A while ago I mentioned my Bad Patch.


I have since driven past the shop, and taken photos of the unfortunate wall that fell victim to what is rumored to be "drug use gone worse".

Check it. This is what greeted me when I went to drop off my car around midnight that fateful night.

I yanked this from Engadget.

I'm going to reserve comment, but I will share the facts.

From the company's website:

The Babykeeper^TM is a patent pending infant carrier style seat, that hangs from the stall wall in most public restrooms, and can also be used in many public fitting room

That's it.

You know what I'm sayin'.

Let me start by saying "I apologize." I apologize if I hurt anyone's feelings, or step on anyone's toes or any of that stuff. I'm sorry that you're hurt, but I have to get this off of my chest.

I just can't get with this whole "brick front" thing. It's a facade. A sham. A trick. A joke. It's like they want you think that they spent a whole lot on the house by giving you a brick front to look at, but they're not trying that hard at it, because it's only the front! It adds no structural stability. Would the Big Bad Wolf have been discouraged if that third pig had put up a brick front, and built the rest out of sticks? I think not. Who do you think you're tricking?

The only thing WORSE than a brick front is "three sides brick"! These folkz spend more money to put the brick on THREE sides, but don't splurge and put bricks on the back! I guess nobody ever goes around there? They're so concerned about everyone thinking they have a brick house, that they miss the fact that the investment put into that fourth side would add a lot to the actual value of the house.

Am I right, or am I crazy? Why not the fourth side?!?!

Know what I'm sayin'?? Hello?

Even though this is a young blog, I have a few recurring segments. Let's see. There's...

• There needs to be a revolution in...
• Book Review
• Music Review
• Movie Review
• Upcoming Post Watch

I hereby announce a new recurring segment, entitled: "Shoot me if I ever..." These are things that I see people do, that I hope I never do. For example: Shoot me if I ever...buy a house with a brick front.

I'm really into having "The right tool for the job", especially when we're talking about software applications. That being said, I'm having issues settling on the perfect tool to organize my entrepreneurial efforts.

I am looking for an application to:

• Take notes in. I need to be able to add notes quickly and easily. I would love for my notes to be date-stamped, but when I think about it, this is not a huge priority.
• I need to be able to store additional data with my notes: Pictures. Internet information. Information from my e-mails, and anything else that I come across. The easier, the better.
• I would LOVE for this to be internet-based. That way I would have universal access to it from anywhere, and I would be able to share pieces of it if I wanted.
• I would also like to have a local client to view and edit this information. I need to be able to pull out my laptop and retrieve information from anywhere, no internet connection required. This is a delicate point. Such a tool would need to be able to sync changes when I reconnect to the internet.
• Track to-dos and calendar items.
  
• Keep separate projects separate, while still being able to get a "universal view". Allowing me to ask "What are ALL of my to-dos across ALL of my projects?" Or all of my calendar items. Or what contacts have I saved within my notes versus within my address book?

Okay. What I've seen so far:

• Evernote. I currently use this. VERY EASY TO USE. It has Plug-Ins for my internet browser and my e-mail program that I like very much. This means that I can send any part of an email, or the whole email, or any part of a web page, or the whole webpage...to my Evernote with just a button press from that application. Very handy. Evernote also has lots of filtering options to help me find that data easily. The downside with this application is that it's a little TOO abstract. It doesn't naturally lend itself to a very organized, compartmentalized format.
• Wikis. Ah, wikis. Just a fad, or here to stay? Time will tell. Wikis offer formatting options to make everything eye-appealing, and wikis offer the web-based and sharing capabilities I desire. Wikis even allow me to create a new page for each project, and support different types of media, but so far I haven't found a Wiki that has a local client and syncs changes, and wikis don't lend themselves to leisurely data collecting.
• Other note-taking applications. Evernote fits in this category. Others are Microsoft OneNote, GoBinder. Livepad. OneNote is probably the most viable, but it's not online, and I'm slightly anti-Microsoft. I could probably work something out to make it shareable, but it would be a bit dicey. I'm honestly not interested in the effort share it or publish it to the web because of the aforementioned adversity to Microsoft.
• Some sort of hybrid app-thing maybe? We all have different applications that we use. Most people have a Yahoo or a Hotmail or a GMail or an AOL account. Then there's our work e-mail address, and some of us have one or more email addresses hanging off of our on domain names. Then, there are note taking apps like Evernote and OneNote. You have Wikis. Another category of "stuff" we use are our web-based services like del.icio.us or digg or Flickr. How about you guys get together and give me a super-app?

