Jun 5, 2009 Posted by Skid Vis on Jun 5, 2009 in Yadda Yadda | View Comments

8 Steps to Happenis.

Stop hiding who you really are.

“Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.”
- Judy Garland

Start being intensely selfish.

“When you come right down to it all you have is yourself. The sun is a thousand rays in your belly. All the rest is nothing.”
- Pablo Picasso

Stop following the rules.

“If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun.”
- Katharine Hepburn

Start scaring yourself.

“Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success.”
- Ernest Shackleton

Stop taking it all so damn seriously.

“Don’t take life too seriously; you’ll never get out of it alive.”
- Elbert Hubbard

Start getting rid of the crap.

“Knowledge is a process of piling up facts; wisdom lies in their simplification.”
- Martin H. Fischer

Stop being busy.

“We’re lost, but we’re making good time”
- Yogi Berra

Start something.

“After all is said and done, more is said than done.”
- Aesop

Begged, Borrowed, and Stolen from Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun. Good stuff, but I feel this isn’t so much about having fun, as it is about being happy. They also wrongly attributed some of the quotes.. but who’s keeping track, right?

May 12, 2009 Posted by Skid Vis on May 12, 2009 in Yadda Yadda | View Comments

30 daze and 30 knights.

Wow, it’s been a whole month since I’ve written anything? Holy shiatsu, how time flies. Well, since I know you’re just DYING to know, let me give you a glimpse of the last 30 days.

• Extra! Extra! Read all about it!
  • George Clooney, Jason Reitman, and a few Hollywood-types were in town to film a lil movie called ‘Up in the Air‘. George Clooney plays this guy who travels across the country for a company that fires people. Uplifting stuff. I play “Guy walking around like he’s never been in an airport before.”, if I’m even in it at all. I spent 16 hours with about 200 other Extras at the airport pretending to be travelers and flight staff. I found it rather interesting that they needed extras for this, considering that the airport was fully operational and there were plenty of REAL people hustlin’ and blustlin’ through the airport. I’m not complaining though, I’ll be happy if I can see myself on the big screen for one tenth of a second. Such a ham I be, I’m surprised I don’t like Apples more. On a side note, the Extras were split into three groups: Apples, Bananas, and Cherries. I was a Cherry, of course.
• Cinco de Mrazo
  • So there’s this guy, Jason Mraz, he thinks he knows how to sing. Lucky for him, I happen to agree. If you know me, you know that I know that you know that we all know that I know pretty much all of this kid’s songs. I’m not much for going to concerts, but I know this guys sounds great live and is an awesome entertainer, so I always make the effort to see him perform. This particular concert was on May 5, or ‘Cinco de Mayo’ for you partiers out there. As you know, I had a contest to try and show up there with a date, but that was a bust. Instead I showed up alone, met up with Jack Deus and his wife, and we huddled all night just a few feet from the stage. If you were there, you couldn’t have missed me.. I was the dork with the black Sombrero that was probably blocking your view. If if you were there early enough, before Jason performed, before the Plain White T’s performed, and smack-dab in the middle of Anya Marina’s performance, I’m sure you heard my name flowing from her luscious, ‘probably dry from being stoned’-lips. Yes, I lasso’d the moon.. but that’s a story for when I have grand kids. The show was awesome, I’m awesome, let’s move on.
• Gary V saw my O! face.
  • Gary Who? Gary Vaynerchuk. He’s a rich guy who has more money than sense and a video blog about wine. He was here, we shook hands, I washed them quickly afterwards. What was he doing here? Well, these two guys, Jeff Slobotski and Dusty D (Dusty Doily?), wished on a star, rubbed a lamp, and do-si-do’ed their asses off to organize Omaha’s first ever non-crappy tech/business conference: BigOmaha. For one day, Omaha was THE place to be.. if you’re a geek. People came from all over the world.. country.. midwest? to listen to Gary V, Jason Fried, Girls in Tech, Micah Baldwin, Jeffrey Kalmikoff, and a rat-load of other speakers talk about business, technology, failure, and who knows what else. It was an awesome event that I’m glad happened. Omaha might just stand a chance. After the conference was an.. after-party at the Nomad Lounge over on 10th and Jones. Attendees got free drinks, so heck yea I’m there. I called up Jack Deus again and he was my shadow for a couple hours until the alcohol traded places with him. He left and I proceeded to make a fool of myself, which comes amazingly easy.. as I do, in front of all kinds of strangers whom I’m sure went home with the same question every past lover has shared.. What’s that guy’s problem?

