Long blond hair falls over the back
I’m accosted by her perfume as she taps away
Important messages 160 characters at a time
About the guy sniffling profusely behind her
She’s drinking some obnoxious drink
Preceded by double or half
Post fixed by atté or oca.

I know better than to be wishing for the lid to pop
Soaking those leggings she adores as pants
And the top that plunges into her neckline
Like her serial killer neighbor
Making space in his
Garage freezer

I wonder if that
“He was always so nice” neighbor
Finally had his way.
As I rest my foot
On the back of her empty chair.

http://www.carbonfund.org/site/pages/carbon_calculators/category/Assumptions

http://www.appdata.com/facebook/apps/index/id/102452128776

http://www.carbonify.com/carbon-calculator.htm

28 million daily active users

15minutes/per person * 28million = 7 million hours

300 watts average power supply * 7 million hours = 2.1million kw

2,100,000kw * 1.5lbs/kw = 3,150,000 Pounds/day

3,150,000 == 1575 Tons/Day Carbon

“Can you push 73 for me?” She asked. She leaned back on the rail that surrounds middle of the elevator’s wall. She was dressed in a hip business casual way, she had on a tight gray skirt short enough for me to think Where does she work? and a white top that had no reservations about showing off her figure.

“Sure.” I pushed the 73 button for her.

As the elevator sprung into motion I asked her, “Headed back to work?”

“Yeah, afternoon meeting. You?”

“I’m going to an interview for some freelance work”.

“Oh cool, What do you do?”

“I’m interviewing for a social media gig.”

“Oh too cool! I play in social media too.” The elevator stopped somewhere in the 40′s and we picked up some middle aged guy who eyed her from the reflection in the aluminum doors.

“No kidding?” I said, as I eyed her left hand to look for a ring. Seeing nothing, I said, “Well we should have a drink sometime.” I handed her my card as the bell rung for my floor.

“Sounds good.” she said as I made my way past our middle aged friend and to my interview.

Later, I got a new message and friend request on Facebook.

Hey Josh! It was very nice meeting you today. I hope the interview went well for you. Anyway, I’d like to get a drink with you sometime. If you’re ever looking for anything more than a drink, I’m very *professional* and very discrete. Get a hold of me on Facebook, or text me …

As I read her message, I couldn’t believe that the gorgeous girl I shared an elevator with was … a professional. Despite being curious about her services, I was more curious about how much she used social media in her day to day life. If the world’s oldest profession can embrace the newest media, what can the rest of us learn from that? I asked Heather if she wouldn’t mind doing an interview. Here is what we talked about:

Josh: Hey Heather, Thanks for taking the time to speak with me today.

Heather: Happy to do it!

Josh: So how long have you been helping guys be less lonely?

Heather: Not just guys. And about 10 years. I used to be a receptionist and totally hated my life.

Josh: Not a fan of answering phones?

Heather: Not a fan of corporate bullshit. Being at the bottom of the corporate ladder lets you know just how far shit rolls down hill.

Josh: So when did you start using social media for your business?

Heather: I actually had a friend suggest it to me a couple of years ago. When I first saw MySpace I saw the potential, but while trying to use it I quickly realized just how ridiculous it was. Are they even around anymore?

Josh: Some people use them, just no one I know. So MySpace was too difficult to use…

Heather: Well, it was difficult to use it for what I wanted to use it for. Finding people was a nightmare. Facebook on the other hand ties you in (most of the time) with a geographic location. And if I think it’s you, I click, and I can look at your picture and decide. I’m not subjected to some terrible punk rendition of Pink Floyd and blinking star pictures. If I meet a John Johnnerson in Tampa, I can Facebook him and find him much easier.

Josh: So it’s much easier to find people. I happen to agree with you, the interface is much better. So the only thing holding you back was being able to find people you meet in real life?

Heather: Well, we have an “industry” term called the “turn”. It’s when you tell someone that you’re a professional. It’s when you kill there dreams that the flirty girl in the elevator wanted to take them to floor 69–

Josh: Hey now…

Heather: *Laughs* What I’m saying is that it’s a lot easier to explain to someone about what you do when they’re at home on their own computer. They can decide to ignore your friend request and go on with their life, or, more often than not, they write you back and things go from there. It’s a low pressure way to approach people.

