Yeah, it’s been a little quiet around here. So? I’ve been busy listening to the sickest Hasidic Reggae Rocker around the block. What, you haven’t heard about this guy? Get a clue. The name is Matisyahu (and the way the DJ’s on the radio say it sounds like Modest Yahoo). Try out “King Without A Crown” to get a taste.

Frighteningly, another thing has changed. I now only download legal music.
Now now, I know what you are thinking. Why would I pay for music when I could just hit up (insert torrent site/newsgroup site/p2p network here) for the same songs for free? You made quite the violent assumption - and you were wrong… I wouldn’t pay for music…

My buddies at Dell were nice enough to hook me up with a year subscription of Napster to Go. Although, I gotta say, when this year ends it is going to be HARD to give up! The quality of these songs are unsurpassed, they download at unbelievable speed, searches take less than 5 seconds, the “other listeners also liked:” suggestions are on the money, and its Napster! We all have a soft spot in our heart for Napster. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention, Dell also happened to ship me a little Dell DJ - SICK. Shufflin was fun while it lasted, but there is no looking back now.

Good to be back, tell your friends - or better yet, tell Zeek.

I didn’t choose to be an economics major for a reason. It seems freaking hard. The introductory macro and micro economic courses that I took freshman year were very interesting, but they mainly focused on learning about major economists and their general mindsets. Learning how they came up with these mindsets was more than I was looking to bite off.

None the less, it is interesting stuff to me. I can’t help but to think it is impressive that every day a new report comes out and the entire country’s and often the world’s economy reacts accordingly.

So, when perusing The Journal or watching CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC, or Headline News (which I find myself doing more and more) and something snags my interest I often surf over to The Big Picture. TBP is definitely slanted by the author’s point of view (who happened to be on Your World w/Neil Cavuto today), but often whether I agree or not with his take on the issue I feel very informed after reading. I highly encourage anyone interested in economics and “the big picture” of business today to check it out.

Being that The Beast (my broken down 1988 Ford Bronco) is sidelined indefinitely with an unknown injury, I figured I’d take a gander at last weeks New York International Auto Show. All I can say is that I want need a new car. The only question now is do I want a sports car like the new 450 horsepower supercharged V8 Ford Shelby Cobra GT500, something a little more practical like the four door 425 horsepower 6.1 liter Hemi V8 Dodge Charger SRT-8, or I could stick with the SUV trend and look towards the 415 horsepower 6.1 liter Hemi V8 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT-8.

So many choices, so little money .

In my mind one of the few organizations that has a viral sales effect similar to Mac’s is that of the Girl Scouts. For two months in the spring of every year, thousands of young women spread out to knock on our doors and hawk over priced cookies. And every year we buy them up. What is it about an 8 year old girl with a green vest on that sucks those singles out of my wallet?

From personal experience while working in the warehouse at Dircks Moving Services the transportation, sorting, and distribution of the cookies is nothing less than jaw dropping. First, the cookies come in by the ton (seriously) and are stacked in the warehouse until about a week before “C-Day” (Cookie Day) when the updated order quantities come in. The warehouse staff breaks the cookie pallets down and sorts them into districts and readies them for distribution. Then early on Saturday “C-Day” morning the vans and suv’s start to line up in the parking lot. The troop mom’s armed with their order list, and megaphone take over from there ordering pallets to be broken down, sorted out, and readied for pickup. By midnight or so on “C-Day” the parking lot is covered with cookie crumbs, cardboard, and a few last scattered green vests. To give you an idea of the scope of the Girl Scout Cookie operation, check out these statistics for the South Carolina Girl Scout Cookie Sale.

Sidenote: In case anyone is looking to pick up a last second Easter present for me, I looove Samoas.

Mac finally roped me in today. On a mission at Best Buy to pick up a new alarm clock (which was of course sold out) I found myself with $75 in gift cards burning a whole in my wallet. I dabbled with the idea of a computer component, a memory card for my Treo, and a new PS2 game before deciding to head for the door empty handed. Ah, but those pesky marketers were up to no good and plopped the mp3 player kiosk right near the door.

Trying hard to maintain face in front of a known Mac user friend of mine, I looked over all of the portable media devices like the Rio, and the Nomad. I was convinced by said friend that I didn’t want an MP3 player that I would have to buy batteries for every other day. With that in mind, my skeptical outlook on the need to have any more than 512mb memory, and my even more skeptical outlook on the price/value of the device, I was pointed directly at the iPod Shuffle.

Impressions thus far:

• Impressed at the quality of the included headphones and the power put out by the .8oz item.
• Angry at the inability to add/remove songs via Windows Explorer.
• Thus, angry that Mac’s proprietary iTunes software was a required install.
• Even more angry that the iTunes software come bundled with the dogpoop of a programm QuickTime
• Inspired by the Shuffle’s simplicity; ie: no lcd, simple user interface, and unobtrusive branding to name a few examples.
• Intrigued by Mac as a brand a little more than yesterday when I was a little more intrigued by Mac than the day before.

Now, maybe I will be able to put it to good use, while working out on a regular basis for example. In other news, I need to win at poker this week to recover the lost cash cost spent on the damn thing.