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Category Archives: Random
Connected More Than Ever
I’ve been so busy with work I never update this blog anymore. Hopefully I can change that. I finally got a more capable phone and can now easily post to WordPress using the Android WordPress app. So i’m hoping between this and voice input I can find the time to insert my random thoughts here. This also means my random thoughts might get more random but I’m ok with that.
In other news I’m trying to wrap up a side project that ended up being a lot harded than I expected. I’ve accomplished a lot I had never done before with it so it’s all been worth it. It helps that the client is pretty cool and has been very understanding.
Hopefully this will be my last side project for awhile now as I move on to bigger and better things. Either way I’m looking forward to the morning so I can wake up early to move my car and get some Starbucks. Living in Boston has been swell.
5am and I feel like I should be working on something but instead I’m in bed writing this post. Forcing myself to fall asleep now. Good night moon
The Government Just Saved Us From Flavored Cigarettes
Good thing the federal government just banned the sale of flavored cigarettes. Now less teens will start smoking. It’s a good think we learned our lesson from the last time we had a prohibition.
</sarcasm>
Are they serious?
Once again the government has successfully created a situation where teens who DO want to smoke flavored tobacco products will have to go about obtaining them in a black market … awesome.
The best part about this whole thing is no one knows what a flavored cigarette is. However, when you read the actual ban you can see the end goal is to stop the selling of any kind of flavored tobacco product … or in other words … any product that puts tobacco in your lungs alongside any kind of flavoring. The problem they are having is in their choice of words but they have made it very clear of their intentions.
But do they really think this will prevent teens from smoking?
What we really need to do is a better job educating and creating better role models. Taking away freedoms is a poor means of education. I personally don’t smoke cigarettes altho I may have found a few uses for flavored cigar leaves.
But it’s not even about that. It’s about education and freedom. What about all the adults who enjoyed these products but will no longer be able to obtain them. They won’t quit, I’ll tell you that much.
What are you thoughts on the matter?
– Photo by Shannon Coffey
It's Been Awhile
Haven’t posted over here in awhile. I’ve been hard at work with Magicomm and making my own WordPress plugins. I’m starting to get to that point where the monotony of everything is getting kind of depressing. I’ve got enough vacation time to really get out and relax but no time to take a vacation.
In lighter news, my abuelita is coming to visit from Puerto Rico this weekend. We’re all headed down to Brooklyn for a cousin’s wedding. I’m always down for some Spanish food and good dancing. Plus, I think I look pretty damn good in a suit … altho I don’t know if I would like to wear one every day.
Another thing that’s been going good is my trekking. I’ve finally made it a point to get out into nature pretty regularly for some hiking, rock climbing and other nature stuff. I’m trying to get a small group to get up to New Hampshire for a couple nights on the bond cliffs but we’ve been having a hard time committing.
That’s it for now … maybe I’ll post a magic trick I learned a little later.
From Stockbridge to Boston
Photo by peggydavis66
I decided to take a last minute trip out to UMass for the weekend to participate in my fraternities initiation rituals. I started documenting the better half of the night but ended up passing out around 4AM. I used to pull all nighters all the time … not anymore I guess.
My favorite part of the trip was the morning drive. First of all you have to understand I felt like crap; Dog Fish Head 90 minute IPAs were the poison that ultimately did me in. So we finish up the festivities around 7AM and I have my car packed an on the road by 8AM. Then we pass our first road signs “Entering Stockbridge” and “Boston 132 Miles”. It was the first snow of the season and the words of James Taylor had me sitting there glowing.
It sound very childish and corny but “Sweet Baby James” is a song with a lot of history for my sister and I growing up. It was the only thing that could stop my sisters crying when she would get upset about the divorce.
But it was perfect. The Berkshires looked dreamlike with 10 miles behind me … 133 to go.
Awesome
Sam N. got me thinking the other day when he posted on my page on 20SB:
grats jon! better bring some extra awesomeness in your posts =D
So I promised him I would download some awesome off the Internet and get it on my site A.S.A.P. and thus began my quest for awesome.
First I checked out my favorite website indexing service. You should check it out if you’re ever bored. I call it Google. Google told me there were lots of sites hosting some awesome, so I started to sort through my “results” (that’s the stuff Google gives me when I ask it stuff).
First there was some “Oh My That’s Awesome” blog that was only half awesome. It didn’t have the whole awesome package.
Then there was a pretty awesome definition of the word awesome on dictionary.com: Slang. very impressive: That new white convertible is totally awesome.