Josh: You get more people you meet as customers using social media than you did before social media?

Heather: Well, after a few years you gain an eye for potential customers, but yes, combined with my eye for clientele, Facebook empowers people to talk with me, and allows me to dispel some of the stigma associated with being an escort. One of the things I hadn’t considered before trying it, was that most undercover cops or sting operations aren’t going to have a Facebook. I’ve never had a problem before, [She knocks on the table] but you never know.

Josh: Can we expect to see you on Twitter anytime soon?

Heather: Well, it’s tough. Twitter is very public in nature, and your messages are pretty limited. Would you like to see this from @TweetHappyHooker? @JoshuaZiering Nice to meet you tday. I’m a pro. If u want, lets meet up. I’m discrete.

Josh: I can see how that might be a problem. However, you could do something like @ShitMyDadSays. I’m sure you’ve got some good stories.

Heather: Sure I do, but I don’t know that the world of Twitter is ready for @HookerStories yet. Maybe. I’ll consider it.

Josh: Do you have any suggestions for other small business owners to use social media better?

Heather: Well, I think the most important thing is: No matter what you do, you can leverage the power of social media to do it better, more personally, and with greater ease than ever before.

Josh: Heather Thank you.

Heather: Thanks Josh, this was fun!

For a couple of weeks during the summer, some buddies and I got into an escalating series of “Who will blink first” style encounters. It started out small, like drinking drinking two beers at once, or going to some ridiculous place for a beer. As my friends 25th birthday approached, things started to get more serious. One Friday night we decided we needed to do a road trip not 12 hours later. After some text messaging people for suggestions we received the suggestion of “Huntington Beach California”. For lack of a better suggestion, we concluded “Why the fuck not?!”

We set off early the next morning with no hotel reservation, no directions, and our GPS pointed the “town center” of Huntington Beach California. Descending out of the mountains, we started cracking the windows when the temperature hit the 80′s and were full windows down, volume 10 by the time we got beach side.

We found a hotel room, and after pumping up the air mattress, we set to disinfecting our stomachs with half a bottle of Smirnoff vodka we found on sale at the super market across the street. We had dinner beach side at a nice Mexican restaurant (Fred’s Mexican Cafe) that was just bawdy enough to support our antics, and just classy enough I could wear a nice shirt and feel like a douche. The Mexican restaurant was at the top of one of the biggest flights of stairs I’ve seen west of the Mississippi, as apparently are many of the areas local watering holes.

After dinner, we hit the towns beach side bars. I was really impressed at the pedestrian friendly environment they’ve created. You could stumble from bar to bar pretty effortlessly. We found a nice upscale bar on a corner that featured some lovely fish tanks, and liberal libations. As we were leaving, I tripped over something trying to get out, in all likelihood is was my own feet, but I don’t know for sure because some blond girl interjected, as I was defending my sobriety, “You’re drunk. You don’t have to lie to kick it.”

I said, “I’m not drunk, and were you born that blond sweetheart?”

This Short.

It was going to be one of those nights. I heard her swearing at me as we were walking away, and while trying to be cool I managed to trip going up the sidewalk on the other side of the street. Perhaps she was embracing the old latin adage of “Veritas” in some strange way. As my ego was recovering from the “See you next fall”, I saw a beautiful blond walking towards us. She was wearing a tight shirt, and the shortest blue jean skirt I’ve ever seen in my life. She had a stride like a model…from my dreams. She practically walked in slow motion, one foot in front of the other, and her high heeled shoes gave the most indulgent “clunk” as she strode her way towards us. As I was starting to slowly inhale, so that I could smell what I’m sure was the very expensive perfume she was wearing, she turned and went into the bar right in front of us.

I watched, half in awe and half in that way a wolf looks at a rabbit: She was a goddess. She stood at the top of this very steep flight of steps, and I stood at the bottom. As we were waiting, she was chatting up the bouncer for what felt like longer than appropriate for such a hot girl, and my mind was starting to wander. I wonder what her underwear looks like, I thought. So, as she was giggling to the bouncer, I started problem solving. The inherent flaw in drunk problem solving is that one often fails to consider the repercussions of solutions. The most eloquent idea I could come up with was to bend down and look up her skirt. And so, I bent down on humble knee, in prayer to this goddess. I felt my chin scrunch a little bit as I nodded my head.

