A few months ago I tried to get some friends to go along, and never got a solid commitment out of enough people to make it work. And I was sad. And I’m still struggling! Ugh! I want to go!

SO, here’s what I’m proposing. March 2011. Caribbean. Who’s in? I’ve already talked it over with my good friend Chris, we’re aiming for his spring break window so he won’t miss out on his schooling, which at this point is quite important to stay on top of. Here’s a link to our 3 opportunities: Cruise March 2011.

Ideally, the far right, 8 night would be best. It’s on a huge ship (same as I was on, actually) and the stops are amazing. The middle is essentially the same cruise I went on, so that would also be amazing. I just vote for #1 right column because it’s A: One extra day and B: New places for me. The left cruise (5 nights) would be okay fun, but it’s a smaller ship and I don’t believe the two stops have any scuba diving available, so I’d be bummed to miss that.

SO. Who’s in? Are YOU in? Anybody is welcome! The more the merrier! Don’t worry about the prices listed, this is over a year out, the price will fluctuate a lot, so just join in, and start saving!!

And then I got to thinking: we use ‘lol’ everywhere. It stands for ‘Laugh Out Loud’. So, I have to ask, how often are you really laughing out loud when someone texts you or chats over something funny. For me it’s probably 1% of the time do I actually make an outward laugh; usually it’s just an inside chuckle.

This should change, immediately. We’re creating a society in which we all think we’re completely hilarious because to us it appears that people are laughing out loud at all the slightly, barely funny comments we make. We’re not much different than the disillusioned off-key singers that we love to actually laugh out loud at on American Idol. Let’s face, most of us just aren’t that funny!

So what do we do? We change. We stop using lol unless we actually mean it! Try using something like ‘inside chuckle’ (ic), or ‘that was witty’ (tww), or even ‘I’m laughing on the inside’ (iloti).

It might take time for these acronyms to spread the webiverse and text-lines, but this is a movement we need to take seriously, or the humor well is going to dry up and we’ll all become as stale as the Canadians.

Just kidding, Canadians can be funny, I even know a few of them.

It’s short. It’s not spam. It doesn’t have apps. It’s not always asking for personal information (it never asks for information), it’s not getting a new design every 3 months, and it doesn’t have Farmville. Or quizzes. Or poker. Or any of the other plethora time wasters that plagues Facebook.

My favorite feature (and thing I use 98% of the time) are status updates on Facebook. That’s all I care about! Pictures are neat sometimes, sharing things on there is nice, but honestly I only want to know how everybody is doing. And that’s exactly what Twitter is. And that’s exactly why I like it. The only thing I have to check on twitter is how all my friends and colleagues are doing. I don’t have to decline invitations, I don’t have ignore notifications from Farmville. I don’t have to waste my time with any of that. It’s not even an option, so it’s not there to have to ignore. And I love it. If someone wants to follow me and be my friend, I don’t have to follow them unless I choose, whereas on Facebook, if someone wants to be your friend you have to be their friend in return, no one way relationships. If someone wants to follow me on Twitter, but I don’t care to follow them, then that’s okay! I don’t need them cluttering my life if I don’t want them to.

And it’s fast. There are several fantastic apps for both computers and smart phones and they work great; you get a nice timeline of what your friends are saying, you can easily reply, have fun conversations, and just feel connected to people out there while you slave away at your desk. Facebook isn’t like that, it requires your total attention, not something you can have open on the side.

And there are NO ads. None. No slutty chicks in the right column (for me, anyways, being a single guy), no Fan solicitations, no TV show previews, no President Obama media event invitations, NOTHING. All I get to see is what I want to see. Nothing more, nothing less. It’s beautiful. I know you can hide notifications, or use some 3rd party browser block to stop ads, but that’s just the thing, you have to put forth an effort to make them go away; with Twitter they’re not there in the first place.

So there you have it. I didn’t realize how much more I liked Twitter over Facebook until I wrote this up, let me know your thoughts on it and any arguments you may have.

Lastly, I’ve made a LOT of good contacts over Twitter that are going to help me in both Web Design and Photography. If you’re interested in giving it a try, and need a new friend to follow, you can find me at http://twitter.com/unculturedswine

Unless you’ve managed to be dead for the last 36 hours, or stuck underground in rubble because of an earthquake, you’ve most likely heard about the newly released Apple iPad. The hype really built up in the last few weeks as to what it would be called, what it would do, how many wars would it prevent etc. And yesterday we were finally given a look at it.

And people in certain areas have claimed complete disappointment. To which I ask, why? What are you disappointed about? You’re disappointed because it’s not a dual-core Intel chip, or doesn’t have 2 cameras for taking photos and/or doing video chat? Bummed because Farmville isn’t native on it? It’s pretty annoying, and quite reminiscent of the complete and utter disappointed voiced by Apple faithfuls at the release of the original iPod (actually quite an amusing thread to read).

