Yesterday I saw Howard Dean on TV talking about something. I'm not really sure what – I was at the coffee shop and it was muted with no closed captioning.

I don't think the subject of the conversation could have been very important, I mean, it was HOWARD DEAN. No, the most important aspect was obviously the knot of his tie. The damn thing was so lopsided it looked like it was tied by a rabid squirrel in the throws of a seizure.

Mr. Dean, what do you call that amazing knot? A quarter-windsor? A "my wife hates me and told me to do it on my own"?

Here's a quick (11 minute) video that does a really good job of explaining how the financial industry shot itself in the foot (head?) and took the rest of us with them.

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

I'm trying to beat winter by thinking about warmer times.. summer times. And if there's one that that SCREAMS "It's Summer time!".. it's sno cones!

Yep. Sno Cones (or snow cones, or shaved ice, depending on where you're getting it from) – those deliciously overpriced paper cones full of ice and sugar water.
How many foods are there that have colors as a flavor?
What flavor would I like? Red
Is it strawberry? Cherry? Who knows, but it's going to turn my lips, tongue, and mouth the funkiest shade of red possible.

Just think how much fun a person (me) could have with their very own sno cone maker! (for about 10 minutes)

Looking around on amazon, there are a ton of choices ranging from the inexpensive (under $20) My Little Pony Snow Cone Maker up to the (almost $60) Nostalgia SCM-502 Old Fashioned Snow Cone Maker.

Sure, video games today are great – the graphics and sounds are better than ever before, the controls allow for a great amount of.. well.. control, and some engage the player in ways that we've never seen (Wii Fit comes to mind). But those of us who grew up with the 8 and 16-bit consoles, or made trips to the arcade 10-20 years ago, can't help feeling (at least occasionally) a bit nostalgic and looking to relive those memories and replay our favorite games.

Fortunately, there are several game publishers that have noticed this market and have produced small joystick game systems that simply plug into the TV and usually contain several classic games.

Here are some of the joystick video game systems that I found, along with the games that they include:

Namco Original Arcade TV Games Video Game System
Includes: Ms. Pac-Man, Galaga, Mappy, Pole-Position and Xevious.

Jakks Atari Classics 10 In 1 TV Games
Includes: Centipede, Asteroids, Missile Command, Circus Atari, Yar's Revenge, Breakout, Gravitar, RealSports Volleyball, Pong, and Adventure.

Atari 2-Player Paddle Controller with 13 Games
Includes: Breakout, Canyon Bomber, Casino, Circus Atari, Demons to Diamonds, Night Driver, Steeplechase, Street Racer, Super Breakout, Warlords, Arcade Pong, Video Olympics, and Warlords Arcade.

Atari Flashback 2.0
Includes: 3D Tic-Tac-Toe, Adventure, Adventure II, Aquaventure, Arcade Asteroids, Arcade Pong, Asteroids Deluxe, Atari Climber, Battlezone, Caverns Of Mars, Centipede, Combat, Combat 2, Dodge'm, Fatal Run, Frog Pond, Hangman, Haunted House, Human Cannonball, Lunar Lander, Maze Craze, Millipede, Missile Command, Off the Wall, Outlaw, Pitfall, Quadrun, Radar Lock, Return To Haunted House, River Raid, Saboteur, Save Mary, Secret Quest, Space Duel, Space War, Video Checkers, Video Chess, Wizard, Yars' Return, and Yars' Revenge.

And also the
Sega Genesis Radica Plug and Play 6 Games-In-One
Includes: Sonic the Hedgehog, Golden Axe, Flicky, Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, Altered Beast, and Kid Chameleon.

Give me a system that has Galaxia, Centipede, Breakout, Space Invaders, Sonic the Hedgehog, Altered Beast, Pac-Man, and Frogger.. and you'll see me when I need food, and that's probably about it. 🙂

I recently received an email with the word "counterdict" in it.

This is just a friendly reminder so none of you make the same mistake – "counterdict" is actually spelled "contradict".

Please?

Have you ever woken up with such a bad headache that you just decided to skip the first two hours of work?

Yeah?

Me too!

And on the drive in to work, I managed to develop quite a case of nausea and just grumpy stomach feeling. Ugh.

I'm not entirely convinced of the health risks that people claim cell phones pose. Like everything else, I think there's a bias by the groups reporting negative findings and a tendency to exaggerate. That being said, I still don't think my body really expects to have a radio transceiver broadcasting all day from my pocket.

Lately, I've changed my habit from walking around all day with a phone in my pocket to only carrying it when I'm on the move. If I'm at work it now sits on my desk (plugged in and maintaining a full charge on my employer's dime). If I'm at home it sits in my room plugged in. When I'm driving it tends to be put in my cup-holder (once again plugged in and charging).

Changing my phone habits has two main effects: 1) keeping my battery almost constantly at a full charge and 2) reducing the physical contact with my phone from probably 10-12 hours per day to an average of maybe 2 hours per day. Some may say that 2 hours a day is still too much, but it's still a time reduction of about 80%. And to me, that seems like a good thing.