No, seriously. What did happen to bathing suits? You know, the kind with the mesh that holds your junk in place?

Last week I went on a work trip to Tampa in Florida. I’m so used to going to conferences in places like New York and Chicago that the thought of swimming never occurred to me. But when I went to check in to my hotel, the lady at desk informed me that my room had a pool view. That’s when it hit me that “oh ya, Florida hotels would have pools.”

Not to miss an opportunity like this, I decided I needed to go to the mall near my hotel and purchase a bathing suit.

Problem is, you can only find “board shorts” these days.

As far as I can tell, the only real difference between a bathing suit and board shorts is the thickness of the material used and that board shorts don’t have that mesh inside. I’ve always owned bathing suits though and the idea of flopping around everywhere kind of scared me. However, since I couldn’t find any actual bathing suits I purchased a pair of board shorts so I could take advantage of the pool.

The board shorts were fine. In fact, I actually kind of liked them.

But it got me wondering, why don’t bathing suits exist anymore? Did the mesh scare people away? Was I just not looking in the right place?

I don’t know if there’s an actual answer to this question, but I am kind of curious.

If you like music at all, even just a little bit, there’s a good chance you like Daft Punk. Even if it’s just one song that you heard on the radio or in a commercial once, there’s just something about the music they make that people like. And by now, most people know that there’s a new Daft Punk album coming just around the corner.

If you’re like me, you’re stoked about it.

There’s a few reasons why the hype around this album is strong though. Some of it’s just because Daft Punk is amazing and people have been waiting 8 years for them to make a new studio album (of their own music and not a soundtrack for a TRON movie). But there’s also a lot of manufactured hype around it.

Oh ya, and that’s not to mention the giant rumor that Daft Punk was going to show up at Coachella that was going around for about a year. (And in case you didn’t stay up until 4:30am last night like I did to catch the Coachella livestream just in case they came out during Phoenix’s set, they didn’t).

But getting back to this manufactured hype thing… have you noticed it?

It started about a month ago when people watching SNL saw this strange 16 second commercial. It was 16 glorious seconds that was an announcement to the world that Daft Punk was back.

I thought this was a pretty interesting move. Firstly, because you don’t really see commercials for music on TV (except for those Mini Pop kids) (Don’t act like you know who I’m talking about). Second, it was the first sign that the band had really given that the album was ready. What an interesting way to make the announcement. Usually music reporters will get some word from a label on a release date, but Daft Punk is too cool for that. They made a god damn commercial to tell the entire world at the same time.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, they also keep dropping little tidbits about the upcoming album that just makes me drool at the mouth with anticipation.

About a week ago, The Creators Project, which is a venture between Intel and Vice that celebrates the cross section of art and technology, started releasing these videos of people who collaborated with Daft Punk on the new album talking about their experience. While all of people featured in these videos are famous producers in their own rights, each of them says (and I’m paraphrasing here), “This new Daft Punk Album is some next level shit.” Watch all three and try to tell me that they don’t make you excited to hear the album.

But wait, there’s more!

As if the rumor about Daft Punk being at Coachella weren’t bad enough, on Friday night at the festival Daft Punk showed another teaser commercial! I’ve been to Coachella the past two years and have never seen a commercial of any sort appear on the screens there. This one was a bit longer than the SNL one, but had the same song… with lyrics this time. This one also showed the robots playing actual instruments along side Nile Rodgers and Pharrell. I saw a video of it shot on the screens from an iPhone, but it was too jumpy. Luckily Pharrell tweeted this decent copy of the video last night:

All of this stuff coming out is making me super excited to hear this album. But it also made me wonder is all this manufactured hype going to get me too excited and make the album a let down in my eyes?

I mean, Justin Timberlake hyped up his album, and while it didn’t get me as excited, I like his solo stuff and couldn’t wait to hear it. Let down. Even if it’s a decent album (but not like his previous albums), the hype was a bit much and it didn’t live up to it for me.

Is this going to happen with the new Daft Punk album? Is there too much hype around it? Or is it really going to be as amazing as I’m dreaming it will be?

Or am I crazy for even thinking about things like this in the first place?

UPDATE:

Just had to throw this update in because this morning The Creators Project uploaded a new video with Pharrell talking about collaborating with “The Robots”:

The other week I got to Las Vegas for work. This was the first time I went to Vegas since I was 11 years old, so technically, it was my first REAL trip to Vegas. When I told one of my buddies that I was going for my frist time, he could only say “How have you never been to Vegas???” Well, to be honest, I just didn’t ever care, and I responded to him with “Well, how have you never been to Thailand???”

Anyways, Vegas was fun. It’s kind of what you expect. Lots of lights, lots of gambling, lots of women walking around in skimpy clothes trying to get you to spend your money on something you probably don’t need to spend your money on, etc. The trip was a lot of fun, but there was one real highlight for me and it’s something most people wouldn’t expect and something most people I’ve spoken to even knew existed.

One afternoon my buddy and I had some time to kill, so we decided to get away from the glitz and glamour of the strip and head over to the Pinball Hall of Fame Museum. As an avid pinball player growing up, this place was amazing!

The place was started by another avid pinball fan and is completely a non-profit place. They house pinball games from the 1950′s all the way up today. Everyone who works there actually volunteers their time just because they have a love for pinball. All the games (well, most) have been fixed up to playable status and all the coins that go in to the machines wind up getting donated to The Salvation Army.

