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Monthly Archive for May, 2008

America’s Disneyland

today i find myself in Madison, WI attending the 2008 Conference of the Psychoneuroimmunology Research Society (PNIRS). i’ve been in Madison for roughly 36hrs and—so far—the state’s capitol has been pretty cool.

my hotel is located right up against the Menona Lake and the $20 per night I spent on the lake-view-upgrade was totally worth it. (here’s a photo from my hotel room)

Monona Terrace in Madison, WI

last night as i was walking around downtown Madison, i kept noticing that WI license plates all said “america’s disneyland“.

“what the fuck?” i thought, “…that’s pretty damn arrogant considering that disneyland is the happiest place on earth and all.”

today as i passed the cars parked alongside State St i realized that the plates actually said “america’s DAIRYland” which makes a whole lot more sense…you know b/c of all the cows.

the pork & beans: part deux

so remember about a month ago when I was babbling on about the new weezer album? and everyone let out a collective *yawn*?

well, how do you like the first video off the red album? huh? that’s right.

pomp & circumstance

so guess what today is? watch this video with the sound turned UP and hang out until at least the 1minute mark, where it really kicks in.

you can call me dr. onelonelysuccess.

Ph.D FTW!!!!

when the curious girl realizes she is under glass

“…when the smoke came out our mouths on all those hooded sweatshirt walks, we were a stroke of luck. we were a goldmine and they gutted us.” -Bright Eyes “Gold Mine Gutted”

so when i was only barely holding my self together, i had a friend who could do a once-around-the-room and change the fortunes of everyone in attendance.

she was brilliant; hers is a life bordering charm and innocence.

she was a goldmine and they gutted her.

ben harper: live on tape

tomorrow night, ben harper & the innocent criminals are going to be performing “fight outta you” on last call w/ carson daly. this is a good reason to own a tivo and to set it accordingly. in fact, i’m blogging this so that i wont forget to do the same.

unlike the last time that benharper was on last call, i didnt go and see this taping. if, however, you want to take a walk down memory lane, then you should read these posts:

arent memories fun?

ya gotta spend some time with me

damn the video for deathcab’s single “i will possess your heart” is awesome. let’s see…hot hipster chick walking around in slow motion CHECK…band playing in the freezing cold with wet instruments CHECK…3 minute long bass-line intro CHECK.

i liked it so much i bought the full-on-high-quality-version from iTunes for $2 and that rarely happens.

What’s the point of twitter?

so having your friends on twitter is the best. i’ve explained it as being in an ‘always on IM session‘ with my buddies/family. nick, however, got blasted the other day by his girl for being a twit-a-holic.

he explained a recent twitter-related-encounter w/ his girlfriend in the comments section of this post.

Hey so last night kim was kinda in a bitchy mood and I told her she was dumb and she was all, “Im dumb? At least I don’t go online and talk to jeffs dog on that chat thing you do. Youre the dumb one. I saw what you were writing. Why? Whats the point? Why don’t you figure out how to do the laundry right instead of wasting your time on that lame shit?”

for the record, kim’s a cool chick but this was just comedy gold!

does anyone else ever get made fun of for people who havent drank the twitter-koolaid?

now with 100% more sucking

so today i decided to buy myself a graduation present, and here it is:

yep. i bought myself a new vacuum.

you see, despite being an ocd-stricken-clean-freak my entire life, i’ve always just “gotten by” with bargain basement vacuum cleaners. well no more, bitches! this beast of cleanliness is the bissell 3910 momentum and it’s a bad ass. amazon was having a nice sale on the unit and i got it w/ next-day shipping for just under $100.

it will be here tomorrow—just in time for a good cleaning before the family starts showing up this weekend—and i’ll post a more thorough review then.

are you as excited about this as i am!?!? i bet you are!

