Category Archives: internet

Fame Day: Chipotle’s Farmed and Dangerous

I am a man who likes a number of different things, but high up among them are food and environmentalism. When it comes to the latter my immersion into all things animal-related at a young age [Kratts’ Creatures, anyone?] made me care deeply about their habitats, and that extends to this day. As far as food goes it’s something that has kept me alive for the past 23 years. Big ups to food.

Just last December I ate at Chipotle for the first time. While I was extremely unimpressed by my burrito assembler’s assertion that the medium salsa was “pretty spicy”, everything else was great. A good quantity of good quality Mexican food at a reasonable price, plus great chips- what’s not to like? Or, I guess I should be asking, what more is there to like?

goodjobchipotle

How about a Hulu-exclusive show that lauds sustainable agriculture and humane treatment of food animals with one hand while damning the modern world of industrial agriculture with the other?

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Meditations on Listening in the Internet Age

I should probably preface this post by explaining that I am a terrible listener. Sometimes when I am trying to listen to someone I end up talking a whole bunch in order to explain that I am listening, or that I see where the person (who I should be listening to) is coming from. It’s pretty counter-productive. I’m also an extrovert, so when I get nervous I talk more, and sometimes even a lull in conversation can make me nervous. Oh, and one more thing, I’m terrible at taking constructive criticism. That’s probably one of my biggest flaws. I cannot even count the number of fights I’ve had with loved ones because I’m so damn sensitive, not to mention the times I just misunderstand what they are saying because I read too far into it.

Recognize this meme? That’s right, it’s from Hyperbole and a Half. Best ever.

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Grammarly: An Online Platform Review

I tried Grammarly’s check grammar free of charge because, well, let’s just say that I’ve been skeptical of any sort of program that claims to be able to assist or improve writing. Sure, I write a fair amount as you’ve probably noticed, but I edit quite a bit as well [every post that goes up on this blog, for one, so any mistakes you may find are unfortunately all on me]. Suspicion of any product that may eliminate the line of work I’d like to be in is warranted, I think.

Not only that, but back when I was still working as a copywriter I was asked to try out some software that would be used to “spin” articles, turning old content into fresh, new content that would draw search engine attention to our company. Unfortunately the program [the ironically named The Best Spinner] only served as a sort of glorified thesaurus, providing alternatives to words used, something that any accomplished writer could handle themselves, while rearranging sentences as well. 

So I tried out Grammarly with equal parts skepticism and trepidation- would this be an online platform that would make me, and others editors to boot, obsolete?

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Shame Day: Dark, Gritty Fan Art of Beloved Childhood Characters

I was in a dark place when I wrote the post I am least proud of: Fame Day: Creativity [and Imagination]. It’s not that I don’t think it’s a relevant topic, especially right now when it’s more common to see children in front of screens than playing make believe with their toys, it’s just that at the time I figured that writing it was the easy way out. As luck would have it, all of that segues really smoothly into today’s topic-

I hate dark and gritty fan art because it is both uncreative and lazy.

To be totally transparent, I was a high schooler once, so I did think these were really awesome once upon a time. It wasn’t until much later when I realized that if you want to take a beloved childhood character and make it appeal to a large section of the internet you have three simple options:

1) Make said character a killer/capable of killing.

There are altogether far too many gritty Inspector Gadget pictures out there.

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What Happened To MusclesGlasses?

musclesglassesmilkA lot, and I’m telling you, a lot of people want to know what happened to MusclesGlasses of Epic Meal Time fame. For a while it was all you’d see in the comments sections of their YouTube videos, and a good number have found this blog by googling the character’s real name, “Alex Perrault”.

According to an article on New Media Rockstars Muscles stopped appearing as early as January 2013, which meant that for an entire year EMT has been without one of its strongest presences [besides that of Harley “The Sauce Boss” Morenstein himself, creator of the show]. For 365 days and change the show has been missing its most voracious eater,

bordering-on-problematic drinker,

and rap battle champion-

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Fame Day: Hyperbole and a Half and Depression

For Christmas my lovely sister-in-law gave me this book:

I then proceeded to read pretty well the whole book over the next few days. Some of my favorite stories focus on her childhood shenanigans, including the time she ate an entire cake,

and the time she thought dressing in a dinosaur costume gave her special powers-

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