COMMERCIAL TUNES

Hey, you ever watch commercials? Yeah, I try to avoid them too. Sometimes the commercials are entertaining. Sometimes the music in them are the most memorable things about them.

Two commercials have been driving me crazy with their music. The first is this Lexus commercial. The commercial itself is pretty standard for a car commercial but the music kinda catchy. Some people over at Adtunes discovered the music was made exclusively for the commercial, so you can’t download buy it. The best someone did was make the commercial available on-line. You can see and hear it here (.mpg).

The second ad is this kick-ass PSP commercial that they show before the movie starts in Silvercity theatres. For years, hardware and software developers having been trying their best to expand gaming beyond the hardcore geek consumer. This commercial tries to bridge the gap. It shows the PSP spinning around and emphasizes that you can watch movies, listen to music, view photos, surf the Internet as well as play games. It’s high on style and I can see it appealing to people who aren’t traditional gamers. The music in it is pretty cool as well. The song is Comforting Sounds from a group named Mew. The commercial takes a small sample of the song from around 3:33 to about a minute later. Unfortunately, the commercial is not available for download (that I can find). The only thing I can offer is the song itself which can be heard here (Windows Media Player required).

I hope I win the PSP at the company holiday raffle!

MAKE A RUN FOR IT

Hey, did you know that I was suffering from food poisoning on Friday? Yep, it was fun times I tell ya. This is exactly the type of stuff you come to this blog to read up on.

It started even before I got up on Friday morning, when there were rumblings “down there”. I ignored them at first but when I arose and my feet hit the empty cans of Coors around my bed, I knew something was amiss. I quickly made my way to the bathroom where unspeakable things transpired.

Actually, at this point I didn’t think it was food poisoning. I felt much better afterwards and went about my business of getting ready for the long ride in from the boonies. I’m not sure how it happened but I survived the whole trip to the office without incident. There was one point, however, on the bus where I felt a slight twinge but it soon passed.

No sooner had I logged on to my computer that things began to take a turn south. I began to feel extremely uneasy. Minutes later, I knew I had to take care of more business. I headed to “Vader’s personal chamber” or also known as my private bathroom located in my office building. What followed was a tale of personal struggle, fit for a made-for-TV movie. After I was done, I could not help but walk unevenly back to my cubicle. I felt weak and this is no lie, I was actually dizzy. It was at this point I realized this was most likely food poisoning.

The possible culprits at this point numbered two. The first was a grilled cheese sandwich I made the evening before. The other was dinner which was prepared by my parents. I surmised it was something from dinner since my grilled cheese was prepared with fresh bread and cheese. Remember, it was my own mother that caused the worst case of food poisoning I’ve ever had just over a year ago.

Weakened, I returned to my desk to slowly sip hot water. I managed to get through the morning but lunch was another trial. We had a going-away lunch for a co-worker which thankfully was right next door at Accents. Everyone had appetizers and a main course. After eating my delicious bliny crepes, I was feeling ok but then that all changed. Oh boy, were there some rumblings going on. It was really touch and go for a bit but it subsided and I was alright to eat the main course of pan-seared scallops with a wonderful seafood risotto.

Not ten minutes after returning from lunch, I realized things weren’t alright after all and it was off to the races again. I stumbled back to my desk and it was at this point I began thinking I might need to go home early. I stopped drinking and eating after this and just tried to concentrate on my work.

I got the ok to leave early but I had to be sure I was going to be able to make it through the 1.5 hour transit time back to the boonies. I stayed until 5:30pm before “emptying out the tank” one last time and I made a dash for transit.

Luckily, the journey home was uneventful. When I arrived home I began to feel hungry, which I took to be a good sign. I should have just eaten soup and crackers but I’m not that smart so I ordered chicken wings and a garden salad. They were damn good.

I suffered no ill effects from dinner and other than enough gas to fill the Hindenburg, I was alright for the rest of the evening. I’ve been more or less good since then. What a day though.

Keep it solid folks.

BEAUTY AND THE GEEK RETURNS

My favourite reality TV show of last year, Beauty and the Geek, returns for a second season on Monday, January 9, 2006.

