Gray hairs

I've been in denial about this for at least a year, but it appears as though I am starting to grow gray hair already. First in places like my goatee, moustache, and eyebrows. Now, in the tufts of hair aside my temples. I used to pluck out the light hairs, thinking at one point they were just dirty blonde or light brown. I think I'm starting to undergo "The Change".

WTF, I am not even 32 yet.

Looking for a new employer

I am quickly learning that people in the job market, especially those of us who choose to use resources as Monster.com and Dice.com, are considered to be willful guinea pigs on which the likes of headhunters, recruiters, and other vampiric subhumans looking make you their latest kill. These brilliant minds, who for the most part are hired by organizations seeking employment but too lazy to do the required research to discover what skillsets they need, are the next generation of grepping ADD kids looking for their next sweet snack.

First of all, I try to make it as clear as possible that I am seeking employment in 2 locations, Chicago and Philadelphia. Secondly, I make it clear that I am still currently employed and that I can't drop what I'm doing at a moment's notice. Thirdly, anyone with an ounce of job intuition would understand that most skilled techs would not leave a steady job opportunity for a short contract gig no matter how good the pay is or how prestigious the hiring organization is. I could go on and on about how clueless most tech recruiters are, but I'll stop for the sake of the readers.

Consider for a moment the job listing I was offered from the World Bank. The recruiter calls me on the phone before even contacting me via e-mail. Oh, and by the way, if you are a TECH RECRUITER, please understand that I don't answer my phone at work unless you happen to be A) Goo, B) my Mom, or C) Rip Taylor (who happens to be my personal mirth coach). So sorry to the rest of you who need me to pick up the phone immediately. I'd prefer my coworkers (who are notorious eavesdroppers on phone conversations) and my boss (who's office is right next to mine and separated only by a paper thin wall) not know intimate details of my life. Anyway, after the phone call, I got an e-mail from this recruiter stating the position, terms, and responsibilities. One need not be psychic to know that I wouldn't be interested in working for the World Bank, all one would need to do is look closely at my resume and note that I currently work for a nonprofit social service organization that tries to help people, not bankrupt small African nations. Secondly, I don't recall telling anyone that I wanted to move to Washington D.C.!

Maybe if these morons did more than just scan my resume for buzzwords and skill sets, they might be able to save some time weeding thru people like me. Statements like, "I've had a chance to read your resume and I'd like a chance to speak with you more in-depth to learn more about you," are an obvious confession that they didn't read shit.

Anyway, all that having been said, I am indeed looking for a new gig. If you are a job recruiter for a living, I apologise to you for the fact that you have an incredibly stressful job of trying to find frantic people jobs, but seriously ... practice some reading comprehension before you contact me.

The Sidecar AllStars

Ok holy shit, sometimes life can be serendipitous!

Last Saturday, I was playing a gig with my friend Jason Fifield, a professional jazz bass player who is spearheading a collective of musicians called From Cosmos to Chaos. Another longtime friend of mine, Phil Horwitz, was also part of the show. We got to play songs like Blue Monk, Straight No Chaser, and some of From Cosmos to Chaos's original material.

After the show, we were approached by Phil's longtime friend Adam Ritter. Adam asked us if we wanted to form a house band for his new restaruant, The Sidecar ... and he was offering cash! This is the first time I've ever been offered a house gig where I get to play with amazing musicians and I can play virtually whatever the hell I want to play! Naturally, we agreed to the opportunity. On top of this being a paying gig, we get fed for free and we can drink for free! How much better could it be?

So now, I have a recurring house gig with Phil and Jason as The Sidecar Allstars. The act promises to be much fun and adventure, as Jason is well-connected with musicians in the Philadelphia area. We should have lots of horn players sitting in with us and hopefully some singers or other musicians as well. This gig falls on alternating Saturday nights, and seeing as though one of the gig nights is the weekend following my birthday (2/22), I am going to use it as an excuse to throw a huge partAAY for my birthday. Janic's gf Jenn's birthday is on 2/23, so I'm going to invite her and her whole crew too.

Awesome shit.

With regards to IMG tags and my Blogspot atom.xml feed carrying over to innanet.net properly, I've still not figured out what the problem is. I know that part of the problem lies in the STYLE tags that Blogspot adds to the automated IMG tag generation tool within the Blogspot GUI. I experimented with using all UPPER CASE tags, removing the quotes from each attribute, and several other tweaks. When I find the solution, rest assured I will broadcast it.

Testing hourly feed update cronjob + posting images via Blogger image upload

I made a new crontab for my server, with a job that runs wget every hour to ping the update-feeds.php script on innanet.net. That tells innanet.net to pick up the feed coming from http://blogofslack.blogspot.com/atom.xml. Badda Bing.

I used to do this with Gooshizzle's blog, but it didn't seem to be able to see the images that she posted. I think she's currently using the Blogger posting method, but I could be mistaken. I'm going to try one method of each with these 2 images and see which one carries over to innanet.net. One will be uploaded to Blogger, one will be uploaded to innanet.net.

Anyway, these were cellphone grabs from August/September 2005 in Philly PA. Posted by request.



I am pretty sure that #2 will display on innanet, but will #1?

Comments? Does Blogger block off-network requests for files?

Mission Statement

Hello, and welcome to my blog. I'm a web designer/developer and systems administrator living in the greater Philadelphia area. I am also an accomplished musician and electronic artist. More about that stuff later.

I have created this blog for several reasons. These are listed in no order of importance:

- To act as a journal for my various creative efforts with such projects as Mental Contagion (thee Exquisite Corpse blog) DeCheser.org Studios (my freelance web design/development/consulting firm), and Leafblower (my IDM/glitch/downtempo electronic music project).

- To provide an easier way for my girlfriend Mariam to blog with me. *blush*

- As a connective tie-in with Mental Contagion on the blog side of things.

- As a source to feed my other blog, innanet.net.

- To promote more random visitors to my blogs in general.

That's all