Harbor Day - December 1

Yes, I am late providing details.  Consider it an early Harbor Day gift from me to you if you were running short on issues to dwell on.

In case you never bothered to read, or simply forgot, there is a new holiday for us to celebrate.  It is sanctioned by The New Yorker, so don't even start with the "this is not a real thing" crap.  I read it on the internet, it HAS to be true:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2012/07/questioningly-winner-harbor-day.html


The Bloomington Illinois celebration of Harbor Day plans are as follows:

Location: Gill Street Sports Bar and Restaurant,  3002 Gill Street, Bloomington, IL (Yes, I picked a location close to my house, just for my convenience. Maybe if you helped we would have picked somewhere else)

Date/Time: Saturday, December 1, 2012, 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM CST (Time selected to optimize infringement on the edges of people's lunch and dinner times across multiple time zones)

Activities:

• In-person drinking to facilitate the sharing of harbored resentments
   
• Tweet-Up - It is Harbor Day all day, so be sure to share what you can throughout the day and use the hashtag #HarborDay.  Examples:
  
  Oh, @Sean_Schick didn't show, like THAT is a surprise. #HarborDay
  
  This is the BEST #HarborDay EVER (I will be QUITE disappointed if this is not tweeted often) 
• We will fire up a Google+ Hangout from  1:00 PM - 4:00 PM CST  for those too lazy to join us.  Thanks for putting in all the effort.  Don't have a Google+ account?  Maybe you could spend the 3 minutes to set one up.
   
• Selection of celebrity spokesperson, suggestions for Harbor Day traditions, related foods, etc...
   
• Selection of 2012 “Harbormaster”

This will be the BEST HARBOR DAY EVER.

Memes to avoid

The meme market is hopping, with "binders full of women" the most recent addition of note.

That got me thinking... what memes should we hope and pray never emerge.  I thought I would toss out a few, please feel free to comment and add your own.

MEMES-A-NO-NO

1. Naked Trump
2. Meals I didn't keep down
3. Confused looking slug
4. Packer fans at the library
5. Puppy trying to crawl out of a wood chipper
6. Sleepy Biden
7. Blake Zitko in yoga pants

NameStock

Thulipeda: NameStock

Background

NameStock is a week long music festival of bands named based on Twitter discourse.  Hashtag #greatbandname gets you in the running to be added to the program.

Rules

• No professional photographic or desalinization equipment allowed at this event.
• Each band is allowed 3 songs or 20 minutes of stage time - whichever is shorter
• Kenny G. and One Direction are banned for life

Program

Monday

9:00am Peppercorn Kitchen Explosion- Death Metal influenced Polka (@YeungJeans)

- Maim Polka
- Kannibal Kookout
- Mandy (cover)

12:00pm - Box lunch (with Box Lunch playing as entertainment)

Tuesday

9:00am Primitive Screwheads - A Capella (@kellythul)

- Urg
- Urg (Urg Urg)
- Gaaaaaa!

Wednesday

6:66pm Flesh Fork - Stripper Satanist Barbershop (‏@Holidill)

- Fork in the Toad
- Ferrets
- Styx and Stoned

Thursday

9:00am Bees are Scary Too - Children's music based on fear (@LisaMarieBowman)

- Under the Bed (extended cut)

Friday

10:00pm Joplin (@LisaMarieBowman)

10:30pm Finale - All Performers (except Flesh Fork, no one likes Flesh Fork)

- Under My Wheels
- Magic Bus
- Wheels on the Bus

Guessing Bad

First of all, props to @Jhay9 for steadily pointing out to me that: 1) Breaking Bad is the best show on TV, and 2) I should start watching it.  His recommendation and the "Hail to the King" promos for season 5 finally won me over.  I successfully completed a Netflix viewing jihad and cranked through seasons 1-4 in time to fully appreciate season 5 live as it has been airing.  And @jhay9 was quite right on both points.

I had thought about going the route I did with Walking Dead and rank (and re-rank) the characters, but given likelihood of sudden, permanent exits of nearly anyone in the cast, I thought I'd take a whack at who gets whacked and in what order.  Please feel free to add your ideas in the comments.

All total guesses.  All probably wrong, but here we go...  in order of departure...