Expanding on the six episodes from last year, the new season will have a total of eight episodes. According to ratings from the last season, Geek is the most successful reality TV show that the WB has ever had on the air.

I guess they had nothing else to do, so Richard and Lauren came back to help interview possible new beauties and geeks. You can check out amazing clips of their discoveries on the official web site. Is it just me or does Richard seem more comfortable around women now?

THIS STUFF WRITES ITSELF

Some of my long-time readers know that I sometimes get strange e-mails in my Telus account. As a consequence of signing up my parents for high-speed access, I get a Telus account. I don’t use at all but I check it once in a while to see what comes in.

The way Telus e-mail addresses work is that you can choose nearly whatever e-mail address you want. You can even change it as many times as you want. If one day you want to be crackaddict@telus.net but the next change it to muffinbaker@telus.net, that’s ok. The thing to realize is that once you give up an address, anyone can take your old one.

This is exactly what happened to me. I believe I took someone else’s old Telus e-mail address. In fact, I think two people have had mine before. I’ve gotten e-mail with confidential medical reports, real estate planning documents, and even a message from “Mom” asking why I haven’t phoned in so long.

I never respond to these messages, except in the case of the medical report and “Mom”. Those messages I deemed too personal not to inform the sender of their mistake.

In the last two days, I’ve received more personal correspondence from what appears to be some woman. Here’s the first message:

From: deleted
To: deleted
Cc:
Sent: Monday, December 05, 2005 11:16 PM
Subject: Hi to you too

Hey gorgous, I got your message. Sorry it is two days after the fact. I went
to Kelowna to see Kenna-Rae and do a bit of Christmas shopping. The shopping
didn’t go so well, I didn’t see anything that struck me as terrific and wanted to buy. Oh well I think that I will just go to vernon next weekend and poke
around there. I hope you are having a wonderful day! Talk to you soon.
P.s. I am looking forward to the Christmas party Friday!!!!!!

Ok, so nothing weird or juicy here. It’s also strange how the sender did not include a name in either the message or the e-mail header. I still think it’s legit though.

The next day, I received another message from the same person. This one is way more interesting:

From: deleted
To: deleted
Cc:
Sent: Tuesday, December 06, 2005 10:50 AM
Subject: first e mail

I am so sorry. I don’t remember when I talked to you or what I said. Please
forgive me my friend. I am so frustrated right now that I am sure I take it
out on you, because you know where you are at and what you want, and I don’t.
I wish life were simply, happily ever after and it’s not. You know how I feel about you and it makes me angry, upset and frusterated that we are just not going to happen. I guess that I am upset because I can’t have you and that I
couldn’t have brent either, although it was for an entirely different reason. it doesn’t matter I just don’t get it. I just pick unavailable partners and it leaves me feeling twice as lonely as before. Thankyou for being so loving and understanding with me. I know that I have never felt so unconditionally loved. You are such a wonderful friend and I will do my best from now on to respect our friendship and your position. I love you erwin thankyou.thankyou, thankyou for being such a comfort in my life.

Woah! Let’s highlight a few sections here: “it makes me angry, upset and frusterated that we are just not going to happen” and “I guess that I am upset because I can’t have you and that I couldn’t have brent either” and “I just pick unavailable partners and it leaves me feeling twice as lonely as before”.

Damn girl! You get a-round! Make up your mind, do ya want this Erwin guy or is it gonna be Brent? Why us? Why can’t we be with you? This girl likes unavailable men? Alarm bells are going off all over the place. This explains a lot. Brent and Erwin, you guys probably dodged a bullet here.

It’s good to know she wants to be in the “friends zone” however. Though, in this one super rare case, perhaps this might be the preferable position for Erwin. I’ll keep you posted if anything else comes down the line. Seacrest out!

RAMBLIN'

I’m gonna ramble on in this post about different things that have no connection between them. I’m really tired right now. I got the same amount of sleep I usually do last night, which is to say not enough, but I’m usually not this tired. I almost fell asleep at the restaurant at lunch today.