I’ve thought it over, and read a few blogs on people excited about it, so I decided I’ll chime in and give my 5 reasons why I’d like one. I’m still not at a 100% I WANT IT NOW mode, and it’s definitely not a need, but here’s why I’d like to have one.

1. First and foremost, for me, is it’s a terrific way to show off a photography portfolio to potential clients. Apple used stellar IPS Technology and an LED Backlit display on this thing. What does that mean? It’s instantly bright, and the colors are very accurately reproduced from just about any angle. So I can happily use this device to show color accurate and sharp, bright versions of my favorite pictures to people who may be interested in hiring me. Quite frankly, there is a very high likelihood that it’s a higher quality display than they have personally. And the way they can interact and flip and see a slideshow is just awesome. It’s a beautiful device for sharing photos.

2. Surfing the web. Have you watched the short video on this thing? It’s beautiful, it’s just the right size and weight to hold in your hands, and it begs you to reach out and touch the internet. View websites full size, navigate around at the touch of a finger, as they say in the video, hold the internet in your hands. Not on your lap, not on the desk, but in your hands. The iPhone redefined mobile browsing, this has the potential to literally redefine browsing. Think about it. You can’t lie down in bed and surf with your laptop over your head. If you’re watching TV and surfing on your laptop, you pretty much get one position of sitting. This introduces many more.

3. A full blown, email everywhere machine. I have a 5 personal and 2 work email addresses that I check everyday, plus a few more that I check out every now and again. My personal all reside entirely on my desktop, with a few on my iPhone for using on the go. The iPhone has a decent email client, but it’s not nearly robust enough to want to keep all on there. The iPad sure seems like it could replace that on my desktop. Then my email is comfortably with me everywhere.

4. It’s light, it’s thin, it’s extremely portable. This thing is just the right size, just the right weight, and about as portable as a piece of paper. Meaning it’ll fit into your backpack, briefcase, shoulder bag – anywhere. And it’s easy to carry, it’s not a nuisance to carry around should you need it. It’s much more portable than a laptop, and, in my humble opinion, does pretty much everything a lot of laptop owners use their laptops for. How many spend $700-$1500 for a decent laptop to do the following: Facebook, email, pictures and surf the web? Why not do that on something that an awful lot easier to carry around? (Yes, there is a lack of flash and that’s pretty important for some websites, like Hulu, and Farmville. Hopefully that’s coming…)

5. Books. I’d read more books. I swear. The very nice thing that this thing does over the Kindle App on my iPhone is a book looks, well, like a book. It can be one page or a two page spread, but it looks and acts like a legit, real book. I have a hard time reading a book on my iPhone merely because of the scroll rate, every few seconds I’m scrolling because of the limit of characters you can legibly fit on there. I find it much easier to read a real, physical book. The interface and graphics of the iBookstore app are just great, and very inviting to read. Add in the 10 hour battery life, and it should keep you happily reading for as much as you could handle in a day.

In closing, let me just say that I don’t think Apple dropped the ball on this thing. And the terrific bonus you get is what you see is not all that you get – Software updates will seamlessly add new features and applications that aren’t currently ready. Add the 140,000+ and growing Apps that are already available, and this device can keep you occupied for a long time. Now, there are loads of other positive reasons to have this, but these are most important and useful to me. And I know, there are shortcomings as well. But everything has a shortcoming. You can’t beat around that bush. That said, this delivers and will deliver for quite a while. Just wait until you get one in your hands – then you’ll want it. Most of you, at least.

Well, that special election was tonight, and it didn’t go as planned. Not remotely as planned. The republican state senator won. The 41st Republican vote in a (former) Democrat Super Majority Senate was elected in by the people. Did you know it happened? Did you know it was coming up?

The world of US politics is going through a major change. Normal, everyday, hard-working family loving American people are getting politically active like never before. We’re witnessing a disgusting, liberal, anti-constitutional takeover of our country and it’s really starting to piss us off. We’ve sat around long enough and now it’s time to roll back the sleeves and hit back. Hard. No longer the silent majority that gets pushed around cause we’re decent, peaceful people. We’re now taking it to the streets and to the polls and to the town-hall meetings and anywhere that we can to say we’re tired of the lies, the spending, the blatant ignoring of the constitution, the power grabbing, the back room deals and the broken promises and lies. We’re done. And if you’re in Congress and happen to align yourself with any of these treasons, quite frankly, you’re done too.

Now, why do I hope you’re paying attention? Because this is important. This is happening and we need to be a part of it. I find it no coincidence that Ted Kennedy passed away in August, and the proper timing of the special election came into place just in time to elect in a new Senator that has the potential to destroy the disgusting legislation that is the current version of Health Care Reform.

