Animoto

And now a word from our sponsor.





Ok, I don't have sponsors. Nobody pays me to waste five minuets of your day. I do that out of my love for you. But if I did have sponsors, my blog would be about my love for them and read something like this:

So I found this cool little link today. I was checking the world wide web of freebies and found a tasty morsel stuck to the strands. I found an app that let me create a video from my 2012 Facebook photos.

Now I know what you're saying. "But Rob, who would be so vain that they'd want to reshare all their pictures and posts in one neat little bite-sized bundle? Where do we find this paragon of self-indulgence?"

To you I say, "Look no further.  You have found such a man."

I would also point out that the vanity aspect only tickled my senses. What really reeled me in was the promise of a quick and easily produced product.

Yup: the laze factor.

So I gave Animoto slideshow a shot.

The hardest part about creating my Animoto video was finding the link to do it.  I had read about Animoto in a USA Today article, but when I decided to try it, I went to the web page and had to do a little searching to find the app. In fact I actually had to find their Facebook page before I could get started. The Facebook page then led to a link to their page, that was the page I wanted...

After that though, I clicked a button to tell them who I was on Facebook and Animoto did the rest. In less than 2 minutes I had a pretty cool animated slideshow of my year.

And I'm gonna tell ya.  Damn! I'm fun.  I wish I was me.  I led a great life in 2012.

Animoto even incorporated my FB posts to caption my photos.   A picture popped up of the Queen Mary, with the caption "Holy Crap! I'm getting married here tomorrow!" 

Oh! This life of Rob! He's worldly, he's fun.  I want to be just like him.

I want to be just like Animoto too!  They even added a soundtrack to my slideshow. Oh it's not as cool as some of the Licensed music in my personal library, but it's also legal, and did I mention, FREE?

Of course if you do want to spend money, Animoto has a program for you too, but for me, and my cheap hairy butt, I liked  the fur I saw.

I also liked what the automation created, which was rare. What wasn't rare was that I still wanted  to go in and tweak the slideshow.  That took a few more minutes, but was very easy.  The only real limitation seemed to be the wifi speed at my free hotspot. Apparently there are some things you shouldn't skimp on.

But I didn't feel like I was skimping on Animoto. Sure, this will never replace pro video tools, but for a down and dirty slideshow that does all the work, for free, I've got no complaints.

Did I mention how cool they made me look?

Here, check it out for yourself:





Make your own slideshow with music at Animoto.

The Parade Goes on.

Did you catch the Macy’s parade this year?  It could have been the most exciting 4 hours on Thanksgiving television. I know the Lions game wasn’t. I got to watch the instant replay of the play that the officials would never officially watch, repeated, over and over. Nope. Not the parade. The parade replayed nothing. The parade didn’t cost the Lions a playoff seat.

It just took two lives and gave out personal information.

Yup. A killer parade.  You didn’t get to see that part on TV though. You have to live the parade to find out about these things.  It seems that the networks wanted the only Thanksgiving carcasses to be on the viewer’s table and not on the network’s plate.

“I’m Thankful…I’m not that guy!”

“Amen!”

There were two separate incidents, but both were fatal. One was a clown. The saddest clown ever.  A 67-year-old man and his wife dressed up to make kids smile: fuzzy hair, balloons, the works. The parade had barely started. The guy was shaping balloon animals for happy kids. Somewhere between squeaking ears and shaping legs, he fell over in the street: a heart attack.

His wife was quick. She dropped down and almost immediately started CPR. Five compressions, a breath, repeat, repeat, repeat till she’s out of breath. No good. One ambulance ride and now Thanksgiving will never mean the same thing.

We never got to see that. We didn’t even hear about how the man had signed a petition to get Neil Sedaka into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. For me, that’s enough to get the man a shrine.

“…I hear laughter in the rain…”

It’s not clown laughter.  It’s not the dead cop either.  He was just doing his job directing parade traffic, and right there, had a heart attack.   

I don’t remember any of my kid shows readying me for this.

Dead man in street as Mickey Mouse flies overhead. “And that’s one to grow on.”

No.  “You live, you get by until you die and the parade goes on” was not the message. And yet that’s what this Thanksgiving reminds us.  It also reminds us to do something important. Not necessarily like walking on the moon or discovering uranium, but something that makes your time make sense: love somebody, live for others, share the joy.  Don’t make balloon animals though.  That’s just silly.

Don’t work for the Nassau County Police Department either.  They helped with the parade confetti. Thousands of shredded chits from department documents rained down on the happy crowd.  One teen found somebody’s social security number by wiping shreds from his sweater. Now he’s got himself a new car.

“Thanks NCPD!”

Ok. This kid was honest, but not everybody is, and you’d think the police would shred their documents better than that, and maybe find better ways to dispose of them.  I’d love to give a funny metaphor for what this is like, but they are the metaphor. “It’s like a government agency giving all your private information to the public.” What’s more metaphoric than that?

