Year: 2009

I put a web address on my 2009 Christmas card.

Waiting for the bus in the winter can get quite cold in Chicago. Thankfully we now have these bus shelters that help block the wind. In fact, when it gets really cold you can try standing by the illuminated ad…

Taking a break at Tina’s Hot Dog Place on Montrose, I had a nativity in my hand freshly purchased for the second round of “Manger in an Alley” photos. I couldn’t resist photographing it on the table next to the…

The Chicago Tribune and other top content providers are participating in Google’s new online reader, the Google Fast Flip. Take a look at http://fastflip.googlelabs.com. Here’s my review: I was leery as I read bout Fast Flip on Google’s blog. But…

(if you cannot view the above video, you can view it on my flickr account, “Talking ferret scoozie stuffed animal plush.”) Sometime during the late 90s, I bought this plush ferret from a grocery store. He has a voice box…

For greater impact, instead of saying “!!!” use “EXCLAMATION POINT EXCLAMATION POINT EXCLAMATION POINT” The “!!!” is way too short. But look at long and impactful spelling it out in words is. Man, that’s just HUGE and forces you to…

Take a phrase like, “Whoa! Momma mia!” and make it into one word by deleting the spaces. You now have: “Whoamommamia!“

“Monday monday, can’t trust that day” goes the song lyrics. But I trust Mondays more than Tuesdays. Tuesdays try to sneak in all sneaky-like. Mondays are pretty up-front with being a Monday. When Monday comes, Monday says, “YO, IT’S MONDAY…

Every Christmas season, Chicago’s greatest hipster crafters get together and sell their ironic, cool, stylish wares. Here’s a few reasons why Renegade puts on a great holiday show. 1. Great location The Pulaski Park Fieldhouse is worth the trip alone.…

A few blocks east of Chicago’s hipster neighborhood lies the Pulaski Park Fieldhouse. The Renegade Craft Fair holiday show has been held in this wonderful building the past couple years. It’s so much fun exploring all the rooms. Imagine when…

Type an equation into Google’s searchbar, and it will do the math for you. Sometimes I like to type in goofy equations like, “111,111,111 x 111,111,111” The result is rather striking. Does anyone have any cool one-line math equations to…

Check out this super-cool hi-tech community in a cabin. Leo Laporte talks about: * Keeping our open internet * Net neutrality * Starting your own business * Bootstrapping * Niche marketing * Broadcasting * Podcasts If you like ANY of…

Insert person’s name into the word insane to call them insane. spudart + insane = inspudane matt + insane = inmattane Dude, you are so inmoosane!

Would you like the ability to include some lightning bolts in your txts? Could your tweets use some extra magnificent flash? I would love to have a lightning bolt character. And you know what? Unicode has a lightning bolt! Here…

Online personals have some interesting questions, especially eHarmony. They have 13 questions, and I’ve been meaning to share some of my responses, cuz there are some thought-provoking questions. I’ve posted the question What are the THREE things for which you…

My top five favorite tweets I made in October and November 2009 via @spudart: For one week I’d like each car on CTA trains to play a different genre of music. Just to see if people pick a particular car…

Fun crafts! By cool hip people! The DIY Trunk show was held on November 21, 2009 in the Pulaski Park Fieldhouse. It was a nice show with good variety from lots of vendors. The location is in a great old…

PaperGirl had a nice post about her twitter usage, so I’m making one too. I’ve been tweeting for almost two years now as @spudart. My tweets tend to be about fun ideas and interesting observations. My most-used word is Chicago.…

One of the fun things about frozen pizzas is that you get to slice it in any way you choose. Want pie slices? No prob. Squares are your thing? Totally. But the coolest thing of all is to do wacky…

This year I’m going to call Thanksgiving to be “Thank You Day.” The term thanksgiving often loses its meaning, because we don’t think about word actually is: Thanks giving. We are to give thanks. One method is to thank other…

My tummy hurts today. What could it be? Here’s what I had today: * Boing! Tamarind juice (I don’t even know what a tamarind is) * Jalapeno-stuffed olives * Almond-stuffed olives * Nutrition digestive health mix * Coca-Cola from a…

(polar bear cannonball anyone?) The fact that rivers and lakes have a bottom oddly unsettles me. Is that strange? I want to be able to safely cannonball into the Chicago River from the Michigan Avenue bridge. Third grade. Family trip…

I don’t understand why people complain about the city giving more parking tickets. You park illegally, you get a ticket. Pretty simple. That was something I tweeted recently. I got some interesting reactions: aaa: @spudart I think the problem is…

An eBay seller is trying to sell some “Chicago Cub Half Dollars from 1907 and 1908.” Only thing is that they are not Chicago Cub Half Dollars. They are merely normal half dollars from 1907 and 1908–the years the Cubs…

After making the last blog post, “A humidifier with water fills my heart with joy,” I was thinking that maybe it was too cheesey. But then the next day I across these verses in Psalms 65. It’s cool how even…

First sentence: — I’m happy in the morning when my humidifier still has water inside the tank. It’s funny how if the above sentence has slightly different meaning if the phrase “i’m happy” gets moved elsewhere in the sentence. Second…

Do you ever dream that you discovered a new rooom in your house/apartment? I mean sleeping-dream about it. Sometimes I’ll dream that there was this room all along in my apartment that I never knew about. I get so excited…

I was at home sick all last week with some sort of flu. The doctor didn’t know if it was the seasonal flu or the swine flu. He thought I had the seasonal flu, but H1N1 is so similar to…

What did the doctor say to me on Monday regarding my potential H1N1 flu? Here’s how it went down. My normal doctor couldn’t see me for another couple days, and i wanted to know if I had H1N1 now. It’s…

The following is what I submitted for the “Incident Description” field on chicago.stolenbike.org. They ask, “Describe in your own words what you think happened to your bike. Please include any important or unusual details that make your situation unique.” Was…

It’s Halloween. I’m at home feeling sick. Laying around was only making me feel more sick and I really wanted to be able to volunteer at the mens’ shelter tonight, so I take a bike ride to get some fresh…