Ads I Enjoy, and Then Those Other Ones

I have chuckled at Allstate's new television commercials once or twice over the past few weeks. I fully appreciate the character "Mayhem" representing all the things that have, can, or will eventually happen to our automobiles. They're clever, recognizable, a little outrageous and definitely good for a laugh



Then there's T-Mobiles newest ad campaign... It's horrible. We all know and recognize Apple's TV ads, where the young guy represents Apple and the old balding guy in the business suit represents PC. They were great! They were funny. People recognized the campaign and they were very immediately catchy. Recently, T-Mobile spoofed, copied, reinterpreted (take your pick,) the famous Apple ads to, short of ironically, position themselves against the iPhone. While they are clearly playing on the old Apple commercials, they are not doing it very well, and it points out a lack of originality in the company. Their ads say "copycat," and I'll stop myself before I give my opinion on the product

Hello, world! Longtime no babble. I've been telling myself lately that I need to "make a blog" if that tells you anything about the strength of my cerebrum. I had to double check to see if this site in fact belonged to me, well, eighteen-year-old me, who wrote the previous posts. Fortunately (and unfortunately considering the grammatical whatnots I've learned since my earlier years), it was me and I already set up camp. Note to self: look for memory enhancing vitamins. Or write things down. The latter will not happen so vitamins might be my only hope. I will, however, need to write down what I need for when I go to the nearest Vitaminworld, or undoubtably forget what I went there for.

On that note, who wants to hear about my morning? Oh, you do? Great. Well, I spent the night at my boyfriend's house. We had a nice, mellow night. He made me dinner (salmon skewers, yummy to my tummy) and we just hung out. Watched a few episodes of Dog The Bounty Hunter because we're really cool. Minor details. So, I left after he did this morning because I'm a lazy ass and it was my day off and I wanted to sleep in. I skuddled down the stairs around 9 and awkwardly shimmy-shimmy-shook under the garage door while it was doing its best to squish me. What did I forget inside? Oh, just my car keys. So I'm locked outside of the house and outside of my car. Stuck between a four bedroom house and a crappy red Oldsmobile, if I may. So I lay there, waiting for someone to assist my dumb ass. An hour and a half later keys arrived. Sometimes I wonder if I will forget to breathe if I don't think about it hard enough. Again, must get memory vitamins!

Other than that it was a nice summer day. Sunny and hot in Portland (finally!) It has been the crappiest spring. In fact, there was no spring. My boat of an Oldsmobile, mentioned earlier, has no A.C. which is proving to be quite the bitch. I've been driving that thing to a pulp lately. Eugene, Portland, back to Eugene, back to Portland, Welches, Oregon City. All in, oh, three days. Sorry, car. My sumer will consist of lots of mileage. I'm baristaing in Eugene and interning (intern shipping, intern sailing, intern voyaging?) in Portland for Betty Rides, the original independent snowboarding outerwear company targeted entirely towards women. Loving it so far! Everyone is really nice and I'm eager to learn more about the company, the industry and marketing and advertising endeavours.

So that is where I am in my little life. I'd like to tell you everything that has happened since my last post but my cerebrum won't let me and this Lifetime movie is getting really juicy. As I watch this so clearly made for T.V. movie, my step dad says "Eat shit, Buckwheat. See ya later" at the bad guy that got whacked by the distressed damsel wielding a shovel. What a proper way to sign off.

Goodnight, Buckwheats.

Last dance with Werner's Blog...

WE'RE DONE! Hooray! Three cheers, err... maybe 1 cheer for 1 term down and 2 to go! waahoo!

Overall I can say that I have enjoyed this blogging phenomena that I have been introduced to and gotten to know these past few weeks. It got me thinking more about the things I was seeing and hearing in the world of media and beyond. Because of the possibility of blogging, I better articulated my thoughts about some ideas of politics and other topics. When I saw something of interest that may have been "bloggable" I thought more about it...
What do I think about this?
Do I agree or disagree with it?
What can I say about this that relates to this class or my life?
What might others think about this?

I cannot say whether or not I will blog in the future. I am glad that I now have the knowledge and understanding of blogging but I cannot say that I have the time. Maybe twitter would be a little better fit for me. But in the end I could go without any more distractions, really. But who knows, maybe I will become an avid blogger, create a youtube account and upload videos about my insights all day, gain hundreds of followers and end up on Jay Leno!
...doubt it BUT atleast it is now a possibility!

