Mist

“I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent.” ~ Thomas Jefferson

So I just saw The Mist, for $2.00. I had read the novella years ago. The movie did a good job at suspense, but spent too much time on the annoying religious maniac woman. There was also an excess of closeups and slow motion tracking shots. In all, however, I’d recommend it. My two main takeaways were (of course) religion is bad; and don’t shoot your children. Both of which I’m pretty sure I already knew, but it was a fun way to spend a dollar an hour.

 ”Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because if there be one he must approve of the homage of reason more than that of blindfolded fear.” ~ …yep, Thomas Jefferson again

Mind

In a development that should surprise no one but make everyone feel at least slightly uneasy, AdWeek reports marketers are devising ever more subtle ways to intrude upon your mind and body to produce the wallet-opening response they crave. Now: increasingly accurate use of EEGs and biometric data to fine-tune ads. What to do? Shop consciously: know what you want to buy and why. The ability to do so will be rooted in your dispassionate research, your healthy sense of skepticism, and your own self-confidence. Buy what you want, when you want, and why you want to.

(Also in the current AdWeek: a stupid article called “Why Microsoft Thinks Big is Better.” Slow news week, boys? I mean, honestly.)

Surefire

But aren’t they overthinking this whole marketing thing? I mean, it’s all scientific, with charts, and data, and conferences and so on. How long before we see a black belt in Six Sigma Lean Marketing?  I’m working on a new theory that really simplifies marketing. All of it. Goes like this:

All you need to sell something is sex and puppies.

That’s it. My assertion is that, alone or in combination (…), sex and puppies reach every conceivable human demographic. There’s not really a need to make up marketing claims, which are largely lies anyway, or to devise intricate brand management strategies. Sex and puppies. That’s it. Think about it.

Oil filters? Sex.

Pajamas? Puppies.

 Xerox copiers? Sex.

Health food? Sex.

Paper towels? Puppies.

Tax preparation services? Sex, obviously.

Toyotas? Both, depending on the model.

And so on. Very easy.

Subscribe

A slow Friday at work…even for temporary me…so we resort to Advertising Age for a dose of marketing & media loathing. Let’s watch!

Outside Magazine, up the road a bit in Fanta Se, announces they’re doing away with those intensely annoying subscription inserts. Yay! When was the last time you used one to subscribe to a periodical? Yet when was the last time you mentally groaned when one (or many) fluttered onto the ground from a magazine you were perusing…?

Their most e-mailed article of the day includes a poorly-thought-out, and just plain weird, graphic on What Women Want (online). Roll over her thigh: it’s about pay for play gaming. Her upper arm: frequent shopping. Huh? Her left elbow: parenting. The inside of her right kneecap: healthy living. What the hell were they thinking? I’ll tell you what they were thinking: Uh, we got all this data and we can’t really put it in pie charts. Well, get a picture of a hot chick in a black T-shirt! Yeah but how do we match up this data to her? Dude–it doesn’t matter. Everyone will click on her body parts to find out what they say.

They also have an AdAgeChina. (Who knew?) Their headline piece is about Disney using Mickey to tie in to the Year of the Rat for its China campaigns. I thought he was a mouse, but whatever. Right next to it is an opinion piece noting the scarcity of rats in advertising this year because they’re just not CUTE like other Chinese zodiac animals. Yours truly is quite confident there’s no more alluring Chinese zodiac animal than the Horse; and not just because I am one. They’re just cuter than rats. And Mickey. And…snakes and roosters and boars and whatnot.

Nothingness

There is no magical power outside yourself.

There is no such thing as luck–only random events–and only children believe in fairies and angels.

When you die, you end. That’s it. Nothing more. Full stop!

You are not part of some larger consciousness. There is no such thing.

In the absence of luck, put your trust in your skills and your preparation! If this seems unattainable, then work on your skills and work on being more prepared. You’ll gain the satisfaction of improving yourself–not relying on some outside force to do your work for you.

Your strength comes from you. From you! From your own mind. From the power of your belief in yourself and the help you reach out for among your friends and loved ones.

Be confident! When thinking about the nothingness at the end of all living things, draw strength and focus from the moment, from the now, from the people and things around you.

You are here. You know that. You are here, now. Alive.