I consider myself a pretty learned and connected guy, so I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume that there's nothing out there that gives me exactly what I want. (I'd love to be proven wrong!)

Where that leaves us is at the end of a bitching session, pretty much.

Know What I'm Sayin'??

No words. Just watch, and listen.

...have a dog - a little Maltese named "Coach".

When they first brought him home, he didn't know his own name. I heard it a lot in those days. I could hear them outside calling him "Coach! Come here Coach!". I always wondered exactly how they came to that name. I figured that maybe he was kinda bossy, so they called him "Coach".

They just got a new dog - a little black poodle named "Gucci".

I can't make this stuff up, peeps.

Holla.

Hilarity.

(I couldn't decide which title I liked best.)

No. This post is not about Burger King, although I find the Angus Burger quite tasty!

This post is about the growing number of shoe manufacturers that allow you to customize your shoes by creating custom colorways (that's what they call the color combinations). They have created web applications that make changing colors as easy as point and click. Some even allow you to add custom text to your shoes, although I think they probably don't allow profanity or copywrited words, so R.M., don't even try it. Yes, I'm talking to you.

I personally think this is a great thing. I'm salivating over my K-Swiss Classics that I just haven't gotten the nerve to order yet.

So, without further ado, here's a brief roundup of websites where you can customize your own shoes. Have fun.

1. The NIKE iD site. While most other site of this kind only offer a few models to customize, Nike is leading the way here. There are LOTS of shoes here that you can bend and twist to your own well, twisted, desires. BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE. They also have other stuff: apparel, bags, balls. You could probably burn hours here just playing around.
2. Classic K-Swiss. Perhaps my personal favorite, because I crave simplicity in a complex world, and all of the options at Nike make my head hurt. The K-Swiss Classic is just my favorite shoe. Simple. Clean design. Plus, it doesn't make my feet look as big as they really are. They only have a couple of designs to choose from, but why would you need more options? Go with the Classic. Funk it up a little bit.
3. Timberland Boots. Yes, you can get custom boots in a couple of models for men, women and children alike. They offer custom text, with the added bonus of Greek symbols, so to you fraternities and sororities: knock yourself out.
4. Since they're owned by Nike now, I suppose it only stands to reason, but at converse.com, you can customize your own Chuck Taylors! Just look for the pencil icon in the compass rosette-looking thing in the upper right of the main page. I remember back in the day when there was a spot near our house where you could get Chuck Taylors for $5! At the beginning of each summer, my mother would take my brother and I there and we would each get a pair. Those were our summer shoes. Get them dirty, wet, anything you wanted. Just realize that if you managed to destroy them, well you'd walk around barefoot for the rest of the summer. Oh, the good ole days. Well, these ain't really the same Chucks, now that I think about it. Back then, you couldn't get them in leather!
5. I've never had a pair of Vans, and I've never wanted one. Sorry, that's just the way it is. I've already said K-Swiss was my favorite. HOWEVER, when I can customize my colors, this opens a whole new range of possibilities for my wardrobe.
6. rbjcustom.com offers three different models to choose from, including their Classic Leather. I don't have much Reebok experience to draw from, but the site is pretty nice. They let you add text too. One thing here that was slightly different is that as where on other sites you have a shoe floating in space to serve as your WYSIWYG preview, Reebok has thoughtfully mocked up the shoe on a foot, with a pair of jeans breaking over it just right. Nice touch.
7. Puma has an interesting offering that uses the theme of a Mongolian BBQ. Get it? You get to pick and choose what you want? Right! Now you get it. They only offer one shoe model at the moment, but there are 20 different customizable pieces. The site is very graphics-intensive, though. Lots of added motion that the site would move more quickly and smoothly without. That's the price of the BBQ experience, though. Very slickly and nicely done.
   
8. Adidas has this weird concept called Adicolor. They sell you a pair of solid-color shoes in white, red, blue, yellow, green, pink or black. The pair also comes with - get this - a set of markers. They want you to use the markers to customize your kicks. This is decidedly grass-roots and I can see the draw for the artsy set, but come on Adidas! This is 2006.

That's about all that I found. Keep in mind that these take about a month to be made and sent to you, so plan ahead. Next February or so, I'll be putting a few orders in.

Know What I'm Sayin'??