Word of the month -- Awesome

Well after that title, this post has a lot to live up to. I'm not gonna lie to you, Marge (that's a reference to the Simpsons, for the uninitiated) -- it may not live up to its title. But here's what it will do:

1) It'll keep this blog somewhat active.
2) It'll let me share a few of the things I really enjoy about the 'net with you.

Don't let number 1 detract you from number 2 (heh heh). Even though this is an effort to make me use the blog, the things that follow really are awesome, in my opinion.

First, there's this fellow named Wil Wheaton - self-professed geek. You may have heard of him. He was the main character (Gordie) in the movie Stand By Me and Wesley Crusher in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Ok, so now you kinda remember him. Well, forget all that because it was a long time ago.

Nowadays Wil is an actor and a writer. He's written a few non-fiction books (which are great, by the way) and he's got a blog that he uses all the time. Lately some of his posts have been about the acting gigs that seem to be cropping up more often. Add in his tweets and there's just a whole lot of awesome to keep up with.

Secondly, there's FARK (Warning: it can get downright offensive over there sometimes). Interestingly enough, I caught back up with Wil Wheaton over at Fark - he used to comment on some of the news stories more regularly and I recognized his name but couldn't place it. Now FARK is an interesting place. Basically, people with no lives (and living in their mother's basement) find news stories online and submit them to FARK. And this is where you're saying to yourself, "So What?" Right, I agree. Well, instead of using the articles' headline, they make up their own, funny (hopefully) headline. For example, here's the headline for an article about an Indonesian Park Ranger that got attacked: "A ranger was feeding a komodo dragon...until he got rescued". Ok, so it's not the funniest thing you've read, but it gives you an idea.

Finally, there's Woot. This is an online store and they only sell one thing a day. That's it. One thing and when it's gone they don't sell anything else until the next day. And it's usually really cheap (I got an upscaling DVD player for $30). They don't really specialize in anything. I think they basically buy excess inventory from anywhere and sell it off. So, one day they might be selling a DVD player that they have 150 of the item. They'll sell it until all 150 get sold and then they're done for the day. And then the next day they might be selling a wet/dry vac. But, periodically they have these things called a "Woot-Off". During these woot-offs (which tend to last 2-3 days) they'll sell one thing an hour until it sells out or the hour is up. They get a lot of inventory moving during these things and it's kind of interesting to keep track of what's for sale.

So there you have it. The blog post of awesomeness. These are some of the things that keep me busy on the intartubes. That's a FARK-related joke - remember that Senator that described the internet as "a series of tubes"? Well, the ridicule on that guy grew legs and took off. But I digress. Have a look around at the corners of the 'net that I've just shone my light on. Who knows, maybe you'll find something there that you like.

Wow! The speed of tech integration is awesome.

This past week I committed the tech faux pas of sending out some videos in a not-so-common format. And, more than one recipient couldn't get the files to open. Of course, Youtube would have been the best way, but I didn't see it under the 2 years of dust that accumulated since I'd last used my account.

So, over the past few days there has been a flurry of activity on many of my social media apps - Twitter, Youtube, Picasaweb, and even the antiquated (in tech terms) Googlechat; I hooked up with an old friend that I hadn't talked to in years. And of course, here's Blogger's time in the spotlight.

The main reason for all this activity (aside from being snowed out of work for a week) was the launch of Google Buzz. After I saw all the opportunities to integrate different apps to create a stream of multimedia and communication, I started to dig a little more. Now I think I've got everything set up, accessible, and pretty convenient for me to use.

I could always sit at my desk at home and upload things and make blog entries. But, between having the attention span of an ADD chimp drinking coffee and a 2 y/o at home, you can just look at my sites and see I haven't kept up very well. But, it's pretty awesome that I can take pictures or videos, or compose this blog post with my blackberry and just email it to the web. Within minutes, and most likely seconds, my additions to the webosphere will be posted.

Wow!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry