The Great Dr. Pepper Debacle of 2008

Yes, its an overstatement, but I really wanted a free Dr. Pepper. Since the World's Greatest Comedy Record came out the other day, I was looking forward to signing up for my free Dr. Pepper- which leads me to my point:
IT people responsible for estimating server traffic the world over should be fired, because they are always wrong.
Now, I know that the Dr. Pepper example could be just Dr. Pepper trying to avoid sending very many people a free DP coupon. This, being the most likely case, should result in Dr. Pepper being fired.
However, think of other examples. The 2 recent ones that come to mind are the Firefox 3 launch and the iPhone Firmware v2.0 launch. According to my simplistic understanding of economics (read: 4+ years studying it in school), it would appear that turning people away from your website/store would not be beneficial to the "bottom line." Is it that hard to overestimate? You have months! At least 6 months, in Apple's case (AND THEY MAKE SERVERS) to get some extra lines flowing.
The only solution is thus: fire everyone everywhere involved in estimating server traffic on launch day.


You're welcome, bottom lines everywhere.

Things I'm Into: RIGHT NOW Edition

Apologies for the net-yelling. I wanted capitalizations, so deal with it.

Music: Blasts from the past:
The Get Up Kids (freshly reunited!)
The Descendents (RIP Frank Navetta)

Long forgotten webzines:
Suck dot com: I didnt make that a link because the site hasn't been around for years, and I didn't want to inadvertently trick anyone into clicking a porn link. I'm not sure that it is a porn link, but I'm at work and don't want to find out [edit: the site is still there! Thanks wikipedia!]. Anyways, Suck was a back-in-the-day internet site that I thought was funny in my 14.4 dialup netscape days. I was just telling Dawn how my mom was dissatisfied with me because I had a graphic from the site as my desktop on my OG computer. Anywho, it was a picture of 2 socks with a sign that said "Live Fast, Die Young." Needless to say, I don't think she (my mom) got it. "They're socks, mom!" I said. There was also a little blurb on the AV Club on how a bunch of their articles were made into a book. [Note: an (probably not) exhaustive google image search failed to retrieve said socks.]

Hating on the Weather:
Really? 94 degrees in the middle of November? Southern California, you're a dick. Just a I had decided to embrace  the whole "Christmas decorations start even more incredibly earlier" thing, it becomes July again. [Note: This was originally gonna be a "Music for Winter" post, but I need a few days of sub-70 degree weather to get back in the mood.]

Literatuuuuure:
Doris Kearns Goodwin: Team Of Rivals
The latest in my "bought-as-a-gift-for-my-stepdad-and-then-stolen-back" series. You: "Ooooh, such a topical reading choice!"

The Blog That Was The Day That Was 11/4/08

By now everyone knows that Nov. 4th was kind of a big deal- but I always knew that. Here's my day- keeping it real on a sweet b-day.
 

Awaken! Way too early!

The most crucial ingredient to any successful day- Italian Roast.


Coffee and (homemade, of course) cornbread. Desayuno de loscampeones.

First jam of the day, as told by a horribly out-of-focus phone pic. Kristin: Ahead of the game. Thanks. Exercise is horrible. Get fancy for the DMV (it did no good). Directly after I took this picture, some DMV guy walked by and said "About 1 hour from right here," and pointed at me.

Ugh. My paperwork is piling up. Fruits of labor. Even bros vote around here. The scene.

Civic duty: done.

Reward time: beastly present opening. In the box- fuzzy destruction. My lady is the raddest. [Note: There should be a picture here of Dawn and I dining at my favorite vegan restaurant , but I forgot to take one. We were getting the full hippie on.] New shoes and the finest in punditry- Stewart/Colbert. The rest of the audience: Dawn, Oliver, and Danielle. Finally on the winning team. We weren't sure, so we had to check with these evil bastards (that's Karl Rove's fat ass attempting to hold back tears). Celebrating patriotism like a Frenchman.

A fantastic end to a mostly fantastic day. Cheesecake! Aaaaaaand that's pretty much it. Sorry for the terrible formatting (thanks Blogger!) and the terrible pictures (thanks Lack of Skill!).

Current Bullshit

Here's some current materialism for you. I used to put this stuff on my myspace, but, as we all know, myspace sucks balls.

Music:
Brian Eno: Another Green World
Public Enemy: It Takes A Nation of Millions...
Smashing Pumpkins: Machina II
Hot Snakes: Automatic Midnight
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds: Tender Prey
Kanye West: The College Dropout & Late Registration

Literatuuuuuure:
Michael Pollan: The Omnivore's Dillemma
Guitar Player Magazine
Vintage Guitar Magazine

Movies:
Role Models

Guitar Shit:
Devi Ever Shoegazer
Line 6 DL4

iPhone:
Bloom
Cosmovox
Wikipanion

Computers:
New harddrives
Maxing out memory

Recent Concerts:
Mogwai @ The Wiltern (A)
Raconteurs @ The Greek (B)
My Bloody Valentine @ Santa Monica Civic (A-)

The Best Junk Mail Ever?

Junk Mail: my truest, in every since of the phrase, Love/Hate Relationship. Sure, it's one of the hugest ass-pains in modern society, but without it, where would we get gems like this one (allegedly from "GOPUSA Friends"):
Subject: "Chuck Norris To America: Wake Up!"
Of course, I didn't open the message, but did I really need to? Nah. It says EVERYTHING in that subject line. I love that I'm even on the (obviously purchased) mailing list for these supposed "GOPUSA Friends." It takes away the need to gloat.

Dear America: WOW.

Dear California: WHAT THE FUCK?!

I did some of my own polling.

-Chance of celebration tomorrow: 96.3%
-Chance of cheesecake tomorrow: 100%
-Chance of UPS losing my birthday present (from Dawn), finding it, and subsequently delivering it last Saturday night between 6 & 10 pm: 100%
-Chance of my day being ruined by the DMV tomorrow: 30%
-Chance of my Halloween playlist having been awesome: 100%
-Chance of Proposition 8 supporters being horrible people: 100% (This one has been independently verified. BY REASON.)
-Chance of my brother and his friends being badass and stealing "about 30" Yes on 8 signs as well as "some" Yes on 4 signs: 100%
-Chance of me being sketched out that my polling place is a residence: 75%
-Chance of rain tomorrow: 20%
-Chance of me going to the record store tomorrow: 50%
-Chance of me buying a new guitar pedal in the next month: 95%
-Chance of my Dad or Grandpa waking me up with a phone call tomorrow morning: 85%
-Chance of above, plus my Mom or Sister: 100%
-Chance of me taking my birthday off work for the first time ever (except when I called in sick to work at CCS): 100%
-Chance of me watching a music DVD tomorrow (most likely a Beatles Anthology episode, or Refused Are Fucking Dead): 70%