shawnp0wers

I'm a bloggy blogger who blogs.

Dear International Cafe “Cinnamon Dulce” Cappuccino…

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You are a powdered drink mix. Just like chopped steak is still hamburger, and Crocs are just weird rubber shoes, you are not a gourmet beverage. Please do not pretend to be so.

In fact, I suspect you may actually be a prank beverage, because it seems that when I made a cup in my gourmet single serving brewing apparatus (see, it doesn’t make my cheap coffee pot any fancier to use big words either), you foamed sticky goo all over my shelf.

I don’t like sticky.

Apparently someone at Maxwell House thought it would be a good idea to crumble up a bunch of Alka-Seltzer tablets into each can of Cinnamon Dulce Cappuccino, so that a proper foamy head would appear on each cup. Let me remind you, you are an instant beverage mix. No one takes you seriously. It was either you, or I brew another pot with my already used coffee grounds from this morning, and that idea almost won. You are what I drink when I run out of nasty office coffee. Don’t try to be more than you are, it’s unbecoming.

Now please clean my wall-secured, elevated, fibrous, hardwood shelving device. It’s gross.

Amanda Singing “Collide”

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Amanda, my oldest, records herself playing guitar and singing from time to time. She posts them on Facebook, but only her “friends” can see them. I asked her if I could put them up here every once in a while. Enjoy! 🙂

These Bookmarks Are Priceless

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Really. They’re not for sale. This particular one was made by a 6th grader. She was one of the winners of the “design a bookmark” contest here at the school library. She’s also my daughter, which is awesome for many reasons. (No, Donna and I were not judges in the contest.)

The winning bookmarks, of which there are 12 or so, are being printed and laminated to give out in the library. I think it’s an awesome way for kids to see their artwork appreciated by others. Unfortunately, it does cost quite a bit to print & laminate them. It got me to thinking… I wonder if people would buy them if the library made them available for sale on Teh Internets. We’d have to get school board approval, etc, etc, but if they each sold for $1 or $2 including shipping, they’d recoup that toner/plastic cost in no time.

What do you think, Internets, would you buy a hand crafted bookmark designed by a book-loving elementary child? What if the proceeds benefited the library itself? Should I push my darling wife to get board approval for such an endeavor?

Also — CONGRATS LYDIA! Way to go!!!!

CERN Hides Large Hadron Collider Experiment

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What started out as a festive holiday for most ended in the beginning stages of the apocalypse. CERN has certainly been under the public eye with their LHC experiments, and so in order to test some of the more controversial procedures — the “scientists” need to mask their nefarious plans in a bit of pie.

The head accretion team leader, Martha Biggins, told Brain of Shawn reporters that indeed the holiday weight gain is a perfect time to test gravity altering black hole experiments.

“Everyone gains a few pounds over the holidays, so we use that phenomenon to study microscopic singularities,” Biggins said.

A microscopic singularity, for those of us not familiar with astrophysics jargon, is a black hole. The [mad] scientists at CERN are creating black holes over the holiday season, and using grandma’s pumpkin pie to hide the truth from us. That truth, however, is about to unhide like a Jack-in-the-Box.

“The problem is that Hawking Radiation, which normally nullifies the singularities before they can do any damage, seems to be affected by solar flares,” Biggins confessed. “While normally the microscopic singularities vaporize in a little puff of radiation, the solar flare on December 18th disrupted this outgassing, and actually allowed the black hole to take hold.”

Scientists are not sure how to handle the growing dilemma, but the effects of the planetary bound black hole are already evident in gravitation fluctuations across the globe. Our own Shawn Powers weighed himself 3 times today, and each time his weight had increased.

“I’ve been trying to spend my Christmas Day in a normal fashion, and have been eating huge meals with my family, but at every spare opportunity I’ve been stepping on the scale. The increase is impossible to deny. Gravity from the black hole is making me weigh more,” said Shawn.

Biggins gave us the following advice, “While we’re trying everything we can to increase the Hawking Radiation, and eliminate the black hole, it doesn’t look good. Gravitational forces will continue to rise throughout the holiday season, and throughout the following months. With proper diet and exercise, it will be possible to lose enough weight to offset the increase in gravity, but once the singularity accretes enough mass, there will be nothing we can do but leave the planet or be crushed. We’re sorry, fellow Earthlings. We really messed up on this one.”

Some anti-LHC scientists have already volunteered their time, and have calculated the timeline for total destruction. Based on scientific models, the singularity will make this planet uninhabitable around December 21st, 2012. That gives us almost 2 years to either get rid of the black hole, or find another solar system to live in.

Here at The Brain of Shawn, we suggest ignoring the problem. It’s really the only thing we can do. And for the next few years, you never have to worry about gaining weight — because remember, it’s not you, it’s the black hole! Happy Holidays everyone, and remember, have another helping of mashed potatoes. It really doesn’t matter anymore.

