Brand Advocacy 08

My company made a cool site: Brand Advocacy 08. The graph below which is now the battle of lightsabers was actually brand advocacy of phone brands. This site my company made is the same thing but applied to the presidential election. Totally unsolicited opinions, I believe that makes it better.

Mastering Dates

It might just be me but for a while I found dates confusing. Without a calendar I was lost, I still am, but I have resolved to do something about it. Thus I blog and hopefully ingrain it in my brain and maybe share some useful tools to others wonder about the topic. The thing I find most useful is the day of the week calculation. I find myself wondering "How do I calculate the day of the week? 18 days out, 19, 43???" So here is my attempt at overcoming it. Something they never taught us in school eh?

Regarding Months.
Any odd month before and including July has 31 Days, after that it is every even month including August. February is the outcast with 28 or 29 days depending on the leap year.

Regarding Weeks.
The easiest way I have found to Master the day of the week problem is making sure you know the days a month has. Then imagine the week as a 0 based enumeration (Sunday is 0 add 1 for each day up to Saturday 6.)

Todays Date is Tuesday, August 5, 2008

1. Take the current day, Tuesday, which would be 2.
2. Keeping in mind the month's number of days choose the day you need out there. Sept 7th.
3. 31 - 5 means 26 days left in August, Plus the 7 days into September = 33.
4. Now add 33 + 2 (current day of the week) = 35. Now divide 35 by 7 = 0. Which would be Sunday. The remainder is the day of the week from the enumeration, Sunday is 0.

This should work decently for any number and for the most part you can do this in your head. It was way easier than trying to count out the week especially far out.

Here is the enumeration in case its confusing:

• 0 - Sunday
• 1 - Monday
• 2 - Tuesday
• 3 - Wednesday
• 4 - Thursday
• 5- Friday
• 6 - Saturday

If you memorize the ends and middle its easy to know the others.

I know this is random, but I just found it interesting.

The Last Temptation of Crust

Al Finkerton, Street Aristocrat, is enticed by a seductive pie at a Bus Stop.

One of my friends, Dax Norman, is a graphic designer who just got his masters at Ringling. This was his thesis animation, careful it is not for those with a weak stomach, it is amazing what can be done with 3D animation these days. Congratulations Dax this is awesome. Now one day when I invent my awesome game programming company I can dominate the world! (with a great graphic designer!) I just have to rip him away from those white Ipod/Iphone toting Apple weirdos. (Props to him getting a job at Apple ... Wait a second where is my Apple hookup?!) I got a DVD copy with full DVD case featuring Finkerton, the main character, along with the town as a backdrop. If you look closely you will see a sign that says, "Swee-atch" this is the invention of Dax I think anyway I find myself swapping it in often for "Sweet" lately so I thought I would give credit where credit is due. I give it two thumbs up. The title I hope you notice is a play on "The Last Temptation of Christ." A closing comment is I have never seen such a tasty bandage. You can check out some of Dax's art I really like it, I do not know if you can buy any of it, he is mostly in animation of course.

Is that done yet?

I grill allot so I find this chart useful! I also find hitting these temperatures hard but at least its safe or so it seems. So if you are curious about the cooked temperature of chicken or beef or most things this will be a useful guide. I believe this is provided somewhere else by the USDA if you want to look for it.

Meat	Internal Temp.	Centigrade
Fresh ground beef, veal, lamb, pork	160°F	71°C
Beef, veal, lamb roasts, steaks, chops: medium rare	145°F	63°C
Beef, veal, lamb roasts, steaks, chops: medium	160°F	71°C
Beef, veal, lamb roasts, steaks, chops: well done	170°F	77°C
Fresh pork roasts, steaks, chops: medium	160°F	71°C
Fresh pork roasts, steaks, chops: well done	170°F	77°C
Ham: cooked before eating	160°F	71°C
Ham: fully cooked, to reheat	140°F	60°C
Ground chicken/turkey	165° F	74°C
Whole chicken/turkey	180° F	82°C
Poultry breasts, roasts	170° F	77°C

Steak done!
Pork done!
Chicken done!
Grill Done!
and
I'm done!

Green Peace overshoots

Recently I have seen some articles touting the fact that Green Peace is on this whole issue of polar bears drowning. Reading about it recently reminded me of when my cousin, visiting me, was stopped in the street by one of greenpeace's minimum wage professional botherers (PB's)(job description: Stand firm with notebook, as someone comes by pretend to want to engage in friendly conversation then spring angry guilt trap!) Anyway the PB told my cousin that the polar bears were drowning because of global warming because they swam out to sea hunting seals. Dying because they were out of food, blah blah blah, gimme money. "Do you understand why we need your support and money?" asked the PB. "Yes," responded my cousin, "because you are going to ship food down to the polar bears. I am totally on board with that." PB, "... ... Um, no that is not what I meant I mean to fight global warming?" Cousin, "Why would you want to do that when we have the obvious polar bear problem?" I loved that it was the funniest, wittiest comment I have seen shot at one of the PB's. TTFN.

Engrish.com

A personal favorite, this site is hilarious. You should totally check it out. The blatant slaughtering of the english language, I know that I am not a master of their language, so I should not talk so much smack, but it is just how some people try to go over the top and explain or use too much that is so hilarious.

Biking for the groceries

I successfully biked for groceries yesterday. This included going up a giant hill both directions (I live next to a river, therefore I am in the river vally the only safe route out makes you go up that hill then to get back you have to do that same climb in the other way.) I had to leave my bike outside unguarded as I speedwalked to pick up 2 cartons of milk (skim and whole, whole is for my coffee I am that picky) and three blocks of cheese, I got several odd looks since I was in full bike gear and forgot to take off my helmet. At least the cash register guy was impressed. I need a new bag though my current one is killing me. Though I have found a way to make it fit securely on my back. Anyway thats what I have been up to.