I have some of the greatest friends in the world! Our friends Sean and Amy are moving into a new home and it has been a tradition for the past decade or so that anytime one of us moves, the other helps and gets paid in pizza and beer. Well, there was just no way I could afford to fly up to San Jose to help them right now. Much to my delight they bought me a ticket today. I have only been back to San Jose once in the almost 3 years since we moved away and that was a very short trip 2 years ago to go see Ottmar Liebert at Yoshi's in Oakland.

Watched the Grammy tonight. As a musician I always pay attention though I admit I don't really like awards themselves. I thought most of this years performances were actually quite good, but Mary J Blige just stole the show. All I can say is Damn!

The President's speech was amazingly pathetic and shows just how ignorant he is. To think that music downloads are marginalizing new artists and hurting the music business is nothing short of propaganda. They really do view music downloading in the wrong way. They should be viewing it as free advertising, as customizable radio, of course their real issue is that it gives people a choice and they don't think that's a good idea. If it wasn't for MP3 swapping I wouldn't have been exposed to many of the artists I have and plan on buying albums by. Sure those 3 kids were able to download 6000 songs, but I'm sure that over half of them were terrible rips with pops, clicks and bad edits, not to mention not the songs they claimed to be. If they had their way they would charge $20 for everyone's album, have absolutely no returns allowed, and own the right's to all artists music forever. I wish music dowloading could bring an end to the way they do business, but it can't and won't. All most major record companies are nowadays are big PR and Marketing firms. They have no real interest in Artists or Music and that will be their eventual downfall. They have built up the industry with such a demand to turn profit quickly and artists have such little value in their eyes that eventually artists will have no choice but to figure out a different way to get their music out there.

Blogger.com did it again. Last night I wrote reviews of the DVDs I watched this weekend and when I went to post them Blogger was down and everything was lost. I realize this is partly my fault because after it happened the first time I should have known to copy them first, but to me that kind of service failure is just completely unacceptable. I'm patiently awaiting Movabletype 2.0 to be released.

movabletype This is the Blog software I plan on moving to, in the end I don't really like Blogger.com, primarily I don't like it being web based and I'm still pissed about last nights crash that deleted what was by far the most entertaining entry I had.

My wife talked about starting her own Blog soon, that should be great because I'm not always sure what's going on in her mind. She is not as outgoing on the web as I am. I tend to say and do what I want opening myself up for looking a fool where she tends to keep her opinions and feelings off the web.

I also have been thinking about the need to add content to the site that could help draw more people in. I certainly am not talking about doing something commercial, but something like the Emax stuff I provide that brings in people who share similarities with us. One of the things I look forward to with Movable Type is the ability for people to add comments. I had hoped the Sign In page would have done that, but it hasn't we get a decent amount of hits each month, yet no one seems to wants to even admit they've been here... lol

FightDivx a site originally about the horribly bad idea DIVX, which went nowhere in a hurry, but is now a cool open platform video compression scheme for computers. I don't think I buy a DVD or CD new without going through this site to find it on sale or a coupon first. Great resource, though in 3 years I have never won one of their drawings.

Surfing the web I came across a couple of sites that employ a technique that should be criminal. A site should never make it so that hitting the back button keeps you stuck on their homepage. That's right up there with the pop-ups of doom when you leave a site and they barrage you with a never ending amount of pop-ups. These weren't adult content oriented sites either.

I really appreciate that things have become very web based, but it is really tragic how some companies make their sites too difficult to get through. Case in point, I'm on Chuck E Cheese's website trying to get information to book my oldest son's birthday party. You click on packages and there is no mention of what the standard package cost though it does tell you what the upgrade cost to add. Then I choose to make a reservation online, but they never explain the process and it's not until you choose your method of payment for your deposit that you get to the option that shows you what time choices you have... the least a site should do is give you a basic run down of the process before you begin.

This is what happens when people get into webdesign who actually don't care about things like service and ease of use, instead they just seem to want to make money and sometimes just have it look good. They can do Flash, but the basic concept of layout elludes them.

Ok, all of the supposed shortcuts to opening my Blog from my computer just don't work right. This shortcut launches a window that I log into then I get a window to type in a new entry, but it's always filled with some html gibberish I have to delete first and now it's cutting a few characters off on the side too so I can't see all of what I've typed. I might just have to create my own little form like my Guest Book for me to do this.

well, end of day one. I wanted to mention I was just watching Janet Jackson: Live from Hawaii on HBO and I hate the fact that she was lipsyncing by her second song. I realize that all that dancing makes you winded, but it looks really awful on TV it is the same issue I keep having with Britney Spears, they only time she bothers to sing is when it's a ballad and she can stand still. It's just wrong.

my job history .. I had typed out a much cooler job history with funny anecdotes, but that was the screw up blogger.com had and now it's gone, in it's place is this less amusing version. I'll add amusing anecdotes when I'm not pissed at Blogger.

dishwasher ice cream company
sold ladies shoes
diswasher tgi fridays
telesales
driver and assorted other jobs for my dad's nursery
men's clothing store
assitant manager Jeans West
from part-time to store manager Mrs Fields Cookies
shipping/receiving Stroud's Linens
part-time The Wherehouse
Pro Audio sales Guitar Center
assistant manager The Wherehouse
store manager at indie record store
store manager indie video store
assistant manager Musicland
assistant manager The Wherehouse
stay at home dad for 6 years
part-time International Auditor UPS (currently)

ok now I'm mad I just spent 15 minutes on a post and Blogger not only screwed up, but completely wasted my entry ... I hope this isn't a sign of things to come from them...

Ok, well my test post worked. So I guess it's time to begin, I imagine like all things www I'll start this out with much interest and then it will dwindle, but you never know. I guess this would be a good place for me to be informal about myself and who/what I am.

My name is John, I'm 34, and a Dad to three kids. My wife, Brie, and I just celelbrated our 12th wedding anniversary. I guess my two biggest passions outside of my family and friends are music, especially my music and the internet, though I could never devote enough time or energy to be a true geek. I'm more of a laypersons geek (everyday people think I'm a geek not realizing I'm just a very knowledgable user). I'm also very big on pop culture.

Lately I've been spending too much time on our Gamecube playing SSX: Tricky. So much so that I developed a stress headache that attacks anytime I spend more than an hour playing.

Well, I think we are off to a good start, I think the main things I want to achieve from this Blog is to get a good record of what I am thinking so that over the years I can see where my mind has gone and also to hopefully reach other people to make friends and/or learning something new.

TTFN

Well, we'll see how this goes. This is my blog, a web diary of sorts. I'm one of those people that have a million things travelling through my mind at any one time and I'm hoping that this will help me get those ideas out. This is the latest addition to Silveriafamily.com. I got the idea from The Screen Savers a show on TechTV that I love watching mainly because I like Leo and the fact that it's so amateurish one could think you were watching cable access or some college project.