…And the parade goes on.

Arrest records, inner office memos, some people found out about Rommney’s New York motorcade.  If it happened at the NCPD, the news is on the streets.  New Yorkers, little bits of your private life just rained down on Santa Clause.

“Merry Christmas!”

One thing’s for sure, once reports got out of personal information and SSNs littering NY streets, that parade route would have become the cleanest streets in New York.

And that’s just the Thanksgiving Parade. I can’t wait till Christmas.

Shopping Madness

So we’re planning this Christmas party.  I mentioned that, right?  Since the party is planned for this Saturday, today was shopping day.  Every year I do this, make one big trip, after Thanksgiving, and every year I’m reminded of the one basic Christmas rule:

Never shop during the Christmas season.

Yeah, and that’s why you don’t throw Christmas parties after Thanksgiving.  I’ve found that the best party planning season is somewhere around mid June.  Maybe that’s because it’s warm and everybody else is somewhere else vacationing, or maybe it’s because it’s around the same time as my birthday, and somebody else is doing the shopping.  Either way, yay June!

The worst window of shopping hell? That’s Thanksgiving to New Years.  Those are days where you long to be a hibernating bear.

“Go fetch me a pic-a-nic basket, Boo Boo buddy…aw, never mind. Nap time.”

So we planned our party early in the season to avoid the sick St. Nick mania.  It’s a good plan. There was one flaw in our plan: I needed to stop at Costco.  My hope was that school is still in session, and most people are hard at work or squirreling away their nuts trying to afford the last push of the season. That would leave the Costco shopping aisles mostly empty. That was my Christmas wish.

Yeah, that was where I failed.

See it isn’t always the crowds that kill you.  It’s the quality of shopper that will do you in. I mean in the movie Alien, it wasn’t a Christmas infestation of Ewoks that Jub-Jubbed the Nostromo crew to death. No it was one bad day and one curious Christmas egg that killed all but the Ripley and the uncurious cat.

And in Costco, no one can hear you scream—cuz they’re all too mesmerized by the free samples, and I should of known.

The Costco greeter tried to warn me.

“Hello.”

That’s what she said. It wasn’t “hi!” or “How ya doing? Welcome to Costco!” It was “Hello.” Remember the movie Independence Day?  Remember the weirdo welcoming committee with hand-drawn placards leaping skyward at the top of the L.A. skyscraper waving “Hello?”

Yeah, this hello wasn’t like that hello.  This hello was the alien reply to that hello. The blast of blue fire aimed to destroy everything in its path, hello.  And it wasn’t just me. This greeter was greeting everyone with her deadly hellos like blasts from a laser pistol.

“This is Rob-five. I’m going in.”

Inside, the crowd was light. I pushed my cart down the main aisles. It didn’t feel like kayaking Costco rapids while navigating sample station rocks. It felt like, well pushing a cart: normal. I whistled through, filling my cart with necessities.

Costco lured me in deeper.

Lulled into a relaxed shopping experience, I stopped in the Christmas aisle. We needed wrapping paper and bows. There were a few people already in the aisle, making it difficult to navigate with a cart, so I moored my cart off a Justin Bieber kiosk. He looked like the kind of guy who would watch it for me.

After I entered the aisle, a man pulled his cart in behind me, not offering the same courtesy I offered by leaving my cart on the big aisle. This man blocked this aisle, then bent over, examining the differences between two uniform strands of door garland. 

Some of the shopping elves glared at him.  If they were undead, he’d be lunch. Not me, I wasn’t hungry. Besides. I still needed wrapping paper, and if worse did come to worse, I could escape out the other side of the aisle.

Other amblers grumbled and waddled to the open side. Most passed me, except one old lady.  She stopped. Apparently she needed wrapping paper too. She wobbled like a hardboiled egg, until her body turned enough to view the wrapping paper.  She was short. I was trying to be nice.  I looked over her shoulder as she sorted. I’d grab the one I liked after she left.

As she pulled each package of wrapping paper, she tried lifting each one to see the full length of the tube. It being Costco, each tube contained 1000 yards of wrapping paper, and weighed as much as the old lady did. 

She couldn’t lift them, so she’d wrap her arms around each one, bend at the knees and lift each roll out to the aisle. Then she’d spin them like great lumber logs, until she was satisfied that she didn’t want that roll. Then she’d drop it into the aisle, with a thunk.

This continued for half a box. Actually it continued for longer, but at half a box, I saw the roll I wanted out in the aisle, and knew I’d never get by if I waited any longer.  Looking back I could see the man in the suit still comparing carbon copy garland. He still wasn’t convinced one wasn’t better than the other one.  And he was darn sure he wouldn’t be fooled into buying a lesser strand this year.

So I kicked my roll out of the way as the woman spun with another wrapping log. She almost fell dragging her roll over mine. She didn’t realize my roll had moved, and the rolls hit mid woman-wobble.  She dropper her roll and glared at me as if it was my fault. 

