This blog has a kickass banner. Do you know what it’s from?

And another thing. I went out and bought a Thievery Corporation disc: The Richest Man in Babylon. Love it. I wanted to rip it, but Winamp is so weak for ripping. The best thing I found for ripping is the Real Player. I probably should update it to deal with the buffer overflow issue.

I’m rather bummed. A while back, when I had lunch with friends, we were discussing The Young Ones DVDs. James asked if all the musical guests were included. In one of the episodes, Cash, the band was not included when the videos were released by the BBC. A mutual friend of ours had watched the tape she’d made back in the 80’s and sure enough, Jools Holland and the gang played Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues. Much to my chagrin, it isn’t included. My comment, wtf?

But it all seems so real.

Ok. I’m all for treating animals in a humane way. This is a bit much. And I disagree. “The public is not ready for this kind of message“. In fact, they could probably care less as evidenced by the sheer amount of turkey consumed yesterday.

This came up last week at work. I meant to google it, but never got around to it. Wouldn’t you know it? Jay is on top of it:

Press kits: Beyond the basics

You have an attractive folder, a comprehensive and up-to-date company backgrounder, a business card, and a press release specific to an upcoming event or circumstance. What else can you do to augment that press kit?

- Photos or slides: Are you announcing a product, a new location , a major personnel change, or other event that would be enhanced with pictures? If you want to include color pictures, use slides, because they provide top quality and processing flexibility.

- Brochures and reprints: Use these when sending the kits to members of the press who may be unfamiliar with your company.

- Competitive table: A general market overview should already be in your company backgrounder. A competitive analysis highlights your strengths when compared to your competitors.

- Press guide, or Q&A: This document anticipates the key question a reporter might ask about your company or its announcement and then answers them.

- References: When announcing a product or service, include references to some of your most satisfied customers, one or more industry analysts who will comment favorably on your company, and perhaps even the names and key contacts of your major competitors.

Had a wonderful Thanksgiving yesterday. My wife and I spent the day at our friend’s house. They have a beautiful house in the woods, on top of a ravine with a creek running through it. They just had stairs built from the house to the creek bottom. Down by the creek, they had a bonfire going along with the rig for deepfrying the turkey. We sat around for a couple of hours, talking, drinking beer and smoking cigars, while the oil got up to frying temperature and the bird cooked. Then, it was up the stairs, into the house for dinner by the fireplace in their house. It was a totally excellent way to spend Thanksgiving.

Oh. And I’m grateful that someone else is deepfrying the turkey.

Since today is Thanksgiving Day, I feel obliged to express something that I’m thankful for. In July, I left my position of 12 years in a manufacturing company and plunged headlong into technology. I’m thankful for the whole experience. I work with wonderful people. Everyday I talk with really interesting people in the area. A lot of people read my blog, and send me emails or leave comments. I don’t think I can sum it up very nicely, but I’m grateful that my life has been so blessed. Have a great day!

Another interesting random page I found is the Open Tactics Weblog, a blog by Swedish entrepreneur Rikard Linde.

Make sure you check out the oracle of baseball while you’re at it.

How weird is this? In previous post I mentioned six degrees of separation. One of the things that I do when I’m out of blogs to read is use the random script at blogger(dot)com. One of the blogs mentions an old favorite of mine: the oracle of bacon!

Don’t forget to Ignore Alien Orders today.

Tired of the same old blogs? I am. That’s why used this site to find somemore! Notice the six degrees reference on the results page. What’s really cool is dragging the “Recommend” bookmarklet to you toolbar.

I was reading this article about the amount of spam and attachment the writer receives and I noticed the way he says he questions people, “I pinged a few of my sysadmin and webguru friends to find just how atypical my experience has been. It’s not atypical at all.” Very Interesting.

Have you noticed a trend here? If I get up late, there are very few posts. Notice how many I’ve done so far?

Not that I’m a huge baseball fan, but I do think that the Jim Thome situation is an appropriate metaphor for the state of things.

I hope you read CrainTech on a regular basis. AJ from Mango Bay answers the 3 questions and Chris Thompson has hard words about the Athersys issue.

Good news! “Eating lots of nuts or peanut butter may help ward off diabetes, a study of more than 83,000 nurses suggests.”

Do you get Thomas Mulready’s Cool Cleveland newsletter? You don’t? Well, send him an email to subscribe! The first paragraph of his latest newsletter opens with a bang:

“While Pittsburgh�s steel industry died a swift death and forced their community and leadership to re-focus on technology, Cleveland�s old LTV mills are being revived (like a �phoenix�) by WL Ross�s Wilbur Ross, and could become part of the nation�s largest steel company if a potential purchase of Bethlehem Steel goes through, no doubt delaying Cleveland�s resurrection and reinvention of itself for another decade. Read the sad news here.”

I’m all about buying nothing. Especially on the day after.

Last week at Comdex, Carly Fiorina said that HP Technology is “in the cereal you pour, the coffee you drink, the jeans you wear, the car you drive”. Now, I understand what she’s trying to say. I totally object to her saying HP is in the coffee I drink! I sincerely doubt that the place where I buy my beans online or Chris’ parents use HP. I could be wrong. They might use a printer to do the invoices or something like that. But I take my coffee black. Not with cream and HP, dammit.