Never Underestimate Radical Vision

“Fascinating. Semmi, look at this. America is great indeed. Imagine a country so free, you can throw out broken glass on the streets.”

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I have a dream! I have a dream that one day I will be able to hop in my car in the morning and go for a little drive. And in this dream this drive would take me to the land of milk, honey and espresso, the land of Starbucks. I would stroll up to the counter and order myself a Venti Caramel Mochaccino. I would be satisfied in my purchase. I would feel whole. The reason this is a dream is because….

….I LIVE IN THE CESSPOOL OF AMERICA!

I have to live in the only area with a population of over 100,00 people in a 20 mile radius that does not have a Starbucks! ( Note: if this is not true don’t let me know, just bite me ) Oh don’t you worry, we can have a billion Walmart stores each one block apart, we can have Billy Bob’s deep-fried pork fat, we can have every fast food joint in existence, but no Starbucks. I mean sure, I understand. They are just so rare. I mean they are not national or anything. Lord knows the Midwest doesn’t need another vice to add to the list that includes tobacco spit swallowing and incest. Just give me my Starbucks!

I am not even asking for a place that distributes high quality coffee. I would just take a simple Starbucks that servers up its average brew daily. Instead I have to travel 45 minutesfor the opportunity to purchase a Fudge Brownie Frappuccino and eat at Chili’s. Why do I subject myself to such torture? We aren’t even talking fine dining here.

I have anidea why we don’t have this glorious establishment. I think it is because they could not sell enough of their high priced, black gold to survive. I mean Joe Redneck is going to spend all his extra money on lottery tickets, the complete baseball card set of Nascar and Flat Tire beer. He does not have the extra green to buy cappuccino when he has got to budget in those weekly mullet trimmings, the inevitable trips to the dentist from performing too many backyard wrestling moves and the razor setthat will be used to shave the perfect 3 in his back hair in memory of the the late, great Dale Earnhardt. Let’s not forget the duds he will have to purchase, Big Smith overalls, a flannel shirt and John Deere baseball cap, so he can take his second cousin on a romantic date to Denny’s. What is left over is going to have to go for condoms so he can make sweet, passionate love to his cousin in front ofthe roaring light of a bug zapper, listening to Billy Ray Cyrus and drinking box wine. No time or money for a good cup of coffee there.

Man this place sucks. I am going to go shoot myself now.

“We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact.”

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 So as my infatuation with Elisha Cuthbert dies away, I ask myself the question: “What did I find so attractive about her?”  I don’t think my infatuation was toward Elisha so much as it was toward the character of Danielle.  There is no doubt that Elisha is a beautiful woman, but most actors/actresses are physically beautiful people.  There was just something about that character.  What was it?  I searched myself and found a couple answers.

I believe what so drew me was the way the character subtly seduced the man.  No so much in a sexual way but more in a flirting, playful way.  The kicker is the way her character did it with her eyes.  I figured out that I absolutely love that.  I am so attracted to that type of playful flirting.  I realized this was the same type of behavior that I was so infatuated with Kate Winslet’s character in Titanic.  Again a lot of the flirting came with the eyes.  Both woman are beautiful but I see beautiful people everyday of my life.  We see them on the big screen and on TV all the time.  We recognize the fact that they are beautiful but infatuation doesn’t necessarily follow.

So I ask, besides physical beauty what type of things attract you to the opposite sex?  What type of things attracted you to your current wife/husband, girlfriend/boyfriend or in the person you are looking to date?

My wife’s eyes so attracted me.  I guess I am an eye man.  She has the most beautiful eyes and the way she looks at me always gives me that funny feeling   She also has the most sweet spirit of anybody I have ever met.  She honestly wants to do good all the time.  She is so good for me.

Ok, now it is your turn.

“Yeah. We’re definitely outside the box now, huh? Now you gotta ask yourself, how far are you willing to go, hmm?”

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The St. Louis Cardinals are going to the World Series!!! In a great display of small ball the Cardinals finally got to Roger Clemens to win the ball game 5-2. I have to tip my hat to Roger Cedeno for causing so much havoc on the base paths that it took The Rocket out of his game. Albert Pujols won NLCS MVP and well deserved batting .500 with 4 homers and 9 RBIs. More than that is the humbleness he displayed in accepting the award. Go Cardinals!

Note to Dave: Which team are you going to rout for?

Note to Kent: Now that is how a team finishes off a series.

Note to everybody else: Baseball kicks butt!

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Have mentioned recently that Elisha Cutherbert is perfect angel of delight? Have I mentioned that she has the most intoxicating eyes? Have I mentioned that you need to pick up The Girl Next Door and watch it? I have, ohhh, sorry, my bad

“Frank, this is a safe place. A place where we can feel free sharing our feelings. Think of my office as a nest in a tree of trust and understanding. We can say anything here.”