BREAKING BYE BYE LIST

1. Gomez - Never good to be the SECOND most important cop character
    
2. Mike - Hope I am wrong, and he deserves to be around longer than Walt, but he should have stuck with his instincts to pass on partnership with Mr. White and Jesse
   
   BTW, I think both of these COULD go down prior to the season 5 break
     
3. Skyler - Seems like a nice kick-off when season 5 restarts and would thrill many viewers.  My significant dislike of her has tapered off as Walt's ego ballooned.  Might just do it herself
    
4. Badger - won't advance the plot, but will somehow be hilarious.  Think ATM hilarious
    
5. Hank - Walt has given him too many things to piece together for Hank NOT to know something is going on with him.  It is kind of Hank's thing to figure these things out... right Gus?  What he probably can't imagine is how far Walt has broken.. um... bad
    
6. Jesse - Could see his departure as the catalyst to send Walt east and grow his hair out.  Another guess I hope is COMPLETELY wrong

Final thoughts on Mr. White.  Is he..

1. A good man gone bad
2. Always really been bad

I vote neither.. I think he is 100% self-absorbed, 0% self-aware, with a dash of being incapable of conceiving the connection between his actions and what happens - someone else is always to blame.

BTW, "Zombie Walt" would be a pretty cool crossover AMC

  

Harbor Day

The New Yorker Culture Desk runs a weekly online Twitter contest each Friday. If you have never participated, I highly recommend it. Past challenges have included:

• Recap Star Wars in one tweet 
• Suggest inappropriate products to market based on a literary work 
• Propose a psychological, economic, or political effect - name it, bring it to life via Twitter

All you need to participate is 1) the ability to be a tad strange and 2) being capable of appending the hash tag #tnyquestion to your tweet.

Just the kind of low bar that speaks to me.

The most recent contest was to invent a new national holiday.  In a highly unexpected, nearly inconceivable stroke of luck, my offering was declared the winner.  My suggested holiday was:

Harbor Day - Dedicated to holding on to bad feelings about others and passive-aggressively hinting at them. See Thanksgiving.


Through an editorial fiat, which has my full support, The New Yorker has established December 1 as the official date for Harbor Day.  This was an excellent choice blending the forces of post-Thanksgiving family dinner trauma with the increasing intensity of the shopping water torture of Christmas gift list items bouncing off your forehead.

And, of course, consistent with my personal brand, I didn't think this through.  I did create Google+ (for the 6 of us active there) and Facebook invites for Harbor Day. Please share these invites with your friends.  I'd like 1 million people to accept these invites across platforms (hear me 999,994 Facebook people?!?!?).

But, we can't enjoy our first Harbor Day without the accompanying traditions and rituals. Which, well... are kind of TBD.

I thought I would jump start the thinking here.  My hope is this prompts others far more clever than I to offer improvements for me to steal incorporate in the Harbor Day canon.  We are off to a good start with Susana Martins, the embodiment of Harbor Day, accepting a co-chair role in planning and Lori Chase penning the perfect e-vite text for our holiday:

We can provide food and drinks, but if you feel like bringing something for once, we'd like it.

Note: Harbor Day was basically in a virtual tie with Lori's more intellectually nuanced "Take a Friend or Relative to Therapy Day (“Getting someone to see a shrink by any other name would smell just as sweet”).  


Some thought starters for Harbor Day rituals:

1. I am pretty sure this is a card-based holiday.  Nothing says "I am absolutely limiting my financial and intellectual investment in you" like a card does.  E-cards - even better
2. Traditional foods are likely lemon or tart grape based
3. Drinking would seem to be a must
4. Trying to figure out how to work "...and then I send $1 to Kelly" into this.  Stay tuned

Would love to hear other ideas... via blog comment, email, tweet, Facebook... whatever.

Not exactly sure we want to roll 100% this way, but the following concept from Tim Thomas was so good I had to share:

I remember celebrating Harbor Day as a child with the grandparents. We ate roast turkey and dressed in costumes begging neighbors for eggs. Then when the homeless guy came out from our crawlspace and saw his shadow the fireworks began. God bless us everyone!

Much more to come (sorry!) and while I still have never gotten over my recap of Star Wars ("Never underestimate the importance of exhaust port protection") being ignored in an earlier contest - I'll address that more December 1.

Dear Facebook...

I'd like to thank you for your tireless focus on my well-being.  I have no idea what I was thinking when I indicated my Gmail account was my preferred e-mail account.  We both know that account is in shambles - only rivaled by my work e-mail inbox.  Sometimes, "tough love" is the only answer and I only now fully appreciate the change you made.

