Archive for the “buzz” Category

Earlier this week I put out a call for help with creating some banners and buttons to spread the word about Team Diabetes Easter Island and the effort to raise $10 000 for the cause.

My pal, Carolyn, did a little bit of grown up art while her daughter was colouring. Here’s one she came up with:

Here are some thumbnails of others she designed:

If you want to add one of these to your own blog, feel free to click out to the larger version, save-as and then please link back to this address (my donation page with Team Diabetes): https://ocp.diabetes.ca/pledge/cspledge.asp?prId=td&oId=1212656&tId=8410

And while you’re at it, double click on the larger image and make a pledge yourself!

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

The email came back yesterday, I’ve submitted my registration papers, paid my deposit and have been accepted as a member of Team Diabetes: Easter Island.

Now comes the fun part. $10 000 in the next year, all of it going towards Diabetes research in Canada. That’s what this little button the left is for. Click it and you’ll go directly to my fundraising page with Team Diabetes. The money goes right to them, they’ll process your tax receipt and the donation automatically counts towards my fundraising goal.

I have already committed to donating all my freelancing funds to the cause, and thanks to some Twitter pals, a corporate video voice over gig could soon be coming my way.

If you’re a professional holding an event, or producing a video, or starting up a marketing campaign, I will waive my fee to do your work, in exchange for an equal donation to Team Diabetes. You get the work done professionally, while at the same time scooping a charitable tax receipt. Sounds win-win to me!

In addition to money, one of the other ways I’ll be asking for help, is technologically. Team Diabetes has got the online donations going smoothly, but there aren’t slick buttons or widgets to throw in to the site. I made that button roughly this morning. If you’re graphics whiz, or php star and can whip up a button or plugin that I can spread around and have people post on their own blogs to raise for the cause, please let me know.

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

My pal Meg likes to make lists. This morning, as I was playing with Z, I was reminded of some of his favorite things, so I threw them together in a list.

Richard Scarry Busytown poster - I sit in the chair with him standing on my lap and he climbs my chest to stand on my shoulders and face to get a better view - when he gets to the top, he flaps his arms and coos in glee. The best part? The poster is Jen’s from when she was a kid that we had reframed.

Trucks - He loves them. Garbage day is the best in his world

Apple Mango Tango - He has it for breakfast, a couple cubes of apple, one of mango and he’s off

Ikea Sparka Soccer Ball - This is, quite possibly, the GREATEST children’s toy ever created. It’s a super super soft soccer ball that is machine washable. We can throw it back and forth, he can chew on it and it is his favourite toy. Bar none.

Eating things - He’s teething, so everything goes in his mouth

Silvery fish - He loves standing at the windows of the Aquarium waving as the salmon swim past

Books by Sandra Boynton or Olivier Dunrea - He loves the ones about Hippos and Gertie

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

Blah.. blah .. blah .. blah. Oscars schmoscars. Do we really care?

No. But it is fun to watch. And bitch.

Best line of the night to Jon Stewart: “You know what we do in commercial breaks? Huddle together and make catty comments about what you at home are wearing.”

Nice. Perfect. Cause I know you were all like “Who?” and “Eww” when Tilda Swinton won. And when Daniel Day Lewis was interviewed on the red carpet you took a ruler up to the screen to measure his hoops and recoiled in horror when his date’s dress was fully revealed.

Okay, nastiness out of the way, we all know it’s really about the parties afterwards. My son Zacharie will do his best to demonstrate how the night will go for many of the nominees.

Outfit picked by Rachel Zoe, hair done by Ken Paves.

Damn, that LiLo knows how to show a boy a good time.

If ya want a really fun way to watch the show, get on Twitter. Everyone is randomly firing up feedback and one liners and exclamations and disappointments. They say the whole world is watching, and if you’re on twitter, it really feels like it’s true.

You know, stuff like this gem from Meg Fowler: “I’d like to accept my award for Bourne Ultimatum, but I’m busy f**king Matt Damon!”

See ya next year!

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

Today I landed my first big voice over gig. 75 local tags to run for Western Financial (an insurance company in Western Canada).

My work consisted of me standing in a studio for 2 hrs saying “In (city) call (agent name) at (phone number).”

75 times. Well more, like 250 times when you throw in screw ups and retakes.

For my efforts today, (after agent commission) I will be paid about $1000. Such are the spoils of the voice over artist.

Next month, I will be doing some work for Apple’s iTunes Music Store. Again, I will be paid an endorsement fee.

Now I already get a good salary for my job at 95Crave, so these freelancing gigs are supposed to be gravy cash for Jen and I to take vacations, fix the house, or save for Zacharie’s education.

For the next 16 months, I want to do something different.

All my freelancing money will go to Team Diabetes.

Anything I get outside of my regular work, will be donated to the cause. I want to run in the Easter Island Marathon in June 2009 with Team Diabetes, and need to raise around $10 000 for it to happen. Now, before I’ve even really started, I’ve already got nearly $2000 in the bank.

So here’s the challenge I’m putting out to those hiring people for commercials, voice work, hosting and endorsement gigs - hire me.

You have to pay that money to a host anyway, pay it to me and you’ll actually be giving it all to charity.

You know where to reach me.

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

We often bitch and moan and complain about service we receive from big companies, the government, airlines etc. But do we ever stop and give them applause when they do something right?

Probably not, because we expect it to be done right in the first place. But just as you may choose to tip 20% instead of 10% for extra special service, I’m going to give kudos to Shaw for their handling of our internet problem at home.

Yes, I played the “media card” and got a little bit quicker attention than the regular Joe, but when Jen and I talked about how we were treated on the phone, by the techs who came by and how the problems were solved, we agreed the team was excellent.

