February 2006 Archives

Yeah, so maybe I shouldn't keep forgetting to mention this. But maybe I also shouldn't be mentioning this at all, I don't know.

My father and I will be signing copies of Eating Stella Style here in Orlando this Monday (the 27th) night at the Colonial Plaza Barnes and Noble at 7:00pm.

Yes, we will both be there, as well as my mother. We're going to be there whether it is a technical "event" or not. B&N said they needed longer advance notice to put together an actual event, because of their event calendar printouts and what not, but they have ordered a lot of extra copies of the book, so we can come in and sign them and they can put that little "signed copy" sticker on them and put them in a nice display. They said that if people were to show up, that that would be fine.

Sooo... there won't be a big presentation, but we will be hanging out. And also, these are going to be the first copies of the book that both my father and I have signed together.

I am not going to say this once. I am going to say the shit out of it.

CANCEL YOUR NETFLIX SUBSCRIPTION.

The first time I ever used the bastards, I had this to say...

Netflix is the single greatest thing about the internet.

Now, all I can say is... CANCEL YOUR NETFLIX SUBSCRIPTION and call them and tell them why you're doing it. I'll be calling them, but not because I hope they'll change and I'll come crawling back, but just because I want them to KNOW.

That they fucked it all up.

Elise and I started renting a lot of TV shows and going on all-night marathons where we watch the whole season of Arrested Development or Strangers With Candy or PBS' Frontier House or Undeclared in one sitting.

Then all of a sudden, the last disc of Undeclared took an astounding six days to come our way. Astounding because Netflix has been solid since we signed up. Shipping the SAME day from their Orlando center that is only miles from our house. Then all of sudden, we're going crazy waiting six days to see the end of this show and then the disc was scratched, the first problem we've been having lately. In the same month, two discs arrived broken and one scratched.

But that is understandable. I blamed it on the mailman. Just like I blamed the six day wait for that last disc of Undeclared. Our damn movies were getting jumbled in the mail. Because since that disc, nothing has been the same.

Three movies sent back on the same day will result not in three movies arriving two days later, but one movie arriving four days later and then five for the next and six. For the first time ever, our movies were taking forever to get here and getting here lonely, seperated from their siblings.

And yet, even though they were all supposed to be sent on the same day. Our weird arrival pattern never came out of queue. Still, that didn't tip me off. Still, I blamed the mailman.

Today, I read about a class action lawsuit against Netflix that has already settled. And now I know.

I am what is known as a "Heavy User" of Netflix because I've ordered more than twelve discs in one month. As far as I know, once you're labeled as a heavy user, there's no going back and so I'm getting the fuck out of dodge.

Heavy users are subjected to "throttling" because they devour most of Netflix's disc supply before a casual or "light" user can get to it. The problem with that is that the heavy users are also the most loyal and most likely to keep the service, where as the light user or new subscriber still on their free trial needs to be impressed to stay on board and paying the subscription fee.

As a heavy user, my discs are purposefully being delayed from shipping. Delayed just long enough to help their bottom line, while still making me feel like I'm getting my money's worth each month. And I may still be getting my money's worth, by rental store standards, but I no longer feel like I am a part of "the greatest thing about the internet."

I do not want to wait six days to get a new release. Not that I can get new releases anymore. Because that's the second thing about the heavy user throttling. It puts you at bottom priority no matter how long ago you placed a movie in your queue. Because, what does Netflix care? They're going to delay your shipment anyway.

So Walk the Line comes out next week and let's say I've had it saved in my queue for the last three months. Someone can sign up for Netflix on Tuesday and they'll probably get it before me, just because. Because they need to be impressed and who am I?

I'm just somebody who has somehow in some system's eyes, abused what is advertised as an "Unlimited" service, just by using it.

The class action lawsuit filed for all of this ended in a joke. Everyone that subscribed before 2005 gets to check out four discs at once for a month, instead of three. That's it. One month of an extra disc for them to delay.