Christmas: How Did You Know?

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It is the time of year where we get presents. That means it’s the time of year for awkward moments where you must pretend your gift is something you’ve always wanted. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about, “It’s the thought that counts” — but we’ve all gotten those 3 armed sweaters from Crazy Aunt Judy. It’s the time of year for looking past the practicality of a battery operated pasta sorter, and look deeper. Remember that if your relative thinks you should be eating pasta, it means they think you’re skinny. See? It’s a wonderful gift.

Did you get a hideous tie? It just means the gifter thinks you have enough charisma to wear anything and have it look good. Did you get a sausage and cheese pack that looks like it’s from 1986? That’s aged fake-plastic cheddar! It’s probably worth thousands!

The one gift that’s always hard to take well is the soap and deodorant gift pack. How that says anything other than, “You smell bad, I thought this might help” is beyond me. I always try to imagine the person thinks I’m very concerned about hygiene, and knows I’d never splurge on an off brand travel sized gift pack myself. Oh, by the way, what is shower gel anyway? I never know what to do with half those bottles that come in the gift pack…

Anyway, keep your smile on full bore over the next couple days. Remember it’s the thought that counts. Remember you can always regift that sausage and cheese pack next year (they only improve with age I’m told). And lastly, hold off on your pasta sorting — your days of manual sorting are almost over!

Merry Christmas and happy holidays everyone. 🙂

The Plight of the Soupless

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I’m currently sitting in a restaurant with my extended family, as one often does during the holiday season. They’re all eating. It’s not rude of them to be eating while I sit and stare at my empty placemat, because you see, they ordered soup and salad bar with their meal. I, did not.

It’s quite unsettling to have everyone else eating while I sip my ice water. Sure, I could snitch a crouton or two, but really it’s not the same. I could make a pterodactyl out of my placemat. Really. I make a mean paper pterodactyl. I worry it would be considered rude to start a craft project during the meal though. So, here I sit, blogging on my phone. It could be worse.

Here’s my holiday tip for those of you frequenting restaurants with your family: Order the salad bar. Really. Everyone else will, and you’ll be like me, alone with your phone. You’ll hope your meal comes soon, but you’ll realize the kitchen put your order on hold because everyone is eating salad. Happy Holidays everyone. May your weekend be full of food, and not paper pterodactyls. 😉

UPDATE: This blog post was eaten TWICE by the WordPress application for Android. Yes, I’m an idiot for expecting something different the second time I typed it on my phone…

Getting Things Done

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And now I need to fix this tear in my monitor, ugh...Whenever I’m overwhelmed, Donna reminds me how to eat an elephant.  One bite at a time.  It’s really good advice, and yet I still try to poke that thing down in one gulp.  I always fail of course, and have guilt, more stress, an increasing workload, and a lovely shame spiral that seems to never end.  Ahh, RealLifeâ„¢, how greatly thou can suck at times.

A big problem with my conundrum is that much of my work is based on creativity.  Yes, I make crap up for a living.  It’s quite lovely.  When a seemingly endless workload mixes with dozens of half done projects — the end result is usually shoddy product.  Which adds stress, adds guilt, and the shame spiral begins again.  What’s a geek to do?

Quite frankly, I’m open to suggestions.  Here are the things I’ve tried that have NOT worked:

  • Scheduling everything in Google Calendar.  This is fine, until something goes wrong (I work in IT, something ALWAYS goes wrong).  Then I’m off schedule, have guilt, more stress, you see where this is going…
  • Keeping a TODO list for all the tasks in my various jobs.  This works better than scheduling everything in a calendar, because there is no timing on the things.  HOWEVER, it’s a bit like shoveling snow from a driveway that happens to be 30 miles long.  I never see progress.  I have guilt, shame, stress, and yes, the spiral begins again.
  • [INSERT PRODUCTIVITY SYSTEM HERE] — I’ve read books, watched videos, etc, etc.  Whatever system is pitched always sounds great, but my problem is I get caught up in the system and never get anything else done!
  • At work, we’ve implemented a trouble ticket system that is a bit nicer than our old clunky one.  I think this will help at my sysadmin job, because I can just do the top ticket, and work from there.  They’ll never be gone, but at least I can see what to do next.  For the rest of my jobs (writing, producing videos), that doesn’t work, because there’s not just a list of things that need to be done, it varies and changes.