So there it is. 30 days, 3 events.. about one every 10 days.. that’s not bad, right? In 30 days I’ve laughed, I’ve cried, I’ve wanted to be alone, I’ve wanted to be in a crowd, I’ve wanted to live, and yes.. I’ve even wanted to die. But hey, that’s just a normal month for this Sexy, Kind, Intelligent, and Dangerous Vis.

Apr 12, 2009 Posted by Skid Vis on Apr 12, 2009 in Words of Visdom | View Comments

Acts 8:23

When I was a young’n.. you know, last week sometime.. I would frequent church all the time. Not by choice, mind you. My parents were very strict religious people, and going to church was a nearly daily event. An event that I really couldn’t comprehend and certainly didn’t enjoy. Those of you who know me well, know that I have a unique set of beliefs.

As a young teen, I wanted to believe.. not just in God, but in everything.. Bigfoot, The Lochness Monster, The Bermuda Triangle, Aliens.. all of it. I’d spend many days skipping school and digging deep into all kinds of books at the public library. Being forced to attend church services many times a week, made religion a more prominent area of research. I could never understand the point of the service itself.. I mean, people arrive at the church and greet each other, then there’s singing.. ok.. and then someone takes the stand and yells at us for being sinners, then they ask us for money? I found it all very insulting, monotonous, and boring.

Sleeping was forbidden in church, go figure, so I had to find something to occupy my time. What a better thing than to read the Bible? But where to start? Genesis? Sure.. that’s the beginning.. but I pretty much know the story just from the many times I’ve heard it. Revelations? Um.. that’s kinda scary and grim, and probably wouldn’t make much sense without having read what came before it, right? Well.. where do I start?

I’ve always been a “dart-board decider”, When I don’t know what to do, I just jump in and figure it out. My home state of Connecticut has no NFL team, so when it came time for me to pick one to follow, I just turned on the TV, found a game, and adopted the winner (Vikings). That said, when trying to decide on the Bible, I let God tell me why I should even bother. I plopped the big book on it’s back, let the pages fall as the may, and locked my eyes on the first thing I could.

“For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”, Acts 8:23

That’s what I saw. What came before, and what followed after, were of complete insignificance to me. I was bewildered by the fact that I ended up landing on such a direct and plain answer to the question in my head. I was bitter, I hated being dragged to church kicking and screaming almost every day, and.. well, trapped by sin was the way to roll. You had to be either one of Them, or one of Us, and being one of Us yielded a lot more safety.. ironically.

I don’t know if it started there or not, but that moment sticks out as a reassurance of why I don’t believe in chance. Like the movie, “City of Angels”, I believe that there are forces constantly acting For AND Against us. I’ve been very blessed and fortunate. More often than not, my prayers get answered. So much so, that I fear praying sometimes..

When I was a kid, I loved my Godfather. You see, my family was poor. For me, Birthdays sucked, as did Christmas. There was hardly enough money for food, much less for the luxuries that we always crave. My Godfather, however, he always had money.. he was in the game. Whenever I was allowed to see him, I totally enjoyed it.. it always resulted in some money and a shopping spree. As I aged, I started to understand HOW he got his money.. and that made the gifts not as pleasant to receive. One day, my Godfather was a involved in a pretty bad car accident, the docs said he’d never be able to walk again. At that point, he turned his life around and decided to commit to God. It was pleasant to see the change. My parents, who were always hesitant to let me spend time with my Godfather, now had something in common with him again. It brought us all closer, and it was nice. Slowly but surely, my Godfather’s injuries started to heal, until finally.. he walked. As if he were an inmate that had just been released back into the world, my Godfather left the church, and resumed business as usual.

