FacebookTwitter
tom@stortz.com
22 Apr, 2014

The Gourlay Effect

By |2014-04-22T20:58:59-04:00April 22nd, 2014|My Brain|2 Comments

I got a text today that asked if I agreed that Gourlay was a good writer. I pondered for a moment but wasn’t sure how to answer. My initial thought was to answer the question with, “yes, he’s a good writer”.

Forrest-Gump-i-am-not-a-smart-manGourlay’s Goodies is worth checking into if you read both Sam and my blog with frequency. It’s an extremely valuable addition to what Sam and I have been working on for years because it adds more content to refer to. It’s technically producing this post right now. I want to give a more critical response to the question posed in the beginning with regard to the material already produced.

For whatever reason, whenever I read Gourlay’s words in the blog, I imagine Gourlay speaking it. It feels to me like I’m reading a guy who’s mind is thoughtful rambling. I envision Gourlay getting an idea in his head and then rapidly typing thought after thought hoping to strike gold at the end.  It’s like “maybe I’ll get there, maybe I won’t, but something is going to be created either way.”   I’d be curious to know how long it takes Gourlay to compose each post. I should add that this in no way detracts from the quality of the post.

futurama-fry-meme-generator-not-sure-if-smart-person-or-troll-eb4ad6With that thought in mind, Gourlay’s Goodies draws a fine line between brilliance and “what the fuck did I just read”. I’ll find myself amused while I’m reading, come to the end of the post, then wonder did I come out of that post with anything except for spending a minute reading.

That’s why I also claim that maybe this is the next Shakespeare in the making.  His work is so far above me that I’m not able to grasp its excellence.  I know this may be far fetched but stay with me here.  Here is a quick example of a picture that he drew and posted about a theory to injure yourself when you are 18 to make you want to exercise when you get healthy:

20140416-131705I was going to make a comment on it like “dude, at least center the thing in the camera” and then I thought to myself that I shouldn’t be critical because maybe this is next level shit. This could have been done in Paint or Shop and produced at a higher quality but the crudeness of the work and then the off center aspect is all part of its beauty.

800px-Schimpanse_zoo-leipigOr he could just be a full blown retard monkey spewing words on a website. That’s still up for discussion and probably what I’m leaning towards.  Now I just have to get him to invest in a website and install an actual theme to bring him full circle to owning and maintaining his own website.  Most bloggers don’t get past 2 weeks and Gourlay is staying strong at day 19.  I have hope.

21 Apr, 2014

Unpopular Opinions

By |2014-04-21T22:48:50-04:00April 21st, 2014|My Brain|4 Comments

You

youaretheproblem-586x250You are the reason for your misfortunes.  The person who is overweight does not eat or exercise properly.  The person who is poor doesn’t work hard enough.  The person who has no friends is probably a dick.  This is obviously not an all encompassing statement but a general lack of responsibility for what happens to you during your life is incredible.  This isn’t Kenya where you grow up with a stick house and a cheetah in your back yard.  The United States is the greatest country for its equality but it is also bringing us down with lack of  accountability for an individual.  You don’t want to work and have 8 children?  No worries, the government will make sure you survive.  If people didn’t have such a feeling of entitlement, we’d work harder and get more shit done.  I know this is going to sound lame but lack of education is a major root of this problem.

 

Obamacare

The penalties for not having health insurance.

The penalties for not having health insurance.

Obamacare is the biggest racket going on currently.  I want to explain my “best” options for health insurance available to me currently.  I can get the IBX bronze plan for around $230 dollars a month.  This plan comes with a $3,000 deductible which means that I’m responsible for all costs up to $3,000 dollars before the insurance kicks in.  Think about that for a minute.  I give IBX over $2,500+ a year for virtually no coverage, UNLESS I’m lucky enough that  a catastrophe strikes and I only have to pay $3,000 dollars to get my head sewn back on.  If I choose NO coverage (which is essentially what I’m paying for), I get fined by the government.  Seriously, there are a few benefits of the insurance like a physical and some contacts, but this isn’t far off.  This is a complete bend over and there is no lube being used.

 

Music

listenerSam wrote a post about music and questioning why certain people like music that for lack of a better term, sucks.  Gourlay wrote, ““No one person’s music is better than any other person’s music. You like your music, I like mine… Arguing whether one artist is better than another or one type of music is better than another is stupid.”  Let me start by saying that I agree with the last sentence and that everyone is entitled to like what they like.  However, the bottom line is that many people not only like, but prefer shitty music.  There are a lot of facets to music that makes it better than others.  Music is combination of all factors (lyrics, instruments, band appeal) and the artists that are the best, score the highest in all aspects.  The final, and in my mind most pertinent, reason on how to judge how good music is TIME.  Katy Perry won’t be relevant 25 years for now (for Christ sake I hope not)  whereas I listened to Led Zeppelin’s greatest hits the other day.  This is personally why that even though I think I listen to high quality music, I hate being the DJ because as stated in Sam’s post and stated by Gourlay, “it’s impossible to please everyone.”