“Nice” I thought, to her zebra leopard print thong. It was about this point that I heard an unbelievable shrieking. It was so obnoxious that it took me a second to decode what was being said.

“DOUCHE BAG! DOUCHE BAG!” I heard repeated over and over in a speed and pitch that should not have been used together. Hmm, I thought, I hope this shrieking doesn’t have anything to do with me, as I lifted my head slowly I saw the end of a finger, attached to an arm, held by a girl, pointing at me, and yelling “DOUCHE BAG!”.

“What?” I asked, refusing to believe that the jig was up.
“You were totally looking up my friends skirt!”
“What? No, I just dropped something.”

I found out later that while I was managing to keep a straight face, the gaping jaws of my friends who could not believe what they were witnessing was completely betraying my ability to play this one off. The bouncer bore witness to this whole event with the stalwart manor that only someone who works at night could muster. As I went up the steps, I handed him my ID.
“You really think you’re going to get in here now?”
“Yeah.” I said without the slightest hint of pomp.
“You’re going to leave her alone right?”
“Yeah.” I parroted again.
“Alright. Go on in”. He said, handing my ID.
“You know it was totally worth it right?”
“Yeah, I’m sure it was.”

Why Don’t We Toast?

The other night while drinking and telling lies with a friend, the tenuous topic of toasts came up. A toast is a rare thing anymore, and those who do say more than one word before guzzling down drinks frequently do it in a language besides English. I think we need to change this. From the 1880′s to just after prohibition, toasting was an obsession in America, much like the drinks that went along with them. I’m a firm believer that a well placed toast can inspire, lead, and thoroughly entertain.

The Origins of Toasting

The ancient Greeks used to perform “libations”. In modern day, you may have heard this term to refer to an alcoholic beverage. In reality, a libation is an alcoholic beverage, but one that is being offered to the Gods. The word, though often used by seekers of pretense, actually implies a great deal of humor about the drinks at hand. The ancient Greek custom was to stand up with both arms and cup raised to the sky, and pray. After the prayer was complete, the wine was consumed.

Where Do We Get The Word “Toast” From?

The English term ‘Toast’, comes from the practice of putting a piece of burnt toast into wine. Why would anyone taint good wine with burnt toast? Wine wasn’t always the delicious highly refined beverage it was today. Often times, especially in ancient Rome, wine was acidic, and difficult to drink. The story goes that because of a rash of poisonings in Greek and then Roman society, before dinner they would dip a piece of bread into the communal wine glass, showing the guests that the evening would be a safe one. The honored guest would get to eat the bread, and drink the last sip of wine, which was generally considered to be the best tasting. This lead to the discovery that putting a piece of charred bread into wine could help balance out the acidic flavors, and thus became customary at the start of the meal to say a few words and raise glasses.

5 Drinking Toasts You Need To Know

The Fighter Pilots Toast

(Feel free to swap out “Flying” for any number of fun verbs that fit there. Drinking works particularly well)

Here’s to me in my sober mood
When I ramble, sit and think
Here’s to me in my drunken mood
When I gamble, sin and drink

But when my flying days are over
And from this world I pass
I hope they bury me upside down
So the world can kiss my ass.

Three

In my room there were three,
You, my light and drunken me.
Three’s a crowd, there’s no doubt.
So I turned that fucker out!

1..2..3

Here’s to being single…
Drinking doubles…
And seeing triple!

Best Friends

My friends are the best friends,
Loyal, willing and able,
Now let’s get to drinking!
All glasses off the table!

To Me…

Here’s to the women we’ve met,
and the women we’ve fucked,
And to those amongst us who’ve had no such luck
Here’s to beer in the glass
and vodka in the cup.
Here’s to poking her in the ass
so she wont get knocked up.
Here’s to all of you and here’s to me,
together as friends we’ll always be.
But if we should ever disagree, then FUCK ALL OF YOU, HERE’S TO ME!
(Popularized by Tucker Max)

Recently I wrote an article about how much I think AutoTune is ruining culture, youth, talent, and motivation. I came to the conclusion I have to swear off Autotuned music.