Because they're still going to throttle people, even after the lawsuit. They've just changed the fine print in their TOS.

I think I'm going to go see how Blockbuster's online service is doing these days. Right after I CANCEL NETFLIX.

So we bought this Nature's Own Whole Wheat Double Fiber bread and it turns out that it is entirely inedible. I say this as an avid fan of FiberONE cereal, something most people would compare to cardboard.

Today, today I've tasted cardboard.

But what I really want to say about this miracle 5 grams of fiber per 40 calorie slice bread is that the first ingredient is water.

The first ingredient is water! This is a solid loaf of dry, nasty bread and it's actually more water than anything.

Today, I've seen a miracle.

Also, there is a new story over at Ribcage.

It's come to my attention that my stat counter is placed only on the main index template of this blog and that nearly all of the traffic I get from search engines is taking people to an individual post's archive page--where I did not put a counter. Basically, this means that I get a ton of hits that I never even knew I was getting--that is, until I found my web hosting's built in stat pages, that have been keeping track of the 500 Google and Yahoo and other search engine clicks that I apparently get each month.

So it's time again for me to share some of my favorite web-searches my blog's stat page says that people searched to eventually find their way here.

Keep in mind that these are the exact phrases that other people type into Google, only to find and click on my blog. Keep in mind that I am not making these up and am totally for real right now.

---

Stephen Hawking full of shit
George Stella skeletor
mystery magical special marc summers
I ate mango skin
how to shave a goatee
suddam hussein
installing a garbage disposer in spanish
i farted in his face
when cotton swabs are pushed too far
Christian books on the anatomy of little girls
eating horse shit
i am christian and listen to james blunt
lizard poop image
stuff seen on tv pillows with stuntman
cheating on a girlfriend when you are a christian.com
can a racquetball suck your eye out?
roseanne morph opening titles
adam smells like
i love the vivid nicotine patch dream
george stella sucks
american poet died from oven carbon monoxide poisoning
a pictureman doing a shit
elise the robot
chili poisonous to reptiles
hormel beef in a jar
i am wasting trees
christina aguilera dressed in a monkey suit
rat poo in envelope glue
i'm bursting to pee
christian smells
christian stella moon faced
suddam hussein is captured?
peanut butter and jelly sandwiches van helsing
horses eating plastic bags
rodney dangerfield peanut butter and jelly
naked photos of jim caviezel
whoppertunities
jake gyllenhall taco
eggplant colored coffeemaker
yummy recipes for my dog minus the cavities
giada de laurentiis bitch
how to dissolve a scab

And these are the only photos I got.

It's not that I drank myself silly, I think it's just that I had gorged myself on Papa Johns and their new "zesty" sauce that's even zestier on the way back up.

Here is Joshua Radin's MySpace with three songs from his amazing album. Best album since I vowed that I would never say "best album since" ever again.

I guess I never tore the mobile billboard a new asshole, so now is as good a time as any.

Our apartment complex is advertising on a mobile billboard now. It makes me crazy. Not that they're selling these apartments as condos, but that they've taken it to that ultimate level of spectacle. That there's a damn truck that's only purpose is driving a billboard around in circles all day long. The damn billboard might as well say, "Follow me to your new home!" because it's route is naturally one big circle around the complex.

I just hate billboard trucks. They just scream, "LOOK AT WHAT WE CAN FUCKING AFFORD. WE CAN AFFORD TO PISS GASOLINE DOWN THE DRAIN ALL DAY LONG."

I just want to ram into the damn things with a stretch-Hummer. Why the hell aren't they illegal? Seeing as they are wrong on all four levels of Christian Stella's Scale of Wrongness.

1. They are a distraction on the road.
2. They are unnecessary traffic on the road, specifically driving DURING rush hour for the most exposure.
3. They waste gasoline as the government is asking us to conserve.
4. They're a truck. They pollute the damn air.