Hey, some more people at work found my web site on Friday. I wasn’t going to blog about work a lot anyways, but their discovery on Friday sealed the deal. Too bad for my readers, I had juicy stuff to dish… lol. Now, I’ll be limited to what I had for lunch at the office.

You’d think that being this tired would allow me to nap wonderfully on the bus this evening. Unfortunately, it was not to be. The driver dude neglected to turn the heat up, so it was more difficult to fall asleep. Then some moron in the back of the bus decided to open up the window. If that wasn’t enough, some valuable member of society was talking on his cell phone across the aisle from me. He wasn’t trying to show off or anything, he was just talking very loud. I hope for his sake, he’s actually mentally challenged because if he’s not… dude, it must suck being you.

In other news, the teaser trailer for X3 is out. After some early reports that the movie was going to be horrible, the trailer gave me a small ray of hope. Wolverine looks awesome as always. I was pleased to see Cyclops again. Beast looks kick ass. Is that really Kelsey Grammer underneath all that? Overall, it was a good trailer, gave me a semi if you don’t mind me saying.

Ok, good night.

BORAT RESPONDS

As I reported in an earlier post, the government of Kazakhstan has threatened to sue Sacha Baron Cohen over his portrayal of Borat, a bumbling, racist Kazakhstani reporter.

Long-time erwintang.com reader Sarah K has notified me that Borat has responded to the controversy. In a prepared statement, Borat claimed to have no connection with Baron Cohen and that he fully supports his government in possible legal action against the comedian. Furthermore, Borat added that after reforms in 2003, “women can now travel on inside of bus, homosexuals no longer have to wear blue hat and age of consent has been raised to eight years old”.

You can view a video of the statement on Borat’s own personal web site. Be sure to check out video clips and pictures from his travels around the world. Also included in his video library is a clip from the MTV Europe Music Awards where host Borat told the audience to “prepare for masturbations” as the Pussycat Doll were about to take the stage.

NAP TIME

I love naps. A nap is a time when you go to sleep when you’re not supposed to be sleeping, mostly in the daytime. It’s the one rare time when you listen to your fatigued body and let yourself fall asleep, no matter what time it is in the day.

I used to take a lot of naps in grad school. Even ten minutes of napping before I had to TA or go to a class made a huge difference in the day. When I started work, I thought my napping days were over. That was true for a while, but then things changed when I moved my ass out to the boonies.

Having to get up extra early to get to work means I’m pretty tired by the end of the day. Now, when I get on that 160 bus along Burrard in the evening, I’m usually exhausted. The bus is warm and it’s dark. There’s nothing for me to do but sit there. It’s a perfect recipe for falling asleep.

I usually doze after we leave the dowtown eastside. Somewhere along Hastings, Mr. Sandman visits me. I sometimes briefly awake, seeing other people get on the bus. I imagine I must look like an idiot, being half-awake. I’ve never missed my stop. Somehow, I always wake around the time the bus turns onto St. John’s from the Barnet Highway.

Since the bus ride takes about 35 minutes in total, I’m asleep for less than that. When I get off the bus, I feel much better and the cold contrast of the outdoors ensures I’m fully awake for the short walk to the front door. Napping the bus is good.

Ok, your reward for reading about how I like to sleep on the bus is this ridiculously non-user friendly web page that shows you how to make paper airplanes. Good luck trying to fold the paper while watching the animations.

ON A WINNING TEAM

Barely two months ago, I was able to divulge I was working on Shadow-Born, a game for the Nokia N-Gage system. Well, hot on the heels of that news is an admission from Nokia itself. In an interview with a news outlet, a senior VP at Nokia has admitted the N-Gage platform is not a success and that they would be stopping game development on the platform. They call it a pause in the grand scheme of things but I’m not so sure.

Internally, we’ve known about this for weeks but you can imagine how we felt when we found out. After busting our asses for months on the game, we discovered we were doing so on a failed platform.

We’re continuing to work on the game and we will finish it. Why? There’s a very good reason for it which might seem strange since the whole world now knows the N-Gage isn’t viable anymore in the eyes of Nokia. I can’t say more than that.

Read more here.