I'm launching an entire line of t-shirts under the brand name "Death is Good™". This idea started out purely as an idea for a parody of the "Life is Good" shirts, but I think it is going to wind up having an identity of it's very own. The basic premise is Death trying to have fun and be "good" on his time off from work...

I have at least 20 designs already created but I'm rolling them out a few at a time. They are all printed on recycled cotton, both because the shirts themselves have a pretty cool appearance, and because I thought it would be rather appropriate for the subject.

Since this is the 20th(!) year of Freak Day at King's Dominion, Slash and I decided to create a commemorative t-shirt. Since the turnout is so unpredictable (what size and shape the people who will be there, in particular, is hard to predict), I've set up a page where people can pre-order shirts. I'll be printing them on Friday, so if you're going to be there and want me to bring you a shirt guaranteed to be in your size, go here and pre-order by Thursday evening:
http://www.clothesthatkill.com/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=6

Here's the front and back image:


If you're just getting one, use the top option that says "FREE DELIVERY". If you want more than one, use the other option to order the rest after the 1st. My shopping cart doesn't allow for a coupon function (I'm doing something about it but it won't be ready before Friday), so I just set one shirt up that is priced to compensate for the shipping charge.

No, not that kind of baby, this kind:
http://www.scheduledshirts.com/

(if you saw my post the other day, I've revised it a good deal since then. feel free to post comments in the blog section if you want...)

I'm selling a bunch of random things on eBay, mostly in an effort to help my work get rid of things that have accumulated around the office. Some of the items are still sitting at 99 cents, so might be a bargain for the right person...


Apple iPhone 2G
Linksys 4-port 10/100 Router BEFSR41-VN v 2
Mythbusters Season One 4-DVD Box Set (S1 V1)
Mythbusters Season One Volume Two 4-DVD Box Set
Miami Ink Episodes 1-10 5-DVD Box Set
Deadliest Catch Full Series 5-DVD Box Set
Tiffen 67mm Circular Polarizer Filter + UV Protector
S.O. Tech Mission Go Bag - survival/medical/tool bag+
S.O. Tech Go Bag - Multipocket multipurpose bag
Diplomat Gear Force Multiplier Multipurpose Bag
Beijing Olympics One World One Dream T-shirt Adult XL
Beijing 2008 Olympics Commemorative White Baseball Cap
ProEars Sporting Clays PLUS - Dimension 1
ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT

Seriously, all y'all picking the movie apart for little bits you wish had been different should take a step back and realise just what an amazing piece of work this film is. There was no way to perfectly adapt the graphic novel to the screen without making it 12 hours long, and the story as portrayed was amazing.

Two other things:
1. Unless you have ever bitched up and down because a movie contained too many shots of breasts or otherwise naked women, STFU about the blue penis already.
2. Seeing the actor who played Kelly in the Bad News Bears movies pull off an amazing portrayal of Rorschach was worth the price of admission all by itself.

This is one of the few movies I've seen in the last 20 years that actually had me leaving the theater thinking, "I have to see that again."

so lately I have been finding the community aspects on Facebook more enticing to my online time than LJ, but I realised that it's a much faster, generally more superficial thing and I want to keep writing stuff here too.

yesterday I had a dentist appointment. I had asked them to schedule me late in the date, and wrote down my appointment as 3pm, but they called me the day before and said it was at 1pm. Work has been pretty tight lately and ducking out at 1 would mean I'd definitely have to come back, and couldn't let the appointment drag out too long.

So I got to the office just at 1pm, because I couldn't leave work way early to get there. I've switched insurance and it took them about 20 minutes to get that straight. One of the receptionists was being very rude and demanding of information I didn't have on me, even while the other one was on the phone with the insurance company getting that information from them. Meanwhile, I noticed that my dentist was spending the entire time hanging out near the printer, trying to get something to come out of it.

After they got my insurance figured out, I sat there for another 20-25 minutes, seeing the dental assistant and the dentist going back and forth from the reception area, while I heard the other dentist who works in the office working on a patient in one of the back areas. When I finally was asked to come back and sit in the chair, it was about 1:45pm. On the way back, I noticed my dentist on the floor in a side room taping up some boxes and putting shipping labels on them. After getting my little bib tied on, I sat there for another 10+ minutes, until finally the dentist came in just before 2pm.

