Beadazzled benz

So some of you find my phone a little freakish. Now check THIS out.



Even better, this guy videotaped all the details.

You have to scroll down to the videos section and click on #8.

A moment of silence please.

New York Times: Momofuku Ando, 96, Dies; Invented Instant Ramen

While my roomies don't let me eat this stuff anymore because the noodles are deep-fried and preserved. I must observe a moment of silence for the man who let me feed my ramen addiction just that much more conveniently.

And he lived until 96!

Leni the Pug Marketer

Ok, so I like this site. It's promoting a new age "Twas the Night Before Christmas" story about the Christmas adventures of a pug and his crew of canines.

http://www.lenithepug.com/

So many things about it tickle my fancy - the navigation across the bottom - how when you hover over each menu item, popcorn flies out and when you click a different character pops up. I like how it shows all the behind the scenes work that went into the illustration. I like how there's music - and music that so perfectly embodies the ugly cuteness of a pug.

However, how effective is this really, from a marketing perspective? The work that went into building this site is pretty immense. All to sell one book. Yes, a book that is made of paper and printed with ink, that takes up space and is made of matter. I don't question the effectiveness of it in giving viewers/potential readers a sense of what the book is about, but think about the drop off! How much traffic will something like this generate? It's not borderline racy, funny, or controversial enough to warrant viral forwarding. The micro-site was advertised on a bunch of Christian websites - how many people will click on those ads, go to the site, click through and then decide, yes I'm going to order this book for $34.95? The drop off seems pretty significant to me.

I guess I'm just lamenting what seems to me a slightly ineffective effort (a possibly large effort at that) to market a book, which clearly benefits from an interactive site with music and cool animations.

Then again, I do admire this for how it screams labor of love - that's not something I can say often goes into my cost-benefit analysis.

i heart robots

so recently, I've been enamored with the Blackberry Pearl. Ooooooh so pretty. Thin, almost-qwerty keypad, email, shiny, nice little roller ball thing, camera, and a flat back for me to bedazzle it with. Personally, I think it's the true grown up sidekick.

However, it's only available on t-mobile, and I'm stuck with Cingular. Woooooeee is me! But I wasn't about to just give up. So I go to the Cingular website to figure out when my contract is up because I would actually consider jumping ship for the Pearl. I don't think I've ever considered jumping ship before - so that says a lot!

However, it's not exactly clear how to find that information on the Cingular website. And trust me, if you have Cingular, you're not going to want to ever call them. So I click on this thing in the right column called "Ask Cingular" their online interactive agent, thinking it's going to be one of those human manned customer service chat things.

Let me just say I was very pleasantly surprised. Here's my conversation (I'm "Guest"):

Ask Cingular: Welcome! I'm Ask Cingular, an automated service agent available 24/7 to answer your general billing and payment related questions. Please understand Ask Cingular is not Click to Chat with a live Representative, but a automated knowledge resource. Some questions directly related to your wireless account may be best answered in a dialogue with a Representative, and we may ask you to call Customer Service for a resolution.

You can ask me things like:
"What are my options for paying my bill?"
"How do I add a feature?"

Type your question or topic in the space below and click Send.

Guest: Hi

Ask Cingular: Hello! How can I help you?

Guest: when did my contract begin?

Ask Cingular: Finding Your Contract End Date

To find your contract end date, click on Profile in the left navigation. Your profile information will appear. Then, click on User Information in the left navigation to view your contract end date.

Guest: how much does it cost to break my contract?

Ask Cingular: Early Termination Fee

Customers who cancel their contract with Cingular Wireless while still under contract will pay an Early Termination Fee for each wireless telephone number associated with the service.

An Early Termination Fee is not charged if you cancel service within 30 of activation. Please call customer service at 1-800-331-0500 for the Early Termination Fee amount.

There. Successfully found the information I was looking for. Gold star for effectiveness. But just to screw around some more, I continue talking to my new-found friend (I'm still "Guest"):

Guest: i love this chat thing

Ask Cingular: Thank you! I'm happy to help you.