Traffic

As a dedicated motorcycle rider, I have to be at the top of my game every time I get on the bike. (Which is in Connecticut right now. But I digress.) That’s one of the things I enjoy most about it: the total awareness and concentration. Riding I-95 into New York City? A wonderful experience. You’re alive, you’re totally in the moment, because if you’re not, someone will finally succeed in injuring or killing you.

A local radio station is on a crusade against the red light cameras that have been installed at some of Albuquerque’s intersections. The station plays funny fake ads and has made it a cause celebre on their website. Their main objection, as far as I can tell, is the distribution of revenues from fines. All well and good, everyone gets an opinion.

Enough people are trying to kill me on the streets, through ignorance, negligence, or just plain malice, that I’m perfectly happy to see people who run red lights heavily fined. I don’t run red lights. I fear people who do. One of them may cost me a limb or my life one day. I don’t really care what happens to the revenue from camera tickets, as long as the fines are steep enough to deter even one person from blasting through that light. It’s like drunk driving. I detest drunk drivers in part because I fear them.

I also support your right not to wear a motorcycle helmet, by the way. If you’re that stupid, I just don’t want you in the gene pool; my daughters may someday want to have children themselves, and I’d prefer it if you were out of the running. But brain-injured riders increase insurance premiums for the rest of us! you say. I say–a few pennies per day is a small price to pay to help winnow the gene pool. More cost effective than bullets or tobacco.

Love

Valentine’s Day: when the marketing infrastructure swings to crimson-hued plush and continues reminding you that genuine emotion is best expressed through your wallet. This time around, it’s “traditional” to put your purchasing power to use by sending your loved one(s) severed sexual organs so she (or he) can watch them slowly wither away.

When you think about it, the symbolism of all this awfully ghastly. There are other ways to express affection; declare intentions; reaffirm bonds; demonstrate passion.

Science!

In the name of Science, on Sunday kid #1 and I tested six popular, salty, crispy snack foods in order to determine which make the best material for lighting fires. We approached our experiment with a few hypotheses, and were surprised by some of our results.

EDIT: Click on any picture for a larger version. 

Four of the snacks we used came in 1 oz (28.3 grams) packages. The Smartfood popcorn and Fried Pork Rinds came in larger bags; we approximated serving size by transferring small portions into emptied snack bags. We used the nutritional information provided to collect information about calories per portion.

WARNINGS: Do not attempt to set these snacks on fire unless you are in a reasonably safe, well ventilated environment and have responsible, sober adult supervision. ALSO: No one should actually eat these snack ‘foods’ unless you wish to become bloated and unhealthy.

Conditions: sunny, dry, light breeze, temperature about 50 degrees Fahrenheit.

Test equipment:
1 foil pan
2 small boxes kitchen matches
1 digital wristwatch (more on this later)
1 digital camera
1 notebook
1 pen
(1 cell phone)

Test subjects:
Lays Classic Chips (2 x 1 ounce bags)
Doritos (2 bags)
Fritos (2 bags)
Cheetos (2 bags)
Smartfood popcorn (1 large bag)
Fried Pork Rinds (brand unknown, purchased at Smith’s, large bag)

Method:

One serving of each snack “food” was placed into the foil pan. We then attempted to ignite it.

We took the following measurements:
Time required to ignite
Where applicable, number of tries it took to ignite
Length of time for the entire serving to burn (defined as, serving appears completely consumed and no flames are visible)

We also took the following qualitative notes:
Intensity of flames
Quality of smoke
Miscellaneous notes

We tested each snack twice.

In those cases where the materials failed to ignite. we made sure there was no flame and then dumped the waste. In cases where the materials ignited, we buried the waste in sand.

After about seven years of use, my digital watch’s battery expired just as we were preparing the first run. Luckily, my cell phone turned out to have a Stopwatch function. When did they put that on there? I never remembered seeing it before. It proved invaluable, but that doesn’t reduce my unease at Sprint putting stuff on my cell phone without my knowing it.

Results:

Most snack ‘foods’ did ignite, did burn, and emitted awful-smelling smoke as well as a revolting brownish-black grease. We had a few surprises, and are able to make some firm recommendations for specific firestarting needs.

1. Always prefer popcorn! The Smartfood was the runaway winner. It ignited the fastest–an average of 6.5 seconds–and burned intensely, though not for very long.

2. Pork rinds: mega-disappointment! Your hardy investigators both felt these would burn the best. We couldn’t have been more wrong! They completely failed to ignite on both runs. Pork rinds are stupid.