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Both David and Kent commented on what has to be the biggest, most spectacular sporting event in recent history and maybe ever.  For those who live under a rock, the Boston Red Sox pulled off the impossible by coming back from and 3-0 deficit to take the pennant away from the New York Yankees.  It was simply amazing!  The whole playoff series was great.  David Ortiz, Johnny Damon, Curt Schilling, Orlando Cabrera and company put their heart, soul and everything on the line to win this thing and it is a credit to their character.

I am a die hard St. Louis Cardinals fan.  I would love to see Boston and St. Louis in the World Series.  While Boston is my second favorite team, I would not be too hurt if they were to beat my beloved Cardinals.  It would be priceless to see that series come down to a game 7.  Yet, first things first, the Cardinals have to win tonight.  I think the Red Sox have to win the series to break the curse, but this playoff win is almost as sweet.  It would be an amazing series.  (Have I said amazing enough yet?)

This series was one for the ages.  This series taught us to never give up.  Never take anything for face value.  Always try, push and give everything you have and you can do the impossible.  It is amazing that sports can constantly remind us mere mortals to keep plugging away at this life and live something truly spectacular.  I thank the Red Sox for giving me the dream, for giving me an example I can give to my son.  I believe now; I have seen it with my eyes. 

You may not be into baseball or sports in general, but this series was worth the watch.  You got to truly see David defeat the giant.  You got to see the good guy finally win.  You got to see the geek finally land the hot chick.  You got to see history.

History was made, I witnessed it and I will forever be changed because of it.  The question is now posed:

Why not me?

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Have mentioned recently that Elisha Cutherbert is perfect angel of delight? Have I mentioned that she has the most intoxicating eyes? Have I mentioned that you need to pick up The Girl Next Door and watch it? I have, ohhh, sorry, my bad

“You wanna be president? Lemme tell you the first rule of politics; Always know
if the juice is worth the squeeze. You know what that means? It means you don’t steal
my girl unless you’re ready to accept the consequences.”
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I often wonder what I consider the perfect album to be. I love music. I
love music of all genres, some more than others. I buy music off of iTunes and
buy cds all the time.  Recently I have been going through my collection and evaluating
each disk as to what I like about it. What characteristics about the album so
draw me? Is the album stock music that someone else has already done? What
message does the album try to send? What is the quality of the music on the album?

Now, obviously, this is a very subjective matter that comes down to the personality
of the listener. With that being said, so far I have found what I consider two
perfect albums. The first is David Gray’s “White Latter” and the second is Don
Chaffer’s “You Were at the Time for Love”. These albums exemplify what I feel
is a perfect album. The music on both albums has a softer, folky feel. The
lyrics are powerful and often thought provoking. The songs flow from one to another
in a perfect dance of harmonies and storytelling. I would recommend you pick
up these exquisite pieces of work and give a listen.

So the question is offered up to you, what do you consider is the perfect album and
what is an example?

I am also going to put together a little compilation to give out as gifts the holiday
season. David has done this before and I think it is a remarkable idea. You
get to see not only what other people like but also a chance to discover a new artist
that you may fall in love with. The official title will be “Hot Cup of Joe -
Volume1″. The album will be great to listen to with a good cup of coffee while
working or just chilling.  I will have another compilation that will show off
my love for harder, edger music.  I hope to complete it after the first one. Do
I have any takers? I would like to get a count so I can anticipate how many to
make. Best of all it is free! I will do the best production with the equipment
I have. The album will have the track listing, a note from yours truly and hopefully
beautiful graphics.

later
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Have mentioned recently that Elisha Cutherbert is
perfect angel of delight? Have I mentioned that she has the most intoxicating
eyes? Have I mentioned that you need to pick up The
Girl Next Door and watch it? I have, ohhh, sorry, my bad  Actually this
is just my sleazy attempt to get ranked higher on google for her name and maybe she
will stop by my little universe. It worked for the gapingvoid.

Friday night the wife and I went out for dinner at the Market Place where I had a great grilled salmon and really good coffee.  I was surprised by the quality of this coffee so much that I had to have three cups.  Not only was it a good quality bean they also brewed it correctly.  I was amazed a restaurant around here could get that right.  Anyway, as I was saying, after we ate we did a few chores and then rented a couple of movies. We each picked out a movie.  My wife pick up Chasing Liberty and I picked up The Girl Next Door.  I had seen the trailer for this movie and thought it would be a funny teen comedy like American Pie.

Let me just say that I loved this movie.  It had comedy, drama and a plot.  Most of the plot points were definitely outrageous but it made for a great escape.  The basic premise of the movie is about a high school senior, class president, Matthew, and his transformation from a geek to a stud.  He meets the girl next door Danielle, played by Elisha Cuthbert more on that later, who he quickly falls in love with.  She pushes him to break out of his box and just, “Go with it.”  When his porn addicted friend shows him a movie that the love of his life stars in, things get really interesting.  The rest of the movie is his struggle to overcome his initial anger, their breakup and his ultimate quest to win her back.  This takes him on a very interesting and funny ride in the process. There is also the transformation of Danielle from the ex-porn star to the sweet, simple girl she always wanted to be.  There are a few great sub-plots and of course the two sidekick friends that provide the comic relief.  This was a great movie.  I was entertained from beginning to end.  Nothing is new here but is basically a great copy of Risky Business, which I loved.  It brought back a lot of memories of high school.  The acting of the two main characters is superb.  They really make you believe and care about their situations and their love.  Go by and pick it up.