To be fair about this decision, I decided to see how the other side lives: I had to be Autotuned. I very crudely taught myself how to use a free Autotune styled clone. I mean, if Autotune will work for me, it will work for anyone. I am notoriously bad at singing, and when I do it’s usually in some kind of falsetto voice that scares dogs.

First I had to find a song I wanted to duplicate. For this, I just tried to think of the first song that popped into my head with some ridiculous auto tuning. Of course, my mind jumped to “I’m on a Boat” by The Lonely Island. You might remember that T-Paine has a wonderful solo where he sings about how surprised he is that he’s on a boat, and then taunts Poseidon, God of the sea. I too want to taunt underwater Gods despite my poor swimming abilities.

How Does One AutoTune

I had to find out just how the hell one auto tunes something. I did some googling and arrived at various message boards where people were lamenting how expensive Autotune was and how there were no open source alternatives. Someone had suggested that if you’re patient there is a relatively inexpensive ($700USD) software for Mac and PC called Melodyne by a company called Celemony. It’s not an editor in the sense you can cut and paste stuff around. It exists soley for the purpose of autotuning your songs. If you’re looking to play with it, they have a free demo. However, they don’t let you save anything and an intrusive beep plays at random intervals (as is their right to keep away freeloaders like us).

Melodyne Editor

The technology called “Autotune” is actually a combination of several effects. It varies pitch, pitch modulation, amplitude, the relationships and transitions between them. Pitch is just the “note” you’re playing, or rather, would like to be playing.

Pitch modulation is difficult to explain but all I can tell you is that the less of it there is, the more you sound like a robot. A robot has no pitch modulation.

Amplitude is simply the volume of the sound. You can make someone louder or softer using amplitude.

Then, as you move pieces of music around to different pitches you can change how they change. For example imagine someone singing a scale. They smoothly move from one note to another, now imagine if they didn’t, and immediately jumped to the next pitch. This is a popular parlor trick in Auto tune land. If you’re looking for a good resource on how to use the tools in Melodyne check out this wiki. However, I maintain that the best way to learn it is to just go start screwing around with it.

Since I can’t save the files, I had to find a way to get the audio out of Melodyne. Luckily, for Mac users at least, there is a program called Audio Hijack Pro. It taps into any program of your choice outputting a sound and records it. It’s really bad ass. Unfortunately you do have to pay for it also, but luckily they offer a demo where you can record up to ten minutes before it overlays static onto your track.

So, using these two demo programs, and the free Audacity Sound Editor, I managed to piece together some lyrics.

The Outcome

First, I would encourage you to listen to the original. I apologize in advance for my singing. It’s absolutely terrible, and is one of the reasons I’m probably drawn to speaking, writing, and yelling.

I’m On a Boat Lyrics Un-Auto-Tuned.

Now, the final copy, synced up to a pretty rough instrumental version of “I’m On a Boat” I found floating around the internet.

I’m On a Boat Lyrics AutoTuned

The Verdict

Auto tune can’t help a hack like me because not only am I a terrible singer, but I am a terrible auto tuner as well. Even when I had the notes laid out right in front of me, I still couldn’t make my shoddy singing sound like the original.

The response is usually an explanation about what subject or nuance I am preoccupied with at that very moment. However, all is not lost. I had a professor, who made an astute analogy. While commenting on French author (and pilot) Antoine de Saint Exupéry’s book, “The Little Prince” he said that meaningful writing often takes an appreciation in the same way that good music takes an appreciation you must develop, and hence why so many like pop music, and why so few people read things like “The Little Drummer Boy”. Pop music is easily consumable.

Hopefully I haven’t lost you yet. The heart of the issue is that like people who choose “People” Magazine over Saint Exupéry, I often find myself drawn to pop music. I don’t know if it’s the catchy lyrics, the catchy tunes, or the unbelievable outreach it has: into the car, into the club, and into movies but I find myself easily taken in by it’s spell, regardless of how ridiculous the song is. For the most part, I’ve always had the fall back of being able to blame a talented person for drawing me in.

