Day 145

Today has already been an eventful day. I got out early from Llywelyns last night, I was home by 2:30. Sweet.

I got up around 10:30, loaded up a 40 foot ladder, then got up on a roof to help my dad on an inspection.

Then came the awesomosity. A trip to Aldi. Aldi is the best grocery store in town. Where else can you buy chips for $.99 and an HDTV for $399.99? Nowhere else, that's where.

Now when you go to an Aldi, there is some things you need to know. First, have a quarter handy. Why? so you can get a shopping cart. Yes, it costs a quarter to get a cart, but you get it back when you return it. It is also acceptable protocol to offer someone in the parking lot a quarter for their cart.

The second thing you need to know is you should eith bring bags with you, or grab empty boxes as you shop, because Aldi charges for bags. I actually like using boxes better, because they are easier to pack and carry than bags.

The other things you need to know (and there are a few of them), you should learn from a seasoned professional. Luckily I know one or two. I was given a little wisdom from Tommy Bahama (as he calls himself on this here blog, you may know him as Michael Sharp). He tells me he learned everything he knows from the officially awesome Brent Mackey. Get in touch with them to learn some awesomes about Aldi.

I almost made the awesomosity old people fighting. Like last night in the bar when there were fisticuffs between a mid-forties couple and a party of about 20 mid-forties folks. Yes it was crazy, but fighting is never awesome. Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.

TASK o' THE DAY: Shop at Aldi and save some green.

You may notice the ladder in the background of my photo for the day. Have a great one!

Day 144

What is awesome today? I found out when I was at lunch today with a couple of pest guys. One of them said something about gas prices, which led to the discussion of some oil that has gone missing near Somalia. Well, gone missing isn't quite the right word. Here is the CNN headline:

Pirates take 'super tanker' toward Somalia

That's right, Pirates! You know, ARRRGH, eyepatch, pegleg, parrot on the shoulder pirates! So, obviously, the fact that there are still pirates in the world is awesome. Apparently, they can't find them because they are controlling 1.1 MILLION square miles of ocean off Mombassa. That is crazy. I am sure Redbeard is quite jealous of the advances made in piracy these days.

This, of course, gives me permission to tell a few of my favorite pirate jokes.

How do pirates know that they are pirates?
They think, therefore, they ARRRRR!

What does a Dyslexic Pirate Say?
RRAAAAA!

Have you heard about the new pirate movie?

It's rated AARRRRGGH!
And you know why?
Because of all the booty!

Why did the pirate go on vacation?
He needed some ARRRGH and ARRRGH!

And of course, my favorite:

What is a pirates favorite letter?

M, oddly enough. You'd think it'd be 'R', but nope, it's M.

Task o' The Day: Give us your favorite pirate joke, or pirate story, or really, anything about pirates.

So, I was back at the folks house today, here's the proof. Have a fantastic day!

Day 143

Today's awesomosity is happening tonight, and you can be a part of it! It is the St. Louis International Film Festival! It has been going on all week, and continues through the weekend. Why is tonight so awesome? Because the movie I made that got played at the St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase also got accepted to SLIFF and is playing tonight!!

However, due to circumstances (both in and out of my control, all at once, very confusing), I was not able to go see it, or even get the post out early enough for any of you to go see it. I have it on DVD and will be happy to show it to you whenever you like. I even have an alternate ending (not available in any theatre!!!) on the new version. And the credits of the new version feature Joe (he's all we need)'s band, the Fundamental Elements. It's quite awesome.

SLIFF in itself is quite awesome in its own right. My favorite memory was a few years ago when my friend Brian (no blog to link to here) and I went during Warner Brothers 75th Anniversary. I was actually talking to Brian about this last night. We saw something like 8 movies in under 3 days, it was crazy. And by crazy, I mean incredibly awesome. We saw The Wild Bunch, The Excorcist, A Clockwork Orange (horrible flick), The Shining among many others. It was a great weekend. This week, there are some big name movies (including a Sean Penn film) but most of them are smaller, independent (but great) movies.

Task o' The Day: Go see a movie. I would hope you would see something at SLIFF, but if you can't, just go to your local motion picture theatre and catch a flick. It'll be fun. If you really want to go all out, make a film. If you make something, anything, and submit it to the Filmmaker's Showcase next July, you have a good chance of getting in, judging by what else made the cut against us.

Here I am in one of my last days at the old office. Have a great night!

Day 142

Some of you know that I have a thing for calling in to radio station contests. If you call enough times, eventually you win some stuff. I think in my life, I have won more than my fair share of stuff from radio stations. Let me see if I can list some stuff.

• The first thing I ever won was from an old Christian radio station in St. Louis, WCBW (remember that Kim?). I won an Al Denson CD. It was pretty awesome. In fact, it was my very first CD. I am pretty sure that a bunch of Michael W. Smith, DC Talk, and Amy Grant CDs came soon after.
• I have won tickets to concerts (everything from DC Talk to Night Ranger, Ted Nugent & Quiet Riot to Primus, Limp Bizkit & Powerman 5000 to lots and lots of others.
• I have won video games
• I have won countless other things that I cant remember at the moment, but the big two are:
• A trip to see the Rams beat the Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV in Atlanta. Paid for flight, hotel and tickets. It was very awesome.
  