That memory stands in the front row every time I decide to pray. Am I using my faith as some sort of magic genie? Is this request worthy enough? Selfless enough? Sometimes, when my heart starts to act up, and I’m overcome with the fear of dying, my instinct is to beg for mercy, to ask God not to take me.. but then my Godfather pops in.. I feel calm, and accept that if I have to die, there’s no point in begging for him to change his mind, instead.. I just think of those I love.

It’s been decades since I was that kid, yet Acts 8:23 still holds just as precise. I’m still bitter and I’m still locked in sin, but it’s Easter, a day to remember that there is Hope even when the worst of the worst has happened. Life can be painful, difficult, and disappointing.. but next time you’re feeling that way, take one second to realized that you’re being watched, you’re being held, and you’re being loved.

Peace out.

Mar 22, 2009 Posted by Skid Vis on Mar 22, 2009 in Yadda Yadda | View Comments

Dating site review

What’s all this, now?

Included, for your viewing pleasure, is a dating site popularity chart. I’ve been dating for a little while and I’ve tried pretty much all of the dating sites out there. I figure it’s high time I let people know what I think about these super fine sites.. it’s been a while since I’ve done a ProCons.. so let’s begin.

Yippee!

Match.com

• Pros
  • Tons of users!
    • Being the most popular has its benefits. You’re pretty much guaranteed to FIND the type of person you’re looking for on this site.
  • Refined Search
    • If you’re reeeeeally picky.. like I am.. you can really drill down in their search and find that one blond that’s a holiday-only christian, plays football, doesn’t like white wine, likes sushi, climbed Mount Everest, and wears thongs. Their search is fun!
• Cons
  • Cost!
    • It’s 30 bucks a month to be on this sham. For 30 bucks a month, this site will go out of its way to keep you single.
  • 2-timing sleezeballs.
    • If Match.com isn’t stealing enough money from people, they also own Chemistry.com, Chemistry is Match’s attempt at a eHarmony-like system. Think about it.. we’re so confident in our dating site, we own two. Gimme your money and shut up like a good tool.
  • Horrible Chat
    • Instant Messaging is my thing. Why would I want to spend 3 days emailing back and forth only to discover there’s a huge issue which breaks our compatibility when I could discover that issue within 30 seconds of IM? The chat on Match.com blows.. big time. It’s about as passive as someone sticking a post-it to your front door. You try to IM someone and they aren’t notified.. instead a teeny-tiny little link appears in the top left of the screen.. I’ve missed it, and I’m sure all those bitches that ignored me missed it too.
  • Pay to play?
    • Ok.. so I’m dropping my 30 bills a month to use this thing.. I see a smoking hot redhead.. yumm.. so I send her my world-famous “Do you come here often?” email. But wait.. if she’s not plopping down her hard-earned cash, she can’t even READ the damn thing, much less REPLY to it! Unless you subscribe, all you can do is WINK at someone.. which is just about useless. It just sends you an email saying someone likes you. I think the ability to reply should always be free.

PlentyOfFish.com

• Pros
  • It’s FREE!
    • That’s right, it’s not #2 for nothing. POF is 100% free. You can browse, search, and send/recieve emails all without spending a dime. They recently added some crappy Premium account, but that’s cuz the developer is an a-hole and doesn’t think his crappy site has made him enough millions for sitting on his ass.
  • Plenty of Fish!
    • Yes, being #2 means that there’s tons of people to check out. Yippee!
• Cons
  • Total Crap.
    • POF is perhaps the crappiest website on the internet. It looks like crap, the images are all distorted, sometimes images don’t load, it has no fancy-dancy web 2.0 magic.. it just plain sucks. I get physically ill when I think about how much money this bloke makes with this POS.
  • Sucky IM
    • Just like Match.com, the Chat app on this site is horrible. It’s about 1% better than Match, but that’s not saying much.
  • Free.. from HELL
    • Free is good, right? I mean.. who wants to spend so much money on a dating site? I do! Free means every wacko, weirdo, and whizzbang is going to hop on, create an account, and pee in the pool. Making you pay to be a part of a site does a decent job of weeding out the wackos.. sure, there’s some “interesting” people on Match.com, but the ratio is like 99:1. I fear checking my mail on POF sometimes. There may be plenty of fish, but the water sure is polluted.

