyler Florence dishes is Tyler's New Yorker. You see, what Tyler likes to do is start with a New York Strip Steak. (Who doesn't?!) Then he half asses it up a notch by siding it with onion rings. Finally, just to make sure we absolutely KNOW he doesn't give a shit, he rounds it out with a blue cheese salad...

What exactly did Tyler hope we'd take away from his association with America's most mediocre little neighborhood grill Applebee's? And did he really expect us to believe he "created" a New York Strip Steak with Onions Rings and Salad? I heard he's working on a secret new dish... It's a "twist" on an American classic. Tyler likes to take an all beef patty and then layers one slice of mild, flavorless, white Amercan cheese that is of a medium thickness. Then he tops the burger off by actually putting in a bun! Can you believe it!

We can't wait to try it.

Block Smashing Cake Action

While reading this Boing Boing post about a multi-teared multi-tiered video game console wedding cake it reminded me of the super awesome Groom's cake that my friends made for me when I got married.

I sent the photo along to the guys at Boing Boing and they made a post about it. I wouldn't have had this great cake if not for the hard work of Matt, Jackie, Nat and Sharie. Thanks again you guys!

Clark Howard's Timed Stoplights

Saturday night we saw this month's episode of the Lucky Yates Talk Show at The Vortex Bar and Grill in Midtown. It was another great show, (our monologue jokes bombed as per usual) and featured local hero and Consumer Activist Clark Howard. He's like the nicest guy in the world. After the show we spoke to him about our iPhone! Even though his official advice was to wait for the "next version" he seemed impressed with it's beauty.

Clark responded to a recent article blog post from our local free newspaper, Creative Loafing, that called for the lovable Howard to run for Mayor of Atlanta! (There's a bit of controversy surrounding this story, as it was aped (re-written) by our NON-free local newspaper The AJC who failed in any way to cite the previous article) Clark Howard seemed open to the idea of running for Mayor, but wouldn't exactly commit quite yet. He did have lots of great ideas for fixing some of ATLs problems. (like timed stoplights, and an effort to remind the City workers that they work for US)

Also making a rare appearance that night was the world's only all-bass Rollie Fingers tribute band: Bases Loaded. Their mustaches proceeded them.

Incidentally...

We sat directly behind AJC blogger Rodney Ho who blogged about the show instead of actually watching it. Seriously, he had his Macbook Pro open and was hunched over typing in his blog practically the whole time. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he really couldn't wait? I don't know... Maybe it's no different than a film critic taking notes on a notepad with a little flashlight during a movie. Although it seems much douche-baggier.

Posted from iPhone.

"Let's ROFLMAO!"

We saw Transformers yesterday. It wasn't terrible and I actually had a blast watching it.

The robots looked pretty awesome, even if it was hard to tell exactly what they looked like sometimes. Especially the Decepticons, they barely slow down enough to see them fully.

I totally called who was going to be the first minor human character to die within 3 seconds of meeting them. It's a Micheal Bay film... there aren't too many surprises. Although the acting from the human characters was pretty admirable, considering.

Some of the dialog was laugh out loud bad, but I don't care how good of a writer you are, trying to shoe horn in "There's more to THEM than meets the eye" is going to feel weird no matter what. There is a lot to look at in the film and always something new and shiny just around the corner. So the film is fun and enjoyable and ridiculous and dumb.

In other news:
I also had some time to make a new iPhone desktop.

As a matter of fact it is the awesomest!

Whoa! What a weekend!

We got to the Apple store just after lunch on Friday where we ended up being a respectable 50th in line. Apple employees brought us water and coffee while we waited. We were thanked for our support of Apple several times and rarely made to feel like jerks for waiting in line for a phone. The phones themselves arrived around 4:00pm and we were informed that they had "plenty" of them. And they did! There were stacks and stacks of them!

Where the Great Apple Experience ended...

The flaming tailspin into the inescapable pull of AT&T hell promptly began.

We spent the better part of the entire weekend in various states of AT&T limbo. Nobody could tell us what was going on. Our beloved phone was apparently stuck in a failed activation loop. And a popular instruction from the polite and apologetic but ultimately clueless AT&T agents was "wait a little longer." We believe that AT&T, in an effort to bulk out their work force, hired a bunch of people specifically for the iPhone launch. I spoke to at least 3 people on Friday who told me that this was their first day on the job! Of course they had no clue how to help me, and were easily overwhelmed.

We finally spoke to someone on sunday who told us we would have to have the sim card replaced in our iPhone. Which we did, with the help of the lovely Celena at the Perimeter Apple Store. (She called the nearest AT&T store, and had a sim card waiting for us when we arrived.) Celena at The Perimeter Apple Store really saved our bacon, and was really nice about it the whole time despite the fact that I was totally freaking out, and had been for 3 days solid.

A special thanks also goes out to Chris at the AT&T Perimeter Store, he had our new sim card ready to go and set us up in minutes. (we also know how to get to the sim card now, which is partially hidden on the iPhone)

Our phone works now.