Well okay, so it was my fault.  I can admit that, I said so. “Sorry.”

She shot me a glare and a “Hello.”

The store fell silent. People in the aisle started to turn.

I’ve seen these movies before. They don’t end well. I grabbed my roll, and ran for the other side of the aisle.  Navigating the aisle with my wrapping caber, I gained a new respect for the old woman.  This thing was heavier than I thought. I bounced like a pinball off a few carts and people. I looked back over my shoulder to make sure she wasn’t chasing me.  She wasn’t. She was still glaring at me though, and now other people in the aisle glared too. They now hated me worse than the guy still studying garland, and it looked like they were ready to tie me up with ribbon and run me out of Costco on a pole of wrapping paper. 

I hefted the roll onto my shoulder and I ran.  It was all good till the end of the aisle. There I rounded the corner but forgot that my width was now the same as a log of paper. I took the corner and took out a Christmas tree.   Sending ornaments everywhere. Those that didn’t shatter when the hit the floor rolled across the back aisle and across to the freezer section, where more people took notice.

The store began to murmur. Like a whisper of mist I could hear it raising: “Hello.”

Now it wasn’t just the people in the aisle who hated me; it was all of Costco—including the employees.  Pretending to see nothing, I made my way up the next aisle.  I see the Bieber kiosk at the end. He’s still smiling. I’m almost there.

I get there, and my cart is gone, along with the rest of my purchases.

“What the…”

I look around. People who aren’t crying carols over the spilt tree are lumbering towards me.  There’s a blockade of Costco employees coming at me from the front of the store.

“Hello.”

My cart is nowhere to be found and all I have is a Yule log of paper.  There’s no way I can take them all out.  It’s Christmas. It’s over. I mean maybe if hadn’t left the keg of Wesson in the cart, I could light it on fire. Then I’d have a chance. As it is it’s me against the world.  And the world coming up behind me has grabbled an economy sack of duck down and a bucket of pitch.

I drop my roll and raise my hands slowly. All I wanted to do was shop.

You’ll be interested to know that Costco does have a jail. It’s not as big as everything else in the store.  It’s more like a little closet.  It’s me and some guy who tried splitting the spaghetti cord into individual packets, cramped into the small space. The wifi here isn’t bad though; at least I can get a blog in while waiting for My Queen.  She’s on her way. I’ve had to explain that we’re getting another Christmas tree for the party. She wasn’t real happy about that. She was glad to know that we’ll have plenty of wrapping paper for the next 30 years though.

Tis the Season

So the Monday after Thanksgiving is now Cyber Monday. So now we’ve got what, Thanksgiving Thursday, Black Friday, Local Saturday, Weeping Sunday, Cyber Monday, and then what? Total Bankrupt Tuesday?  This year we’re putting the Commercial in Christmas and saving the economy one credit card at a time. 

I know the Queen and I are doing our part.  I mean we’re not buying presents or anything, but we are spending money. 

You’d think a writer and his Queen wouldn’t need much, right? How expensive can a pad of paper and a pen be? You’d be surprised.  It’s all the little stuff. It’s the Starbucks coffee, it’s the cable subscription (to keep my writing topical and my Walking Dead current. Speaking of which, what do you think Glen’s getting Hershel for Christmas? What about Rick? In Zombie Apocalypse world, how does he return Lori’s gifts? Did he have keep the receipts? Looks like Darryl is getting a brother for Christmas; is it one he’s really gonna want? How much gift can Rob give between a set of parentheses? ).

This Walking Dead Christmas season The Queen and I are throwing a party.  That’s how we give. Yeah, it’s this Friday; you’re invited if you want to come. Just mention my blog and the super-secret password, and we’ll let you in.

The super secret password? Fat Batman. But you gotta say it like Michael Keaton in the first Batman, or you ain’t getting’ in.

Party spending is like Christmas spending. First you think “Oh, we’re just gonna get a few small things. Invite a few friends.” Next thing you know, you’ve got a Macy’s parade with the Detroit Lions in your living room and Kid Rock trying to assemble a bicycle in the bedroom.

“Bawitda-WTF? Where the hell is flange ‘B’?”

Yeah, that kind of humor is what you can expect going into the Holiday season. Why? Cuz I’m planning a party. I’m too busy and broke to be funny. This party started as four friends and a trough of punch.  Now we’re having a cookie baking party with friends, family, egg nog, beer, fireworks, snow castles and Rob whine. I’m watching the Christmas budget explode and I’m trying not to say anything rude.

“Ho! Ho! Ho! What..? Yes, honey. I’m practicing my Santa.”

Of course I say that like the PQ is to blame. She’s completely to blame: she invited me. I’m a partyfectionist. I’m Martha Stewart with Dennis Kozlowski’s Tyco party budget. Everything has to look cool.  Throwing a party, that’s the Pirate Queen’s fault. Making it an event, that’s my bad.

