Ever Wonder If You Have Too Much Time On Your Hands?

My apologies to anyone who has been bored at work recently, and have been in the routine of reading the blog in order to break the monotony. I feel for you. And If i was able to blog at work without being monitored like it was 1984, I would do so.

So recently, I've needed another medium to flex my creative muscles through. My left-brain brawn. And that new medium is a project started by Kaj and myself.

We are writing, performing, recording, editing, and filming a gangster-rap music video. Probably one of the must fun things that I have ever done. And in case you are wondering... no, we aren't taking ourselves seriously (do I ever?). The inspiration was the SNL Digital Short with Andy Samberg and T Pain - On A Boat.

So I have a make-shift studio set up, and we are almost done recording. Here are a couple of pics from the first session. I hope you are as excited about the final cut as we are. I would say that the video should be done in three weeks, or thereabouts.

So now I am going do devote the afternoon to trying to get my voice-filter to create the T Pain effect. So keep it real homies. We be ballin', and so on and so forth.





the inspiration:

A-rod's 'Confession'

What a D-bag.

He doesn't answer ONE question from Peter Gammons. Why? Because he is:

1. Lying
2. Covering his tracks
3. Too afraid to come clean

Gimme a break. I say give him a congressional hearing, and make him name names.

Also, if the player's union was smart, and wanted to get this steroid era over with, they would release a publication naming EVERY player that has used steroids. The list would be so populated that incurring any punitive measures would be pointless. You can't suspend 3/4 of MLB and have it survive. After the names were released, they would agree to a random new drug-testing policy, and increase the fines for positive testing, and the matter will be closed.

But that's just my opinion.

Riches To Rags

A really interesting clip of a man who was fired from a very high-paying corporate job, who is now a barista at Starbucks.

To be fair to the viewers though, he is not poor. He has a NYT best-selling memoir about his experiences which is currently being adapted into a Tom Hanks movie. So - he's not exactly living paycheck-to-paycheck.

BUT. He still works at Starbucks, and seems to be pretty happy with it. Goes against conventional thinking, huh?

youtube yousucking mylife away

You ever just sit there, in front of your computer, paralyzed by the infinite universe of information that lies at your fingertips? Have you ever been completely and thoroughly frozen, not unlike Buridan's ass, numb with the mouse in your right hand?

Welcome to the window of my daily schedule I like to call 'Ollie Unwinding Time'. During daily UOT, there are only a few requirements; I need to be so full from dinner that the thought of movement makes me ill, I need to jam out to my new music downloads, and I need a blanket, because it's freakin cold downstairs. Once those requirements are met - you might as well kiss goodbye to productivity for the rest of the night. Just lean back and let youtube take you away...

After watching Extras season one and two again, I delved a little deeper into some more British humor, which seems to be growing on me. First was Ed Byrne; a wiry, optically challenged Dublinite who, in my humble opinion, is one of the best on-stage story-telling comedians since Seinfeld. I've graduated to the slightly more underground/riske (pronounced "risk-A", but I'm lacking that pretentious french accent mark on my keyboard). So now I've got Eddie Izzard on my playlist - a cross-dressing limey who goes on drug-fueled rants that digress so dangerously that he often has to ask himself out loud 'where he was going with that'. But what Mr. and Mrs. Izzard does have, is a great amiable and charming aura, letting you forgive his on-stage blunders.

For those of you who aren't very interested in the anthropological history of youtube standup comedy clips, this might not be interesting.

So I suppose next time I can talk about the other part of my life right now. REFINANCING!!

I can talk your ear off with amortization tables, current fixed and adjustable rates, origination points, blah, blah, blah, blah...

PHEW! This was the most energy-consuming UOT I have ever taken part of. I even feel a little inkling of motivation brewing deep down inside of me... Maybe I'll balance my checkbook. Maybe I'll do some cleaning.

I'm just so comfortable under this blanket...