• Last year, I won a 3-day trip to Cancun, same deal.

Both of the trips were on 105.7 The Point, as part of their "Trippin Thursday" promotion. I was the right caller to get qualified, then I got my name drawn out of a hat.

So you see, I have obviously won way more than my fair share of things from radio stations. So, do I sit quietly and not pick up my phone when they say "Call now!"? Of course not. Therefore...

Last night I was able to name 10 high schools in under 24 seconds on The Point and won a "24 prize pack" thing.

As you can see, it includes a "24" T-shirt, an official Jack Bauer Army surplus looking jacket, a "24" tote bag and season 6 on DVD. I hope to have it all up on EBay tomorrow. Unless of course, one of my faithful readers is a huge "24" fan and wants it. I personally have never seen the show and don't plan on starting, much less collecting paraphenalia anytime soon.

However, I am now entered into a drawing to win a bunch more stuff, the big thing is an iTouch. That would be super sweet and not sold on EBay. I'll keep you up to date.

Task o' The Day: This is an easy and abvious one. Call the radio station when they tell you to. Just do it. Call repeatedly. When you think its been too long, call one more time. Try to win something. If you have won stuff in the past, share with us.

Here is I.

Let me know what you think of the new layout, I'm still playing with it and not sold on anything just yet. Have a great day!

Day 141

Isn't stuff supposed to become a habit after like 30 times? Then how does it manage to completely slip my mind to write a blog that I have written for 141 straight days until after 4 in the afternoon?

It just so happens that I just came across a very awesome thing, in a day full of awesomeness. We (Sean and I) met with a SCORE counselor, who pointed us (hopefully) in the right direction for our business. That was sweet. Had lunch at a nice little cafe in the CWE. But upon arriving back at the office, began doing research on writing business plans and getting more free help for the new biz. One of the websites I came across had some links that may be useful in your business (including Twitter, which I'm not sure how that is useful to the business).

They did have a link to the site Oh, don't forget! This site is a timed text messaging service that you can use to schedule a text message to yourself, a coworker, a friend, anyone really. I am sure you could use it if you have a first blind date as a possible escape plan. Set it up to text you with an urgent message, then you can show your date that you really do need to go since your dog found Timmy in a well and sent you a text to tell you, or whatever story you want to make up.

So, sending text messages at a specific time is pretty awesome.

Task o' The Day: Send someone a text message tomorrow, today! It's really easy (though my test text hasn't come through yet). We'll see.

Here I am enjoying the hardness of the bench I sit on at my new "office".

Have a great one, see you tomorrow (assuming I don't forget!)

Oh, and watch this, it might just change your life, and it literally (depending on your internet speed) will take you 5 seconds.

Day 140

First off, thanks for voting in the poll everyone! However, my sister-in-law is indeed very awesome, you should all vote for her. How can anyone that has 3 children between 1 and 3 not be awesome?

Second, totally didn't get to go shopping yesterday (boo), but it was because I had a great lunch with some great friends from church. Awesome.

Third, what is awesome today? Productivity. And I have found a site (Thanks Travis!) that is all about being productive. From keeping your inbox at zero messages to making powerpoints or blogs or anything else better, this is the site to learn about it. They've even got a page to help with creating to many productive systems. Do yourself a favor and go to www.43folders.com and learn from Merlin Mann. It is awesome.

If you live out of your inbox (in email, I hope no one has an actual inbox anymore, much less one big enough to live in), do yourself a huge favor and watch his presentation to Google call Inbox Zero. It can revolutionize the way you do email. I have watched the first half and I plan to watch the rest of it soon. I have some serious browsing to do here.

In fact I'm gonna get to that.

Task O' The Day: This is gonna be a hard one, but get your email inbox to zero messages. Organize your email. Do it.

On another note, I'm gonna post another poll real quick like with some ideas we've had for names for the business. What exactly we are doing is this. We will be creating episodic video content for websites. I can explain more, just send me an email or something.

Here I am at the "new" work.

Day 139

Quick, before I forget, come check out the alternate ending to the short film I worked on this spring! It will be playing at the St. Louis International Film Festival this Thursday night at 5pm at the Tivoli theatre in the Loop. It'll be awesome, you should totally go, and bring everyone you know!

Now, on to the awesomosity. Friends and Family discounts. How awesome is it when someone you know gives you a card good for, say, 30% off the Old Navy and Gap family of stores? Pretty awesome. Especially since I just started a new job (still looking for a name, little help here?) and I also made some cash last night.

I never even knew I was a friend of someone that worked there until I was handed the discount card last night. So, if you want some money off at Old Navy or a similar store (aren't all the mall clothing stores owned by one company?) let's go shopping this afternoon. I know its short notice, but give me call, maybe we can work something out.

Task o' The Day: Discount or not, go shopping. By yourself a new pant suit. Husbands, sorry for telling your wife to go shopping.

Sorry for the short post, but isn't 30% off pretty awesome?

Here I am walking out of church, which I have to go back now. Bye!