This weekend while driving home from her parent’s house, we discussed our beverage list.

She says, “What about the egg nog?”

I say, “What about it?”

“Do we need it?”

Egg Nog...

I turn to her. My face, the blown tire of distress, gapes, winded at  the common street urchin who’s replaced my Party Queen.

“What?” She says feeling her face for boils.

“Party without egg nog?” freakin’ weirdo. I scoot closer to the car door hoping it’s not contagious. This may be how the REAL zombie apocalypse starts: not with a party but a half-assed gathering.

“Nobody likes egg nog, do they?”

“Well I do.”

“But does that justify spending over fifty dollars in alcohol?”

“I like egg nog.” I repeat, emphasizing the import.

“But you’re a writer, you’ll drink anything, so long as you can feel bad about yourself while you do it.”

“And?”

“Why not beer and wine? People like beer and wine and it’s cheaper.”

Now you’ve read the start of this blog. I’m complaining about spending money. And yet  here I am arguing with my beloved wife because I think that beer sounds cheap. Egg nog represents options. I say some festive words. She regale’s Yule tidings of yore…

So we’re serving beer.

But I’m still fighting.

And that’s what Christmas means to me.  While you are all out there spending lots of money on lots of gifts, I’ll be home planning to spend lots of money on very few gifts, because my gifts are cooler.

I might have to rethink the Lions though, it’s probably a little overboard, especially if I’m gonna sneak in the vat of egg nog. That’s alright, cuz I don’t care what it costs, Kid Rock is still putting together that freakin’ bicycle.

“Git back in there Kid!”

Thanksgiving 2012

It’s Thanksgiving. What are you thankful for? 

Me, I’m thankful for several things. Most of which are the normal: wife, home, food, etc.  That’s not to belittle any of these items. They’re all important, especially the wife. She reads my blog. I could never forget her…and live.

“The cranberries have a bitter almond flavor this year.”

So yeah, I’m thankful for My Queen.

I’m also thankful for things that are not.  I’m thankful for not being Albert Einstein.  Great man, brilliant man, knew the speed of light and how to keep things relative. You’ve read my blog. You know that I suck at keeping things relative. My family knows too. This will be another Thanksgiving I spend 2000 miles away from all of them.

It’s better this way. I’ve seen the horror holiday movies. Families and Thanksgiving go together like toothpaste and orange juice. That’s the true gift the Indians gave us that first Holiday. We gave them beads, they gave us family stuffing and resentment gravy.

“What do you mean Rob wet the bed till he was 15?”

Einstein’s family gave his brain to science.  Yeah. I’d wet my bed at night worrying about that. That’s right. After Einstein died, they cut out his brain, ran it down to the photo booth for commemorative pictures and then chopped it up into Hors d'oeuvre sized bits.

“Try the patte. It’s brain food.”

Ok, they didn’t serve it, but they did study it.  Even last week they uncovered new information about Einstein’s brain.  Do you realize what that means? They’re still looking at it! What the heck?  Did you read where I said he was brilliant and great? Let him rest.

That’s why I’m thankful to announce what you already know: I’m no genius.  I’m a blogger for heaven’s sake. You don’t get much further from the center of genius universe than that.

I’m also not gonna have scientists, for generations to come, using my brain for much more than a paperweight. I’m thankful that when I die, I can rest in peace.

I’m also thankful that I’m not at the other end of the spectrum.

“Abby someone.”

Yeah, they study those people too.  Lindsey Stone will probably get her brain examined if she survives the social media backlash for her moment of shame. She’s the girl who posted the picture of herself disrespecting the tomb of the Unknown Soldier last week. She’s so brilliant she might even lose her job over that. I hope her piece of comedy was worth the price.

“To become a moron takes the deepest commitment, the most absent mind. Dignity, respect. A moron craves not these things. Think not. Do.”

You tell ‘em Yoda.  I’m thankful I’m not him either. Yoda lived on a dark planet with nobody else around. I love people. They amaze me. Lindsey, I’m shocked and saddened, and thankful that my father taught me better. He taught me that I can be an idiot and an ass, but not when it hurts others more than it hurts me. There’s a fine line between humor and haughty disrespect, and let’s face it, I’m blind, I still trip over that line on a regular basis. I’m just happy when someone like Lindsey reminds me where that line is.

And then I’m thankful they’re not me.

Some Things are more Prescious than Others

The problem with most Hobbits is that they aren’t real. No, really.  It looks like they’re finding that out in New Zealand right now. I guess they’ve discovered that movie Hobbits, unlike real Hobbits don’t know how to handle livestock and now local animal wranglers are complaining.

“Hobbit blamed for dozens of animal deaths,” read one headline.  Wow!

