483 days of awesomeness (and counting!)!

Congratulations to TDP blog for successfully completing 483 days of awesomeness today! While few said it would never last, others said wtf of course it won't shut up and just deal the cards. How remarkable is the 483 days of TDP's existence? Consider the following:

TDP has been in existence during the terms of two United States Presidents.

TDP was around long enough to see the release of Guns N' Roses epic Chinese Democracy.

TDP was there to mourn the passing of Michael Jacksan, Farrah Fawcett, and America's Hero Billy Mays.

What will TDP achieve in the next 483 days? I have no idea who the hell do you think I am Steve Jobs?

-Hollywood out.

To re-hatch the Twitter debate

I think most of what I have to say is fascinating too. However I don't use twitter for personal use that much. I think I'll tweet this blog post out to the world. @alfredu2

Smart ass remarks from students are hilarious...

This compilation of student work has to be one of the funnies things I have ever seen. Especially the ridiculous stories created by 'Peter Nguyen'.

in reference to: Funny student Exam Answers (view on Google Sidewiki)

Whitefish anyone?

New post on a nearly dead blog...

Wow. AT&T should run a follow up ad set to these 1993 "You Will" campaigns and change the slogan to "You Do Now"...

Has Jim Left PA?

The blog JimInPA has been dark since March 5, 2009, which has the blogosphere in a flutter and typing questions in unnecessary capital LETTERS asking if Jim of aforementioned JimInPA has quite possibly left PA?

My sources tell me he's working on a confidential side project.

TDP is about to get LOST

... though that still doesn't explain where we've been the past month

F This Site

When you really think about it, the internet is really only good for a few things: Hitting the random article button on Wikipedia to impress people with useless knowledge, pr0n, fantasy football, and pr0n.

I recently discovered a fifth reason to fire up the fox, the site F My Life, or FML as we call it on the interwebs.

To say it's hilarious would be like saying a Cadbury creme egg is worth losing a nut over. It is.

The short posts follow a similar theme of someone having a crappy day, but not so crappy they fail to see a small glimmer of humor in the day's crappiness and find time during aforementioned crappiness to post it on FML.

Here is an example of a post that made me barf with giggles:

"Today, my boyfriend of 17 months, the first guy to tell me he loves me, the guy I lost my virginity to, the only guy whose parents I've met, told me we should stop 'hooking up' because it's weird that I was telling everyone we were a couple and it was ruining his chances of finding a girlfriend. FML"

I also found this post that must have been from when Zod, Alredu2, and Goose were roommates:

"Today, cops showed up at my apartment demanding to look inside. Satisfied with the search, they told me they had received a noise complaint. More specifically, hearing screams someone believed a girl was getting raped. I had two friends over and we had been wrestling. The three of us are male. FML"

So next time you're having a crappy day, otherwise known to Jester as Wednesday, type FML in your search engine of choice and enjoy others witty unfortunateness.

Hollywood out.

Despair.com

If your in the mood to kill time at work, I recommend surfing on over to despair.com. Here you will find numerous demotivating phrases that will ironically cheer you up as you laugh. You can also create your own like... Twitter: broadcasting your insignificant life to other insignificant people.

Enjoy!

Twitter is Stoopid

Usually when I don't understand something I call it stupid, automatically elevating myself to a superior level of being more intelligent than the thing I don't understand. However in the case of Twitter I do understand it, and it's still stupid.

I signed up for a Twitter account a few weeks ago and instantly had several people following me who were complete strangers. Cool, so far I had a small cult going on. Time to order some Snuggies and schedule our trip to the spaceship behind the comet.

The novelty of posting several times a day quickly wore off and I realized I had nothing of substance to contribute. I realized from the other cult leaders I was following that they also had nothing of substance to contribute either. You are hungry? Awesome. Just got back from gym and did an extended cardio routine? Good for you. Fell in to a hypnotic trance induced by Billy Mays' beard and bought three cases of Mighty Mendit? Who hasn't?

It was like we had all been handed a microphone with a mass audience and no idea what we wanted them to do. Really, what's the point of being able to talk to your followers when you don't know what to say, and you don't know what you want them to do?

That's why I predict Twitter will either quickly fade from relevance, or change their model.

Twitter is like fantasy baseball, whereas traditional blogs are more like fantasy football. Fantasy football is substantially more popular with the masses, and sometimes chicks even play. It takes up a relatively small amount of time each week to keep your blog/fantasy football team relevant, and overall it is a rewarding experience by watching how your players perform on Sundays. Blog followers also read with the expectation of regular updates, but on a daily or weekly basis.

With Twitter and fantasy baseball, a daily commitment is required over a long period of time. It can be frustrating to make frequent updates and not feel like there is a payoff since there are multiple games every night of the week. Twitter users have an expectation of frequent, non-stop updates every day.

Many argue that news outlets will utilize Twitter as a means of content distribution in real time. I would caution that news outlets need to be careful about the frequency of their updates. I was a follower of the 6ABC Twitter account and received 42 tweets in one day from them. It is information overload at its core.