On a side note, the movie features one of the most beautiful women I have ever laid my eyes upon, Elisha Cuthbert.  She is just a perfect angel of delight.  Her eyes so captivate you that you would go through everything Matthew does just to be with her.  I better stop there before I get in trouble with the wife Watch the movie and disagree with me if you can.  If you don’t believe me just take a sample look:

Let me tell you, The juice is definitely worth the squeeze! Watch the move and tell me what you think of it.  It does get a little raunchy so watch it with people you don’t worry about offending

“According to the latest report from Juniper Research, Java-enabled downloads will generate over $4.8 billion in mobile revenues by 2009, and mobile games will account for the vast majority of the revenues.“

http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=136&thread=75123

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I am debating whether to spend time developing a J2ME, Java2 Micro Edition, ame for a cell phone. I was either thinking of developing a action/adventure game or a great card game, like Texas Hold’em. The Texas Hold’em game would be very involved and you would have to work your way up to the no limit, championship tables, etc. 

What I want to know is:

• Would you play a game on your cell phone if it was done really well?
• What genre of game would you be most likely to play on your cell phone?
• How much would you pay for unlimited play or a monthly subscription?
• Would you be willing to use your minutes to play online with real people?
• In the case of a card game, would you be willing to use minutes playing real people risking real money via a credit card?
• In the case of an RPG, would you be more likely to use minutes to lay online if there were also a desktop version that could be used to advance your character?

If this industry is going to be that big, I want in. It is small now and the perfect time to invest some resources toward that direction. Ringtones for the cell phone is a 2 billion dollars industry already! There is money to be made there.

P.S. For the technical types out there, would you invest your learning resources in Java/J2ME or BREW? 

On this day of the year 2001 my son, Isaac Ryan Chase, was born at Freeman Hospital.  That day was filled with joy and expectation.  That feeling is still here as we mold and form him into the man he is to be.  I absolutely love being a father and would not trade it for anything.  I have learned so much about patients, love, teaching, etc. 

With that said, even though he won’t see it, Happy Birthday Isaac!  I love you more than you will ever know!

After reading a eye-opening article in ComputerWorld today I came to the realization that I may need look into a slight career change.  I started asking the questions:

• Can I compete anymore? 
• Can I provide enough value on my own training dollars? 
• Can I keep up fast enough?

The article in question was discussing a new business model an ex-CIO was starting to push.  The term she was propagating was “farmsourcing”.  The theory was that she could starting a contract programming firm in Arkansas where the cost of living is extremely low.  By doing this she could compete against the Indian, Russian and Chinese outsourcing shops.  While the contract rate would be a little higher it would even out with the extra communication costs needed to ship code overseas.  If this endeavor takes off you will soon get a battle between the farmsourcers and the outsourcers.  Each while try to one up one another till they truly make a buyers market.  While this may be great for companies, it sucks for us developers.  Even though I live in a low cost of living area, it will be increasing hard to compete with these farmsourcers for quality.  There companies will spend the training dollars making their people the best they can be to pump out high quality code.  That will be there greatest value prop which I can not match on my current low salary.  There is no way in the world a company will spend dollars training me when they can go to a farmsourcing outfit.  That leaves me spending my own income on training which reduces how much a take in.

This is just SUCKS!  I can either get into management, get more face time with users and customer thus making me harder to farmsource or I can go into a new profession.  In five years gone will be they days you could truly be tech and that is sad.  It may be better for the business industry but sucks for tech.  Some tech people are just not business people.  They do not want to be.  hey love tech for the joy of tech alone.  They could care less about dollars and cents.  They are cut from a different cloth and have a different discipline.  Why should they be force molded into business people, don’t we have enough of those?

I love technology.  I have a passion for doing cool things with code.  I love learning new technologies and applying them to solve problems.  It is just too bad nobody will pay me to do it.  I would rather not work for a coding sweatshop that constantly tries selling by being the lowest bidder.  How will I ever make a decent wage in that scenario?  I might as well work for McDonald’s.

I have seriously be considering getting my MBA, since I already have a business degree and may be forced to move to management to keep a job.  Then try to become a tech professor at a local college while I get my doctorate.  This way I could still live tech with the added bonus of teaching it.  Who else to you think are going to fill those sweatshops?  None other than the students I would be teaching needed to break into the industry.  If I can not beat it, I might as well try to give it the best minds that I can.  That way tech can get better and better.

My name is Travis Chase and I love technology.

Now this is engineering at its finest. Move over coffee.