Oy vey. I am interviewing Rufus Wainwright any minute now. Crazy. I’m scared because he’s too cool for me, but as Charles says, “He shits just like the rest of us.”

A warning. This site may be down starting Thursday. I am in the process of switching hosts and I may not have timed things right. We’ll find out soon.

Russians jealous of Everquestians. You have probably heard of Everquest, the most popular online game to date. In fact, I have mentioned it before. Another funny store surrounding the game has cropped up.

According to CNET, players of Everquest earn an average of $3.42 an hour and produce annual gross exports of $5 million. This is all done by selling "Platinum Points," characters and other things online (an example). In fact, if the Everquest universe were a nation its per capita income of $2,266 would make them the 77th richest country in the world, right between Russia and Bulgaria.

Addictions to this game make a little more sense now. Some of these people are probably living off of Everquest. I bet I could live off Madden if it were possible. Hmm.

The cold. There has been a lot of talk about “the cold” today. Yes, it is chillier than last week but I welcome it, for a few reasons.

1. Winter is supposed to be cold. That’s just the way it goes.
2. I like the cold and I’ve missed it. It’s nice to wear light coats but I have a ton of sweaters and they need to be put to use.
3. Cold = Snow — and there’s nothing I like more than snow.
4. Rosy cheeks are hot. Nothing beats people come in from the cold, throwing down coats and hats with rosy red cheeks.

I’m glad it’s cold and I can’t wait for the snow tonight.

He he, I am the coolest. Oh, and Marla was my second place, which also rules.

Lego my video. The White Stripes are back with a nutty video that is made with legos. You’ll have to see it to believe it.

Gosford Park is wonderful. I had no desire to see this movie until I realized my good friend Robert Altman directed it. This summer I went to see Dr. T and the Women and I just loved it. It wasn’t the most innovative or breathtaking movie, but it was just damn good. Altman has a flair for great character development and it really shines in Gosford Park. Granted, there are over 30 speaking parts and it is hard to keep track of, but figuring out who’s who is half the fun. So, if you enjoy character driven films then this one’s for you.

February 1st, er, no. So I am realizing the site will not be ready until after the first. It’s going to be more like a week from then. Sorry, for the first time in my life I am going to have to give homework precedent.

I think I am going to enjoy Mondays the most this semester. I only have one class from 12-1:15, which gives me plenty of time to do stuff that needs to be done. This is better than a day without classes because I am forced to get out of bed/the house, which helps me stay awake.

Top albums of 2002: 1. Cornelius - Point. 2. That’s all.

New site development. Well, things have been slow going in the site development center. I definitely am ready for a new design but I’m not loving anything I have right now. So, I’ll probably change things and see how I feel about it later. The new site will be up February 1st, followed by a quick hiatus as I’ll be out of town for the weekend staffing a retreat.

In other news…the new Cornelius album is unbelievable, as would be expected. It’s a bit more toned down than the last one, but still brilliant. Go download some tracks.

I don’t want to grow up. Today I was talking to Eric Clay, who is the first person I met at this university. We met at SOAR (orientation) four years ago. While talking to him he told me that he is engaged. Now this is the first person who I am friends with and is my age who is engaged. I was happy for him and this is very cool, but it makes me a little nervous. As much as I would like to have someone who I want to marry, I can’t imagine what that would be like. The whole thing is just scary.

It is just a reminder that is time for me to grow up in a lot of ways. I knew this day would come. Don’t worry though, I won’t stop being incredibly irritating.

Pay me for my breasts. As expected, a woman is finally suing Girls Gone Wild for using her in their ads, commercials and movies. She was at mardi gras and was flashing. Plastic is asking, does this claim have merit?

I think she should be allowed to sue. They are making money on her without her consent. In commercial films the company is required to have them sign a waiver. Obvisouly, this isn't always true and there are a million loopholes in the law, but that's the gist. I really hope she wins.

For the trifecta…I can’t believe that O’Cayz didn’t get their lease. That is a huge travesty for Madison. After it burned down a year ago most of those involved in the Madison music scene were devestated. Now, I’m just in shock. I think we should all go to the bank and give them letters of support for O’Cayz. Hell, I’ll pledge to go to a show a week if it means O’Cayz gets its lease. Damn.

Best of’s, conveniently ordered. If you’re curious what all the critics had to say about the music of 2001, head over to metacritic. They have the lists neatly organized with an index explaining which albums got what ratings. A very nice compendium. They also have the movies.

