Year: 2006

Recent Radio Ads

Observations

People! Check out this awesomely bad radio advertisement that keeps playing on the radio:

“People, has your career gotten nasty? You know!

Boring Job. Lousy pay! And then there’s your boss! What’s his problem? Isn’t it time to get some opportunity back in your life. Imagine, you and a high paying computer job.

Every day, thousands of computer jobs go unfilled. Check it out, according to salary.com microsoft certified network administrators make between $40,000 and $75,000 with only a few years of experience. That’s a lot of cheese people!

That’s why you gotta come to the PC productivity career revival. Keep your day job, get trained at night. Just 6 months and you’ll have a plan b for a new career. You’re done! Finito! On to the good life.

We’re also giving away an x-box 360 and servin’ pizza so just call 1-866-xxx-xxxx or register at pc productivity schools .com.”

I sure wish I had the audio but I’m too lazy for that. I do, however, have the audio for this “wear your seat belt or else” ad from the USDOT, which is almost as awesomely bad.

Click it or Ticket!

MG comments on the USDOT ad:

“‘blah blah blah’ NICE. Looks like the US Dept of Transportation is looking to get some street cred by speaking the language of the “non-buckler” by referencing what apparently they think goes through the minds of non-bucklers when they don’t buckle up. Something tells me they missed the mark on that one.

Yeah, that seemed like your standard gov’t attempt to sound hip in a psa-style setting–complete with cheesy dialogue delivered by a booming monotone voice, yielding just the right balance of awkwardness and all-around starchiness.

Thanks for that….loved the music too, btw–that blend of trance/techno meets 80’s jock rock guitar. Although the guitar soloing I think didn’t soar quite high enough.”

G Says

Family

At the Noah’s Ark waterpark where the new ride this year is Time Warp, G was standing in line and said, “Maybe they call it Time Warp because you have to wait so long in line!”

JDEdwards Frustration

Adventures

Given my sustained frustration with the JDEdwards OneWorld software, I decided that tracking the level of said frustration was in order. For your review, here is the first month’s graph.

As you can see, I was enraged twice during the month but the second peak occurred during a period of sustained rage. Towards the end of the month I was able to coach myself back into denial, mainly because I interacted less with the most vexing features of the software.

Burnin’ Wood

Adventures

As I upgraded a client’s computer last week, I overheard a conversation. It sounded something like this:

“Hey John, how’s it goin’?”

“Pretty Dern Good. Say, you burn wood at yer house don’cha?”

“Yah.”

“How much you use in a year?”

“Oh I ain’t gonna go troo more’n two maybe tree cords at da most. I just use it now and den ya know — usually whenever it gets below zero an’ stuff. Say, you know Jake Johnson don’cha?”

“Yah, I drive by ‘is place on my way to work.”

“Yah, I guess I knew dat. Did you see dat pile o’ firewood ‘e had in ‘is front yard? He musta had ten cords right dere between da house and da road!”

“Yah, I wonder what ‘is wife thought o’ dat. Well, she musta said somethin’ ’cause ‘e got dat pile outa dere inside o’ two weeks.”

“Yah, I’ll pro’ly cut up a li’l more wood dis year.”

“Yah.”

Twain in Europe

Opuses

Found this quotation in A Tramp Abroad (pub. 1880) and I think it’s worth sharing.

From ch. 46: “But in Europe everywhere except in the mountains, the water is flat and insipid beyond the power of words to describe. It is served lukewarm; but no matter, ice could not help it; it is incurably flat, incurably insipid. It is only good to wash with; I wonder it doesn’t occur to the average inhabitant to try it for that.”

MG comments, “Zing! Score 1 for Twain, The whole of 19th Century Europe 0! It started off so unsuspecting…just a critical remark on water in Europe…I read the end and immediately thought OH!”

ZH (recently back from Europe) responds, “It is still an issue! No ice…it’s too expensive!”

T-Ball

Family

Last year G played tee-ball but we weren’t sure whether he enjoyed it or not. He said he had fun but didn’t seem to get into the games as much. This is understandable since he’s very competitive and they don’t keep score in tee-ball. Of course we don’t want to force baseball but this spring we asked and “yes” he did want to play baseball. So far, they have missed a game and a practice on account of the rain. He was quite disappointed when the game was cancelled, then when practice was cancelled he kept asking why. I said the field was too muddy and he said, “It can’t be. Our yard isn’t muddy. Can we go have a practice of our own?” I said yes, so he put on his team shirt and cap and strapped on his cleats and we went to the back yard. He set up the bases and we started by warming up, then took some batting practice and played a one-inning game with the neighbor girl.

I say there is a good chance that G will dive whole-heartedly into baseball because it’s right in his line. He displays an uncommon passion for gameplay, competition, and strategy. Recently, we started listening to some baseball games on the radio. Now he’s asking me questions like, “So dad, if I hit a foul ball, is that a strike or a do-over?”

Help Desk Woes

Adventures

Real life help desk ticket no. 5901:

She has done this before . She received the new build yesterday . Now every since the upgrade to XXXXXXX, when she puts in a requisition, says error action invalid . Usually fills in her description also and it is not.