It’s not coincidental at all. God has the power to call people home, and I believe Ted Kennedy had finished his mission on earth just in time for the right person to step into history and restore some decency to Congress. Just in time to block the destructive health care bill and basically kill any momentum President Obama has left.

So I say again, are you paying attention? The stability of the US Government, and the maintaining of the freedoms that the founding fathers implemented is vital to the progression of the Gospel today. I promise you that God is involved in politics. If it’s important to Him, should it not be important to you? For far too long the LDS population, at least in Utah, has been far too apathetic as a whole I believe to politics. We don’t think it’s proper to get involved because it’s too worldly or something; I really don’t know. But I think the days of that apathy really need to come to an end, and we have a responsibility to know what’s going on, and to be actively involved in promoting leaders and legislation that secures and protects the freedoms we need. Remember, it was wicked leaders and wicked politics that led to the destruction of the Nephites; do you think you’re justified in idly sitting by and allowing it to happen again because you just figure that God will sort it out and you’ll just sit back and watch? Is that a principle of the Gospel that you know? Cause I don’t recall ever hearing that taught as a legitimate practice.

Now, I’m not saying become a nut like me and blog about it and talk about it too much and over-voice your opinion, but I do ask that you make yourself aware of what’s going on. Freedom lies within the people, be a good steward of your gift.

This last week I finally got to go. It was great. The weather was a lovely 75, the sun was shining… it was beautiful. I checked Hotels.com and found myself a nice recently renovated Motel 6 just a 10-15 minute walk from the front gate of Disneyland and California Adventure. It was perfect!

I hadn’t been to Disney since my senior year in High School (ahem ‘96 ahem) and it was fun to be back, even if by myself. The park was pretty much empty, my longest wait was maybe 20 minutes. I rode quite a few rides, but not all. I also spent a few hours in California Adventure right across the way from Disney – that place has amazing rides. Soaring Over California is incredible, and the Hollywood Hotel Terror Tower or whatever it’s called is fantastically done. All in all, I had a good time.

This year I hope to take a lot more trips to a lot more places – why not? In April I’m hoping/planning for a trip to Japan again for a week or so. I do love that place.

That’s the update for now. I’ve got a few projects / changes / plans in the works, so stay tuned!

Therein lies the explanation of their stupidity when it comes to handling the economy.

SO. What’s the better alternative? Let’s turn to the music industry. I’m gonna lay down a blanket statement and say that pretty much everyone I know in my generation has stolen music. Napster, Limewire, torrents, whatever we all played in it cause it was the rad thing to do. And what happened to the music industry? It started to tank. Sales plummeted, execs got ticked, and downloading’s popularity shot through the roof. Portable mp3 players were born and CD burners became affordable. Music is part of what defines us as individuals, what poor high school student wouldn’t jump at the chance to make their music collection explode with such an easy medium as the internet?

That ‘revolution’ was what, about 7-8 years ago when it was in it’s prime? Is the music industry dead? Are the record labels still around? Yep. They sure are. And doing just fine. Did the government jump in and save them? Subsidize their earnings with taxpayer money? Nope. No they didn’t. So what happened?

iTunes. That’s what happened. A private, publicly traded company saw the industry dying. And as much as artists see the record labels as greedy thieves, Apple knew that if those labels started to bankrupt and run out of money to find new talent, music would inevitably suffer. Sure, sharing music would still run rampant, and new indie bands will always populate all the cities, but there has to be revenue to feed those new artists desires. At some point mouths have got to be fed. There has to be an exchange of money somewhere.

Apple introduced iTunes to Mac computers only at first, and finally ported it over to Windows around version 4 I believe. And then it took off. Downloading music was already the way to get new songs, but now you could spend 99 cents and get a high quality version of a song instead of someones re-encoded rip of a re-encoded rip. And you only needed to buy the songs you liked! You could skip on the dumb ones that every album has.

I’ll save you some time and stop there. We all know what happened. We now have iTunes, Wal-mart and Amazon competing for the top 3 music distributors worldwide, and rarely is an actual physical CD changing hands. Downloads far exceed physical purchases. I don’t remember the last time I bought a CD. But I know the last time I paid for a download. And I love it. I actually enjoy the honesty. (I know, that’s just me, not everyone sees that).

As a side note, it’s not the threat of jail time and massive fines that have made people move from downloading for free and paying, because if that were the case we’d all be in jail. Aside from a few sad stories (one, two)of peoples lives being financially ruined by still greedy music execs, they law isn’t the reason why people have moved away from it. People are inherently honest, and let’s face it, what’s 99 cents?

