Too old to Trick-or-Treat?

All Hallows Eve is a magical night.
You get to play dress-up with the rest of the world.
You get to go up to complete strangers and ask them for candy.

But some people think this is only for the young; and not the young of heart.

Despite the fact that I'm almost 28, I still haven't reached "too old".


I'm the oldest child in my house.
My youngest brother is 15 years younger than I am.

That means when I was 15, I was Trick or Treating with a 10yo, 5yo, and a baby.

As long as you have those younger siblings with you, people don't complain.
"Oh what a cute baby! Have some candy."

Of course the baby can't eat the candy, but that's not the point.

And when I wasn't walking around with a baby?
My youth group used to go Trick or Treating for cans.
We'd dress up and go door-to-door asking for canned goods. We'd explain that we're collecting them for the local food bank.
It works out great. People are already planning on being home, answeing their door, and giving stuff away--migt as well do it for a good cause.
And then they insist that we take some candy as well.

And latley?

My siblings have grown up, I'm not in a youth group. What now?

I have two children of my own.
I'll be taking a 1yo and an almost 3yo around the neighborhood.

Yup. I'm still going strong.

What Google Voice means to Sprint users (verses everyone else)

A while back, Google realsed Google Voice. In fact, they're still releasing it.

While I admit that it looks cool, the biggest "wow" factor was having all of your phones ring at once.

For someone like my mother-in-law, who is a realestate broker, that would be fantastic.
You give out ONE number, and no matter if you're home, at the office, or at a showing, you're able to be reached.

For someone like me who has ONE phone, there's not much of a point.

Yes, yes, I know all about the e-mail voicemail. I don't get that many messages.



Even more recently, Sprint rolled out a new program: Unlimited calling to ANY mobile number (US only).

Sweet. No "top 10" or "fav 5", you can call any of the hundreds of cell phones in this country for free.

So with my 1500 minute plan, I've got to actually hunt for landlines to call.

Unless I use Google Voice.

While I haven't looked at my phone bill yet, Sprint Customer Service claims that a GV number is considered a landline.

Now let me back up.

GV works like this.
Google gives you a new phone number. When someone calls that number, you actually get a incoming call from *your GV number*.
When you make a call, you dial *your GV number*.

Your call history will to to and from the same number (as far as the phone company is concerned).


So yes, *every* call I make/receive will be to a landline, and will cost me minutes.
Suddenly that whole unlimited mobile calling seems rather lame.


What if I don't use Sprint?

Check this out.
If your wireless provider lets you select a landline in your "fav 5" or "top 10", all you have to do is include your GV number, and all of a sudden, ALL of your calls are free.
It doesn't matter who you call, as long as you call them through GV.


Pretty nifty if you ask me.

-----------------
As of this morning, I am able to make my Prē send all TXTs and calls through GV by default.
As far as the user (that's me) is concerned, I'm using my phone like normal. All of the work is in the background.
As neat as that is, I'll have to pass for now. 

I need your help!

I need y'all's help winning a contest.

If you have a MySpace account, I need you to request to be friends with the band Savvy & Mandy.

If you don't have a MySpace account, you should sign-up for one.

When (not if) you make the request, I need you to put "referred by naHQun http://www.myspace.com/naHQun" in the 'send message' section.

This will help them keep track of the referrals.

Once I refer the most people between now and the 31st, I'll WIN!

Official Contest Rules.

Kellogs Star Trek Promotion Part 2

As I mentioned in Part 1 (http://nahqun.blogspot.com/2009/08/kellogs-star-trek-promotion-part-1.html), I ordered (well, Dalyn ordered) every promotional item available from the Kellog's/Star Trek catalog.
Sadly, not much more has shown up since the last post.

A few weeks ago, or maybe it's been a month now, I got a postcard from Kellog's. Basically is says that they sold out of T-shirts, but they're ordering more and I should expect my shirt in November.
And while I hate to wait, I'm surprised that they're doing this.
Accorsing to the rules (which are standard), they have the right to substitute a different item.
They could pretty much send me anything in their wharehouse that has the same value. Anything.
But instead, they're actually having a second run of shirts made.

Amazing.

A week later, Dalyn got a similar notice.
But her's offered her a chance at a refund.

A refund? Really? Also against insustry standards.

I'm quite proud of Kellog's for handing this so well.
Not only are they spending money to keep us all informed, but they're making sure we have the chance to get the right item, or a refund.

And then not too long after that, Dalyn got two letters from Kellog's.
It ended up being the one free item we ordered--the movie tickets.

Not only do we get to see a movie for free (well, for the price of a stamp), but it claims to work on "no pass" shows too.

DATE NIGHT!!!

We'll see how late into November we have to wait.

And then there's the USB drive and waffle plate..

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Lack of pictures due to blogging on the go, and the fact that they'd be boring anyway.

What the heck are you listening to?

As some of you may have noticed, my status updates have been filled
with song quotes and references to what I'm listening to.
Even back on Wednesday when all of my updates where in Klingon, I was
playfully translating lyrics.

But what in the world am I listening to?

Way back in the day, Dad and I downloaded a whole lot of .mp3s onto
the family PC.

A lot. Trust me.

So many, in fact, that we crashed it. (Well there were DS9 episodes too...)

So My Mother bought some blank CD-Rs and burnt all of the .mp3s to disk.
That's right, not as music CDs, but as straight .mp3 files.

I happened to get my hands on these CDs the other day, and as my car
CD player accepts .mp3s, I've been listening to them.
I'd say there's between 145 and 200 songs on each disk. And there are
at least 20 disks.

That's at least 2,900 songs. (yes, I did pull out the calculator...)