I'm normally a very understanding person of the delays involved in doctor visits, because you never know what the previous patient is going to need, exactly, and things can run long. On the other hand, I really didn't feel good having been made to wait while the dentist was performing duties that her office staff should have been doing, or that could have been done later. I would even have understood if they had called me and said, "we've had an emergency and can't see you today at 1pm, can you come later or next week?"

I wasn't showing any outside signs of anger, but at that point, I decided I was too upset by the process to be able to properly relax while she was sticking sharp objects in my mouth. I told her that I wasn't feeling good about the visit, and that I needed to be back at work soon and didn't want to be all shot up with novocaine just so she could maybe get one filling done in the short time remaining. To her credit, she looked me in the eye and said, "You're right, I'm sorry. I got focused on doing something and wasn't thinking clearly about you waiting." (it was slightly different from that because she has a heavy Vietnamese accent, but that was what she was trying to say at least). She offered to give me a Saturday appointment in a few weeks, so I could come back without taking off work.

I really like my dentist, and even though I was annoyed yesterday, I actually respect her even more for admitting right away that she had made a mistake. I do think at least one of her office staff is completely incompetent, though, or else she wouldn't have been doing that work herself in the first place.

A comparison of the panorama I took on the Mall on election day, to one taken in the same spot this past Sunday. It's crazy to see exactly how much space there was in front of us that was all crammed full of people...and that there were probably twice as many more behind us...

If you want to see them really large you can go here:
Inaugural | Five days later

Click on each thumnail for a bigger but still mostly reasonably-sized version:

We've gone to Silver Diner in Springfield a few times before on a Sunday morning, and this guy is really entertaining. Every time a new batch of biscuits comes out, he performs a song about biscuits to entertain the diners, and also to alert his co-workers to get out of the way of the hot tray. He has a pretty good range of songs he's created for this purpose, so far I don't think we've heard the same one twice.

I want to write a full story of the last couple days but have other things going on right now, so a quick visual reference:

A small set of pictures I posted on Facebook.

Facebook won't let you upload superwide panoramas so I put this one on multiply. It's from around 8:30 AM. Click on the thumnail for a bigger version:



A segment from the "Obama Radio Nation 2009" event, during which I got to ask a question (comes in around 6:45)

6:30 am by 7th street entrance to the mall

Ok, now we wait four hours

Howard Dean showed up at the Netropts Nation party tonight!

A show at GWU with a bunch of progessive radio hosts. I think I got on C-SPAN.

want something to wear on Tuesday? I'm still going to be making these shirts for a few more days:

These are going for $15, and if you want one I'd be happy to hand-deliver it to you at Spellbound or Midnight later tonight.
I also have a limited-edition version printed on Navy blue American Apparel shirts (to even more closely fit the Obama campaign color scheme), that are $20/each.

I'm filming at the Udvar Hazey Museum for a client, and haven't been here in a while. I was surprised to find you can stand right next to the shuttle now

Courtesy of Ikea

...going on over on Facebook lately

Apparently someone thought this meter was cold.

I've been meaning to put it up on eBay but figured I could ask locally first. I don't know what the going price is but I'm open to offers. It's the larger memory version of the 2G phone which I think is 8GB...

This was mostly a test to see if posting photos from my iPhone was working again, but since it did work, here's a photo of the rose petals set up on the edge of the bed at our hotel room the night of the wedding.

This being the first full weekend in about 3-1/2 months where I did not have to work, get married or print a huge batch of t-shirts, I turned my attention to the huge to-do list that has built up while those other things were going on. So, even though I just finally bought a PS3 Friday night and just got it set up on Saturday, I managed to ignore it almost all day in favor of getting some much-delayed work done.
( a very good, happy, productive day )

Last night two cool things happened.

First, when I got home my deluxe edition of The Tales of Beedle the Bard was waiting for me. The packaging and design of this did not disappoint at all. It's just a cool thing to hold in your hand, and I look forward to reading it with Killian.

The second thing was that we went to see Cirque du Soleil. This would have been cool all by itself, but it was more cool because their current show is set up just across the bridge from us, and also because we lucked into really great seats. When I went on just three days ago to look for tickets, someone else must have just cancelled an order because there were two seats in the very front row. It's quite a different experience when you can see the detail in the performers' makeup and costumes, and when you see some of the daredevil acts from almost underneath them. We weren't supposed to take pictures but I snuck a couple with my iPhone.