buzzin buddy

Google's answer to Facebook finally appeared in the form of Buzz. Not sure how I feel about it but I'll roll with it for a bit.

Some of the doubts expressed by posters in the Metafilter thread centred around not knowing where and to whom updates would go. Like, if you are on Facebook (I'm not) and post something, you know that anyone you have as a contact will see it, and that's it. But with Buzz, it's already tied in to your email and other sites linked through a typical Google Account. So as a test run, I linked my blogger account - I'm pretty sure nobody reads this other than random Couchsurfing people, as I link to it through my info page - wrote this post to see if it shows up. Anyone else catchin my buzz?

FollowFollowUp

Last year (by a day) I wrote about the Detroit man who froze to death and had a game of hockey played around his protruding legs. For a tertiary look at it, I'd like to recommend a viewing of Detroit 2009, The Movie - a 25 min. news montage. Its a bit slow, though interesting, in the early stages before getting to a somewhat heartbreaking clip with Johnny Redding's brother, a bizarre political inquiry / improvised musical number worthy of David Lynch, and some delightfully wacky interviews with city residents, including one guy who is building a flying saucer in his backyard, and another guy who serves raccoon barbecue buffets.
Enjoy and welcome to 2010!

Schizowebbia

Recently I spent a weekend at home in front of the computer keeping a friend company while she was quarantined with a bad case of swine flu. It was the first time I'd used my msn messenger account in roughly a year; over the course of those 3 days I realized how many old friends I had on there, with whom I had no other way to connect.

intermission: FUCK FACEBOOK

ah, so, anyways, it occurred to me that there might be a way to get Kopete to connect with my primary medium of online conversation - GMail's GChat. I kind of forgot about it until today, but after only 10 minutes or so of searching, I found a great tutorial that worked for me right off the mark.

I present an excerpt from my groundbreaking first convo:


Barrett Jones  22:18:12
Yeah. On my phone.

k. v. m.  22:18:18
yeah you were my guinea pig

Barrett Jones  22:18:38
I see. What kinda guinea pig?

k. v. m.  22:18:39
i just spent a while trying to get my instant messenger client to recognize gmail

Barrett Jones  22:19:00
Ah. You are on gmail now.

k. v. m.  22:19:06
bbbbbboooo ya shaka son
hey does this cost you a lot of money or anything?

Barrett Jones  22:19:22
And msn too.
Nope. I've got plenty o data.

k. v. m.  22:19:39
yeah trying to consolidate my online persona

Barrett Jones  22:20:07
Word. I've got too many as well.

k. v. m.  22:20:25
schizowebbia
or something
anyways thanks!
and btw you type amazinly fast on that little thing

Barrett Jones  22:23:08
Thanks. I've had a little practice by now.

k. v. m.  22:23:42
yo fingers is all up in that g-spot

Ignorance is NOT Bliss

Hot off the Internet, its the 9th Annual Year In Ideas!

Thus far I have learned:
-Cows with names make 6% more milk than anonymous cows...
-Google's search algorithm can predict ecosystem extinction...
-People who smile in their yearbook photos live happily ever after...
-Zombies typically take 7-10 days to overthrow humanity...
-Monkeys and I agree that The Grudge is the best Tool song evar...

... aaannnd there's plenty more. Kudos to the New York Times on the site design; the drop-down menus with the mouseover are great, and you have the option of browsing alphabetically or by category, all on the same page as the articles themselves.

Another Incident

My inner nerd can now rejoice! According to Lostpedia, with the final season of Lost starting on February 2nd (and assuming that there are no weeks off, and the final episode will be a two-parter ... a few ifs), the Series Finale will be on May 18th, my birthday. Thanks JJ!

Now, if I can only manage to go 3-for-3 in landing my big day on an off-day of tree planting, all will be well.

Astrology: Now Available In 13 Flavours!

Today I had an email with the following information:

ARIES = APRIL 19 - MAY 13
TAURUS = MAY 14 - JUNE 19
GEMINI = JUNE 20 - JULY 20
CANCER = JULY 21 - AUG 9
LEO = AUGUST 10 - SEPTEMBER 15
VIRGO = SEPTEMBER 16 - OCTOBER 30
LIBRA = OCTOBER 31 - NOVEMBER 22
SCORPIO = NOVEMBER 23 - NOVEMBER 29
OPHIUCHUS = NOVEMBER 30 - DECEMBER 17
SAGITTARIUS = DECEMBER 18 - JANUARY 18
CAPRICORN = JANUARY 19 - FEBRUARY 15
AQUARIUS = FEBRUARY 16 - MARCH 11
PISCES = MARCH 12 - APRIL 1

...and, actually, that's all the information, there was no explanation. Talking to her later she attempted to explain that these were the signs from the old 13 month calendar. So - note the newest (or oldest?) in the family, Ophiuchus, which would be starting in about a week or so. It appears as though it is represented by the snake, and symbolized by the Staff of Aesculapius (which I thought was the Staff of Caduceus, though it appears that Caduceus was a showman who not only demanded two snakes, but also the Van Halen logo!).

Bah. An atypical vague, unresearched blog post, this one is. I'll try to do better next time.

Oh, something funny while talking to my friend and getting some background on it:
Me - ? at least im still a taurus..
Her - im a taurus now..... dun dun dunnnn

Li-Tra-Cha

My brains going booksbooksbooksbooks after a pretty good afternoon book swap with some couchsurfers. I handed out five of my own and threw a sixth out on Rhizome's trading post table. I also picked up four new books : Santa Evita, The Hottest State, The English Patient, and Freakonomics.

As a nice cap to all of this there's a new sensation sweeping the nation - the nation of Colombia, that is! It's ... ...... BiblioBurro!!!