Now, like I said, there were two people involved in the downloads.
(which were perfectly legal at the time, thank you very much).
So I've been skipping the weird stuff that my dad listens to, and
focusing on my music.

Now, the files were burnt mostly in alphabetical order by file name.
So, we have 3,000 songs mostly listed alphabetically by artist
spanning over SEVERAL decades.
That makes for some funny transitions.

Rob Zombie and Rod Stewart for example.
Godsmack to God's Army Soundtrack.

and so on...

And I'll go back to my eclectic music collection now.

I don't want to pay for your 800 number.

According to dictionary.com,

“800” number –noun any toll-free telephone number, usually with a 3-digit code of 800, established, as by a business, so that people from widespread areas can call for merchandise, information, or services.

Like it says, 800 numbers are useful for calling what would otherwise be a long-distance number.Who wants to pay to call their credit card company?

Not me.

And so companies establish these "toll-free" numbers.

But they're not really toll-free. The company has to pay for it. And guess what, they pass the bill along to you, their customer. So you really are paying for that phone call. Hopefully, you're still saving though.

So what about cell phones?

Yes, cell phones don't have "long-distance". I can call anyone in the 50 states for the same price.

Wait, you can call anyone for one rate?

Yep.

So, you could say... call your credit card company in Dallas.

Yes, if my credit card company was located in Dallas, it would be the same as calling a local number here in Indy.

Sweet.

I know.

So why are you calling an 800 number from your cell?

That's a good question. I'm using my minutes to make the call. And they're using their 800 number. So we're being charged on both ends of the call. And then part of my payment is going towards that 800 number. I'm being charged TWICE for one call. I need to find a local number for my credit card company.

It's on your bill.

It is?

Yeah. It's labeled "collect". If you need to call them collect, they list a local number for that purpose. The number works whether the call is collect or not. Just don't dial from your land-line.

Sweet.

So why do companies still have 800 numbers then?

A couple of reasons:

• Habit. They've always had one, why wouldn't they?
• Not everyone has a cell phone. Some people still need it.
• Mindset. You feel comfortable dialing an 800 number.But chances are, you don't need them.

A while back, I signed up for Vonage. Any VOIP provider that offers "unlimited nationwide calling" has no reason for an 800 number for their customers to call.Sure, have one for your potential customers, but when I call to ask a question, why waste the money?

Y'all've been asking for my opinion, so here it is.

So all y'all watched the Teen Choice Awards the other day, right?

Don't worry, I didn't either. But boy did I hear about them!

Mostly, I heard that Miley Cyrus performed a pole dance and stripped. I also heard people calling her not-so-nice names.

I was slowly exposed to everyone's opinions.

The people I follow on Twitter were defending Miley (in fact, #WeLoveYouMiley was one of the most popular topics on Twitter for TWO DAYS STRAIGHT!).

My wife said something about needing to wear more clothes.

A Nurse I talk to said her 30+ year-old husband enjoyed it. She thought it was alright.

I happened to come across a recording on YouTube. By "happen to come across", I mean that a friend tweet™ed a link.

And?

Sweet niblets like to complain!

Really? Isn't that what one expects from a female performer at an awards show?

She sang, she danced, she performed. I think dancing and performing are actually the same thing in this case.

Now, before anyone starts panicking (like my wife...), let me move on.

While that's the type of dance I would expect from say... Brittany Spears, that doesn't make it right.

This isn't just any awards ceremony, it the Teen Choice Awards. For teens. People 13-19 or so. Probably younger. Not so much the 19 year-olds.

And it's someone else's show. When invited to perform at an event, you should try to err on the side of caution. You're representing them too.

If it's your concert, you can do whatever you want. It's YOURS. An awards show, or a Super Bowl half-time show, is not the place to try something new.

• Stripping

She stripped? Okay, at the very beginning she took off a boa? a scarf? a something. She removed one article of superfluous clothing. I wouldn't call that stripping.

It's like taking off a jacket.

Although, I will admit that she was more modest before that thing came off.

• The pole.

Even if she just touched the pole with her finger, people would have freaked.

In our society, if you're dancing, and you have a pole, you're pole dancing and a stripper. Period.

The pole is considered a sex symbol of sorts. It comes with its own luggage.

There is no way to tastefully pull off a dance with a pole.

That being said, she wasn't pole dancing. Besides that one little dip, she basically just stood there. But that one little dip is why mothers across America are in an uproar.

But don't just blame her. You don't manage to get on national TV and perform on stage on your own.

This would have taken months of practice and planning and approval. Tons of people would have been involved in selecting, creating, training, and approving the dance.

Not only that, but it had a TWENTY-FOUR HOUR delay. After the half-time show problem years ago, NBC has added a five second delay to all live broadcasts. This show had an entire day.

If the show's producers had a problem with it, they had plenty of time to just cut it out.

Miley's dad didn't have a problem with it either:

“You know what? I just think that Miley loves entertaining people. She loves singing [and] songwriting. I always tell her to love what you’re doing and stay focused for the love of the art and not worry so much about opinion. I give my kids a lot of freedom to make the art they wanna make, and make it in their own voice. I think it’s important.”

The Disney Channel however, said this:

“Disney Channel won’t be commenting on that performance, although parents can rest assured that all content presented on the Disney Channel is age-appropriate for our audience — kids 6-14 — and consistent with what our brand values are.”

Well then.

So no, I don't think that a pole should have been anywhere near that stage. And yes, I feel like that skirt should've been longer, and yes, I feel like she shouldn't be showing off her bra straps.

But if you're going to yell at someone, yell at a bunch of someones. A whole lot of people (I'm going to assume that they're adults. Maybe even "corporate males") would have had several opportunities to keep the dance we saw go out on national TV. Yell at them.