Ever bookmark a site and then have a hard time finding it in your long list of favorites? You can organize your favorite sites with the website del.ico.us. By using tags, you can bookmark a webpage in multiple categories. Plus, your bookmarks are available everywhere, and you can share them with others!

I now have 4,003 bookmarks on del.icio.us at http://del.icio.us/spudart. Sure, that's too many to look at, but check out the tag categories over on the right of that page--especially the "print" tag. Anytime I print something out to read, I tag it with print. If you are ever looking for something interesting to read, just check out that tag, it now has 1,002 items. :-)

Here's a fun question to think about. If you had a fight tournament in your office, who would win? Think of the arena as your workspace.

I'm not saying who would win in my office, I'm just saying it's fun to think about. Wait, I will say. It would be Marco. I can see him having the determination totally annihilate. Hi Marco! I know you're reading! Just don't attack me now that i'm on the south side of the floor!

Chicago's IBM building. It's a classic. Very simple black box. And now he has a good buddy across the street from him, Trump Tower. Of course IBM traditionally stands for International Business Machines. But here we are talking about two good buddies on the same block. There's a mystery about this fellow, IBM. Everyone calls him by his initials. But what do the initials stand for? IBM refuses to say. What do you think IBM stands for?

I think it's Ivan Burley Mauer. I liked using Ivan, cuz it's a strong name for this strong building. And Burley sounds, well, burly. And Mauer is German for wall. (and I picked German, cuz the architect is Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.) Feel free to leave your I.B.M. name suggestions in the comments. Thank you.

Are you on a PC and have problems when Mac people send you fonts? One of my co-workers on Windows was having problems with Macintosh fonts that would get sent to her for ad layouts. Here's part of an email that I sent to her about how to use Mac fonts on a PC:

There’s a few different approaches to a solution. I order them from what is the worst to the best solution.

3) Converting software
Because I’m starting off with this solution means that it’s the “worst” solution. But I don’t think it should be really that bad. There is software out there that should be able to convert the macintosh fonts over to PC. Not being on a PC, I don’t know how well they work. I’m afraid that little details like the kerning pairs will come out funky. When you go to load a layout, some of the lines might break differently. But here’s some programs:

CrossFont 3.6, $45.00 (it also has a limited free trial)
http://www.pcdistrict.com/crossfont-prod1180.html
(this program was recommended by some of the geeks on metafilter)

MacDisk 4.5 for Windows, $54.87 (35 euros)
http://www.macdisk.com/mden.php3
This is actually a program that enables Windows users to read Macintosh-formatted media (cds, floppies, zip disks). But they say, “MacDisk offers certain features to transfer and convert font files between the Macintosh and the PC.”

A decent (although kinda confusing) explanation about why sometimes the mac font files you get are actually showing up empty: http://www.macdisk.com/fontsen.php3 Basically that webpage says, “on the Macintosh, fonts are stored in the resource fork of the file. When files are transferred through a network, or by email, you often get therefore an empty file, the data fork. Transferring fonts between Macintosh and PC must be done using real Macintosh media... MacDisk manages all those data media.”

If you have further problems once you have a trutype font, they recommend Typetool: “try to open the file in a font editor. We use TypeTool by FontLab. From the editor, save the font to another file. The editor will save the file with a more conforming structure, which should allow the installation in Windows.” But remember, you first need to convert the Mac Postscript font into a TruType PC font.

My recommendation (if you are going with the converter approach):
I would recommend trying the CrossFont program. Not only can you preview to see if it works, they also say “Features include Zip and Stuffit support” which is really how you are getting these files. MacDisk sounds like it’s main thing is handling cds and floppies and old school 90s stuff. If it ends up that CrossFont can’t find the Mac files, you might need to get the MacDisk, because it sounds like that software is good at getting empty resource files.

2) Buying the fonts
If the clients use the same fonts over and over again, perhaps you might be able to purchase the PC version of the fonts. That way, things don’t get all wonky with the converting program.

1) Opentype fonts (best solution)
Virtually all applications and operating systems work with OpenType fonts. If your clients used opentype fonts, you’d be able to use the fonts on both a mac and pc. No converting. No buying extra fonts. All happiness. But honestly, I don’t see that happening, because once people have their set of fonts, it’s not like they are gonna go out and start changing them.

Sidenote:
And oh, The Adobe Font Folio is actually not an application, but it’s just a collection of fonts. The current version of Adobe Font Folio is version 11, and that has all OpenType fonts, which rocks, because those are the ones that are compatible with all operating systems. The new complete set is $2,599 which includes 2,300 fonts.

Last week the brown line had delays. I can understand delays, they happen. Things can break. A train might hit someone. Whatever. Crap happens. But when crap happens, they need to improve how they react. Here's my email to the CTA:

------ Start Message
From: Maldre, Matt
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 2008 17:25:22 -0500
To: ctahelp@transitchicago.com
Subject: Six suggestions from the brown line delay this morning

I have six suggestions for the CTA as a result of the brown line delay this morning at 9am:

1) Have broadcast speakers give proper information.

