Photoshop Challenge

At work the design team will do a Photoshop Challenge from time to time. They all start w/ the same image and tweak it using their creative mojo. Another web developer and I get in there sometimes and participate.

Check it out! - http://picasaweb.google.com/illushop

4/16

This is a day late, but that's about right b/c I managed to busy myself enough this week to not think about what happened a year ago. I sort of pushed out that part of my week, off to the side so I wouldn't have to deal with it, all the questions and anger and confusion around it.

Until my drive home tonight from Core. It's as if God was like, "now is a good time." I thought about the time I went to visit the marching band to see the tone section after I graduated a couple years ago. It felt so good to be back, and when I walked toward the back of the field to see some tones, Stack went into really-ecstatic-full-of-joy mode immediately when he saw me. I felt so, missed. It was good to see Stack and it was good to see the tones.

I also thought about how we always sat next to each other in psych class and would walked over to practice afterwards. We usually laughed a good bit on the trek over to the field, and it did my heart good.

And then I thought about how he's dead now, he's not at Tech anymore, he's not around anymore. And to this I cried.

I parked my car outside of my place, and I cried. And then I felt the presence of my heavenly Father, Abba, the all-compassionate God. And it was like He sat with me while I cried and wrapped His arms around me, and mourned with me. Now as I write this I feel a hint of rejoice, because the loving, compassionate God whom I trust was willing to meet with me.

San Francisco Pictures

I recently went to San Francisco for a conference and it was lots of fun. You can see pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ihdavis/SanFranciscoSpring2008VSLive

Dr. Pepper...so worth it

I work in a building that holds a few companies, one of them being First Market Bank. They have the entire second floor, complete with a sweet lounge with candy and soda machines. You can get a can of soda for fiddy cent.

The door is always open, so several months ago I'd go every once in a while during lunch to get a Dr. Pepper. It was great. Then one day some woman asked me, "do you work for First Market Bank?" to which I replied, "no." She then said, "well, our company provides us those drinks subsidized at a reduced price, so they're only for First Market Bank employees." Bummer.

I still go from time to time, just not during lunch. I have a hard time obeying rules that I don't agree with. We share the same building and their lounge door is always open. This may come back to haunt me some day.

This has dramatically become less frequent, however, ever since I jammed the machine. I took orders from my floor for 4 Dr. Peppers. I went down and cranked them all out, hitting the button one after the other. I didn't remove each can before getting the next, just got them all in bulk. They got stuck. I panicked. I ran upstairs and grabbed a co-worker of mine and some scissors. If worse came to worst I could always puncture one can and have it drain, then crush it to get the others. My co-worker and now friend pulled a MacGyver and pulled them all out, unharmed. I took them up with me and we enjoyed some nice Dr. Pepper, subsidized by First Market Bank.

I do what I do. This story is along the same lines as story #2 on this post: Wet Paint Sign + Women's Forum

Beating up 5-yr olds

17

Starbucks Anti-war Hoax

(Link: Starbucks Anti-war Hoax)

Not too long ago I received an email forward about a US soldier writing to Starbucks asking them to send over coffee to US troops in Iraq. Starbucks responded by saying they will not because they do not support the war. I later found out that this is indeed a hoax.

What if it wasn't a hoax? I wouldn't disagree with Starbucks. Although, can you support something without endorsing it? What if they sent coffee over while declaring, "here's some coffee, but we hope that you all can be out of Iraq ASAP because the war sucks."

Or what if they said, "here's some coffee, take half of it for yourselves and half of it for the Iraqi soldiers, or the Iraqi children." That would be revolutionary.*

I don't intend to spark a heated discussion over the Iraqi situation, but I did want to throw it out there.

* Thought inspired by some good conversation with a buddy of mine, Jake.

Gizoogle

I love this. Props to Beas for enlightening me to Gizoogle.

(link: my blog, gansta style)