Our internet has been intermittent, we were credited 5 days service. It still didnt get better, so they suggested a new modem. When that new modem was broken, and I mentioned how quitting the internet for 5 days for me would be harder than LiLo quitting booze, a Shaw tech called my radio request line offering to help, even though I hadnt mentioned Shaw as my ISP.

Last night a Shaw tech came by and solved our problem, this morning another group of Shaw techs came by to sort out wiring issues the previous fellow couldn’t solve. When they found we had old splitters and cable, they left replacements behind - all gratis.

Oh, and they’ve credited us with 2 free weeks because of the inconvenience.

Now you could argue that what happened is what should have happened. I had an issue and a company dealt with it properly. We’re so used to getting screwed by these big companies, that when they do something ordinary it becomes extraordinary. However, in this instance, the techs were positive, happy and the company exceeded our expectations.

Thank you Shaw for a job well done. (Disclaimer: Your experience may differ)

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

In August, 2003 I ran the Iceland Marathon as a member of Team Diabetes.

I raised $5000 and got to pound my way through 42k around Reykjavik. It was one of the greatest experiences of my life. Since then I’ve continuously received email updates from Team Diabetes and have been tempted to do runs in Brazil, or Rome, but the schedules never worked with the time off I can take from work.

Today I got an email update from Rebecca Taylor with a marathon that fits my schedule and fulfills another lifelong adventure dream.

As you may have seen on the Team Diabetes website, Easter Island in June 2009 has been added to the schedule as an alumni-only event. The Easter Island event offers full marathon, half marathon and 10K distance options.

Are you kidding me? A marathon on Easter frickin Island? SIGN.ME.UP. Maybe.

Because here is the fine print. The fund raising requirement is $7500. $2500 of it is required by June. That’s a lot of money. I’d need a lot of help.

I firmly believe in the Team Diabetes cause, education can prevent us from getting hit by it in our adulthood, and many children have no choice having to live with daily insulin shots. Being a new father, I am all over preventing diseases that Zacharie could face.

So. I have a question. Would you be prepared to help? Late last summer I scraped together almost $1500 in less than a week to do Lance Armstrong’s Tour of Courage. That was huge.

So I need to know, would you all step up again? I’d need to average $500 / month for the 16 months between now and the run. Now that doesn’t sound too tough.

So I need to know if you’d be interested in helping out.

Maybe a $50/month donation between now and then? Would you add a donation badge to your own blog? Would you help collect prizes for raffles and Easter Egg hunts? What would *you* do to help out?

Comment below.

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

I’m going unplugged.

I wish it was a reference to some acoustic version of Guitar Hero, but alas I’m referring to my connection to the internets.

For the better part of a month, our internet connection with Shaw has been spotty. Not the fastest, and dropping off frequently. The drop off means getting under the table, resetting the modem, resetting the router, waiting. Climbing back up, seeing it’s not working and doing it again. Even once it starts working, 15 mins later I’m crouched down doing the reset dance again.

We’ve called Customer Service a couple of times, once getting a credit for 5 days service because of our troubles (nice!).

BUT… (there’s always one of those)

The last call was resolved with Shaw suggesting we exchange our modem for a newer model, free of charge (nice!). Jen went and did that today, brought them home and plugged everything in.

Dead.

Nothing.

Zip.

She calls tech support and they have her under the desk doing all sorts of cable origami and nothing works. So they’re going to send a tech out to us (nice!).

On Sunday (ouch!). Today is Wednesday. 5 days with no series of tubes connecting us to the world.

At first I thought this would be great. A chance to format the hard drive that is my life. Get off the grid, take a breath of fresh air and re-evaluate how I have let technology monopolize my life.

The problem is, I’m not the only one it monopolizes. Work doesnt phone me when it needs something, it emails me. Friends don’t call, they Facebook. I don’t phone my parents and chat, they get updates on Zacharie through this blog and his photo blog.

With no internets, that all disappears. Gone.

Thankfully we have 2 neighbourly neighbours who leave some ports open so the whole ‘hood can get online. It’s not the most reliable of connections, so it’s nothing I can depend on to get serious blog / audio / video / research work done. Instead I’ll be able to just hop on the open port and get in a couple of email checks to stay in touch with work, but that’s about it.

For 5 long, hard days, I will be off the grid (sorta).

I’m looking forward to it (sorta).

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

Unboxing is a favourite geek pasttime. Some might even call it geek porn.

Get something new? Take a picture. Every.step.of.the.way.

I received a new pair of Creative Aurvana Live yesterday, and I thought I’d try my first unboxing.

Sure, it’s not as cool as the Apple IIc unbox, or a MacBook Air unbox, but this is my unbox. Here it is

I’m looking forward to test hearing them this afternoon on the air, I’ll post a review then.

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?

Leo Laporte is the host of many podcasts, tv and radio shows about technology. His TWiT Network is one of the most listened to online, and he comes up to Vancouver 1 week a month to work on The Lab With Leo.

He loves his gear. He’s usually on the bleeding edge for buying the latest and greatest, sitting on waiting lists until something new is released.

But every now and again Leo waits and buys something a little further down the line, and when he does, it means the item is about to be discontinued.

He’ll buy the HD DVD player the day before the battle is lost to Blu Ray, he’ll buy a new iPod the day before the memory is doubled and the size is shrunk.

It’s called getting Leo’d, and it just happened to me.

I finally received my iPod Shuffle that I scooped on the Future Shop Boxing Day Sale for $59.99. A GREAT deal I thought. Nope.

Today Apple announced the price of the shuffle has dropped to $55, and a new 2 gig model is being introduced for $75.

Grrr.

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?