Sounds simple, right? But today during the brown line delay between 9:00am to 9:20am, she gave two crucial incorrect pieces of information.

One, she said that the delays were only affecting northbound brown line riders. She never ever mentioned southbound riders. And southbound riders were the majority of those affected by the delay due to the morning rush into downtown.

She also told people to take the Lawrence bus NORTHBOUND. She even said that several times. “Take the Lawrence bus NORTHBOUND.” But the Lawrence bus only runs east and west. You need people who operate the broadcast equipment to know how the CTA system works.

2) Have the attendant inform riders waiting on the platform.

After waiting 30 minutes on the Western brown line stop, some CTA workers appeared inspecting the tracks. I figured that can't be good, so I left the station. While exiting through the turnstiles, a CTA employee—the attendant for the station--was telling people to not bother entering through the turnstiles, that instead they should take the Lawrence bus. Good for him, informing people at the gates, but you need someone informing people on the platform. There were fifty to a hundred people waiting on that platform, because of the misinformation being provided over the loudspeakers.

I told the attendant, "You need to tell the people upstairs this. They are all standing there waiting.” He said, "Well, it was on the speakers." To which i replied, "uh no. The speakers only said there were delays NORTHBOUND. All those people are going SOUTHBOUND." So then as i exited the station, he started to go upstairs. That's right. Even the CTA employees don't know the difference between NORTHBOUND and SOUTHBOUND trains.

3) When alternate transit means are recommended during a delay, increase the number of buses offered on that alternate route.

Upon arriving at the Lawrence bus stop at Western at 9:30am, there was a long line of people waiting for the bus. Sheesh. If you are going to tell all these people on the brown line to take the Lawrence bus, then by all means, run more buses.

4) When there are delays on the train, inform your bus drivers, so people do not transfer to the delayed train.

When the Lawrence bus arrived, the bus was packed to the front with people standing. No more room. But about half the bus emptied out to take the brown line. What? But the brown line is delayed? These people need to know! So I told the people, they were all shocked that the brown line was delayed. The driver did not tell them.

5) When a CTA employee is inspecting the tracks, don’t have him use a stick. He should be testing the bolts with his hands.

I finally arrived at the red line train at 9:45am after being on the Lawrence bus. While waiting for the red line to come, there was a CTA employee on the tracks tapping the bolts with a wooden stick. Yes. A wooden stick. How can he test bolts with a wooden stick? Wouldn’t you think he would bend down, and actually twist them to see if they are loose? This is how you get tracks that are bad. You have employees testing them with a wooden stick! You need to hire inspectors who are physically able to bend down and test the bolts with their hands.

6) When a train is coming, and a CTA employee is inspecting the tracks, have that employee get out of the way.

Another one that sounds simple, right? This same employee that was testing the tracks with a wooden stick was still standing on the tracks while both a red AND purple line came. Both trains were at the same point. He stood on the red line tracks forcing the red line train to wait while the purple line crawled by. What? That guy should be getting on the platform to get out of the way. He should not be forcing an entire train of riders to wait, because he simply does not want to get onto the platform.

Once the purple line train crawled by, he stepped over to the purple line tracks to let the red line go by. This goes back to hiring inspectors who are physically able to do their jobs. You need an inspector who can climb back up on the platform when a train starts coming his direction.

Matt Maldre

------ End of Message

What type of tea do you like? My recent fav is Yogi Tea’s Clarify Ginkgo IQ. Does it clarify my mind? I dunno. But it’s quite nummy.

And an odd combination I stumbled across a couple months ago is how Kiwi gummis and white pear tea complement each other tastily.

Facebook's Scrabble application, Scrabulous keeps track of the highest scoring words ever. The number one word: SINGHIOZZEREBBE, scoring 2118 points. It runs the ENTIRE length of the board touching on THREE triple letter squares. WOW.

According to wiktionary SINGHIOZZEREBBE means: "Third-person singular conditional tense of singhiozzare." Singhiozzare means "to sob." Yeah, if my opponent dropped that word down, I'd be sobbing too! The only thing I don't get is that this word is ITALIAN. What? You can't play Italian words. Hrmmm.