 

Being an Asshole

funny-cat-fight“Richard, I need you to stop being such a pussy and start being an asshole.”  It’s important to strongly disagree.  There are too many confrontational viewpoints that eventually something will strike you as completely wrong.  Maybe it’s the government or some asshole who deserves a punch in the face, but if you never feel strongly about anything, than you go through life without making an impact.  The older you get the less you start caring what people think about you.  You realize that you live one life and what happens, happens.  Nobody else cares about your life more than you.  Most people only think about their own life which in turn should show you how much you should care about what others think.  Society has turned us into a huge bunch of pussies where every kid gets a medal and this is going to allow other countries to trample us.  For the benefit of mankind, tell someone to fuck off.

 

 

21 Apr, 2014

Wire to Wire

By |2014-04-21T13:00:39-04:00April 21st, 2014|My Life|0 Comments

Oh the places you can go.

Oh the places you can go.

When I pass huge empty spaces of parking lots, I get this idea that it would awesome to hang out there.  The problem is that once you are actually there, it’s still only a parking lot.  I’m not sure what my fascination of parking lots is but I feel this is a good analogy to most things in life.  You anticipate something being awesome, and then when it’s actually happening, it’s not as good.

Take yesterday for instance, in my mind, doing nothing is all I ever want to do.  I spent the entire day of yesterday doing nothing and it wasn’t anything.  I watched a ton of the Wire, played some chess, and viewed some bball playoffs and I finished the day feeling like a worthless sack of shit.  Yet when I think how great it is to do nothing, it’s all I want to do.

I think the moral to take out of this is to always be doing something because doing nothing isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

“I’m not going to eat a bunch of drugs and sit around the desert and hope a name randomly pops into my head.”

 “Well then I question your leadership.’

20 Apr, 2014

Slippery When Wet

By |2014-04-20T10:36:26-04:00April 20th, 2014|My Life|0 Comments

FS_CautionSlipperyWhenWet__08458.1332953704.1000.1000I heard this title during some porn. ANYWAY, while I was going to Wawa today an unusual course of events happened. So I’m pretty psyched about the 2 for 3 sizzli deal and I picked up 2 sausage and cheese croissants when I entered. I knew this wasn’t the best idea because carrying 2 sizzli’s around made it difficult to do other things. I got a 16oz coffee successfully and then wanted to purchase 2 Nantucket Nectars because they are 2 for $2.22. Unfortunately other people are aware of this deal and they were all sold out except for the Orange Mango which I didn’t want. I settled on 2 for $3 32oz Gatorades (Glacier Freeze if you were curious) and as I was going to pick one up with my already crowded hands, I dropped it. Wouldn’t you know but it drops exactly on the cap and opens up unloading liquid all over the floor. This doesn’t happen instantly but I was able to stop it with about half way of the liquid leaving. I didn’t know what to do and felt like an idiot so I put the messed up one back on the shelf and successfully took 2 away. There was a slippery when wet sign already in the area so I added to the its relevance.  Cool story bro.

19 Apr, 2014

6 TV Shows That Ran Too Long

By |2014-04-19T11:58:30-04:00April 19th, 2014|Tv|0 Comments

I watch too much TV.  I’d like to think I have a pretty good idea of whether what I’m watching is good or not.  I’ve compiled a list of only 6 TV shows that aired far longer than they should have.  If the greedy executives behind the show cared more about quality and less about money, they should have seen this too.  I should point out that in some of these examples, I quit watching when I deemed that the show got stupid.

Dexter

DexterWhat can I say except that Dexter ended the series as a lumberjack faking his own death.  In the same episode he secretly concealed Deb out of the hospital and gave her a bizarre burial at sea.  These were only the icing on the cake because the show should have ended when Dexter killed John Lithgow seasons ago.  The villains in the last few seasons were corny and the show was weakening without dynamic murderers.  The premise behind a serial killer murdering bad people while being on the police force was cool… for a period of time.  Once you stretch that past 4 seasons with ridiculous plot twists, you get tired and that’s exactly what happened.

 

Californication

CalifornicationI stumbled upon this show and a 9th? seasons started last Monday night.  I was surprised it was still going.  Hank Moody is a great character and his fucked up family life and womanizing ways was intriguing.  The dialogue is generally hilarious and at one point I thought this was one of the best shows on television.  I stopped watching after the season with RZA from Wu-Tang.  The show kept having to one up itself and that’s not good.  Realistic television is the best television and once you bypass that point, you need to quit.  The current season has Hank fathering an unknown child.  No thanks.  Runkle is still great.