Winners and Losers and Magic Machines. Kmart has lost its way. After years of being the onestopshop it lost out to Target and Walmart. I think I’ve been in one Kmart ever, which may help explain why they’re going down. Amazon, on the other hand, has turned things around. They have posted their first quarterly gain, which was $5 million. It’s a good start and it put them ahead of what the analysts had predicted. It appears they just got smart and started to automate a lot of tasks with fancy machines that do all their sorting for them. For those who don’t want to sign up for a NYT web password, here is the gist:

The drumbeating constraint is the $25 million Crisplant sorting machine at the center of Amazon’s automated approach. Working with batches of 500 to 2,000 orders, the employees with the hand-held terminals feed items onto a network of conveyor belts into the sorting machine. The machine reads the bar code on each item and routes it into one of 2,100 chutes, each chute representing an order for a single customer. When all the items in an order are in the chute, a light flashes, and a worker rushes to put them in a box. They are then sent on other conveyers to machines that print packing slips, seal the boxes and send them off to shippers’ trucks.

I want to see this thing in action. Apparently they had 1/3 of the staff this holiday season compared to the last and had a 15% gain in sales. I like that. Also, the person who oversees this fantastic machine is called the flowmeister. I would easily work at amazon if I could attain that title. So once again, kudos.

A hiatus is cool. I’ve been taking a break from blogging lately because I’ve been working on other projects. Classes have begun and things are looking up. Of course, things always tend to look good when a new semester starts. I have a chance to stop being lazy and work on junk.

This weekend I was home for the Bears game and it was more fun than it should have been considering the end result. I went with Will and some other guys and it was just nice to yell a lot and talk to ugly men in huge winter coats. It’s funny how there are much fewer attractive women at playoff games. When your team has an 8 year playoff drought you tend to leave your dates at home and bring your drinking buddies. I stayed until the end of the game because there was no guarantee the Bears would lose, even if they were down 16 with 4 minutes left. I’m glad I did.

This week will consist of settling in, a visit from my cousin and uncle, more football and good times with a old/new acquaintance. Look forward to more frequent blogging now that I have homework to avoid.

Steve’s got a point. It’s been a while since I’ve last posted but I do have the goods for you. I will put them below and I will post tomorrow with “normal” information, since this needs some time alone. I present…britney in maui.

Spears update. Yesterday, when I accompanied my sister down to attempt to get an autograph, Britney smiled at me. She looked at me and smiled. Now I’m just waiting for her bodyguard to approach me and say, “Ms. Spears requests your presence in her suite.” “Oh, that sounds wonderful. Thank you Biff.” It will go down like this. Then again, maybe she was just smiling in my general direction. No matter—I will see Spears again.

To answer some questions: The threesome will happen, just give me some time. I didn’t get any shots of them making out; I didn’t have my camera then. Britney’s boobs are hanging out but less than usual. She just looks like any other blonde bombshell in a bikini.

In other news, I saw Oprah and Stedman walking down to the beach today. She looks hideous in person.

The ultimate celebrity. I was waiting until I head visual confirmation before I blogged this and it is now safe.

Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake are at my hotel.

This is not a joke or a test or something else. They are here. They are together. They made out in the pool last night with three bodyguards and 50 little girls around them. Justin wears a beanie. Britney is still hot, but not as hot as she looks on tv. Justin looks like Justin Divenanzo even more when you see him in person.

The funniest thing about the whole shebang was the hordes of people swarming around them. There were about 5 sand castles being built around them when they were at the beach and about 80 people swimming when they were at the pool. People were talking pictures and trying to talk to them. It was gross and I got some really good pictures.

Anyway, it is really funny to see them. I will report more tomorrow after more scientific information gathering…er, gawking.

too oh? oh, two. Generally, I don’t get all worked up about the new years celebration. I mean, why should you celebrate on this day? Yes, it’s the first day of the year, what’s wrong with february 12th? I just think that celebrating on big days is for the lazy man who needs to be reminded to celebrate.

My celebration was pretty uneventful. I went to dinner with the fam and then we went back to the hotel for fireworks. The fireworks were way too long. They were really good, but how long can you watch fireworks (unless of course they are in sync with music)? So, I promptly went back to watch the remainder of the Sex in the City marathon. A good thing too, because I never saw the season finale.

Today I got to work on some of my resolutions, which are as follows…

1. Be less fat
2. Be less bald
3. Be less lazy

There are others but those are the big three. Today I worked on 1 and 3 by running 3 miles, which is crazy because I haven’t run since high school. I was quite pleased. The key now will be keeping it up. Tonight I will begin 2 by using rogaine. Ah, yes. And now I’m going to go and watch some tv before dinner.