Now I mean it’s not like movie Hobbits are offering sacrifices to Cecil B. D’Beelzebub. No, the poor critters are just dying due to “death traps.”  OK, granted, that doesn’t sound much better, but let me assure you just as the news assures me: Hobbits and Dwarves are not wandering the hills setting snares and punji sticks for furry toed shits and giggles.

First Blood 5: Bilbo

No, this problem is more like the land that the film crew is keeping the animals on is filled with sinkholes and such. The problem isn’t any less serious though.  Death tolls vary, depending on whose PR team you’re listening to, but AP agrees that wranglers admit to burying three horses, six goats, six sheep, a dozen chickens and one troll. 

Ok, I made the last one up, but I think that that’s a great way for New Zealand’s PR team to spin this. Let’s not talk about film crew negligence in our land of beauty. That’s yesterday’s news and let’s face it: film crews are carrion. Film crews leave nothing but death and depleted catering teams in their wake.

Instead, let’s talk about film crews killing trolls. 

Tourism will boom!  News reports will picture Princess Kate leading three billy-goats to their bridge-top doom in order to trap a toll troll.

“I don’t know. This billy doesn’t look gruff enough…”

I’ve watched enough news to know that it’s all on how you sell the death, because lets face it. These film Hobbits aren’t as conservative as real Hobbits. They’re like goblins on a grog bender. They lay waste to all that they see and then leave.

Maybe if film Hobbits had natural predators. You know, circle of life and all that. Film crews would be required to keep the natural film Hobbit ecology in check with film Balrogs or the like.

“I had no idea Joe Peschi could run like that…”

“Run Joe! Run!”

Until then, a good rule of thumb for visiting film Hobbits is to hide your women and your livestock.

You’ll be glad you did.

Rising to the Occasion

Breaking News: The Twinkie and the Ho Ho may go the way of the Dodo!

That’s right all you maître d's, Hostess is one foot out of the liquidation grave.

Remember all those jokes about Twinkies lasting forever? Lies. Start locking up Suzy Q in your bomb shelter now, cuz there’s a stalemate in the bakery.

I remember as I kid I grew up with a whole host of Hostess products. Not to mention the Hostess side brands like Wonder Bread. You don’t get much more white bread Americana than that.

But in these times Hostess has fallen on hard times.  Bad obesity PR and questions by whole food growers about which plant yields yellow #5 have hindered Hostess’s profit margins. They’ve had to slim down.

It’s the way of all America now. We’re all trimming back. And like many other corporations, Hostess started by cutting back on workers, but here’s the Zinger.

When they tried cutting wages, that cake didn’t rise with the unions. Now there’s nobody working at all, because the union is on strike. The union doesn’t care that if nobody works, the jobs disappear for good: They’ve got Little Debbie on snack food speed dial.

As for the workers…well when Hostess liquidates, they’ll have to stand in a different line: the line of unemployment.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not anti-union.  Unions deserve a Hostess packaged apple pie deal, just like the rest of us. But sometimes you gotta accept a little less filling so you can still have your pie and eat it too.

For now, it looks at Hostess there’s no more pie, and no more Wonder Bread.

Let them eat cake.

Word Presents

The new words are here! The new words are here!

It’s like nerd Christmas, except I don’t get a weird reindeer sweater from Aunt Sadie.

That’s right, OED (That’s the Oxford English Dictionary for you heathens. What? You don’t know what a heathen is? Check the OED. It’s there.) has announced its new words for 2013!  For word geeks, the OED is the constitution. If a word doesn’t appear in the OED it’s not really a word. The OED holds more power than the Scrabble dictionary and Richard Scary’s Picture Dictionary, combined! You don’t know words, if you don’t know the OED.

So it’s a big deal when every year the OED picks a word to add to it’s folds.  Jumbled letters are validated as real words! It’s like Pinocchio touching his real boy self for the first time.

“Wait! That’s still wood!”

Oh, or maybe the second time.  Either way.  It’s that way.

OED means words become real.  We could not have LOLed or OMGed without the OED. Those letter combinations became words last year along with muffin-top and tinfoil-hat.  The last words were only paired words until OED legitimized them with a hyphen.

So this year is a new present to open. This year there are two words, one for the American version, and one for the ATP (across the pond) English version. What are those words?  Well, lets pull back the wrapping and see:

American’s get “GIF.”

The UK gets “omnishambles.”

Yeah, it’s obvious who the OED favorite is. GIF? Really? I don’t know if I’m more offended that that’s our word, or by the fact that that wasn’t a word already.  People have been sending GIFs for as long as the Internet has had viruses.

Beware strangers bearing GIFs.

GIF? It’s already given way to the Jpeg  and the PIX.

Omnishambles? It means “a situation that has been comprehensively mismanaged, characterized by a string of blunders and miscalculations.“ 

I thought that was a presidency. 

Well apparently it’s not.  It’s an omnishambles, and the UK gets it, and we don’t. We get GIF. It’s that reindeer sweater all over again.