Google also served me up some “results” video style. I think google should warn people not to post unawesome videos under an awesome title. There was one video that had a good collection of awesome.
I was about to give up when all of a sudden a ran across awesometheband. They had some insightful posts that really began to open my eyes up on awesome.
That’s when it hit me. It’s not about the awesome … it’s about my readers.
Because the truth here is that I can’t bring the awesome to my posts without you. If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it does it still make a sound? Same with blogs people. If a guy writes a blog and there is no one around to read it is it still awesome?
At Pats vs Jets
Wednesday my boss asked me if I wanted to go to a football game on Thursday. I immediately said yes, because it was the Jet Pats game, failing to think that the ticket would cost a lot of money.
So on Thursday we left work around 2:30 to meet up with some of my bosses drinking buddies. They seemed like cool guys at first …. then the drinking began. We were in the car for about 15 minutes on our way down to the razor when the guy driving goes “You guys know the routine”. About 8-10 beers later we are in Foxborough. The buzzed driver then decided to see how close to the stadium he could get us with his wife’s old handicapped sticker. We ended up two rows form the entrance.
So safe and sound at the stadium with 3 hours to go until the game we headed up to the bars at patriot place. The bars were packed to the gills so we ended up eating at some fancy expensive place. I was okay with this because the guy who drove us offered to pay … so I had some muscles, calamari and an anchor steam ale.
The game was awesome …. minus losing in the end. But here’s the thing. It was my first NFL football game … and I think it would have been a lot more fun to watch on TV. Don’t get me wrong, the scene is amazing. It’s just hard to follow whats going on in the game. First downs and touchdowns were about all I got out of it.
So when my father asked if I would be wiling to throw down another 120 bucks to go to a football game I said no, I would rather pay half of that and go to Sox game. However it was still a lot of fun.
Thank You 20SB
So I’m the featured blogger on 20SB.
This really only means one thing … people might start reading my blog. The truth is that all of my traffic comes from 20SB anyways so there’s no point in telling everyone to go join. But just in case, if your not part of it you need to become part of it right now … as long as your a 20 something blogger.
The 20SBs really are a great bunch of people and its been a great way to manage my ADD while at work.
So here’s to you 20SB …
Epic on 12seconds.tv
Flashback Sunday: God Camp
So I went to camp up at Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire from when I was about 8 till I was 16. Regardless of the fact that it was a Christian camp … it was a lot of fun. I spent my entire summers of my last 2 years there I loved it so much. I mean who wouldn’t … we had “the blob” from the movie heavyweights (that big balloon you jump on to launch people in to the lake).
My older years at the camp were my favorite. Especially the CIT years. The camp had an awesome program of activities:
- White water rafting
- 15 days of hiking
- 7 days in a canoe up on the Allagash in Maine
- 10 days up in Chibougamau in Canada
- 3 days solo in the woods with no tent
- 3 mile swim across a lake
It was all awesome and I have a lot of great memories… but one sticks out.
The CITs were broken up into 1st years and 2nd years. When I was a 2nd year we had just gone on one of the best hikes I had ever been on. I took a lot of pictures on this specific hike and was looking forward to bragging about some of the things I had seen.
Well there was this squirrel. He made it his mission to steal every piece of small electrical equipment he could get ahold of so he could dismantle is and use it for his nest. He especially enjoyed eating our batteries out on a rock in front of the cabin where we could see him as if to mock us. Needless to say both my camera and my cell phone fell victim to his quest. I was furious. We actually found the squirrels nest some time later with my camera torn to shreds and my phone scratched to all hell.
Then one day we caught the squirrel in a mouse trap. It’s tail was chopped off by the trap and it had gone into shock. We brought the squirrel about a mile down the road and set it free by the girls camp. We didn’t want to kill it but we didn’t want it messing with our stuff anymore.
About a week later the squirrel is back in our cabin trying to steal our stuff again. The little bugger was relentless … tailless and all. So we immediately went on the offensive. Next thing you know there are 12 guys running around with lacrosse sticks and canoe paddles trying to swat down and shoo out a technology loving squirrel. Unfortunately in the scuffle the squirrel hit its head and knocked itself out while trying to jump across the room.
Next thing i know, one of the other 2nd years comes walking into the cabin wearing nothing but the squirrel’s pelt and he says “Anybody want them some squirrel with hot sauce”. I was 17 and had been out in the woods for 7 weeks … so of course I ate me some squirrel.
So that was God camp in a nutshell. Well, that and a lot of capture the flag.