Funny Video From Conan

Here is a very funny video from the Conan O'Brien Show with guest Nasim Pedrad impersonating Aziz Ansari. It is absolutely hilarious. Let's take a look:

My Favorite Singing Monster

    I've been playing My Singing Monsters for about 3 weeks and am starting to get a number of good earning monsters. So far I still only have the plant and cold islands, but I have one of my entbrats halfway thru level 14. At 15 I can place him on gold island for a 3 million coin payout. That will really help fund my continuing efforts to succeed. I have so far 5 of the quad monsters with 2 more incubating. I've been really lucky I guess lately on breeding them, esp. entbrats. I don't know if using 'retry' after breeding something you wanted helps, but even with zero torches I'm producing entbrats pretty regularly over and over. Maybe I'm just super lucky, who knows.

    Oh, anyways, I wanted to say what my favorite singing monster was. I haven't bred one yet cause I've not gotten the chance as I haven't the resources, but I have seen it in some videos by other people. It's the whisp monster. I love her song. I've heard I think most all the songs & she's my favorite.

    I can't wait to finally get whisps some day :P

A Very Happy Camper

This image is self-explanatory. I found it on a Facebook page I'd visited and thought it was too hilarious not to post. Enjoy!

Ice Is Nice

    Ever wonder how they make money selling ice? I have. Of course everyone's seen the ice freezers at gas stations, grocery stores & Walmarts that hold ice bags people can buy for about $2.50 or so. And I guess they must make some money with them or they wouldn't bother doing it. But what I'm talking about are the stand alone ice houses that generate, produce and bag fresh ice for walk-up customers. You see them usually in more rural areas, like places outside the big cities, like maybe in smaller towns or out in the country. Places away from the more wealthy residential areas it seems. At least that's where they seem to be around where I've seen them here in Alabama. And I've always wondered how they made money. 

   It costs money to: put the ice house somewhere, put it in operation, keep it running (power, maintenance, servicing, collecting money, etc.), what have you. I just have trouble seeing a profit in this. But, maybe they can make money. According to a few web sites there may be money to be had from them. After reviewing their information I'd still wonder how much I'd really make - only giving it a try in a practical application would really answer that question I suppose because you never really know for sure how it would turn out. Their projections look good - but you can't predict the future, especially with something like this. If you had the funds to get an ice house going somewhere and were willing to keep it going long enough I would assume that in the long run (like in 5 years or more) you might start to see a profit out of it. I guess in that way it's like a lot of other businesses that have high start-up costs and take several years to get your investment back out to then start making some money.

http://grandeice.com/index.html
http://www.icehouseamerica.com/

A Groundbreaking Occasion

Two days ago the ground breaking ceremony of the Atlanta Braves new stadium was enjoyed by a great many fans of this historic team. Here are a few highlights from that day.

The Train Lane

   As technology advances we become more and more dependent on it and it seems like there could be a time in the near future where this will probably involve our transportation system. I'll try to explain my thoughts on how this could actually be a good thing for motorists as well as the system I foresee being constructed.

   We all know how things currently are on the interstate. It's a free for all fight for your life activity to get where you're going. It's dull to drive on these roads and potentially very dangerous. People die everyday in accidents due to all kinds of reasons including distractions, exhaustion and driver error. These three reasons are the focus of my point here as it pertains to why my idea for the Train Lane will likely be developed.

   If computer technology could advance far enough to provide a safe alternative to the difficulty faced by drivers on the Interstate we would see several improvements to our society. Two examples:

1> fewer accidents = computer control would eliminate many accidents

2> distractions = nearly everyone would rather be doing something other than driving their vehicle down the road. EX: listen to the radio, talk on the phone, work/play on a laptop or other device, watch TV, read a book, sleep etc.

   I'm not advocating total control to computers where vehicles are concerned, just part of the Interstate systems (at least to begin with initially), because I do think that there are many situations in our world where human control is still necessary (off-roads, busy city streets, neighborhoods, etc.) Let us drive where it's logical to do so, but transform the Interstates into an advanced roadbed for the future. It I think is the next logical step forward for mankind's transportation system.