King of Creativity and Duke of Sciency Stuff

I love science.  If I hadn’t been a writer, I’d have been a scientist.  Yeah, sorry Dad, surprise! It’s ok.  And no, now is not the time to start sending me Devry Institute brochures again.

But yeah, I could see me as a scientist. Not a microby or a mathy scientist, just a cool scientist.  The kind who does cool science.

“Why, yes. I am Rob, the scientist of cool. Do you want to see what I can do?”

As a scientist I wouldn’t have discovered alternate fuel sources or created a village-worth of mineral rich food supply from an 8 oz glass of table water. No, I would have blown stuff up, fizzed up black gassy clouds and like the scientists at Duke, I would have created an invisibility cloak.

That’s right. Step aside Harry Potter with all your magic mumbo jumbo; they’ve got science on their side and they created real invisibility.

And now, so can I.  That’s right, I found the article and I immediately downloaded the Duke research. Invisibility!  Can I get a “muah-ha-ha?” from the mad guy in the back?

I was so excited!  I wanted to show my queen my new bag of tricks. My old bag was disappearing, and not in a good way. Who’s your mad scientist now, baby?

I followed the Duke specs and built me a wedgy Eischer picture-framey looking thing (Scientific terminology) that made things vanish.

Tada! And for my next feat of science I will make a desktop computer disappear. 

It made perfect sense. My queen has complained about the clutter surrounding my desktop.  If I could make it disappear, she would never have to look at the eye sore again! Happy wife, happy life, right?

I hefted my desktop, monitor and all, and moved it the invisibility device. Here I discovered one slight hiccup in my plan. The computer was bigger than the invisibility device. I couldn’t even prop it on top.

Sighing, I stared at the pile of electronics and then at my magnificent device. Maybe a test run, maybe something small.  What part of my computer would fit onto the invisibility wedge? Sifting through the parts I placed each component onto the wedge, gauged its size and removed it when the dimensions proved too large.

After twenty minutes of scientific trial and error method I found the piece that fit my little experiment: the cordless mouse.

Oh, well, that’s anticlimactic.

Fine. For now I’ll make a mouse disappear.  I set the mouse on the platform, said the scientific words, and waved my laser wand.

“Eureka!”

Yeah, in Mr. Rob’s sciency world, “Eureka” is Greek for “WTF? Nothing happened!”

I tried again.

“Eureka!”

Nothing. And no, not in an invisibility way. In that way, there was something: a mouse, sitting on a wedge, all perfectly visible.

Back to the Duke drawing board.  This time I read more of the article than just the title.  Apparently the invisibility chamber only works on microwaves.  Well that’s weird. Who wants to hide something from a microwave? An underground potato railroad? 

I read more.

It wasn’t hiding from microwaves, it was hiding in microwaves.  That made more sense. I wasn’t sure why I’d want to hide my computer in the microwave, but now I’d invested in science.  Now was not the time to surrender to logistics. 

I took my wedge to the microwave in the kitchen.  After some struggle, I discovered that laws of light may not apply to my invisibility cloak, but laws of space did apply. The thing didn’t fit into my microwave.  What could I do?

I’m a smart guy. I bought a bigger microwave. I bought one big enough to hold my computer.

Taking my scientific tool home, I placed it on the table. Now with the microwave to hold things in, I could wedge my computer around the wedge and maybe at least part of it would disappear. We’d see. And this microwave, I could move to the bedroom, where the computer normally sat.

“Watson!  Come here, I need you!”  I don’t know how that applies, but it sounds bedroom sciency.

But back to my science. First, I deducted that I only had one computer, so I should start with a test sample.  Something smaller. A mouse? No, I’ve seen a mouse in a microwave.  I didn’t want to clean that up. For this experiment, I’d try a potato. 

I placed my potato on my wedge and my wedge inside my microwave. Closing the door I asked myself the next question: How long did I want to make the potato disappear? 

I set the timer for two minutes, and pressed start.

“Eureka!”

I have a visibly cooked potato.

What happened?

I go back to my article.  “…only microwaves…” yeah, I know that. Finally I found the problem.  This device only makes things vanish on one side. I left the carousel tray in the microwave. As it spins, I’m seeing the other three sides.

I am a freakin’ genius!

Back to the microwave. I pull out the circular piece of glass and it’s little track, leaving me with a square box. Next goes in my wedge.  I have to make sure to place it in the microwave with the “invisible” side facing the window, or I won’t see the science.

I look at my potato. It’s a little overcooked. It’s my last potato. No problem.  I know what I was missing before. I’ll jump to my computer.  I stick the whole thing in around the invisibility wedge and into the microwave. It takes me a bit to get the door closed, but it happens. Nothing left to do but to let science run its course. I set the timer for five minutes and press START.

“Eur—Holy crap!”