There's a cool application on facebook called Baseball Trading Cards where you can collect and sell virtual cards for free. If you collect an entire team, you get a special Hall of Fame/Fan Favorite card. There are several of these collector cards per team. Here's the Cubs:

Chicago Cubs

Ernie Banks 13 cards, Avg Sale: $500 Last Sale: n/a


Ryne Sandberg 14 cards, Avg Sale: $500 Last Sale: n/a


Ron Santo 15 cards, Avg Sale: $500 Last Sale: n/a

See below the fold for the entire list of Facebook Hall of Fame Baseball Trading Cards

I'm just about to purchase a water filter. I was thinking of getting the big momma 1.13-gallon tank (Brita Ultra-Max Dispenser). The easy-to-use dispenser would be nice to fill up water bottles or cups. And it's so monster huge, I won't have to be refilling the thing all the time. But then several different reviews said there was a problem with mold on this design:

Mold: If you do not let this filter dry within a maximum of two days, you will get mold. This mold will probably make you ill (sore throat) (Conversely if you look at it from another point of view - it will strengthen your immune system). To avoid this problem, the water dispenser should be washed every week at very least (to safe you should wash it more often). I have never had this problem with Brita's other products

So I thought I'd go with the pitcher version (Brita Deluxe Water Pitcher). The biggest one i could find is this 80 ounce sucker. But then the amazon reviews were complaining about how the lid didn't stay on, and so many people talked about how they spill water all over.


Some of the reviews for Brita said people should go with Pur, it's better quality. According to the reviews for the Pur 2 Stage Water Dispenser #DS-1800Z, there wasn't anything significantly bad about this dispenser. In fact, there were even several reviews about how people used a Brita, and then found the Pur to be much better. So there you go, Pur is better than Brita.

Ironicsans has an interesting blog post about how overpasses are so handy, yet so forgotten. "Crossing over just a few lanes of traffic, they are simultaneously bridge and tunnel. We pass them and immediately forget about them. They are the unsung heroes of traffic."

But while they are great for cars, they aren't so great for pedastrians. I wrote a little poem about this dichotomy.

The overpass.
Great for auto traffic.
Yet cars don’t think about them.
Instead they speed along.
Going to where they want to go.
Destination? Is not the underpass.

The overpass.
Walking dead-ends.
Pedastrians think about them.
They don’t want to walk under one.
Stopping before they get to the underpass.
Destination? Not beyond the underpass.

MLB.com has a game called Beat the Streak where you try to put together a hitting streak to beat baseball's legendary record of 56 games. Choose one player every day who you think will get at least one base hit. If your player gets a hit, your streak is extended. If he fails to get a hit, your streak ends and you can start a new one.

Be the first eligible participant to get a hit in 57 straight games and win $1,000,000 in cash.

I'm also doing my own little pool/league and if you win the league, you get $20 via paypal from me!
Requirements to join the Amazing League:
1) Leave occasional comments on this blog post about the status of your team.
2) I have to know who you are. If I don't know you, then introduce yourself to me and I might let you in.

One year I got an 11-game streak. Think you can beat that? If you get the longest streak in the Amazing League, you get $20. It's totally free to join my league. I'm offering the twenty bucks out of my pocket just to make it interesting. One year, we had about 10 people in the league.

if you type "yes" a bunch and really fast, you'll end up typing "eyes." WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?: The eyes are tied to saying "yes." wooooo.

Looking for new music? Something funky? Something with a groove? That's what I like. Every four months I'll post my favorite new songs that I recently discovered on iTunes. In this quarter's mix you'll find an international mix of French, Russian and Latin pop--and some dance grooves.

Just click on the Spudart Mix 1 and you'll be brought to the iTunes player where you can listen to free reviews of the songs.

Song	Artist	Genre
Nas Ne Dagoniat	T.A.T.U.	Russian Pop
Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger	Daft Punk	Electronic
Aya	Faudel	French Pop
Oh My God	Mark Ronson	Hip-Hop/Rap
Ta douleur	Camille	French Pop
Amigo en el Bano	Kany Garcia	Contemporary Latin
L'Alize (Radio Edit)	Alizee	French Pop
J.B.G.	Alizee	French Pop
The End	Groove Coverage	Dance
Runaway	Groove Coverage	Dance

Here's a map of America with JUST the capitals. No state lines. It would be fun to number these stars and make them into a connect-the-dots game.

Dude, if you use Yahoo messenger, you can totally blast your friend with ALL the yahoo emoticons at once. Just copy and paste this into an IM:

:) :( ;) :D ;;) >:D< :-/ :x :"> :P :-* =(( :-O X( :> B-) :-S #:-S >:) :(( :)) :| /:) =)) O:-) :-B =; :-c :)] ~X( :-h :-t 8-> I-) 8-| L-) :-& :-$ [-( :O) 8-} <:-P (:| =P~ :-? #-o =D> :-SS @-) :^o :-w :-< >:P <):) :o3 :-?? %-( :@) 3:-O :(|) ~:> @};- %%- **== (~~) ~O) *-:) 8-X =:) >-) :-L [-O< $-) :-" b-( :)>- [-X \:D/ >:/ ;)) :-@ ^:)^ :-j (*) o-> o=> o-+ (%)

POW! I'm not even gonna do a screenshot of what happens, cuz you gotta see it for yourself. And if you want, send it to me on Yahoo. I'm username artdude75.