So to you all,
May your life be like toilet paper, long and useful.
And if blogging is not our destiny, may our soul purpose in life be simply to serve as a warning to others.

Goodnight from Washington.

social networking: for the record

I have been thinking a lot about what we talked about in class about social networking, Twitter and blogging. I thought about how social networking has affected my life and my social circle. I am starting to notice that social networking has become a big part of my everyday, whether I am entirely conscious of it or not.
Over the weekend I went home to spend the holiday with my family. I spent a lot of time with my sister who is a year older than me and basically my other half. We are interested in all the same things and have a lot of the same friends. A few times I noticed that my sister and I wound up sitting next to each other, communicating through facebook. We would be looking at the same pictures, joking or commenting on our friends posts or statuses. My mom even peeked her head in the room a few times and said something along the lines of "you two and your laptops!" or "what can you two possibly be doing on the internet for this long?" We had no real answer, just... looking I guess. Killing time, maybe. Either way, its times like these where I realize that social networking takes up a lot of my time, but is helpful in connecting me to my friends and family near and far.
Another thing that I took into consideration and thought more in depth about was the major hype surrounding Britney Spears' debuting documentary this evening, "Britney: for the record". I have been hearing about it on television, over the internet and from my friends for a few weeks now. It was a pretty big deal that she would put her career and personal life on the line to inform the public about her recent endeavours. While watching the hour long documentary I was texting and talking to my friends about the show and that made me wonder what others were doing to communicate to fellow viewers. I hopped online and found multiple blog sites about things that were happening on the show at that exact moment. I clicked around and found more conversations than I could count from people chatting about the documentary. This is nothing that I would have done before I was aware of just how widespread blogging has become. While I chose not to throw out any of my own advice, I spent a few minutes reading the thoughts of others.
We are constantly connected with each other, whether it be through social networking or otherwise. We have all just become so used to it that we don't really take the time to notice just how constantly connected we all are.

Calling all snowkids!

This is Travis Rice's most recent and EPIC snowboard video. That's It That's All (featuring T Rice, Nicolas Muller, Terje Hakonsen, Jeremy Jones and others) is currently making its way to the top of the charts in this year's snowboard scene and many are saying that it could be the best snowboarding video of all time! In this snowboarding masterpiece, co-produced by Curt Morgan and T Rice, the boarders take to the mountains of New Zealand, B.C, Tokyo, Munich and Jackson Hole. Whispers of the budget for this film range anywhere from 1.5 and 2 million!

Some friends from the snowboarding team here at UO and I got in on a trip to Portland for the premier a few weeks ago. We piled on a short bus and headed to P-town for the evening to meet our friends and hundreds of other snow dudes n' bunnies to view the video for the first time surrounded by others that are as passionate as we all are about the sport. Half the fun of the experience was the setting. This video brought together a community of people. The event was more than just watching the video, it was coming together as a people with a common interest. We all had a blast and a few of us even got to talk to Travis after the show. It was awesome to hear him talk about the video and answer questions from the audience. A few other riders from the video were there as well. After the show we hopped back on the bus and headed back to Eugene.

This past week was the That's it That's All premier for the UO campus. It was talked about and buzzed around campus and the snowboarding community for a few weeks leading up to the event. It brought together all the kids on campus that are interested in and involved in the snowboarding scene here. For a few hours ,the students and non-students of Eugene could get together and share their passion with others interested in similar things. Before the show where was a raffle, giveaways, challenges and merchandise giveaways. Admission was charged and a part of the proceeds went to the UO snowboarding team.

Events like these are great for building community! They give people a chance to get together and have some fun while surrounded by friends. Money was raised and a good time was had by all!

* check out the whole video! It'll BLOW YOU AWAY!

The other 3 little words...

"We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But In the unlikely story that is America, there has been nothing been anything false about hope."

Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs

CoOoOolest book everrr!

I started reading this book last week and I'm really enjoying it. The summary on the back of the book totally sold me. "Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs is ostensibly about art, entertainment, infotainment, sports, politics, and kittens, but - really - it's about us."

It brings a lot of issues about the modern media into a new light. The things that are happening in the here and now that we haven't yet realized perhaps. Klosterman uses a conversational style of diction almost, and after a while he starts to sound more like he is holding a conversation with the reader rather than writing a book. Definitely a "different" type of read but very enjoyable and absolutely interesting!

Ch-ch-check it out. It will entice you.