I am simply not qualified to indicate what e-mail address I want people to use to contact me.  Something had to be done.  Thank you for stepping up.

Sure, some folks might view changes to content they provided as a tad intrusive, but most those are the crazies using other platforms like Twitter or Google+.  If they lack the judgement to use the one true platform, and only the one true platform, screw 'em.  They'll fall in line once you buy those.  If they miss the old platforms, you can always tell them to "take an Instagram - it will last longer."

I realize you have been nice enough to let me poach on your ad distribution network with my inane status updates and the occasional photo.  I appreciate it.

Not that you are interested, or would ever ask, but I do have some questions...

1. Are you OK with where I live?  I could use a heads up if I need to move
    
2. I am not the greatest looking guy... would welcome the opportunity for you to "trade up" my profile pic
    
3. Maybe you can change the ads so that, unless I say no, I buy whatever you feel is best targeted for me

Hugs and Kisses

Kel

Five ways to manage e-mail and fail

I will be the first to admit my management of my work and personal e-mail is not worthy of praise.  In my defense, it is not for lack of effort.  I am pretty sure whatever gene helps you do well at this skipped me... along with its buddy genes that:

• stop Achilles tendons from rupturing
• make you pleasant
• empower you to execute a strongly tied shoelace 
• enable you to recall names or faces of people

I'd thought I share a few techniques that have failed me in managing the e-mail beast...

By Date, Bottom Up (Attrition is Your Friend)

Start at the bottom of the list.  Many people there have probably given up, died, or failed to pass on the request they made to me to their offspring.

By Date, Top Down (Prove You are Alive and of Some Use)

One by one, read, then understand, then respond.  Move on. Unfortunately this is hard and requires thinking.  I wind easily.

Sort By Name, Work it by Person (Who Do I Want to Hate Me Less?)

This showed some promise, but it would worked a heck of a lot better if NEW people just stopped fricking e-mailing me.

Focus on the Critical/Flagged E-mail (Yeah I See Your Stupid Red Exclamation Point)

Kinda worked, but so many of my old e-mails reappear wrapped in urgent clothing.  They join the first generation urgents.  The numbers grow.  I lose heart.

Sort by Subject (What the Hell, Worth a Shot)

Very interesting method providing limited results.



So it is clear I can't help myself.

There are some strategies others have tried with some success (honest!):

• Use "Hey Stupid" in the subject line.  I offered this up as a tactic.  Some folks REALLY took a liking to it.  Like Tanning Mom to skin cancer liking it.
• It has been said e-mails taking the time to insult me have a higher response rate.  My whole "Hey Stupid" framework seems to support that.  
• Tweet me.  This seems to work.  I like Twitter.  Twitter doesn't judge you.  DMs aside, Twitter lacks an inbox.  I loathe inboxes.

Stupid out.

My 30,000th tweet is looming

So here I sit at 29,386 tweets (29,387 after I tweet a link to this post).

I wonder what number 30,000 will be.  My track record at knowing where I am at on my tweet count is dismal, so it definitely will not be anything planned.

Anyone care to make a prediction?  I have some familiarity with the posting patterns of @kellythul, so I can offer up some likely candidates - with odds no less...

1. A SyFy movie livetweet (3:1)
2. A hashtag game tweet (4:1)
3. Star Wars mention (5:1)
4. Saying something strange (5:1)
5. Declaring someone ENEMY OF THE STATE! (7:1)
6. Retweeting @anniecolbert (8:1)
7. Saying something mean (8:1)
8. Retweet in general (9:1)
9. Zombie mention (10:1)
10. Alice Cooper mention (10:1)
11. Saying something nice (92:1)

Feel free to toss your prediction in the comments section if you are so inclined.

My review of Undercover Boss: Darth Vader

Note: Everything after the first paragraph is made up.

I have grown to like Undercover Boss quite a bit.  I am sure the actual events are enhanced or edited to tidy up the story, but I'll watch the "nice hard working person just trying to get by catches a well earned break" story anytime.

That is why the Darth Vader episode threw me so much.  I am pretty sure this was the first Sith CEO  (well... maybe the DirectTV guy) they featured.  They really should have known better.  Here are some of my observations about this episode...

PRE-UNDERCOVER PREP

Did the actually think just taping photos on the front of Vader's mask would full ANYONE?  Basically all this accomplished was to amplify his breathing.  Yeah, I know he tried the "I have allergies" line, but seriously.   And the cape???  He kept the cape??