So, "Follow this truck to your new home! Don't mind the pollution from this billboard as it circles your new home all day long."

What I think would really be funny is if someone was driving in the lane to the left of the billboard and the billboard has sold them and they're looking for the complex, but all they can see out the passenger window is the billboard because it's 12 feet high and 15 feet long and so they miss the place entirely and then just drive all the way to Wyoming because condos don't cost $273,000 for a one bedroom there.

This week's story will be posted on Thursday, due to I think I really fucked something up in the gym the night before last. I think it was on the machine with the seatbelt and you strap in and do crunches with added resistance.

The point is that yesterday was Valentine's Day and I spent it with Elise and some coconut rum as I became ever convinced that I had punctured my spleen or gallbladder or anything internal with my bottom rib or something, while on that stupid seatbelt machine, and that I was bleeding somewhere inside my body.

Then I thought that my appendix had burst. Not that it was inflamed, but had actually, already burst. I was sure that I had appendix poison spreading through my abdomin and up my side, my chest and around to my back, then down.

That was the problem with last night, it wasn't just the right side of my stomach, but the entire right side of my upper body. I've had muscle pain before, but on a scale of 1 to 10, muscle pain from a really good workout is a 2 or 3. Last night, the pain was a solid 8. It was actually some of the longest and most excruciating pain I've ever been in, if you can believe it.

I couldn't sleep. I haven't slept much at all.

But I am feeling better. I have no idea what was wrong with me. A muscle sprain, strain, tear--tendons--I don't know. All I know is that I haven't slept and this week's story will come tomorrow. Because this is about the only story I have today. The story of my Valentine's Day!

Don't worry, I'm taking a few days away from the gym.

So I am going to go out and get one of those real-life, hands dirty jobs where you trade their stresses for what will become your cash. I need a little stability in my bank account.

I am seriously considering a job at Golden Corral. A job in Buffet Hell. Why I would ever want to work at a place that probably had a lot to do with me getting to be such a very fat kid, I don't know. Well, actually I do. It's the closest I can stay to bussing tables while technically being a server. No ordering. No filling the first drinks. Just drink refills, clean plates and a whole shit-lot of bussing.

I don't mind the bussing. It's a good workout. About the only thing that scares me is waiting on people that are eating pizza and fried chicken and steak and pot roast and nachos and macaroni and cheese off of the same plate. The people that used to be me. They should have therapists for their employees. "Today, I enabled people to gorge."

Not that I haven't been there and gorged myself in the past six months, but I mean... seeing it everyday is a whole 'nother animal.

People seem to think that there's no money in a buffet, but I think it's all about the turnover. Sure, 25% of the tables will stiff me and 50 will tip two or three dollars, but the last 25 might leave something decent. Maybe on a brownie, cookie and ice cream high (all on one plate), they'll feel generous. With larger sections and ridiculous turnovers, I really think it might be worth my while.

But maybe they're not hiring at all. I'll have to go and see.

Damn it's going to be hard not to sit down and gorge myself.

Lately, I've been living in the gym. That's what I've been doing. This is the extent of what I do now. Work out every single day and try not to eat too much garbage. Two or three miles on the treadmill at a high incline and good protein to fiber to fat to carb ratios in my meals.

I've been ridiculously loyal to this. Six out of seven days this week with at least the cardio. Three with cardio and weights. Egg beaters and soy sausage for breakfast every day. Quaker Weight Control Oatmeal (It's sweetened with Splenda, with added fiber and protein) or FiberONE cereal for a snack.

This month is Hell Month. Trying to shock my metabolism into full gear. This is all because I'm usually locked inside this apartment writing all day long and I really need to start moving again. Of course, I haven't been writing. Not even here. My mind is boggled. I've lost my multitasking abilities and it sucks. Yeah, it's great that the one thing I'm really dedicated to at the moment is my body, but what about my vast body of unfinished work? Har-dee-har.