Twitxr - A Tale of Mobile Posting

in a continuing effort to streamline my web2.0 existence, i’ve made a few changes to how i share my wildly interesting mobile photos with the world.

basically all i want is to be able to post an image from my iPhone and have it propogate to Facebook, Flickr and send out a Twitter alert complete w/ link. previously, i was just uploading any mobile photos to directly to my Flickr account and then having my blog update my recent flickr photos into a nice row of thumbnails (which you can see at the top of this page).

not content with having to upload photos to multiple services, i’ve decided to go with a service called Twitxr (pronounced twit-cher).

emailing a photo from my iphone to the twitxr service posts the photo on my twitxr profile page—but more importantly—sends out a link to the photo via twitter, posts a copy of the photo to flickr (complete with geotagging info) and uploads a copy to my facebook profile.

i settled on Twitxr b/c they have a publicly available API that will allow for growth and community support; in addition, they also have a decent iPhone client that will hopefully benefit from the iPhone SDK.

now that you’re aware of all of my behind-the-scenes tech wranglings, you can finally go about your day in peace.

i was in love with mary ann

stumbled upon this picture today and for the first time realized that my childhood obsession with ‘gilligan’s island‘ may not have been as innocuous as i once thought.

in related news, i spent the entire day in the med lab doing basically what you see pictured in this photo…except no coconuts…and no mary ann.

blog house keeping (how i spent my saturday)

so since its the weekend (and no one visits this site on the weekends) i decided to do some blog housekeeping. here’s a few of the changes/modifications i’ve made to your favorite blog on the entire internet:

  1. Added the “Web Two-Point-Ohhhh” section to the top of the sidebar to conveniently list all of my profiles from across the world-wide-internet. Quick links to twitter, facebook, flickr, etc are all nicely organized for your perusing.
  2. Integrated the Disqus blog commenting system which has all sorts of bells & whistles that should making posting comments and keeping track of the compelling conversations that follow a d-r-e-a-m.
  3. Video Comments!!!! One of the perks of disqus is that they are partners with seesmic and allow for YOU (yes you!) to leave a video comment on any blog post! Simply click on the comments link of any post, click on “Record a Video Comment” and BAM the seesmic software pulls up your webcam and lets you easily record your thoughts of love and admiration for ME.
  4. Upgraded to Wordpress 2.5.1 and read up on how to cleverly integrate photos into the blog. Using the built-in Gallery in WP2.5+ and nick stakenburg’s incredible Lightview javascript library, I’ve got an easy to implement and dead-sexy gallery system in place.You can see this post for a demo.
  5. Went through and cleaned out all the stray files and unnecessary uploads from my FTP server & backed up my entire server. Organization is a good thing.
  6. Installed the WP-Cache2 plugin to speed up loading of the blog b/c you guys have more important things to do than wait around for my blog to load.
  7. Installed the Wordpress Backup plugin and scheduled daily/weekly backups of all of my content b/c like sand through the hourglass, these are the blogs of my life.

As my lack of a social-life permits, I want to download all of my Flickr sets to individual WP Gallery posts and whip up a gallery page so that all my little snowflakes are never more than a few clicks away from all that is ME.

redlands fire & javascript fun

so yesterday a brush fire broke out across the street from my apartment building. i snapped a few photos before the smoke/ash became too much even for my incredible-olympic-athlete-like respiratory system.

also, i’m playing around with the built-in Gallery option in Wordpress 2.5+ using the Lightview javascript, so click around on the thumbnails below for some sexy-nerd-fun.

one lonely word of wisdom :: 5.15.08

today’s 1LWoW involves the often-intimidating chore of public speaking…

Before u give a lecture clean the board with this and everyone in the front will be nice and high

so at some point in your professional life, you may find yourself assigned to give a lecture, make a sales presentation, etc.

understand that it is quite natural to be nervous/terrified.

from time-to-time, i give lectures to a bunch of really smart kids and i’ve learned the following:

if the classroom/lecture hall/conference room you’re using has a whiteboard then cleaning said whiteboard with copious amounts of spray cleaner minutes before your lecture will effectively make the first 3-4 rows of your audience high/drunk from the fumes. an added bonus to this phenomenon is that you too will be just drunk enough to bust out with the greatest lecture of your life.

note: if a whiteboard is not available then whiteboard spray cleaner may be substituted with whiskey shots.

