July 2002 Archives

So, I seem to have an issue with my TV viewing habits. Over the past few months, it is amazing to me how many sappy movies I find myself watching. I would have to say I've seen more "date" movies in the last, oh, five or six months than most men will see in a lifetime. Tonight I ended up wasting two hours of my life watching, She's All That which was nothing more than a teenage high school, bet the other jock you can turn the nerd into the prom queen, then fall in love with her, she finds out about the bet, they make up in the end, kind of movie. I knew this when I started watching it, but I watched the trainwreck anyway. Heck, I'll be honest, I even felt moved when the finally kissed at the end as if I had some kind of satisfaction in things ending as they were supposed to.

Dang, so long I had to use the MORE... additional text for the first time.

GEOCACHING - (GC66EE) Jump Here by jaym

Picture of the Swim Hole

So, I've posted my first GeoCache! Originally I posted it back in June when down in North Carolina for vacation, but it was rejected since it was a virtual cache, and I had not put a question to be answered in the cache description. The reason you have to put the question in there is to keep a certain population of GeoCachers from just claiming the cache without ever actually visiting it.

It saddens me that such a group of folks exist at all. There is no prize for getting the most caches, no reward, no contest... if a sick person has to claim to have went and enjoyed something without actually going out an enjoying it, I think they are punished enough in their own sick little mind games they must play with themselves. But, I updated the cache as you can see if you visit it, so now, all should be well and it should become active again for others to go and enjoy.

GeoCaching in general has been a great motivator for me to actually get out and get some exercise of late. Without it, I am sure I would not have gotten back into hiking and instead would still have no motivation to go outside. Of course, this summer in DC is enough de-motiviation to keep it from happening right now. I've only been out one weekend so far this season thanks to temps in the upper 90's and humidity of the same numbers. I am looking forward to the humidity to break, I guess I only have August left, then hiking should be come FUN again when the temp/humidity goes down.

So, if you haven't checkout GeoCaching as of yet, I highly recommend it, a $120 GPS and you are set to participate for quite a while. There are caches hidden all around the world! I'm looking forward to traveling overseas again in order to pick a few caches up from wherever I am. My sister and her kids seem to be into it now, I'll have to find out their logins and see how they are doing. Again, I highly recommend it, check out: www.geocaching.com and enjoy yourself!

A few more changes to the layout and such. I was trying to get the real blog to be at http://tp.org/jay but that didn't work out so well. Will have to see if I can't figure out why later. As for the overall blogging efforts at Turning Point Studios, we have a few now. If you visit http://blog.tp.org/tp the links section has several of them listed. Shannon and Kimi seem to be busy with theirs. Woody a little busy, and Mark's is still empty. Welp, enjoy yourself!

I have to admit it, I listen to "illegal" streams of MP3s on the Internet. But, ya know what else? I purchase CDs as a direct result. I had never before listened to trance mixes until I discovered Groove Salad (now off the IP airwaves). It had been YEARS since I had listened to any Johnny Cash music, then I found a station streaming songs I had forgotten in my past. Friends of mine often had listened to Mickey Hart songs, I had never really noticed who the music was by, but one day went looking for songs like I had heard while visiting them; I found them being pumped out in all their rythmic glory on the Internet of course.

So, there are at least three groups of music that I have found via what the RIAA would have you believe are illegal means. The result? I have stack of CDs that I continue to buy as a result of my being exposed to Internet based music that I would have NEVER have heard via the so-called "legal" radio stations on my FM tuner. While I've continued purchasing CDs for quite a while, the list of CDs I've purchased BECAUSE of Internet based music is quite long. Here is a sample:

Chill Out Lounge - Volume 1
Various - The Matrix Soundrtrack
Paul Oakenfold - Swordfish - The Album
Orbital - The Altogether
Johnny Cash - Super Hits
Bela Fleck - Tales From the Acoustic Planet
Bela Fleck & The Flecktones - Live at the Quick
Blue Man Group - Audio
Mickey Hart - Planet Drum

All of those purchased over the last few months, direct result of Internet based music. There are other CDs I've purchased as well, probably another 10+ that while were not a direct result of listening to the music on the Internet, I certainly could have obtained all of the music for free from the Internet had I wanted to, but I didn't.

As far as I am concerned the RIAA is simply a group of money hungry individuals using art as a means to their own personal gain, The RIAA in no way is for the gain of the artist who deserve compensation for their wonderful entertainment that they give us. While I'm sure the RIAA will win, I would give nothing more to see the RIAA disbanded and let the fair market find its level.

Of course, I am realist as well and know that probably won't be able to happen. I simply look at my friends who don't bother paying for others art and instead steal it, whether that be music or games. Though in my friends cases it is because they refuse to move out of North Carolina and get real jobs that actually pay a person enough money to make a living. I can see that attachment to "home", but not wanting to get out and find a niche that you'll be well compensated for is a different story!

Since I work for AOLTW and have three different music companies as part of the corp (Warner Brothers Records, Warner Music Group, and Warner Music International) I feel I must state the views and opinions expressed here in no way reflect those of AOLTW... obviously.

Okay, this is driving me nuts. SOMETIMES when you come to tp.org/jay (ie: where should be at if you are reading this) then the blog section stops right about where I have the Movable Type logo image on the right. If you click RELOAD everything seems to be fine then though. I'll have to do some research I guess and see if I can't figure out what is going on. Overall though, thanks Chip for getting this all going again!

Wow! What a day for the AOL ticker. I can't say I am completely surprised, but am disappointed we actually closed below $10. Investors are pretty dumb when it comes down to it. If anyone really thinks that we would do anything wrong in accounting after the problems back in '95, they just really don't get it.

My personal theory is that Dubbya called up Case and Parsons and asked them to tell him off the record if we were really doing something illegal with the AOL accounting... then my imaginary phone call would go something like this:

"So, you guys are sure and swear to me all is clear down there?" Dubbya would say.

"Yes, sir Mr. President" Case and Parsons would answer.

"Then here is what I'm going to do, I'm looking very weak in my handling of the economy right now, so I'm going to send the SEC over there to 'investigate' you. They're going to search through all your records, and confirm what you've just told me. Then we'll make a big announcement about how not all US companies are corrupt and that other companies should follow your lead. That'll get people confident that not all corps are out to get them, my approval will go up, and confidence will be had and your stock price will go back up. Thanks guys, you're good Americans." the phone clicks as Dubbya moves on to go declare war somewhere.

The opinions, views, and such in this blog are my own and are not in ANY WAY representive of AOL Time Warner views.

Hmmm. Well, they say you are supposed to update your resume once a year. Soooo, I decided to oblige THEY and go ahead and update. I've changed the content around a bit, deleted some of the sections that weren't really valuable and fleshed out my current position with more information. I decided to move the Skillset listing towards after the Work Experience section, to highlight the experience instead. Even though a couple of friends said that Objectives were out of date and not used anymore, I decided to keep mine. My Objective is direct, concise, and really is what I am doing (and want to continue doing).

Welp, back up and running again! Not sure if I'll copy the old entries over or not. Not tonight though, that is for sure. Maybe this will be more active this time around!