Adam Kazwell is...somewhat concerned

This is gonna hurt me more than it hurts you

I love information.

I may be borderline addicted to reading stuff on the web....but reading is good for you, right? Right?!

I think it started with that bastard Tim Sanders, who suggested that there were different types of 'knowledge food groups'. Reading the news is like candy. Magazines are like a snack, and books are a healthy meal...or something like that.

Well, I'm not a news junkie in the traditional sense (I haven't visited CNN.com in months) but I fear that blogs might be in the same class (or even worse. a super candy of some kind - one that shatters your teeth the instant you bite into it). Reading this post from Philip Greenspun (who strangely enough has a cousin who made 'The Girl Next Door'....see, how would i know that if it wasn't for blogs...don't i need to know that! I'm only half-kidding) I decided that something needs to change.

Why? Only one reason - the hope of increased productivity.

I very rarely feel productive...maybe because 'getting stuff done' is a hard thing to define. Is running errands productive? Is watching a movie or reading a book doing something?

(about to be really uneloquent, but I want to get the thoughts down now, I'll worry about the wording later). For now, I'd say no - and here's how I'd differentiate between 'doing stuff' and 'getting things done'... reading a book is doing stuff - it needs to happen and it's not inherently bad or good. Reading the book and then taking notes and/or adding original thoughts to it, etc...that's 'getting things done'. Personally, I very rarely get to the 2nd part - even though I always have the best intentions to do so eventually.

Here's the concern...probably my main source of my feeling productive is writing in my blogs. But there's got to be other things to do besides that (I've got a few ideas). Or maybe I can still write in them, but it doesn't mean I have to continue to read all the other feeds...

So, how drastic of a change should I take? Eliminate a small, medium, or complete amount of my blog diet?? Here's my idea:

1. Do as much of a clean sweep of my blogroll as possible (in other words...take everything outside first, and then decide what I need to bring back in).
2. Then, instead of checking up on them frequently, maybe only go to Bloglines.com once a week (or month).
3. Profit!

I'll let ya know how it goes.

On the mound, off the cuff

Is there any book out there that has a bunch of conversations between catchers and pitchers?? After reading this snippet, I'd love to get my hands on it if it exists....

On catching for Maddux:
"Maddux loves to argue and talk. That's the neat thing about him. He had different ways of doing things. In the World Series with Jim Thome, he wanted to throw a changeup. So I went out there and I put down that I wanted him to throw a cutter inside. And he shook it off and went to a changeup. I said 'no' and went back to a cutter. He said 'no.' And I said 'OK' and called a timeout -- that's what I like to do, you don't force things on him.

I said: 'Dude, this guy is going to hit your changeup. He's on it. You threw one already and he's kind of looking for it. What we'll do is throw a cutter inside and we'll throw a changeup afterwards.'

He said: 'No, he can't hit my changeup.'

I said: 'Oh yeah he can.'

He said: 'Bet me.'

I said, 'OK' and went back there and called a changeup and [Thome] hit a bullet that almost hit Maddux right in the head.

I can't tell you exactly what he said. But he said, 'OK, you win' -- with a couple of cuss words in there -- and said, 'What'd you do, tell him it was coming? I said, 'I wish I did. He would have hit it out.'

Full article here - The great debate: Maddux vs. Clemens

What's an artist to do

Some nice back and forth on this site for Eminem's Mosh video.
(lyrics here)

Really nice video.. but I’ll say the same thing I’ve said for years. One of the most dangerous thing that “famous people” can do is use there fame for political satire. Eminem says Bush is a bad president equals people that dont want to find out things for themselves beleiving that he’s a bad president. Meanwhile others that follow wold events and read between the lines can make up there own mind. But in a younger generation, who really wants to do all that? I know I didn’t when I was that age. So now we have all these newbie votes going to the poles with M’s song in the back of their head, along with rock against bush etc…etc.. and pulling democratic. Without really knowing what their asking for. Kerry will probably win and then we'’ll see. But I still think people should be more educated about what their asking for..

Comment by Eric O’Grady — October 27, 2004 @ 9:12 pm

Mr O’Grady (comment #12). With all due respect,sir, it is an artist’s responsibility to keep his or her mouth open. At our best we are mirrors for our own societies, many of which (particularly our own as of late) get lost in the morass of their own problems and general lack of public discourse. At our worst, we are puppets making art deco and contributing to the anasthetic of modern “entertainment". If you don’t like people expressing their opinions, change the channel, watch the Simpsons, get stoned, and stop the half-baked attempts at expressing your own.

Comment by Anson — October 27, 2004 @ 11:43 pm

I'm mostly in agreement with O'Grady...just because artists (or TV broadcasters, etc) are in the public eye so much doesn't really mean they know what's going down globally (would you trust Jessica Simpson's, or Dan Rather's, politcal advice?) but at the same time Anson raises a good point that 'at their best artists are mirrors for their own society.' Either way, it's still important for people to want to
find out things for themselves...and it's whatever inspires them to do so that's important.

Also, some good analysis of the video here (at the Daily Kos).

Google answers all

I don't want to waste too much time on this so here are the results to the first few questions I asked...

Q: Who will the next US president be?
A: John Kerry

Q: What is the meaning of life?
A: To increase fitness

Q: Who am I?
A: I am better than your kids.

Q: Who let the dogs out?
A: Mrs. Brown, shortly before 8 am on February 14.

Good times!

I have no way to prove this

But I think Bertrand Russell would have made an excellent rapper (assuming he would have chosen that career path if it had been available 'back in the day').

Not sure what his rap-name would have been though...Bert McGirt maybe??

Neat idea

To contact Amit Gupta, email: [current year] at amit gupta dot com*

* (example: if this were 1983, you would use 1983@amitgupta.com)

That's pretty damn clever. Wish I'd thought of it.

Maybe while travelling I'll start giving my email out as: location at adam kazwell dot com. Although using the year is nice cause it doesn't change often, gives basic context info, and is easy to remember.

Other (kinda boring) possibilities:
family at adam kazwell dot com
friend at adam kazwell dot com
coworker at adam kazwell dot com

Got any other ideas??

Name that Film

Well, if you enjoyed the first FilmWise Invisibles™ Quiz (aka: Movies.xls)...looks like there's a second, called Name That Film: Download namethatfilm.xls (looks like there's some repeats, but definitely some new stuff too.)

On your mark, get set, Go!!!

ps. I won't be participating in this round, sorry :(
pps. Thanks for the file, Emma.

Update on 3.10.05: Found some additional links to more FilmWise Invisibles™ Quizzes (or .xls) games on BoingBoing - along with a ton of other spreadsheet movie games (complete with answers)