I'm really hating the email lately ...

In addition to having to weed through 569 emails following my 11-day vacation from work, I was roaming around my personal inbox and found something that just made me smile ear to fucking ear.

For reals. Ear-To-Fucking-Ear.

Delivered to me via the wonders of Yahoo email, was a missive I've been dreaming of receiving.  And no, it wasn't Anna Kournikova naked.  (That's an old virus, people!) What I received, for all intents and purposes ... was news I'd been waiting to hear for a long, long, time.

FINALLY ... I had an opportunity to break free from Armstrong's One Wire and Infinite Problems.  I work at home I need both internet and phone bundled, and DSL isn't an option where I live, neither is Time Warner (who I loved in Niles)  And there are three reasons I can't get a dish ... first because I live on the wrong side of the building; second because I need better internet speeds than they offer; and finally, because I have to have a bundled phone solution for work. 

So to hear that another option ... and one I wanted ... was finally available in my area ... I was stoked beyond belief.

I'll use the good points from their email in quotes ... read along with my excitement!

"Retire cable. The future is here."    YES ... I can get rid of Armstrong's shitty cable/internet/phone service! So I kept reading what was available based on this finely crafted marketing email ... and hell yeah I was picking up the pimp hand to dial the phone and sign up for this shit!

Check out this impressive list of features:

• "HD TV and DVR
• "Record up to four shows at once, play them back in any room
• "Pause in one room, resume in another
• "Playback recorded shows on all TVs at once, at different times
• "TV packages starting at $19 a month. 
• "Access to 130 HD channels and growing
• "Schedule DVR sessions and watch TV on your smartphone
• "Professional standard installation included with most packages
• "No term commitment
• "A 30-day money-back guarantee - bring it all home with no risk and all reward" 

How fucking cool is all of that?  Beats the fuck out of Armstrong feature wise, price wise, and since it's all new fiber that's been run to support this ... odds are good I'd not have had to call Armstrong every other week when my shit breaks and I can't porno surf.  (I mean, can't work. Yeah. Can't . Work.)

Then, in what has to be the biggest taint-kick in my recent karma history, I got down to the last line:

"Please call us today at 1-800-FUCK-YOU to enable AT&T UVerse service at your OLD ADDRESS IN COLUMBUS.  HA Fuck you, fanboy.  You suck."

(Okay, maybe I made up some of that statement, but seriously, AT&T finally is offering UVerse in my old neighborhood in Columbus ... and since I asked for it on their website ... oh, two years ago when it wasn't available, they decided to tease me now that it is ... and because I don't live there anymore.)

/fuckers

Broken Record, Track 7 - Windows 7 rocks

I hate to keep sounding like a broken record about how amazing Windows 7 is ... but check this out:

I just downloaded the new NVidia Graphics Drivers for my 512mb Video Card ... and didn't have to restart to apply the current (and proper) Windows 7 Driver so I can have my 1680 x 1050 native resolution on my 22" widescreen LCD.

Can anyone out there remember EVER changing a video driver in Windows and NOT having to reboot? Hell, you used to have to reboot when changing screen resolutions.

Yeah. Windows 7. It rocks.

He *was* right ...

How ironic is this?

Best.Photo.Ever.

It's no donut, but it was dunkin'

As some of you are aware ... I'm quite a brand specific ... and once I find something I like, I tend to drive far out of my way to find it. Or buy it online. Until I can no longer find it. Then I bitch about it.

And every so often one of the products I'm very specific about surprises me in ways I never dreamed possible. In good ways.

Like one of my memory cards from my digital camera. That I dropped into a cup of coffee. Where it sat for a few seconds until I realized that splash was bad. Because the card still had stuff I needed to copy off of it. I feared the worst ... but I pulled it out, shook it off and let it sit, holes down to drain, for a few days ... I figured I was out one of my kick-ass Lexar Professional 2GB 133x with Write Acceleration memory cards. About $50.

Then today, I put it into the card reader and everything was beautiful. All the data copied over, I ran a couple of disk diagnostic utilities on and it's operating as normal. I love solid state stuff. No moving parts, and mere fluctuations in the electrical current that appear as zeros and ones to the device readers. Science is yummy.

So ... we learned that

Yay me :D

Are we too connected?

So apparently, the lives of several million people were woefully impacted yesterday for about three hours when the had to take a break from their Blackberry and realize that there is life outside of a smart phone.

Cause it was down. For the second time in nine years, as users, according to the Blackberry people, "experienced intermittent delays."

I remember when cell phones were for the obnoxious and annoying who used them as status symbols.

Same with the Blackberry - or, as it's called, the Crack-berry - but even more so because of the level of connection you have with the office, while being outside the office.

But really, do we need to be this connected to our jobs? Take this piece of the story from the Associated Press where crackberry user vents:

Outages have been rare in the BlackBerry's nine-year history, but when they do hit, subscribers who have become addicted to the gadgets are quick to unleash their fury.

"I'm mad — it's enough already," said a frustrated Stuart Gold, who said he gets 1,000 e-mails a day as director of field marketing for Web analytics company Omniture Inc.

Gold, who worked most of Monday on a laptop while traveling, plans to ask his company to buy him a backup smart phone from a rival like Palm Inc., which makes the Treo, in case BlackBerry service goes on the blink again.

"I don't know what happened, I don't care what happened. They need to save their excuses for someone who cares," Gold said.

I understand Stuart's frustration. Maybe.

But really ... is Stuart *that* important? 1,000 emails a day? On a crackberry? And he still has working thumbs?

Maybe he's just frustrated because he's named Stuart and has no life outside of his 1,000 emails a day - most of which, I'm guessing, deal with enlarging his manhood, finding him a Russian Mail Order Bride, offering him $999 for online gambling or informing him of a relative in some African or Eastern European country who's tragically died with no apparent heirs, but left millions of dollars in the bank that for a small transfer fee, can be direct-deposited into his account here, in the US, as long as he gives them the account number.

(Oh, wait, that's my spam box. And I've yet to receive any of that - despite giving out my bank account, buying a woman, and a bigger penis. I stay away from the gambling sites - I'm pretty sure they're a scam .... but really, if that's my spam box, I'm sure his is worse. Because he's named Stuart.)

And no, it's not tech envy. I'm not really a gadgety person. I want a phone that's a phone. I want a music player that's a music player. I want a computer that's a computer. Not some all-in-one toy I can flash around. Besides, I used a crackberry. One week. For a job I had. Was enough. Don't want one, don't care to have one.

Do I understand the market? Sure. Do I support crackberrys and their users? Sure.

Sadly, I know enough people like Stuart who feel the need to be that connected with work, rather than life.

Like the saying goes, nobody on their deathbed ever says, "Man, I wish I would have worked more."