It will be interesting to watch the evolution of Twitter as users learn about the service and help define what it becomes. If Twitter doesn't change with its users, it may wake up one day receiving tweets about its own obsolescence.

Drink Lead MoFo

Wow Hollywood, a post about Santa in January. Way to be a month behind schedule. No, Cheech, I'm bringing you crap tons of ho ho holiday cheer 334 days early.

I was enjoying my french vanilla coffee out of my favorite mug and reading up on my dyslexia diagnosis when I discovered Satan was more evil than Santa and the devil combined.

He lured me in with his innocent looking smile that almost says, hey bud...you know you want to drink out of my head. I'm like, yeah...you know I do. I love you Mug Santa.

But behind Mug Santa's playful veneer lies a sinister dark side. Dark like the absence of all light dark.



I know this is hard to read. It was hard for me to read too, but I need to share this with the world. For the visually impaired:

WARNING:
The materials used as colored decorations on the exterior of (this product) contains lead, a chemical known to the State of California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm.

It is now clear that Santa hates California, but living in another state protects you from aforementioned perils of lead consumption. Pennsylvania FTW!

--Hollywood

I want your free stuff

A friend of mine has been running a rather successful blog for the past year and a half called Spoiled Pretty and your friend Hollywood definitely spoils himself pretty every day. I can't vouch for the content as I don't know the difference between lip gloss and lip stick but what I can tell you faithful readers is that this blog has delivered package after package of free products to her door for her review.

I want in on that action. But not for beauty products (wow that was close) but for cool stuff that I promise I will review with adjective-laden and keyword search-able posts.

Hey Microsoft- I'm rocking your Zune right now. What do I think? I'm not sure, maybe the newest version of your Zune would refresh my memory.

While you're at it I also have your XBox 360. I like it...or do I? Maybe I need some new games to play.

I'm currently enjoying some high def action on a 30" Samsung, but I heard they have newer and bigger models. I wonder if they're any good?

I'm ready to write about your stuff too Sony, Apple Budweiser, and Hot Pockets. FYI- I especially like the Cheeseburger and Chicken Fajita Lean Pockets. The Meatballs and Mozeralla ones used to be my favorite but I ate too many.

-Hollywood

Unplug

This new year, I'm dropping the evil Comcast and committing to watch as little TV as I can without losing my mind.

Here's the plan:

1) Buy a "cheap" computer with no monitor.

2) Hook it up to the home theater with the biggest, fattest cables I can find

3) Get one of those blue tooth remotes that let you interact with media player

4a) Drop down to the lowest basic cable offering for $20. This has the added bonus of potentially allowing me to add the sports package for K$ so he can watch PennState play the foosball.
4b) Get a fancy HDTV antenna and live with the major networks only.

5) Fire up iTunes and buy a season pass to the series that I really want to watch

6) Tell Comcast I don't like paying bills, so I think I'm going to just stop doing it

Windows Media Center has DVR functionality built in, so I could still record any of the network shows.

It should be noted that the primary goal was to watch less televsion. I later came to the conclusion that paying $90/mo for a habit I'm trying to break seems counterproductive. I've canceled gym memberships for less than half that.

I get home from work on a typical day around 6:00pm, leaving around 6 hours of non-working consciousness per day before I fall asleep around 12:30pm and get my less then optimum 6.5 hours sleep. Between Cash Cab, the "quick" Alton Brown episode, some prime time comedy or drama, and the Stewart-Colbert hour, I average about 3 to 4 hours of TV a day. There's a whole bunch of sites that give you good reasons to watch less TV, but even simple math will tell you that 2 to 3 hours a day is barely enough time to take care of things like laundry, dishes, and making yourself a respectable meal. Let alone doing things I might actually want to do.

I'll let it stew for another few days, but after I've rationalized this idea to the point where I stop listening to good advice from friends and family, I'm heading to the Best Buy to see what I can put together.

Remember, 60% of the time, crazy ideas work every time.

Hollywood buys new MP3 player. Gives self high five.

After spending 102 hours researching every MP3 player created since the Mesozoic Age, your friend Hollywood will finally STFU as the quest has been completed. It was a long and arduous journey, filled with excitement, adventure, and tears.


Hollywood's trusty sidekick for the past several years, the Toshiba Gigabeat S, has passed on. A funeral pyre was held for the Gigabeat, known by friends as Giggy, the Gigster, and Getting Giggy With It, at sunrise this morning. A lone bag piper played Giggy's favorite song, Rump Shaker by Wreckx-N-Effect, as he passed on to MP3 player heaven.

There were many candidates to fill the void left by Giggy, most notably an iPod Touch. However, the FBI's recent investigation in to the iPod Touch's alleged attempt to sell the Senate seat vacated by President-Elect Obama made it an likely candidate.

"I'm f***ing untouchable!" proclaimed the Touch in a wiretap phone conversation obtained by the FBI.

The vacated MP3 player position will be filled by a 30 gb Microsoft Zune, a much safer bet agree critics. The Zune has been in the news as of late with it's late-to-the-party Y2k9 bug, however, as with all Microsoft products, you just need to restart the little buddy and he keeps on kicking.