My book is this constantly evolving, constantly almost finished thing but I can't fret about it because it gets better with age. Specifically, it gets better when my age continues going up as it stays unfinished.

I did at least manage to get a Ribcage story up this past Wednesday. Lately, Ribcage feels a litle first drafty and that's probably due to writing them at the very last hour like I swore I would never do again. I am hoping to put a full rewrite on all of the newer material before I put out the second book. Things feel like they need to be expanded. They feel rushed. Because they were.

Then there are other things I want to be working on--second priorities--but I can't or won't get into them because first things first I have to rededicate myself to my book.

But even firster, I'll dedicate myself to multitasking.

Elise is playing the guitar. Two chords anyway. Yeah, that's happening now. She's catching on fast. I think anyway. She got an acoustic guitar for $89, but it gets the job done. The two chords sound really nice.

And she's painting some new stuff.

She's multitasking.

Sony was busy squeezing minutes of more music onto minidiscs as Apple was inventing the iPod and its days of music, but now Apple is busy making iPods play videos on their tiny screens for the gimmicky fun of it all as Sony is blowing my mind with something straight out of the last decade. Sony is finally going to make something that should have happened happen. Sadly, no one will really give a damn.

This is text on a digital device that is sleek and sexy and perfect. The new Sony Reader goes on sale sometime in the next few months and it's making me that much more excited about reading. And you might be thinking that I'm a big sack of crap that loves anything with a lithium battery inside, anything that syncs with my computer--but I swear that this is different. Or, at least I swear that this is as big to reading as the iPod was to music. I swear that, because all the big geeky bastards are swearing that.

You probably saw something that looked a lot like this back in 1997, but this time it's different. This time it doesn't suck. This time it doesn't hurt your eyes. This time, they're saying that the clarity of the screen rivals actual paper. And everyone that came in contact with it at the Consumer Electronics Show is vouching for that.

As far as I know, this is the first consumer product to use what they're calling eInk technology. Text that is BLACK black, against a backdrop that is paper-white. A screen that interacts with light the way that light interacts with an actual book. A screen that you can read from any angle, in bright sunlight or beside a dim bedside lamp. The only place you can't read it is in the dark, because it's just like real paper in a real book, you dummy.

Only it holds 80 books in its memory and has a memory card slot (even taking SD cards, besides Sony's expected Memory Sticks) to hold even more--to even hold MP3s because why the hell not leave your iPod at home for once?

It downloads all kinds of purchased, rights-managed e-books from every publisher, but it also displays any PDF and any RSS feed automatically fed every time you sync it. So besides novels, you could be reading this site on it right now. Or any other blog. Or news site. You could listen to your iPod and read a big old newspaper or you could listen to MP3s on this thing as you read through Google News. Granted, neither of those things truly excite me about the Sony Reader--I just want to have something less annoying to cozy up with and read. Something not so heavy. Something that I don't have to hold open. No matter how lazy that sounds.

And if none of that has you as excited as it has me--think of this... the battery life is 7,500 page turns. It isn't in hours you see, because you can put it in its dock and charge it, then leave it on a page, set it down for an entire year and come back to that very same page and you'll still have 7,499 more page turns before it needs to recharge again. What I'm saying is, displaying a page draws no power whatsoever. No need for a bookmark, it is always open to the page where you left off.

Then there's the crystal clear graphic novels and greyscale photos and all of that, but I'm done. You can click here if you're like me.

If you're still not sold, I'll leave you with a quote from Gizmodo...

To give you an idea of just how good this display looks… I walked up to the counter, looked at the text on the screen and asked, “So when will you have working units to play with?” The reply: “This is a working reader.” I mistakenly though the text on the screen was some kind of plastic overlay—that’s how ink-like it looked.

There are some photos from my trip here. There are also some other photos that I never uploaded. Like this one that you have to click on so you can read it and see how cool it is...