So I’ve been trying to think what might actually work.  Here’s what I’ve come up with:

  • Get up early and try to accomplish one thing before anyone else gets up.  Getting up early sucks, but if I only have to accomplish one thing, it might not be so bad.  Plus, I can have a nice quiet hot beverage, and maybe my creativity will flow a bit.
  • Make a daily list of things to do.  NOT all the things I have to do (30 mile driveway again), but rather a smaller list of things that I need to accomplish THAT DAY.  I think I’ll put this on paper, because if I put it on something electronic, I’ll spend weeks designing the perfect list software…
  • When I’m done with the list, STOP WORKING.  I think this is important, because I suffer pretty badly from burnout.  It seems like I never accomplish anything, so stopping cold turkey probably won’t really change productivity, but perhaps it will help my brain.
  • Do something fun every day.  I miss fun stuff.  Perhaps this is a silly video.  Perhaps this is a silly poem.  Perhaps this is just a snowball fight with the dog.  Whatever it is, I think I should insist on doing something fun.  For science!
  • Take time to read.  Even if it’s just a little.  Reading is brain exercise, and quite frankly, my brain is getting flabby.  I need to tone it up a bit.

So that’s it.  It’s not a list of New Year’s resolutions, because those never work.  It’s not some new "system" I’m going to get caught up in.  It’s just me brainstorming how to get stuff done, and be happy while I do it.  That last part seems important, ya know?  I’m open for suggestions on how to get stuff done without instilling the wrath of Mr. Shame Spiral, but we’ll see how my plan goes.  I spoke with Fred about it, and he seems to think it’s a grand idea.  Although, to be honest, I think he just wants me to feed him earlier, so he was in favor of the early rising thing.  🙂

Meet Fred The Fish

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I read that fish relieve stress. I also know that caring for fish can be very stressful. Ironic that. So, following the advice of my Internet friends on Twitter, I decided to adopt a betta fish. I have a 1.5 gallon tank, and he seems quite happy. He likes to strut his stuff and flare his gills and fins quite often, and has a healthy appetite for blood worms.

I’m sure some of your are just itching to comment on how a 1.5 gallon tank is too small for a betta, but I assure you I’ve done a lot of research. I’m not putting any other fish in the tank, and while I wanted to get a 3 gallon aquarium, I couldn’t find any that I liked. If Fred turns out to be awesome, perhaps he’ll graduate to a bigger tank someday. For now, he’s like a college fish living in a dorm room. Hey, it beats those little torture bowls they live in at pet stores. 🙂

I’ll try to get photos of him all flared out, but right now I’m waiting for the bubbles on the tank to go away. They block my view of his awesome.

What Are Your Traditions?

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The Glowing Green Eyes of Doom! Her super power is peeing on the floor...It’s really interesting to visit others during the holidays.  Some folks have advent calendars, some have fake snow on the windows, heck some even have dying pine trees sitting in their livingroom decorated in a morbid mockery of their death.  (At least that’s what I assume the trees are for, we have a fake tree…)

Here at Chez Powers, there are a few things we do this time of year.  I’ll tell you ours, if you tell me yours.  Unless you do some creepy public urination tradition or something.  In that case, let’s just pretend you just play in the snow.  Anyway, here are some of the things we do:

Burnin’ Down the House

This was actually a tradition we started last year.  I don’t recommend it.  The plan is to make it a one time thing, as it’s a very expensive tradition, and makes for a rather rotten new year.  (Yes, it’s been long enough to joke about.  Quit yer cryin.)

Coins In Shoes on December 6th

December 6th is St. Nicholas Day, and every year we buy chocolate coins to put in our girl’s shoes.  We read the story of St. Nicholas, and start the holiday season with chocolate, which is a very good way to start it.  Unfortunately, we forget almost every year.  So we mostly remember around December 10th, read the story, and just hand out chocolate coins.  It’s a good plan, but for some reason we forget.  Still, we get chocolate, so it’s all good.

The Scavenger Hunt

This is a Powers Family favorite.  Every Christmas Eve, Mom and Dad create an elaborate chain of hidden clues.  The girls work together solving the clues and searching for the next clue, in order to find the final destination.  That final clue leads to a family gift, usually a game of some sort, that they open and we play.  It’s a great tradition, and as the girls get older, the clues get more and more difficult.  It’s so much fun to watch them work together to solve the clues, and at the end, we all get to play a game together.  It’s really cool.  We try to do this tradition on Christmas Eve, because it’s usually just our family.  It makes it special.

The Christmas Photo

Every year, we take a Christmas photo.  Actually, every year we take 6,328 Christmas photos.  Donna is really passionate about pictures, so we end up taking many photos, trying to get dogs and kids to pose correctly.  We all act like we’re upset by it, but really it’s sweet.  Donna loves the Christmas photo, and we love her – so we’re happy to oblige. 

This is actually a video, it was just so cold we froze in place

So there you go, some Powers traditions.  What are some of your traditions?  Perhaps we want to steal one or two!  (Also, if you’re looking for an idea from us – I highly recommend the scavenger hunt, it’s full of win)

Happy Holidays!