3. Doritos came in second in terms of being a useful firestarter. They lit in an average of 8 seconds and burned for at least 7 minutes, accompanied by a loud hissing noise and volumes of thick, putrid smoke. Their shape proved very conducive to building nice little flammable piles.

4. Lay’s potato chips, while not as outright bad as pork rinds, are also much more flame-retardant than we expected. They did light, but never held a flame and always self-extinguished in under 3 seconds. Lay’s are useless as a firestarter.

5. Fritos and Cheetos both lit slowly (15 seconds average of Fritos, 17.5 seconds average for the Cheetos) but burned strongly and well. Their flames were tall and hot, and their smoke only somewhat putrid. If popcorn isn’t available, either would make a good choice, especially in damp conditions when your kindling might need longer to ignite. One batch of Fritos was clocked at 9:08 burn time–which we felt remarkable for one ounce of snack ‘food.’

6. I anticipated a positive correlation between the calories contained in each serving and the burn time, but the best burner (Smartfood) and the worst (pork) both had 160 calories per serving. Go figure.

Conclusions: buy Smartfood as a firestarter. Don’t eat it, obviously. Pork rinds have no reason to exist.

Ideas for further research:

The two obvious candidates for further research are: popcorn, to determine which brand will burn the best; and pork rinds, to determine if they are in fact flammable at all under normal conditions. Doritos also merit further investigation to determine if there is a difference between the various appalling flavors available.

Also, some pointers for your own research into the subject: if possible, burn your materials over a fine grating of some kind which will permit the disgusting oils to drain away. Next, stay out of the wind as much as you can. It’s better for the science part of it, and your clothes and hair will be MUCH much more appealing afterwards.

Finally, for heaven’s sake, don’t eat your leftover materials, or feed them to any pets you love! Instead, burn them all.

Can’t

I had the craziest dream last night.

Those who know me know that I both dread and yearn for the zombie apocalypse. But I haven’t even thought about zombies (consciously, anyway) for weeks, I reckon. In my dream, I was at home in a house playing a first-person zombie shooter game on my Mac. The first level of the game took place in my house, the second in the yard, the third in the neighborhood, and so on up until you had to escape the city.

I don’t have a house, of course. But in my dream I did. It was all dark, no lights working. The dream was excruciatingly violent, featuring lots of biting, clawing, clubbing and shooting. And I wasn’t very good at the game. At some point the experience left the screen and became real, but I was still having trouble with the controls. I just wasn’t good enough at it to be having a good time. Finally, after being repeatedly jumped out at and chewed on, I said “Screw this” and pressed CMD-Q to end the game.

Didn’t work.

They kept coming. I was in the yard by now (it was night) and even though it was supposed to be my own house, I didn’t recognize the yard very well, or the car in the driveway. I was searching on the Mac for the key combination that would end the game, but as I kept shooting and bludgeoning zombies in real life, it was becoming clear that the only way the game was going to end was by standing there and letting them kill and eat you. Well, that wasn’t going to happen.

I wasn’t scared at all. I was really pissed off. Stupid game design! What kind of crappy game won’t let you quit out of it?! Stupid zombies! Christ! I went on, getting more and more irritated, running through the city streets, buildings now, zombies always lurking around. Goddammit!

I came to the scariest and hardest level yet–a city hospital. No power, nighttime, zombies…intensely spooky! But I was still ticked because of the game. Goddammit…stupid game….can’t quit when you want…Escaping the hospital from an upper-story window, I was carrying this little kid…Don’t ask me where he came from; he just suddenly sort of appeared as part of the mission. To complete the escape I had to descend these stacks of steel shipping containers, jumping down, up, across, while holding the kid, and avoiding zombies. Finally I got down from the last one.

I looked around and realized I had just won the game. Then I woke up, feeling well rested.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

After this weekend: the science of flammable snacks. And, for an Outward first…with photos.

EDIT: Not just Fritos. On the list: Doritos, Cheez-Its, Fritos, Cheetos, popcorn (brand TBD), potato chips (brand TBD) annnnnd…pork rinds (brand, of course, TBD). Daughter #1 and I will be scientifically evaluating which makes the best firestarter. (With photos.)

Photos

There’s a really cool photo essay on Mother Jones about shopping in America. You’ll get more than one wry smile, at least, out of it. Check it out here.

“I’m all lost in the supermarket
I can no longer shop happily
I came in here for the special offer
A guaranteed personality…” ~~ The Clash