eHarmony.com

• Pros
  • Um.. nice commercials?
    • We’ve all seen the commercials. eHarm uses a highly sophisticated matching system that matches people based on the 20-something bla bla bla’s that make couples work. Right.
• Cons
  • Cost!
    • eHarm costs a ton of cash for a little amount of service. It’s rediculous.
  • No Search
    • eHarm doesn’t let YOU sift through their member list.. THEY get to pick. So you’re basically paying them to let you wait.
  • 20-something levels of BS.
    • When you join eHarm, they have you take this personality test. They ask all kinds of questions to try to figure you out.. it’s actually kinda fun. Then they ask you about your dream-date… what’s he/she like.. bla bla bla. Then they use that info to match you up with the perfect person. …or, do you really just pick a random person from the file cabinet? I told them: I like physically active, white redheads. It’s my thing.. what can I say? What was my 1st match? An overly obese African American chick. Great job.. can I get my money back? No? Could you use lube next time, then?

OKCupid.com

• Pros
  • It’s FREE!!
    • Like POF, OKC is 100% Free! It’s amazing too, considering how awesome it is.
  • Beautiful.
    • OKC is the lowest ranked site on this list.. and that’s a shame. OKC is a work of art. This website look amazing, it has all the fancy dancy web 2.0 features, it’s intuitive, easy to use.. Beautiful.
  • Awesome IM.
    • The chat on OKC is a lot like Google Chat. It’s quick, responsive, does a great job of notifying you without being intrusive or obnoxious, let’s you block people.. it’s a wonderful thing!
• Cons
  • Lowest on the pole.
    • Not many people know of OKC apparently.. which is sad because it’s a truly great site. But, low numbers means you’ll not have many people to choose from. I hope more people turn to this, it would great!
  • Crazy loons.
    • As I mentioned with POF, Free means the crazies are everywhere. Some people have even created bogus accounts JUST to be a-holes. People are strange.
  • Saki Search
    • If the search on this was as refined as Match.com, I’d be loving it.. but I can’t drill down to be as picky as I love to be.

In a perfect world, Match.com would buy OKCupid and rename it Match.com, they’d drop the monthly fee and instead make it like $50 for 5 years. If you can’t find someone in 5 years then.. well, you have your cats.

Thanks for the review, oh great one.

Anytime, kid.. anytime.

Mar 15, 2009 Posted by Skid Vis on Mar 15, 2009 in Yadda Yadda | View Comments

Petty or not, here I come!

Um.. you have some thing with Tom Petty now?

Nope. Today was a great day.. I ran a few errands and played outside in the great weather. As my day went on, I found myself experiencing bouts of sadness.

Aww, what’s wrong? Realized that because you’re such an a-hole you’re forced to do things alone?

No.. I’m always well aware of that fact. My sadness was brought on by the petty. Throughout the day I kept running into situations that were so minor and meaningless, that they did not merit sharing. Not worthy of a phone call, a text, or even a twitter. You know what I’m talking about.. itty bitty things that you would only verbalize if you were standing in front of a loved-one.

Um.. something like “my ass itches”?

Uh.. no. More “average” things.. things like “I think we should get a new trash can, this one’s starting to smell funny” or “I think I should paint the lawn furniture white.”. See? Things that aren’t important, but that you’d like to express to someone who would actually give a rat’s ass. (Sorry rats!) You see, no matter how good my friends may be, I’m pretty sure not one of them would be amused if they received a call from me asking them how long past the expiration date they think it’s ok to eat Yogurt.. I mean, it’s already Bacteria, right? What’s an extra week gonna hurt?

Eww.

Yea.. but the person who shares my bed would not bat an eyelash at a question like that.. maybe a chuckle, followed by prying the spoon from my mouth.. but that’s it! Relationships bring with them tons of headaches.. I’m well aware of that, but they also bring with them the little things that make a wonderful, sunny Sunday afternoon an absolute pleasure to share. If you have it, Cherish it.