Guest: are you a real person?

Ask Cingular: I'm a robot.

Guest: are you cute?

Ask Cingular: How to Contact Cingular Customer Service

To speak with a customer representative please call customer service at 1-800-331-0500 or 611 on your wireless phone.

The hours of operation are:

Monday through Friday 7:00am – 9:00pm
Saturday 9:00am – 6:00pm

If you are roaming internationally, you can contact us by dialing +1-916-843-4685.

Guest: where are you?

Ask Cingular: I'm actually a computer, but I'm housed in a high-tech hosting facility in California!

Guest: cool!

Ask Cingular: I'm glad you think that's cool.

And another gold star for tickling me pink.

George of the Jungle

So you remember in George of the Jungle when Brandon Fraisier takes his woman back to his treehouse? Don't laugh! I know you all have seen that movie but can't bring yourself to admit it. (What is it about women and horses?) OK, fine - maybe it's just me that saw that movie and thought that a tree house would actually be a really really romantic getaway.

Well, as I was sitting at work, dreaming about vacations, I stumbled upon this. Man oh man, it's dreamy ... sigh ... Sure, it's in India. But it has a turret!



Full slideshow here:
http://www.concierge.com/ideas/luxury/tour/detail?id=1277

If you're in to tents and yurts (ahem, eve), you should flip through the slideshow.

Back to daydreaming...

Back from blogging dry spell with a shallow post

Burlington, Vermont - July 4 Recap

Just a bit of a catch up post for last weekend - July 4.

Five and a half hour flight to Boston. And then a three and a half hour drive to Burlington. Sure, the circulation in my legs took a beating, but I saved like $500 on JetBlue! Which, I'm sure I could have saved even more had I been slightly responsible and booked earlier, but where's the fun in that?

So Kevin and I went to visit our good friend Zach at his sister's place in Burlington. It was a Yahoo! Finance peon reunion! We went running - twice. Swimming in Lake Champlaign (in which supposedly Champy, Mr. Ness' cousin resides) - twice! And ate Vermont Sandwich Company sandwiches - twice. Zach and Kevin each got sandwiches on house-baked grinder rolls that were like over a foot long so we saved some for lunch the next day. It was a perfect weekend. Lazy, warm, summery. Just the way July 4th should be.

I had very few expectations for what Burlington would be like. Aside from the coat factory, ben and jerry's and cheese, Burlington, and Vermont were just estremely far north and far east places to me.

First impressions:

- Lots of white people. In comparison to California, there's definitely a relative lack of diversity. I think I saw a whole 6 black people in our 4 days there. And every asian was definitely a tourist from overseas. Why is it that I notice these things? Maybe I'm racist, maybe I just feel like I didn't fit in some strange way. Maybe I'm being stupidly self-conscious. Either way, it's not like people there were mean, so maybe it's all in my head.

- Very crunchy. Biking trails, the lake, and not one but two outdoor stores were in the middle of town. There was one co-op grocery store in town - Onion River City Market. Kinda like Whole Foods crossed with Rainbow Grocer, except everything was as expensive as Whole Foods without the pre-cooked food section.

- Lots of mosquitos. I think I got about seven bites on my legs in the course of one night, watching the fireworks. Those Tiki torch lamp things don't work. Neither does non-DDT bug repellant. The buggers come out at night and feast.

- Beautiful old buildings, lots of brick, lots of columns, small antique-looking windows are everywhere. And the best thing is that they will house the most normal of businesses - like dentists, candy stores, Banana Repulic. There's a sense of history. Burlington used to be a big center of trade on Lake Champlain - between Vermont and New York. Not so much now, but it was definitely a bustling cosmopolitain city. I think I annoyed Zach with all my questions: "What's that?" "Where's that from?" I hope he had fun making up the answers.

- College town. UVM (Univeristy of Vermont) brings lots of young people to Burlington. The people out and about on the pedestrian promenade were clearly of an age and social mentality that I left behind a few years ago. Not to criticize them, but wow, we used to try so hard.