My Twitter Updates on 2008-05-12

  • just finished washing my car and did a disappointingly average job…pfft #
  • Took Buster on a walk and he was impressed by this particular hydrant - photo at http://twitxr.com/jeffcarter/updates/43517 #
  • damn my vacuum cleaner just exploded midway through late night cleaning. there is dust EVERYWHERE! ugh #
  • ok so now there is a haze of dust, buster hair and carpet fresh lingering about head-level throughout my entire flat. *cough* *cough* #
  • tracking info about the earthquake in China through twitter while big media tries to keep up. #
  • Quake in southern Asia is reported as 7.8 near a population of 11million via USGS #
  • carefully planning out the day so that I can kick monday’s ass #

this is what happens when adults drink wine

so it was pretty awesome and fulfilling for you when i posted all sorts of pictures from my (now infamous) seattle 2008 dinner party.

also, you’re probably feeling shitty about missing the party b/c you had a final exam or an appointment with your gynecologist.

here’s more 10megapixel fun:

Seattle Dinner Party-12.jpg

while stonebraker was chopping our lettuce he was also chopping off his fucking-thumb which is increasingly funny when you find out that he’s a surgeon. HA! workman’s comp FTW!

after dinner brooke and julie sat around and told each other stories and we all listened b/c they are girls and girls can do whatever they want at parties.

Seattle Dinner Party-9.jpg

at some point the night turned to guitar hero b/c that’s what happens when adults get together and drink wine.
Seattle Dinner Party-8.jpg

dude…we played guitar hero on a 120″ screen. let me tell you now…you havent played GH until you’ve rawked it on a 120″ of goodness. it will blow your fucking mind.

Seattle Dinner Party-4.jpg

Seattle Dinner Party-3.jpg

ok so here are some more pictures of people at the party including me and my sexy-yet-stylish blue-striped-shirt. that’s right ladies…blue AND striped.

Seattle Dinner Party.jpg

Seattle Dinner Party-2.jpg

Seattle Dinner Party-2.jpg

oh and this dude was brooke’s bfriend and even though i cant remember his name he was all about posing for pictures while he played GH so that earns him a spot on the blog…also bonus party points for intensity.
Seattle Dinner Party.jpg

up high—on the side—down low—too slow

seattle dinner party

last month, i travelled up to seattle to see stonebraker b/c he’s my best-friend-in-the-whole-wide-world-ever. while i was there he decided to welcome me by throwing the dinner party of the year.

before the previous night’s drinking had even thought about wearing off, we headed out to market square to secure fresh seafood and produce. the party was a super-smash-sensation and we got silly while eating incredible food and playing guitar hero on a giant 120-fuck-inch screen. yeah! i know!

here’s a few stumbling shots that managed to survive the night.

Seattle Dinner Party-23.jpg

the first ingredient to any good party is stoli

Seattle Dinner Party-21.jpg

farm fresh seattle goods

Seattle Dinner Party-22.jpg

stonebraker is an incredible cook…

Seattle Dinner Party-20.jpg

this pacific-northwest-fish doesnt know what he’s missing!

Seattle Dinner Party-16.jpg

chop-chop!

Seattle Dinner Party-15.jpg

so the pretty girl helped set the table and people were all a flutter over the ambiance

ok so i have like 20 more awesome-rad-super-show-photos to share…but this is enough for one post.

also, now i’m hungry.

My Twitter Updates on 2008-05-11

  • god do the companies that make car alarms have ANY idea how annoying they sound…oh wait. #
  • playing around with twitterfone because typing is for losers
    http://tinyurl.com/5qo6kn #
  • @alexalbrecht MobileTwitter on the iPhone hands down! #
  • can someone please explain to me why jenna bush getting married is top news on cnn.com? #

making music with john mayer

i’ve never been a huge fan of john mayer’s music; that being said, the guy is fuck hilarious. check out the latest video from funnyordie.com or an episode of “john mayer has a tv show“.

favorite line: “have all the chords in music been found? some say ‘yes’. i say, not so fast, asshole”

My Twitter Updates on 2008-05-10

  • @st0ney I think everyone was shocked that u made it through a day of class today. Tomorrow can be for personal development #
  • At home watching the laker game, hanging with @busterthedog and chillaxing #
  • Sirius satellite plus the 90s Alt station FTW! - http://twitpic.com/xmh #
  • Top secret lab stuff! - photo at http://twitxr.com/jeffcarter/updates/42644 #
  • giving Tweetr 3.1 a try and digging the simplified interface #
  • wishing @lcarter97 best of luck on her law exam today! #
  • just had a great convo with @gst0ne about photography and the sweet new Rebel XSi…that guy’s cool #

My Twitter Updates on 2008-05-09

  • @gruber to me cindy mccain has always me of something out of an Anne Rice novel #
  • @st0ney wow that is a nice room! i’m so jealous right now. #
  • @st0ney the speaker fell off the stage?! HFS! #