UNDERCOVER

I have to admit, he looked hilarious in the Jawa outfit on his first assignment on the Sandcrawler.  It basically looked like a dickey.  We did see to softer side of Vader though.  I counted at least three Jawas he was sure to stop force choking before they died.

The Kamino segment was painful to watch.  EVERY moment he was left alone in the clone factory he kept going "No, I am your Father".  Funny the first time.  And ONLY the first time.

The last one was the riskiest of course.  The Dark Lord of the Sith trying to manage the weapon firing controls on yet another Death Star under construction???  I am pretty sure some of the Stormtroopers knew what was up, but they played along.  He did seem to learn that targeting planets was trickier than he thought.  Unfortunately so did Bespin, Hoth, and Upatu.

THE WRAP UP

So, all the people he worked with showed up Sith HQ (in Delaware I think) to discover who they actually had worked with.  This totally did not goes as planned I expect.  It featured and unending string of force chokes, Sarlacc tosses, "You have failed me for the last time", "You are as clumsy as you are stupid", and so on.

Of course the Death Star Training Officer that brought up "Take you child to work Day" had it coming.

The Walking Dead Rankings - Revised

As we all wait for October and the start of season 3 of The Walking Dead, I decided to update my earlier rankings.  I included any positive of negative movement in the list below.

(Graphic novel character development still omitted from these ratings)

1. Daryl Dixon (-)  Still cool and the most practical member of the group.  Plus, he put Dale down.
    
2. Glenn (-)  Shortround grows on ya.  Handy.  Honest.  A little goofy.
    
3. Maggie Greene (+2)  She seems normal.  Kind of makes her unique in the group.
    
4. Rick Grimes (-1)  Want to give Carl a gun?  Fine. Give him Daryl's gun?? You drop spot.
    
5. Otis (-1)  Kind of hard to move up being dead the second half of the season.
    
6. Hershel Greene (+4)  The man has a shotgun with unlimited ammo.
    
7. Andrea (+8)  She is a mixed bag, but is hanging with Michonne now.
    
8. Dale Horvath (+1)  Props for suggesting people behave humanely.  Tip: Night cornfield strolls = bad idea.
    
9. Carol Peletier (-)  At least you support Daryl.
    
10. Sophia Peletier (+2)  Since you had been bitten by a zombie, I forgive you dragging out the first half of the season.
     
11. Well walker (-)  Dude, don't go to pieces with your ranking.
     
12. Shane Walsh (+4)  Our head rubbing whack job had his moments.
     
13. Merle Dixon (-)  A bad guy, but his bout with the clap proved useful.
     
14. Theodore "T-Dog" Douglas (-8)  Almost forgot to list him.  There is a reason for that.
     
15. Carl Grimes (-7)  The kid is an idiot and his parents dress him funny.  AND he stole Daryl's gun.  AND he got Dale killed.
     
16. Lori Grimes (-2)  Car crashing, Carl losing, manipulative and basically useless hosebag.

Pinteresting, very Pinteresting (part 1)

OK, fairly recently joined the herd and decided to check Pinterest out.  An extremely bright colleague convinced me to do this.  She has a deep understanding of nearly all of the social platforms, but had never become a super-heavy user of any of them.  That all changed with Pinterest.  She LOVES Pinterest.

So I signed up.  I am a bit fuzzy on it, but pretty sure I chose to connect via my Twitter account.

Tangent 1: My Twitter followers run roughly 60% female, 39.99% male, and .01% male with a white iPhone.  Conventional wisdom seems to have grossly underestimated the percentage of females interested in zombies, Star Wars, general snarkiness, ducks, and live tweeting god-awful SyFy Original Movies.

Tangent 1.1: I am influential on ducks.  Klout says so.  I have a duck board on Pinterest.

So, for those unfamiliar with Pinterest, you use it to share pictures or videos you find online or upload.  You organized them on "boards".  They give you a default set of boards that you can change.  Which I did.  Right away.  Few will be surprised that mine now include Star Wars, Alice Cooper, Graphics, Photography, Zombies, and (of course) Ducks.  Remember, I am influential about ducks.

You then start following people and your experience is defined by what they add to Pinterest - called "Pinning".  If you like one, you can re-share it, sort of an image re-tweet, and people following you see it - called "Repinning". I can only assume Pinterest initially populated my "following" list from Twitter.  I am also assuming EVERY female follower I have on Twitter has a Pinterest account.

