Brainwaves of Sken

I took it all into account, and decided to get the shot, and this was my line of reasoning:

1. I’m healthy, and I rarely get sick, but I am often around friends with immune systems that are easily compromised. I have two close friends, particularly, who regularly come down with bronchitis on a paralyzing level.

2. I don’t want to waste time by getting sick.

3. I can handle a few days or a week of having minimal symptoms, I think. So long’s I can breathe to get to sleep, anyway.

4. I’m a firm believer in the “you should eat dirt as a child” concept of immune system bolstering – in other words, if you can fully recover from it, it will probably help keep those antibodies floating around, and generally lead to a heartier life.

Oh, I still wash my hands and all, don’t get me wrong.

Anyway, I got my shot, and THEN went and got my three allergy desensitization shots about two and a half hours later.

Immediate sensations: the tiniest bit of warp, like a part of me was busy being fascinated with whatever was going on in my body, and the merest hint of a precursor of a headache. It went away.

Anyway, if I start singing “Let my Cameron Goooo” in the next few days, I’ll let you all know.

Posted in Uncategorized

Can anyone find me a picture of my favorite heavy vehicle?

It’s something I’ve only seen in a few select cities, but what it seems to
do is -pick up- those cement barrier walls and actually -move- them to the
other side of the lane, assembly-line fashion. This seems to be designed
for events (where there will be massive influx at one time, and egress at
another) or rush-hour switches.

Anyone seen one of these, and better yet, able to find a pic?

Thanks!

EDIT: ariock wins!

Thanks, buddy!

Posted in Uncategorized

Thinking about getting it today. I have to decide within the next 45
minutes. In an hour after that, I’ll be getting my allergy shot, too. So I
might be a big pain in the ass tonight, heh.

Yes I know the flu shot can’t give you flu – what’s never said is that
people really are just complaining about flu-like symptoms, which seems like
a very reasonable response your body might have to a vaccine (IMH and
non-learned opinion).

Thoughts, opinions?

Posted in Uncategorized

I find the usage of the phrase “viral marketing” in marketing papers to
be, in a word, annoying.

Why? Because when I think viral, I think underground, meaning a
marketing message that is stealthy, where the actual product is
minimally invasive and the message doesn’t necessarily seem to clearly
come from the product creator. It seems perhaps unauthorized, or
doesn’t have a particular incentive (other than entertainment value) for
passing on the message. In fact, the entertainment sometimes is only
loosely connected to the actual brand/service/company being ‘promoted’.

However, it really means any marketing message that relies on
previously-existing social networks for its propogation. I think it’s
fair to use the phrase that way, but I rather wish it wasn’t. There’s
too much sex appeal to a concept that, while attractive, is not for
every company or product, and in fact may backfire if the company does a
poor job, has a poor message, or an inferior product.

For instance the ‘make-your-own-commercial’ viral campaign that (I
believe) Ford tried to make for one of their SUVs, where most of the
front-page user-created ads were satirical references to the
gas-guzzling nature of the product.

Technically speaking, the old Ved Bok site had a viral element (you can
look at an archive of it here, though I highly suggest
you switch to IE to view it in its last-updated-in-2002 glory). We had
a talent database that let actors, crew, and directors/AD’s interface
freely, creating resumes and contacting people on their own for
business. It was very popular, and people contacted each other to tell
them about it.

It’s called VALUABLE CONTENT. It’s not ‘viral’ to me, even though we
intentionally used pre-existing social networks (that of the local
entertainment industry) and word-of-mouth (first ours, then others) to
promote and extend it… for as long as it lasted, anyway. It was a
valuable service that promoted our name by giving people incentive to
tell their friends and fellow actors about it – once we had some people
using it, we received resumes for years later, long after we
“froze” the site’s content due to the closing of that company.

I almost feel like I should create a separate blog (I still hate that
term) just for these weird thoughts of mine.

Posted in Uncategorized

Oops. I forgot to link to this:

Ozy/Rikki
Hallo-fest!

Posted in Uncategorized

Also, I’m a little worried about the state of my computer. Ever since I had some quirks awhile back, it’s been doing strange things. These days, if I try to copy and paste an entire folder, it sometimes craps out on me, and then makes that folder entirely inaccessable and undeletable. How strange is that? Scandisk time, methinks.

Posted in Uncategorized

Okay, I’ve put off dumping my photos for about a month now, but since I needed the camera for some business, I couldn’t do that without taking care of you fine folk, now could I?

Lucy and Amanda’s Vet Student Party

A HalloWeekend at Cedar Point

A Very Lansing Halloween Party (812)

Notes: I didn’t crop, color-correct, or de-redeye any of the photos. This makes Leanna’s Clockwork Orange costume even nastier, in an awesome way. I didn’t even delete all of the blurry ones. Also, uhm, it’s totally not my fault that half the halloween pictures are of Little Red Riding Hood and Rainbow Bright. They won 1st place and Sexiest Female Costume! I was, uhm, recording the event for posterity. :D

Clearly, I need to add to this icon.

Bedtime!

Also, unrelately, I’m totally excited. Our new web site should be up within a couple of days. It totally makes me hot.

Rather not be in the pictures?

Posted in Uncategorized

Gears of War ad

This official ad uses the D.D. version of Mad World as its soundtrack.

From what I’ve gathered, this game is absolutely the hottest new game to come out in years. Hotter than any of the games-to-be from the new systems coming out. Hotter than Zelda (if you can believe it).

I wish I had a 360, heh. It’s best I don’t, though – I still end up spending too much time on Halo. The original.

Another video: “These are the stingrays” – parody of this outrageous political ad: “These are the stakes”

Posted in Uncategorized

“Over the course of almost eight years of reporting for Ars Technica,
I’ve followed the merging of the areas of election security and
information security, a merging that was accelerated much too rapidly in
the wake of the 2000 presidential election. In all this time, I’ve yet
to find a good way to convey to the non-technical public how well and
truly screwed up we presently are, six years after the Florida recount.
So now it’s time to hit the panic button: In this
article, I’m going to show you how to steal an election.“

Posted in Uncategorized

I think that’s totally cool. Thanks for participating in this thought-space with me, my friends. :) I’m glad I feel comfortable here, spilling both serious and silly things

What I find most interesting are those who’ve posted only once. You totally can’t tell how close someone is to me by the number of comments they make here. :D

Totally unrelatedly, my coughing has been a bit out of control lately.

Posted in Uncategorized