does anyone read this?

Yeah, I don't know the answer. blogs were so 2005.

Went to visit a friend in chicago today. he's got an amazing apartment, with a phenomenal view of the lake and city.

eventually I will graduate and face the same decision: go somewhere cool and exciting, or stay at home, and save for a house. The appeal of living the life in such an insane city is so appealing...

but then I'll realize that the 20 grand spent every year renting a tight apartment will be missed when signing a loan for a house. I thought tough decisions were behind me, haha.

Quizno = fail

Quizno's is giving away 1 millions free sandwiches. No big deal right? Well, I gave them my email, and printed a legitimate coupon, and brought it to the Quizno's in Peoria, IL.

Guess what... the knuckleheads that worked there didn't know how to enter it. WTH? You work at quiznos, and I could figure out how to enter the code. Hell, it practically had instructions on it. Oh well, they were too busy texting on the job anyway.

Calendar companies go out of business in 2009?

Since Bush is no longer president, and The Far Side comics are done, what are calendar companies going to do?

Black Friday disappointment

Utter disappointment for Black Friday this year. C'mon retailers...trying the GPS sale again? Gas prices aren't going to stay low forever, and when they go back up, you're still stuck with a poorly functioning GPS unit that probably makes you use more gas taking its "calculated" route.

Sad to see all the people injured or killed by shoppers. I know people are stupid, but its awfully sad to see people fall for the "50% off MSRP" deal, when retailers normally sell the item for 45% off MSRP anyway...

I had to laugh, too, at Best Buy. They had doorbusters that were the exact same price as they had been for two weeks prior to Black Friday. Online retailers did the same thing. Everyone internally just laughed at shoppers when they knew stores only had 2 of the items that were actually priced as a doorbuster anyway.

Now, in this slowing economy, I can just say one thing about the failing retailers: Let Em Burn.

AMC Theaters = Not Student Friendly?

Well, after going to see Eagle Eye (not too bad, kinda like Terminator and Die Hard: Live free or Die) I am basically forgetting about AMC Theaters. It costs $10.00 to see a movie at our Cantera 30 location; the worst part, believe it or not, is that they eliminated the student discount. Are they trying to ruin their own business?

I don't make as much money as all the lawyer schmucks that live around the theater, and don't expect to have to pay as much as them. I'm a college student. I don't mind paying $7.50 to see a movie...that's acceptable. The principle of the matter is missing though. Being used to the student discount made going to the theater a meaningful event, because I felt like my patronage was appreciated.

Now, it seems like AMC doesn't care. Ten bucks for the movie. Another eight for the popcorn. Four more for a drink...and then the gas to drive to the theater.

My solution: skip AMC altogether. Ask yourself if you want to give money to a business that doesn't care about YOU. Save that money and buy a cheap LCD Tv, surround sound, and if you have money leftover, some beanbags to sit on. Then watch the movie that you would have gone to the theater for on DVD when its released a mere three months later.

News and Music

Heh, it sucks for CERN that their LHC is down, but that really only benefits us at Fermilab. I suppose we have a little more time now to discover something, and shift the world focus back here.

So the other day I purchased (yes, purchased, legally) two previously owned albums. At least, I think that is legal. The nice part was, I could listen to the cd's in the store, and listen to the WHOLE SONG! What a crazy concept. I was able to determine how good or crappy an album was before I bought it. So I've realized this system works a whole lot better than iTunes, since I can legally purchase the music, rip it, and not worry about DRM garbage. Then, I can sell the CD back to the store, or online, etc. So even if a few of the songs sucked, I didn't pay as much for it in the first place, and I won't feel too bad about pawning it off again.




At the same time, iTunes is nice, because of their large music catalog, but hearing 30 seconds of a song can make me think twice about buying it. Hopefully the music industry can adapt to a changing world, and truly create a good solution that benefits the consumers the most.

Back to the Blog Future

So I decided to kick back and restart the blog. Why not? So long as I don't share any of my money making schemes I am pretty safe.

Anyway, I watched live as the LHC was started up on sept. 10th, and was pretty impressed. The world didn't end, and a major scientific achievement was made. Next step: a giant ring in outer space that is secretly a weapon...wait no that's a video game.

While watching the startup, and feeling like I got kicked in the balls, I realized that the Fermilab I worked at was no longer the biggest particle accelerator. Then, my head started to really spin. Not because the cost of their accelerator was $10 billion, but that the cost of the war in Iraq was $550 Billion.

Thats where the kicked in the balls feeling came from. Not only are the Europeans laughing at our piddly science endeavors, but also that we could have had an accelerator ten times bigger if we hadn't been pissing our name in the sand a few thousand miles away.

Oh yeah, and if someone gave me $550 billion, not only would I be the first person to shit a gold brick, I would make cars run on water.