   How it would work: What I foresee is what I call the Train Lane. I imagine it would be situated in the far left lane of the Interstate. What you would do is when you pull onto the Interstate and get up to matching speed with others you'd then activate Train Lane Navigation. Your vehicle would be taken over by computer and moved into the next available spot in the Train Lane. Once in a screen would pop up on your dashboard display where you program your path/destination by touch screen (this way you wouldn't be distracted for too long while still manually controlling your car/truck). When you reached your destination the computer would alert you to reenable manual control and leave the Interstate. You would deactivate Train Lane Navigation by pressing a button. Upon doing so the computer would move your vehicle out of the Train Lane safely and place it in cruise control at the speed limit whereupon you'd then take full control. While in the Train Lane you would be free to do whatever else you wished and not have your attention tied up with the bothersome chore of driving. Of course those who still wished to drive themselves, either because they weren't going very far anyway or they just rather would, can do so and drive along in the right hand lanes. This system is meant for and available to those who really need it: long-haul truckers and people having to drive a long distance in their cars being two of the primary reasons.
    I'm not sure if anyone else has also imagined the future in this way though I do know that many people and companies are designing transportation systems for what cities will need in the long term and as our technology becomes much more advanced. To this end I searched for a video of like-mind to what I envision and came up with the following. It is not exactly what I've described, but not too dissimilar.

View At Your Own Risk

    In 1992 an animated short film aired on Liquid Television. It was the pilot episode of Beavis & Butthead called Frog Baseball - a rather unpolitically correct and alternative style cartoon notable for cringe humor, shock value and being off-color. It quickly gained in popularity amongst the younger crowd leading to Judge being signed by MTV to develop the concept into more episodes. Needless to say the show did well. He also later created the cartoon King of the Hill which did well and others such as the movies Office Space, and Idiocracy. Here is that pilot episode of Frog Bseball to commemorate the beginning of Beavis and Butthead.

My Singing Monsters Are On My Mind

    I just started playing My Singing Monsters a couple days ago & it's infectious. And I can't get their songs out of my head! LOL! Now I can't wait to get back home from work or to wake up in the morning to see how much money my monsters have gathered, if my baked goods are ready to take out of the bakeries, if an egg is ready to hatch from the incubator, and if I can breed any new monsters. This is because even while you're not playing the game is still running & your monsters are still busy working for you. 

   Best of all it's a free game & just a fun diversion from everyday life. You can buy stuff for real world money if you want to, and of course that's why they really made the game - to make money ultimately, but why? It's great fun without having to do that.

Check out some of the in-game action in this short video clip:

Wild For The Wild Card

    This year in Major League Baseball (MLB) 5 teams get to play, at least initially, in the post-season for both leagues (the American & National). This is a total of 10 teams out of 30 out there who get to feel some post-season baseball. That's not bad - a third of all the teams playing have a shot at winning it all. Compare this to other pro sports: In the NFL 12 out of 32 teams see post-season play (37.5%). In the NBA 16 out of 30 teams get into the playoffs (53.3%). In the NHL 16 of the 30 teams play in the post-season (53.3%). So comparatively MLB has the fewest teams seeing post-season play. When I started writing this post I had no idea that MLB was the loser in this, I actually assumed it had the most teams - but it's totally opposite.

    As of this moment the Atlanta Braves are in 3rd place in the Wild Card standings, which means they would not see post-season play if the regular season was over. They have 21 games left in the regular season - 21 games left to try and beat out the competition for one of the top 2 spots. Their chances of winning the Eastern Division over Washington are nigh impossible - so that ship has sailed. But they do stand a chance at getting in as a wild card.

    Assuming that San Francisco takes the top spot, the next spot looks to be between Atlanta, Milwaukee and Pittsburgh to take. There's only like 2 games difference between these 3 teams in the current standings, so with 21 games left any one of them could win it. Atlanta's been playing a little better lately, going 5-5 the last 10 games, while Milwaukee's gone 1-9 and Pitt's gone 4-6. If the Braves can keep up 50-50 ball they'll end up I think in pretty good shape & it would take one of the other two teams getting really hot to beat them. Of course anything can happen, which is why we watch them play, so we'll just have to wait and see.

Update: As of today (Sept. 13) Atlanta is in 4th place in the wild card standings behind San Francisco, Pittsburgh and Milwaukee with 15 games left to play. It's looking more and more like it'll be the Giants and Pirates playing for the wild card birth. There's still time to catch up being 3 games back, but it will be a Herculean effort to say the least for Atlanta to accomplish. And they're not playing well at the moment 

(3-7 in the last 10 games). We'll just have to keep watching and hoping.