Luddy’s blog

I am not the brightest man you'll ever meet or the most insightful, so I won't try to be and simply say that these new ads from Microsoft are great (although they don't directly advertise anything).  The concept behind them, just being purely wacky and therefore making Microsoft a more approachable, cooler company is genius though, and they're very well done.  I look forward to watching more of them hopefully.

A great book by an awesome writer I am lucky enough to call a friend has released "Violet In Private" this week, #3 in a series of 3 about the life and times of Violet Greenfield - a fresh-faced 19 year-old runway model headed to Vassar College.  Those of you who know me know that I can barely read, and when I do read it's usually about fun things like the technicalities of disease and pestilence, but I really enjoyed reading these books.  So, if you haven't read "Violet On The Runway" or "Violet By Design" you should click on the box below or to the left and order those from Amazon.com (or any other bookstore, Melissa just gets some sort of credit with Amazon if you click though the box) and pick them up.  They probably won't change your life dramatically, but they will make your day a little brighter... :)

I'm not too into video gaming anymore, but I do have to say that what Rockstar is doing leading up to the launch of Grand Theft Auto IV is most impressive.  I especially like the following news widget:

I just came across this article about a 72-year-old man who was arrested for possessing and transporting what appears to be a couple of hundred pounds of marijuana.  The gentleman probably would not have been caught if he hadn't popped the trunk to his car and asked the officer to assist him with removing the duffel bags the weed was in while his car was being impounded (any weed that's bunched-up into bales is also probably not of the highest quality) but no matter.  The fact that a 72-year-old guy was hauling this much weed up-and-down the eastern seaboard is just plain awesome, and anyone that doesn't think so is probably a member of Al-Qaeda.

I really should be posting more regularly about more diverse subjects than weed and how to effectively break the law, and in time I plan to, but for now - baby steps.

I just cam across this article from Slate.com (a Ben Russell favorite) that explains (or at least tries to) how the police look-up information on you.  It's pretty vague though and leaves many questions unanswered (such as: how much information is pulled-up on you when you're pulled over; what if you committed the crimes in another state; which states communicate better or worse with others, etc.) but still kind-of interesting, so I thought I'd post it.

I have been telling myself that I can't post until my thesis is finished, and although I'm breaking that rule now, once it's done I will do a better job at spewing poorly written drivel to disgust you all.

I told myself I would not give myself the pleasure of posting anything until after I was done writing my GD monkey-on-my-back Masters thesis, but like any good junkie I have broken down and gone against that to discuss Boston College football being ranked FOURTH in the AP Top 25, USA Today, and Harris Interactive polls for Division IA football.  Fucking mind-blowing, although I will say it's probably a little inflated to what it should be (even though there's no super-star teams this year like the Reggie Bush USC or the Vince Young Texas teams of the past).

Our next game is against Notre Dame, who we consider our main rival (at least we used to before we joined the ACC) but they don't.  Notre Dame considers themselves superior to BC, at which you just have to smile and let slide, because if you've ever spent any time out in South Bend, IN you'd want to hang yourself.  I think Notre Dame is a fine school academically, but it's weird out there, and boring and homey as all hell.  My grandfather went to Notre Dame and played football there so I considered it when looking at colleges, but when the tour guide explained that you stay in the same shitty dorm building for four years and was like "There's a chapel in every dorm and everyone comes together and takes some role in the masses," and that "Everyone goes to this one bar just off campus once they turn 21" I knew that there was no way I would willingly spend four years of my life there.

Anyway, some BC fans made the following video about ND which is fairly amusing:

I like the line "BC's got better Christians" followed by pictures of BC students in the Mod's shot-gunning beers. Sweet....

I just wanted to quickly post the following promotion of my friend's work:

"Internet People," the first episode of "The Meth Minute 39" which is written and produced by Dan Meth was launched on September 6 and has already received many rave reviews and accolades.  Check out Dan's website here or his blog here, as well as the video below obviously:

Violet on the Runway

I just came across the following YouTube video that apparently was created by a recent alum on this Boston College blog and thought it was very fitting, with the drunken Irish music and the focus on the best football team ever - the BC Eagles:

I recognize that it's twisted that this story about Katie Couric traveling to Iraq and Syria to report made me smile, but it did. I can just see stodgy, old white TV executives for CBS sitting around the boardroom table weighing options: "We've taken a number of different angles with her as the anchor of the Evening News and the ratings still in the toilet, and her contract's air-tight so even if we replaced her we'd still have to pay her un-Godly sums of money.  The only option is to try something radical: How about we send her to Iraq? And not one of these deals like the other networks have pulled where they secretly send someone to Iraq and film them and then they come back and report on all that they have seen.  No no, we send her to Iraq and do a media push about it leading up - that way Susie homemaker from bumble-fuck Iowa can write in to the network and ask questions and tell Katie what to do over there and she does it from fucking Iraq! Either ratings go up or she gets blown up by insurgents and therefore breaks her contract - or both. Total win-win."  And then the other people at the table grumble a little bit "Yeah, yeah, not a bad idea. Good thinkin'" and the proposal passes by unanimous vote.

I'd hate to be the asshole who had to tell her she was going to Iraq though. He probably needed body armor. "Hi, Ms. Couric. Boy you look really nice today. Sorry to disturb you but I have a quick message from the guys upstairs...."

I week or so ago I received the following in a fortune cookie:

Worst Fortune Ever