Okay, this got long. Where am I going with this? Newspapers are dying. Practically dead. The government is a short trip through Congress away from intervening and buying them up like they (illegally) bought GM. Do you really feel like bailing out a newspaper that you don’t subscribe to? Is it sad to see such an historic medium go the way of time? Sure. But hasn’t that happened thousands of times with different companies and products? Products evolve, it’s just how things go.

ALMOST DONE. I just read an interesting article by Vincent Laforet on what technology he thinks is going to take center stage in 2010. His big claim is the tablet PC. They’ve been around for several years now to very minimal success. Yes, I’m an Apple lover but let’s face it, Apple knows how to revitalize an industry. His prediction is that when Apple releases their new rumored tablet mac in the upcoming months, they’ll once again be redefining a dying industry: Newspapers. Apple knows how to invent and innovate and, just like with music, they know how to save an industry. He predicts that along with the new hardware they’ve released, they’ll have created a new medium and method for delivering the news, in a fashion that people will pay for it. Whether it’s a measly penny an article, a nickel, or 25 cents for the day they’ll have created a method to generate new revenue for the industry. And it’s going to work. Not because it’s Apple, but because people don’t mind paying money for an honest useful product. IT’S HOW THE ECONOMY WORKS. I read the news all the time, I rely on it to know what’s going on. I believe that despite hypocrisy and biases the news is vital to the world. So, if it gets to the point where I’d have to pay a little bit to get an article that I feel is worth reading, from a source that I feel deserves the money to keep them afloat and allow them to write that news that I enjoy, I’ll do it.

I’m a big big big fan of Bill Whittle on PJTV. All of their content is free, but I like what they do. I like his take on things, so I was happy to sign up to pay a whole $5/month on a completely voluntary basis to show my support. I believe this same mentality exists in the majority of Americans, and if given the choice they’ll do it. It might be something like free online, but if you have a tablet it’s $5/month to read it on the go. I don’t really know how they’d structure it, or even if! This is still all speculation. A really really long post on speculation.

Sorry if I got confusing, or failed to make a point. I’ll summarize for you. The economy works because people and innovators are driven by profits. Everybody wants to be rich, and that means you have to create the best product in whatever you’re aiming to do. Create the best, make the most money. If you’re going to get paid regardless of the success of the product (think bail-out, no chance of failure) then where’s the motivation to put out that #1 product? If one industry is dying, it’s only because a newer better one is coming around the corner. If they days of printed newspapers is dying, it’s only because the digital newspaper is finally taking shape. LET IT TAKE SHAPE. People, consumers, capitalism and the economy will provide. It has for the last 200+ years.

I got a BluRayDisc player. BluRay quality? Amazing. I’ve been watching Band of Brothers in HD Glory and it’s amazing. Now I just need a nice surround sound system to finish the deal.

But then, I met Netflix Streaming. WOW. I’m in love. They have thousands of movies and shows digitized ready to go, all I need to do is add it to my instant queue and I’m off to the races. I spent the majority of Saturday just watching movies and a TV show or two. It was glorious. I HIGHLY recommend getting a Netflix account and a streaming player; whether PS3 or BD Player or even the made-for-netflix box the Roku.

Somewhere in the middle of all that Christmas happened. It was a good one. Except for the day after. My grandpa went to the hospital cause he was having trouble breathing; he’s out and okay. My uncle went the same hospital cause of a kidney stone. My aunt and a few cousins all got the double-end flu for a day or two, so they were out of commission. Kinda funny. I did fine though.

Tonight I played Bingo with my FHE group, and by group I mean the whole ward. It was a lot of fun. I won a Pez dispenser! Let’s not pay attention to the fact it was a Princess Cinderalla Pez Dispenser….

My dad was going to order something for me, but the website was being picky so I came home and setup and account and meant to tell him to order it that way. Then, they just gave me the money for it. However, somewhere in between I changed my past and assumed that I had also ordered the product. Today I finally decided to check up on the tracking of it only to find no order history whatsoever. Doh! It’s now ordered, on its’ way from some village in China. Arrival? Who knows.

Package two was for a few members of my family, a pretty cool lil invention that I found off someone on Twitter. I excitedly ordered a few. Today, just the first package, I go to check up on the shipping. Only, there wasn’t any shipping info. I DID place the order, I just neglected to see that in the description they said ‘We’re still getting FCC Clearance on this, should be shipping first part of 2010.

FAIL.

The only package that has arrived is one for me. Yeah, so far I have nothing for anybody else. Way to go Joel, way to be greedy….

BUT, in happy news, Beth and I gave Miles his present a little early for his enjoyment, and it was a lot of fun to see the look on his face when he realized he got one of his dream lenses, for reals and for him. That was a lot of fun. Use it well Miles! Use it well!

What colors should I use? Any sites out there that you like that would be a good inspiration for a new design? Gimme some feedback here. THANKS!