I just watched a pretty interesting documentary on Pinball called Special When Lit. It mapped out the industry over 30 years up to its decline when the major pinball machine manufacturers started to close around 2006. It had interviews with engineers, manufacturers, arcade owners and of course pinball players from the tournament circuit.

The film seems to try to both shine a light on the people involved in the "magic" of pinball as well as explain its demise.

It points to video games
...Read More

Avid Pro Tools - The End of the Recording Studio

So I've been getting back into songwriting which is infinitely easier if you have the ability to lay tracks down. Even if it's just a tape recorder taking a horrid live recording of a jam session, songs will always turn out better if you can listen to them as you write them. It allows them to evolve much faster than they ever could floating around in your head or written down on paper. So completely agreeing with myself on everything I just said,
...Read More

Ten years ago I was twenty-two.

Twenty years ago I was twelve.

Thirty years ago I was two.

But when I came out my momma I was zero.


“Strange” is a word that has both followed and described Sage Francis throughout his career. Interestingly, his most recent album is probably best experienced as I did - without any prior knowledge of his back catalogue. Li(f)e isolates
...Read More

Ted Williams, the homeless man with the golden radio voice, has captured the hearts of America.



*cue sappy music*

So why does this whole ordeal make me a bit queasy? First, let's recap what we know:

- Young Ted likes radio.
- Ted tries to get work in radio.
- After moderate success, Ted dedicates his life to drugs and alcohol.
- Somewhere along the way, Ted has nine kids.
- T
...Read More

Best soundtrack I have ever listened to.

Now, I might be biased because I like electronic music, but come on. This album is ridiculous. It so perfectly suits the TRON environment and mood it is absurd.
You know when you were a kid, and you run around with a friend, pretending you're in the future saving the world? Remember those slow motion, superiorly enthralling, climactic mo
...Read More

Secretly, the internet of today terrifies me. Much like James Whitmore's character Brooks Hatlen in the Shawshank Redemption, I find myself able to navigate yet unable to understand the ever accelerating madness being pumped into my browser window at approximately 1.5 Mbps.

Years ago however, the screen scene was much different. When I first logged on as a spunky teen, the internet had already outgrown its infancy. Due to barriers-to-e
...Read More

After reading through some of a 'must play before you die' list on 1up.com i decided to go ahead with my own list. While i wouldn't play a crap game, some of the games listed are based on historical and/or game play significance over wow factor. I'm sure I enjoyed a lot more games from each generation, but these are the ones that I felt were worth mentioning.




...Read More

The following is the original Discussion section I wrote for my master's thesis. My advisor today informed me that it sound too grandiose for my measly finding. So I figured that posting it on idio would cancel that out for me.

The Evolution of Organized Religion

Charles Darwin (Descent of Man, 1874)
[i][On the other hand a belief in all-pervading spiritual agencies seems to be universal; and apparently follows from a considerable advance in man's reason, and from a still greater advance in his
...Read More

50 years after birth control pills were first available for public use and women are still fighting with conservative politicians and religious associations that are trying to reverse these earlier decisions. They are trying to take the right of women to have access to birth control. I will never understand how conservative Republicans want run on the platform of small government yet still want the government to control things like education and women's rights.

...Read More

"DON'T EVER TOUCH THAT!", my step-father yelled with a rage a tad more noticeable than my typical wrong-doings would incite. And just like that, my indoctrination was complete.

Hardly my fault if you ask me. Police issue revolvers are shiny attractive objects in general and I was a just a 5 year old boy. Like a fish to a lure, I just had to pick it up. St
...Read More

It's amazing to think about all the technology present in modern society and how this technology has profoundly impacted the manner in which we live. Computers, for example, came out of a need to store massive amounts of “collective knowledge” into small bits of information that could then be manipulated and put towards solving a particular problem. The computer can be thought of as a tool that allows humans the ability to better control the abundant amount of information encountered on a daily basis a
...Read More

Since the birth of this great nation there has always been some type of National Day of Prayer (NDP) at one time or another. Starting when the Continental Congress in 1775 set aside a day of prayer to mark the birth of a new nation. Following along these sentiments George Washington (1779) also proclaimed a day of public thanksgiving and prayer. After that, however, NDP was not adopted as a national holiday and believed by some at the time to be down right unconstitutional.

"[i]They seem to imply
...Read More

This is a review of Yeasayer's somewhat recently released album Odd Blood.

I will start by saying I've been a fan of Yeasayer for a bit (~a year or so). Their first album (All Hour Cymbals), I thought, was marvelously experimental. You could hear how they were searching to create 'their' sound. Odd Blood is the answer to their first debut album. It seems they fo
...Read More

I will be moving onto a farm in August and I have already begun to collect animals. I found a store in town that will allow me to sell the angora (rabbit) fiber through them.
Here they are:
My dog, Dagny, which many of you have probably seen before. She is 1/2 Pharoah Hound, 1/2 Australian Sheppard. She loves to run and also to herd animals. She watches the chickens in the mornings.


Next up we h
...Read More

I am smarter than Neil deGrasse Tyson...but just this once. Still, I can't help but take to the internet and brag about it. The guy knows pretty much everything about everything and any chance to one up him is a chance I have to take. So let me tell you about it in open letter format.

Dear Mr. Tyson,

I would like to quote yo
...Read More

"My computer does too much!" I try and imagine the look on the face of the sales representative of any technology store as I repeat, "My computer does too much!" How delightful for him though. Any opportunity to sell something else to someone who thinks they need something else is graciously welcomed. But the statement itself is preposterous. Would he be inclined to ask me "What don't you want it to do?" ...Read More

Imagine you are 6-years old and you taking part in a psychology experiment. You are taken into a room and a marshmallow is placed down on the table in front of you. Just as you go to grab for it the researcher tells you that she must leave the room and while she is gone you can either eat the marshmallow now or you can wait until she
...Read More

Dear Blog,
I got a new tattoo. It is so cool and so painful that I want to scream.






...Read More

After reading up I decided I will get another one tomorrow so she won't be so lonely. She is the CUTEST.

Her name is Glenda.
Glenda Peck.
Glenn Peck for short.


ps. I cant fucking make these links show because i am decidedly retarded so just copy and paste them.
...Read More

The other half of my friends argument taken from Behe's book regarding the immense complexities of the human eye.

Section taken from Michael J. Behe's book Darwin Black Box:
[i]But let's touch on the subject of Darwin's theory of how complex eyes evolved:In the 19th century, the anatomy of the eye was known in detail. The pupil of the eye, scientists knew, acts as a shutter
...Read More