I understand that Tom Cruise used to be quite the heart-throb. Then he’d turned into some android Scientology freak. I also understand that doesn’t have anything to do with it because I’d  hammer Megan Fox like a 10 penny nail but I cringe every time I hear her give an interview. That said I don’t think this is the look I’d go with.

Larry Thursby, who is apparently Nationwide’s vice president of Personal Auto,  is an asshole. During one of their radio commercials, he’s talking about accident forgiveness and specifically teenagers when he says it’s not a question of if but when they get in an accident (paraphrased because I couldn’t find the commercial online anywhere). This is how insurance people think. I, for one, was never in an accident as a teenager. My brother was never in an accident as a teenager.

As far as he’s concerned rampaging teenagers are out there running around crashing into things and fucking up his bonuses. But they’re such great people that they’re willing to let the first one go. That’s how Nationwide is on your side.

I don’t think I’ll be giving them any of my money.

This is maybe the coolest thing ever (probably not more than the second coolest though). It’s a polar exploration exploration lab designed by Matthiew Tarrit. It’s currently only a concept which means, like all extra-cool things, that it’s unlikely to ever see production but he gets props anyway.

Core 77 via Gizmodo

I hadn’t been to The Brewery in what seems like forever. Last night they had 8 bands playing so, finding myself with nothing better to do, I bopped on down.

The first band that came on after I got there was Though He Slay Me. They were pretty tight but lost points on the non-metal looking front. I know, I know, the music doesn’t really have anything to do with the look but is it reaqlly that hard to change out of your street clothes?

The next band up was one I’m going to call The Band After Though He Slay Me because they never said their fucking name. Anyway, the set was tighter and they had the look down better (although its pretty hard to look like a really BAMF when you’re a 17 year old suburban white kid) but I didn’t like the music quite as much.

The next band was Steryle from Roxboro. These guys rocked. The performance was tight and the music was good. I’ definitely planning one catching these guys again.

After Steryle was on, something else came up and I left before the last bands played. Sorry. Shit happens sometime.

I have a Blackberry. I know a lot of other people who have a Blackberry. I know more people with assorted phones with qwerty keyboards on them. What this means and apparently what advertising/marketing  monkeys have failed to grasp is that a lot of us aren’t looking at standard phone dials anymore.  That means that we don’t have ABC above the number 1 and it makes it hard to decipher alphabetic phone numbers. What that also means is that when somebody asks me to dial 800-CleverNumberThatSpellsTheirName I either have to go to a site like phonespell.org or, more often than not, not call them.

When I was taking marketing classes, the object of advertising was to make people want to use your product or service. This fails in the most astounding way if you make somebody want to use your product but then make it really difficult to get to.  I can’t possibly be the first person to notice this since Blackberrys  have been required equipment for every upper level management wonk for approximately the last 10 years.

I mean, seriously, I understand that numbers are tricky for people to remember but it’s nothing like trying to remember what letters appeared above what numbers on a phone dial and decoding that in your head. I could totally buy into phone “numbers” becoming alphabetic like domain names but since telephone companies have all the innovative capacity of Neanderthals I don’t see that happening any time soon. They still seem to think area code splits are a good idea. I’m hoping Google Voice (and services like it) will change this someday.

Normally, I’m pretty libertarian in my outlook but there are a couple of areas where I think government intervention is a pretty good idea. One of them happens to be public libraries. So it was with some concern that I read that the Free Library of Philadelphia will close on October 2nd. It’s exactly the sort of brinksmanship politicians play when they want to raise taxes in the face of public opposition. Tennessee legislators did it a few years ago when voters disapproved of a bond referendum or something. So they stopped funding school transportation.  It’s one of those times you wish that people would grab their guns and descend on the state capitol for a good ole revolution.

That may be  what’s going on here. Or, if Philadelphia or PA is in such bad economic shape that they really can’t afford to keep the libraries open,  I hope the voters of Pennsylvania remember over the course of the next several elections who put them in this situation.

Mostly it reminds me of why politicians can’t be trusted.

[Free Library of Philadelphia via Boing Boing]

Why is it, in English, we say a store is either open or closed? Shouldn’t it be open/close or opened/closed? I’m sure it’s the French’s fault somehow. English was pretty straight forward until they started fucking with it.

So yesterday I wrote about cops speeding without their lights & sirens on and what do you think I saw today? Just to prove I’m right some State Trooper sgt in an unmarked car with license plate SHP-142 blew past me doing at least 70 in a 55 at 4:00 this afternoon on US-421S right by the Old Liberty Rd. Exit. So there.

Lately I’ve noticed a lot of cops driving in ways that are not exactly legal without having their lights on. I was under the impression that when they were exceeding the speed limit by, say, 20 mph they were supposed to be running with their lights on. But maybe that doesn’t apply when they’re racing to get to Krispy Kreme for a fresh batch of donuts.  Of course, since we all know that they’re superior drivers to the rest of us mere mortals maybe that makes it ok. I mean,seriously, isn’t it about time we stopped letting them get away with whatever the hell they want to do because they have “dangerous jobs”. Fuck, I have a dangerous job too. I’ve always kind of felt that cops and other officials that are in charge of the justice system who break the law should have their penalties doubled. What that would mean is we’d have to get rid of the whole “you wash my back, I’ll wash yours”. I’m just sayin’.

[Photo by detritus]

Jalopnik has a story about a guy that did an 8 bit flame job on his Toyota Prius with colored magnet strips. The idea is so weird and geeky on so many different levels that you’ve got to love it.

Photo by saeru

[Jalopnik via Gizmodo]