Something happened! There was lightning, smoke and flames, then poof! Well, more Bam! than poof! But poof is more scientific sounding. Either way, my computer disappeared! So did the microwave, the table and window behind it.  I can still tell that they’re there though: there’s a black char looking smoky circle surrounding where everything really is. 

Funny, I thought that invisible objects could be touched though, just not seen. 

Whatever! My Queen is gonna be so happy!

Monday Non-Blog RobBlog

Hello RobBlog fans.

Ok, you’re right, there is no such thing.

Hello RobBlog readers. 

How’s that?

Everybody reads the RobBlog for their own reason: My dad reads it because it’s the only way he can keep up with me. Yeah, the irony of having a writer son who doesn’t write home is not lost on my father.

“So you say you’re a writer? Really? I’ve never seen you do that…”

My father wields the sarcastic art like a Jedi Knight.  Me?  I’m the weak-minded storm trooper just following orders.

“This is not the blog you’re looking for.”

Well, at least that much is true.  Today’s blog is not about anything in particular, it’s just to tell you that I’m sorry you won’t see a real blog today.  

I apologize if this ruins your afternoon escape from Monday drudgery. I apologize if this is your afternoon escape from Monday drudgery.  You do realize that there is a whole world of Internet distractions out there, and most of them are exponentially more entertaining than any RobBlog entry. Seriously, I can think of three computer viruses that would make you smile more.

Most of all, I apologize for everything that is Monday. Everything that stole you’re reading enjoyment—Humor me, we’ll call it “enjoyment” for the sake of the blog—My excuses abound: Rain, Monday, Government Holiday, lack of caffeine. Call it what you will, but in calling it, you will call it a short non-blog RobBlog.

As the RobBlog writer, I’m calling it.

You can be thankful. Most non-blogs are long non-blogs.  And I’m just the non-blogger to give them to you. 

But not today, this is short.

Just like we’d all like Monday to be.

Say thank you.  I’m glad I could help.

Now on to Tuesday, please.

More Dark Meat

If Election Day is the Anti-Christmas, the day after is the voter’s Thanksgiving. We look at what we now have and we’re thankful.

Sort of.

Those who asked for the turkey are happy. Those who wanted ham: not so much. It’s ok. There’s plenty of stuffing and four years worth of leftovers.

Bon Apatite!

What does this mean for the RobBlog?  Absolutely nothing. It’s business as usual until they outlaw laptops and coffee shops. Until then, lucky you. 

See? I told you it was Thanksgiving!  What am I thankful for?  Lots.  Here have some dark meat; it’ll give you something to chew on.

My blog has been a lot of dark meat lately.  A little greasier, and not as healthy as the white meat stuff you’re used to, but it does make better turkey enchiladas than white meat blogs.

 What white meat? Yeah.  Thanks a lot. For that you’ll get an extra helping of Jello Salad Blog.

What’s a Jello salad blog? It’s an odd assortment of mixed metaphors suspended in a green congealed prose. Yeah I write those too.

It’s OK. It’s true.  The RobBlog hasn’t been the light fluffy blog you may have expected.  Which is weird because, over all, I’m all-over happy.  I’ve got a wife, I’m working a cool story idea, there is kibble on the table and two cars in my one-car garage.  Life is good.

Maybe it’s the writer in me that believes that every story needs conflict. Let’s face it; we all thrive on conflict. It’s the tough times that make us grow. Maybe I want to grow but feel life is too good.

Where’s Lucy’s 10-cent Psychology stand when I need her?

I think that election season brings this inner conflict out of us too. I mean we spend the whole year listening to people tell us how bad we have it, or how horrible we’re gonna have it, but everybody agrees that so long as they’re elected, it’ll be sunshine rainbows and My Pretty Ponies for everyone. Honey will drip from our lips and fireworks will fly from our butts.

The day after Election Day we’re all grateful that everything is a lie, because no matter how bright a dream future we fantasized about, nobody wants a lit roman candle wedged between our cheeks. We’re all just thankful to have things back to normal.

And today I’ll write more of what I wrote yesterday, and then I’ll write even more tomorrow, because I live where coffee shops and laptops are plentiful.

And for that, I’m always thankful.

Your Vote Counts

It's Election Day!

Yay us! It's time to pack away the lights, the lies and the signs for another year; the vote-me tide season is over.

Election Day: the anti-Christmas.

Christmas is all about God's gift of love and our love to collect other gifts we don't need while praising a fat guy in a bad suit.

Maybe it is the same thing.

"You'd better vote correctly or Candidate Claus won't bring you any policies."

Yeah, kids love Candidate Claus.  He's the next best thing to sliced Care Bears. Or bread. Yeah, sliced bread is good too. It won’t get the same attention from a five-year-old that a sliced Care Bear will. That I’ll tell ya. 

Try talking elections with five-year-olds.

"Part of this is going toward electoral college.”

“Just like my Christmas money?”

“Yup. Now lets talk about your social security money…”

Before they need social security, I think we should teach children more about voting. Not just the “voting is your right” speech, I think we should emphasize a “voting is your responsibility” discourse as well.