However, in the last couple of years things have started to change and I’ve been unable to blame a talented person. A new technology called Autotune has burst onto the market in a big way. Autotune was perhaps most notably popularized by Cher’s “Believe”, her 1998 hit single. You can watch it here to refresh your memory.

Phonographs Wont Autotune

Autotune has been a polarizing force in the music community. Jay-Z wrote a song called “Death of Autotune”, and Seattle band Death Cab For Cutie started a campaign against auto tune they they launched at this year’s Grammys. Meanwhile, others have capitalized on the trend. T-Paine developed an iPhone Application that lets you sing along karaoke style to his songs, while the phone uses Autotune technology to make you sound like him as your confessing how much you like the bartender.

My beef with Autotune is that it takes away from the artist. The unfortunate plight of pop music is that the person must usually be just as marketable as the music. Take for example Miley Cyrus, she’s a talented young lady for sure, but she possesses a marketable quality that the masses absolutely eat up. Now suppose we have a highly marketable person, but with no talent. That’s OK! We can use Autotune to turn her into the star we can sell. What’s the problem with this? Well, what is there to strive for if we can synthesize talent and skills? I’ll tell you what: A rocking pair of tits, some bleached blond hair, and an ass that won’t quit. Autotune is very quietly creating a generation that strives not to be better, but hotter. Autotune is a toxic inflation to the economy of talent and hard work.

So while yes, I’ve been known to like certain auto tuned songs, I don’t think I can continue to ideologically support the institution that is pop music anymore.

Am I off my rocker? Should I have my ringtone as “Lollipop” and own every one of Kayne’s albums? Let me know in the comments.

However, whilst shaving the other day I noticed that I had something close to respectable on my upper lip. It was faint, and needed love like a young child, but I saw it’s potential. In order to focus on my new son, my mustache son, I had to lop off all the other distracting follicles on my face. The result? Well it’s to your right. And yeah, I know I look intense, it’s the ‘stache.

Please note: While I am chronicling my experiences with a mustache I sense that their may be some good old fashioned “ribbing” or “fun pokering” that may occur. This is encouraged, however,  in an effort to keep things original the following themes are banned because they are trite:

• Porn Star
• Pedophile

However, funny pictures are encouraged.

While flying 10,500 at 125mph I notice that we are rapidly approaching some airspace. For those that don’t know, Airspace is the equivalent of lanes on a highway. It separates different types of air traffic so everyone can play nicely. As you can imagine, having 747′s flying around in the same area as Crop dusters could create something of a problem.

As we’re approaching the airspace, I break out a chart and look to see if I can get some more information about it. The GPS was saying RES MOA Mojave. Seemed reasonable enough. The chart confirmed my suspicions that we seemed to be busting this airspace like Chris Hanson on to Catch A Predator.

Now, relatively sure of our whereabouts and the situation, I piped up. “I think we’re in some restricted airspace.” I said to my friend sitting in the left seat. I kind of pointed to the purple line on the GPS, hoping it would add to my credibility. “Well, We’re on flight following, they’d probably let us know.” He said. And that kind of rang true in my mind.

So, I stuck my face back in the chart to find some more information about the MOA, still unsure of what MOA stood for. After burying my face in the chart for another minute I mention again, “I’m pretty sure we’re in this MOA Space here and we’re not supposed to be… and we can fly a couple minutes outside of it pretty easily.” I said. Whilst discussing the merits of what this would accomplish, the radio chimes in, “8 SIERRA ECHO FOXTROT, YOU’VE BREACHED AN ACTIVE MOA AIRSPACE FOR EDWARDS AIRFORCE BASE. TURN HEADING 170 IMMEDIATE LEFT TURN.”

The right wing of the airplane shot skyward as we turned left. In the distance I saw an airport … It was Edwards AirForce base.

As I was standing at the contest Saturday morning it had become clear to me why the MOA was active. A double sonic boom hit my chest pretty hard. It was the Space Shuttle, and it was landing at Edwards Airforce Base that morning. So, you know, My bad and all that.