But I think it's wonderful to have a weekend where we made homemade pizza, watched the fireworks, and played Trivial Pursuit - 90s Edition. Just a warning - I'm horrible at trivia, and at naming state capitals. Did you know what Robert Van Winkle's stage name was? See? I'm terrible!

My First Yelp Party

DSC_0244.JPG
Originally uploaded by yelpdotcom.

This photo begins to capture what my first work party was like. As in I think I drank about that much Rockstar, and at 4am was staring wide-eyed and sleepless at the ceiling above my bed.

USB Teddy Bear

This is just one of the posts that is more like a pointless, yet in my opinion very funny email forward. But at least I'm not spamming you with email.

There's something just comical about this picture.





From: http://greensboring.com/viewtopic.php?t=847

Social Experiment

All my life - ok not all my life - but ever since i got rid of the bangs and grew my hair out - which is pretty much beore i can even remember, people have told me not to cut my hair. Their actual words were probably "NOOOOOOO! DON'T CUT your HAIR!" Especially coming from my mother who supervised practically every haircut I painfully went through as a child. With reasons like "your hair is your best attribute" and "your face will look fat." So what's a girl got to do after a nasty heartbreak and taking the first wobbly newborn-calf-like steps of a newly single woman? Well, see what's left of me when I cut it all off, of course!

I admit, I did not go into this without a single ounce of fear. I did honestly question whether I had it in me to chop. I'm vain about my hair. Heck, I'm vain, period. But if I didn't try, I'll never know - and doing some jumping might be good for me.

The new do is even shorter than I had in mind, but my hairdresser, Johnny from a fob store called Trend 2000, really believes in "movement." And thus layering - which means it just gets shorter and shorter. Not that I'm complaining - I highly recommend Johnny. Before he started, I asked him to cut it short but keep it feminine. He said: "no, not possible." I asked him "can I pull it off?" And he said. "It should be ok." Not exactly the kind of assurance i was looking for. I was going to chicken out, but then he asked me, "why do you want to cut your hair?" My answer: "I just want a change." And he said ok - that's a good reason.

When he was done, my first emotion was fear. There was nothing left of me - a boy was looking back at me in the mirror. Either that, or an Asian mom. (Which one's worse?) I better freaking like singledom, because it wasn't going to end any time soon, or at least not in the next year with the average growth rate of hair being 6 inches per year - yes I was freaked out enough to look that up online.

But I'm also really happy that I didn't cry this time over the hair that I had parted with - if I thought about it, that was around 1.5 years of growing. 9 inches of hair that had been a part of me for longer than my last couple relationships. But, heck the desire for some kind of an adventure was just greater this time.

The best part about dramatic changes is when people notice them. And my hair has been more noticed than anything else I have ever done. I'm not sure what that says about my past life changes, but this one's definitely noticeable. So what exactly does long hair connote in someone's mind? Thus, we begin the social experiment.

For starters, it's a unanimous vote, if I were a Sex and the City girl, I would be Charlotte. No one really can explain why, maybe they just don't want to say that I have a stick up my butt and am neurotic beyong compare, but everyone agrees I just am. And how long is Charlotte's hair? Long. So if I cut my hair, am I no longer Charlotte? Do I seem to have too much attitude? Am I now too boyish? Regardless of whether I care who I'm compared to, how much of my likeness was attribute to a certain demure, feminine, even girly appearance?

At work, does anything change? Do I look older? Younger? Worthy of more or less respect? You must think that I'm putting a lot of thought to a rather superficial change, and I am. Because I will not be afraid to admit that appearances do matter as first impressions. It's sad, but true. They don't matter at all once you get to know someone, but this world is brutal!

A friend of mine also told me about one author's take on the sexual energy between two people. His theory is that you need sexual polarity. One person needs to play the role of the traditional masculine and the other the feminine. If deep down, I'm flat out fem, do I no longer look the part? Not that I care about sexual energy or anything ...

Just a few things to ponder as we embark on our social experiment...