Voting isn’t just about all those people who died so that we could, although that can make for a great attention getter for kids.

“You’re Great-Great-Great Grandfather Cougar was shot in the head, his eyeball hanging out to the side, and a strong wind whistling “Yankee Doodle” through the his new skull hole so that you could vote.”

“You said he got the clap.”

“No, that’s your uncle Cooter. Big difference.”

“Uncle Cooter is on Mom’s side?”

“That’s the difference.”

 

No, voting is about real choices and real consequence. Despite the lies we tell our kids, participation isn’t the same thing as winning. And when it comes to elections, voting your conscience is not the same as participating. Participation gets you a sticker. Voting gets you a $10,0000 bond.

“I voted!” 

Who cares that I’m voting along what the glossiest mailer I received, and that the name “Sandusky” sounds like a respectable name for the head of the school board. I voted. That’s all that matters.

No. Like all participation sports, in voting, there are winners and there are losers. And when we vote just to say we voted, we pay a price. More than our “I voted” sticker, we win the “I voted poorly” sticker shock. We win a bond. We win a thieving politician. We win what we deserve.

That’s why we need to teach our poor children the consequence of poor voting before they’re old enough to vote.  Start simple.

“Ok Tommy, would you like a stripped power cord and a wall socket or would you like an X-Box 360?”

Let them get a feel for choices and consequence it before you teach them real politics.

“Tommy do you want the electric cord to the tongue and a dollar or the poke in the eye and you pay me?”

It’s important that we teach our children to think before they vote.  Because their decisions will establish our comfort level as we grow old, and we don’t want them basing those decisions on which TV ad conveyed the prettiest pictures.

“I’m Justin Bieber and I approve this message.”

Speaking of our children, now is a good time to consider how you vote. Baby Boomers have already stolen our children’s social security, Do you want to be the generation to tell the them that you’ve pawned their “American Dream” for a handful of magic coffee beans and a party vote?  God gave you a brain use it.

Over 2000 years ago, God gave the Israelites brains too. They decided to vote for a king.  The king they elected was Saul because he looked the most kingly. Never mind that the best man for the job was a young Shepherd boy with a slingshot. When it comes to elections, image is everything.

That was over 2000 years ago, and we still do the same today. Can we teach the children of today to be the first children to buck the trend? Can we teach our children to vote for substance? Can we remember to do that before we congratulate ourselves for voting today?

That’s my Election Day wish.

Building babies out of Bathwater

“It’s not funny.”

“Sure it is. You just don’t get it. The mouse—“

“Oh, I get it. I just didn’t think it was funny.  Sorry.”

That’s my queen.  She says she’s my biggest fan, but how can she be my biggest fan when everything I create doesn’t make her melt? I’m sure there are bigger fans.

My work is genius!

And there ya go!  I’ve found my biggest fan and he is me!

I like me. I think everything I create is an overflowing horn of creative plenty.  I wrote a short story about the family cat in second grade: creative gold! I wrote a twenty page essay about the MMPI in college. If you were awake when you reached the last page, you would have been astounded.

So would have I.

Over the years, I’ve dealt with haters and doubters.  Most of them are in the publishing industry.  That does pose a problem if I want others to read my work. I don’t. I am, after all, my biggest fan.

I am a Papier-mâché island crafted on the slick-slime pages of my glory, self-sufficient and self-important.

And like everything I’ve crafted (besides the MMPI report) that’s complete fiction.

Of course I care what others think. And each time I share my work, I craft a bubble of time to consider criticism.

The life of a struggling writer is more than a daily regimen of struggling and writing. It’s about making yourself stronger too. The struggling writer needs to be heroic, because he is both mother and father to his work; stone skinned warrior and nurturing mother, defending and bettering a young fledgling concept to an adult prose, until the time comes when they can stand on their own.

“It’s not funny.”

And sometimes they don’t. Sometimes my written word is a surly man-boy living in my basement, playing D&D and eating Funyuns, never going anywhere. That doesn’t mean that I love it less, but it does mean that sometimes I need to kick the words free.

Tough love is hardest for the writing parent. We always believe in something we could have done to make them better or we only see them for the best we think they are.

I am my biggest fan, but I have to be. I’m also my harshest critic.

I am the two faced Roman god Janus. I am the first person to yell “shit!” and abort my child to nothingness. I am disapproving father living vicariously through my characters; I am the disappointed stage mom complaining about bloated sentence structure and slathering guilt as thick as jelly on all my words for all they could accomplish if they just applied themselves.

That’s what it means to struggle and write. And that’s why we need people around us who are willing to stand outside our heads and give us a real perspective so that we can make our babies brilliant and bright. We need people who care enough to tell us the truth. And we need to take time and consider the value of their criticism.

“It’s not funny.”

I know, but it will be when I’m done with it.