The Walking Dead

The Walking DeadI couldn’t watch the current season of the Walking Dead.  I actually started it and got pissed off that Carl was trying to be a badass and the Daryl – hot blonde girl episode was the worst I’ve ever seen.  During the jail season, I knew what I was watching was getting stupider.  The governor wasn’t bad by any means but he wasn’t as good as season 1 when you actually were anticipating what was going to happen next.  It’s bizarre to think that a show could be so compelling in its first season and go downhill from there.  However, with the idea of surviving a zombie apocalypse, this runs its course after 2 seasons.

The Simpsons

Simpsons_FamilyPictureI haven’t watched a new Simpsons episode in 10 years.  I can’t believe it’s still going.  The glory days of the Simpsons were incredible.  I remember buying the episode guide and reading up on every single episode and loving every bit of it.  Maybe I was younger then but it feels like the show just stopped being funny.  It was too much of a good thing.   Why continue this series?  The ideas have to keep getting zanier and creatores have to keep coming up with jokes that are just being recycled.  Family Guy is hitting this phase as well.

True Blood

True-bloodHaven’t watched True Blood in many seasons.  This was an interesting show when the Bill and Sookie romance was hitting its peak and there were only vampires.  Once the werewolves and pixies and lord knows what else hit, the show became diluted and dumb.  Jason Stackhouse was a quality actor though for the first few series.

Weeds

weedsNever watched the finale.  This is one of the best examples of a show that needed to quit while it was ahead.  The first couple seasons were awesome.  I remember not being able to wait to watch the next episode.  The idea of a pot dealer was fresh because this show was on Showtime and they could do things network TV couldn’t.  Once the hole to Mexico got involved and the family kept moving around, I lost interest.  I think this show jumped the shark when Shane clubbed the woman over the head with a mallet.

 

17 Apr, 2014

Observations of Northeast Business Trip

By |2014-04-17T21:42:09-04:00April 17th, 2014|My Life|2 Comments

New_England_ancestry_by_county_-_updated Over the past 3 days I traveled over 1,000 miles and visited 8 states. Our company sells tools through distribution and I visited more than 30 distributors over the course of these 3 days. I started in Philly, then Jersey and NY, spent the night in CT, traveled all day to RI and Mass, stayed the night in NH, then drove up to the Vermont where the slate quarries are. It’s a ton of driving and not something that can be done with utmost frequency. Either way, here is a bullet list of some things I note on a trip like this.

  • Sting is played in a lot of bathrooms
  • Complimentary breakfasts in hotels are nice but food is sub-par
  • The Holiday Inn pillows of a king size bed were unbelievable
  • There are tons of Masshole drivers
  • Rhode Island shouldn’t be a state, it should be the district of Rhode Island
  • Rhode Island is the “Ocean State”
  • NH has “Live Free or Die” on their license plate
  • Geico advertises everywhere on billboards
  • New York is always shitty to drive through.
  • People in Connecticut are incredibly nice. Probably because they are so wealthy.
  • New Hampshire is filled with space
  • Bostonians are a conceded bunch
  • Dunkin Donuts rules the Northeast – There is no other competition
  • Cleaning your room before you leave is a smart idea because when you get back, you start fresh.
  • Without Sirius radio on a trip like this, I’d go nuts.
  • Don’t eat at Duchess
  • Planning is imperative for a trip like this.  I spend 4 hours plotting and it was worth every penny.  Even with a GPS, you can still make wrong turns and it’s important to know where you are going.
14 Apr, 2014

Another Benchmark

By |2014-04-14T21:43:13-04:00April 14th, 2014|My Life|0 Comments

You can click on the picture for a more detailed look but the site pulled in a whopping 2,300 visits last Friday. This eclipsed the old mark of just over 1,500 a few years ago. How did this happen you ask? Elementary, my dear Watson.

Webstats 4-14-14

I can thank Katy Perry’s breasts for this huge run of traffic. A post I made with a few Katy Perry gifs was linked in the comment section of this post on hugelol. Something so simple brought in about 1,800 people to the site in one day. Now don’t get me wrong, the post is a fine post but required little thought and very little production. This was dumb luck. However it proves something that I probably knew but didn’t know how powerful it was, comments in posts get eyeballs. Why I don’t go around the internet and start throwing my links around I’m not sure.

If you notice though, the post has to be good because without the upvotes, there is no way it would have rose to prominence. Sure it’s a cheap way of getting traffic, but eyeballs equal value. This is just another way of getting your site out there. Will I do more of this? Perhaps.

Toggle Sliding Bar Area

Categories