This resulted in me swimming in a sea of wool skirts, clever kitchen designs, and brooding shirtless male models (most of which resided in boards called "Hotties" or "Future Husbands" or "Yum").

Tangent 2: My only beef with Pinterest so far is my female friends can have a "Hotties" board and are actually celebrated in the community.  If I fire up a "Hottie" board, it would not enhance my online brand.  That is OK though, I am influential on ducks, not hotties.  Clearly.

You can refine your experience by following someone, but dropping any of their boards, oh say like "Hotties", and still see much of what they pin.  Much like my colleague, I now LOVE Pinterest.  I have connected with people with similar interests, am awash in cool Star Wars pics, and can continue to share the duck gospel I am so well noted for.

Will probably explore this further in a future post.  So don't say I didn't warn you :)

Rock and Roll Faux of Fame (ver 1.2) #RnRFoF

Additions to my first post on the topic of awesome band names.  Still working on the proper form factor.  Open to guidance.  I think I my try something via Pinterest.

(UPDATE: I am trying Pinterest for this: http://pinterest.com/kthul/great-band-names/)

While this is a stong list, the editor's pick is Surplus Marco Scutaro Jerseys by @whitesoxski


Hat Quest - pretty sure this was @ohalchemygirl

Mutant Gonorrhea - @anniecolbert

Phantom Limb Tollbooth - @TinyNietzsche

Surplus Marco Scutaro Jerseys - @whitesoxski

Volcanic Ash Flow - @kellythul, inspired by "2012 Ice Age"

Even good spam is bad

Wanted to share some recent spam I got via e-mail. I was actually impressed by their manipulative effort and felt it merited some play by play. My inner monologue in in bold italics below.... (fancy, I know)

EMAIL OPENED......

Hello!

Seems a happy sort. Cheerful.

I just want to thank you for your wonderful blog commecon.blogspot.com.

Gee, I already feel warm and fuzzy. Someone LIKES it!!
 
I read the post "Top Ten Twitter Bios"

My most recent post at the time. Maybe this is real...

and then I spent another hour on your blog by reading your posts with pleasure :)

Big smile. Wait a sec. Even I wouldn't send an hour reading it. Maybe this is is a spammer.

Every article is interesting and easy to read.

Well, I DO fancy my writing is a like that, at least a bit. Would be nice if someone agreed. Hard not to really.

I really like the "Rock and Roll Faux of Fame (ver 1.1) #RnRFoF".

Hmmm. The EXACT title another recent post. An awkward title. Almost like it was captured via automation. Maybe my super-smart new friend is a spammer after all. That would be sad. He is saying such nice things. Maybe not. I can hope.

I work for Jooble company, we aggregate job adverts around the world.

Dammit.

My job is to persuade bloggers to link to our site.

Dammit. Dammit.

I really love my job! We have a friendly team and good management, but unfortunately I have no idea how to convince a blogger to link to us,

Wistful, faint flicker of hope he is real. So happy he like where he works. Poor fella, not sure what to do. If he is real, maybe old Kel can help him out... 'cuz I am like smart and stuff.

I'm afraid I might lose my job because of it :(

Oh the guilt. My new fan is at risk! Wait.. my new fan is a spammer. Trying to guilt me. Sigh.

And that is why, instead of sending letters to thousands of different blogs, I am reading yours.

But he DID pick me. Crap, I wish this was real.

Honestly, I am not really sure if the link to our website in United States - (spam site URL), will be appropriate for your blog, but if you believe it will and you can add it, I would be really grateful to you! Our site is really cool, it can greatly help hundreds of people to find jobs.

Now grumbling through the rest of the spam. Crestfallen and irritated.

I wish you to have a good day and excellent mood! Thanks again for your nice blog. Write more! Thanks!

Yeah, yeah.

P.S. I am a Aries by zodiac sign too :)

Oh, now you are just being a dick. Expecting me to buy his is real by grabbing my month of birth from my profile to "personalize". You think I am dumb or something? I caught on SENTENCES ago.

Oh, and "by zodiac sign"? REALLY?? You already mentioned how clear and interesting I write and expect THAT not to jump out at me? Oh wait, there was no real evaluation of my prose. Dammit.

Best regards,

xxxxxxxx
Account Manager

Sad panda. Off to play Zombie Lane.