Walking into this place, my jaw dropped. Growing up in the 80′s when arcades were quite prevalent in Toronto, especially up and down Yonge St, I was used to arcades that were mostly actual video games with a wall of pinball machines usually towards the back. But this place was all pinball all the time.

After my initial walk around to check the joint out, I went on a mission to find a Captain Fantastic pinball machine. My dad was also a big pinball fan (I’m pretty sure he got one of the first ever cases of carpal tunnel from playing too much pinball) and I always remember he would say that this was his favourite game growing up. So, I found it and put my first quarter of the day into it. It was fun, but to be honest, it didn’t compare much to the much more complicated pinball games that came out after it. But I felt I owed it to my pops to play it at least once since he couldn’t.

We randomly met one of the volunteers that worked there and he was super nice. He gave us a big tour of the place and showed us what games were most popular and which his favourites. He knew a lot about most of the machines there. It was actually kind of interesting.

One of the coolest games we found was this 5 level pinball game called The Pinball Circus. There was a big write up above it that told the story of the game, which I’ll probably get a bit wrong, but goes something like this: There were only 2 prototypes of this game ever made by Williams. They tried to test it in Chicago (which apparently was where most pinball makers were from) and found that it did well in the arcade, but no better than the regular pinball games. Because it made the same amount of money, but cost a lot more to make and buy, no arcade was going to buy it. So, the two owners of Williams wound up keeping the prototypes for themselves. One day, one of these people heard about The Pinball Hall of Fame and what they were doing and graciously donated his game to the place. Story aside, I thought it was a crazy awesome game.

My favourite game that I played that day was the Super Mario pinball game. I had never even seen this one before. The game was a decently fun pinball machine, but what did it for me was the sounds. Everything in the game made a sound from the Super Mario video games and just reminded me of my childhood. This is the only game I played more than once.

We wound up spending about an hour and half in this place, but because I got my pinball groove back after a few games I only wound up spending about $5 in quarters. Probably one of the cheapest things you can do in Vegas.

All and all, this place was amazing and most people don’t even know it exists. It’s about a 10-15 minute cab ride away from the strip, but if you’re a pinball fan at all I highly recommend you check it out next time you’re in Vegas.

Yes, yours is likely ripping you off as well, but mine is doing it differently.

Now I usually don’t use platforms like this to complain about stuff, but this happened to me twice in December and kind of pissed me off. I’m hoping that bringing it to public attention will help to get someone to notice and the Bank of Montreal to fix this problem.

Recently, Canada introduced some new $20 and $50 bills that are made of plastic. I thought it was kind of cool at first because it reminded me of the plastic bills that they use in Australia. The bills are starting to circulate, but you still don’t see them too often. However a few times I’ve gone to the ATM and gotten these new bills.
The problem that I had was that it appears that ATMs aren’t configured to deal with these new plastic bills. Twice in the past month I went to take out money and the two times that I got all brand new bills, it was a bill short.
The first time it happened I was upset, but I figure machines sometimes mess up. But then it happened to me again on New Year’s Eve. Sure it’s only $20 each time, but it shouldn’t be happening.
Both times I called the bank and they said they’d deal with it, but I’m just thinking that it shouldn’t be happening at all.

So with this post I implore the Bank of Montreal to fix your ATM machines if you’re going to have them spit out these new plastic bills. They were made for the paper bills. Upgrade them to work with the plastic ones so I don’t have to call and complain every time I take out money.

Has this happened to anyone else? Or am I just unlucky?

Every year at this time I think it’s a great idea to make some New Year’s resolutions.
Every year these resolutions look the exact same:
- Lose weight
- Quit smoking
- Make more money
- Blog more
- And make a woman fall in love with me

Every year my resolutions look the exact same and every year I mostly fail on keeping them. So this year I’ve decided not make resolutions.
I still want all of these things (plus more), but rather than make some silly promise to myself that I’ll probably not be able to keep and feel like an asshole, I’m just going to make an effort to always think about these things.
Keeping these things always in my head will hopefully help to achieve the things I think will make me a better person, but if I fall short, I just keep thinking about them and keep on going.

No broken promises this year.

Happy 2013 everyone!

It’s that time of year again. It’s the month that everyone either really loves or really hates. The month of the MO. That’s right, MOvember is here yet again. The month where I give up the beauty that is my face to grow a moustache to raise awareness and money to fund research of prostate cancer.

I’m a big fan of this charity event. For one, I think that it’s a great and funny way to raise awareness about a serious problem. Anyone can slap a pin on their jacket for a cause, but it takes a lot of commitment to grow a moustache on your face for a cause. I also support this charity because there is a history of the disease in my family, which means that I may one day need help from the very people that I’m funding today.

Today is the fifth day of the month. I shaved to a babyface on the first, but today I was finally able to shave in my moustache. Well, kind of. There’s enough stubble that what’s currently on my face semi-resembles a moustache. Anyways, now that I finally have a ‘stache I figured I could finally start really asking people to donate money and support me and this cause.

Last year I worked with my company and we raised about $11,000 collectively. This year we’re looking to beat that. My company, Marketwire, has agreed to match anything we raise on the team up to $7,500. That means we have the potential to hit $15,000 this year. But I want to do even better. I know we can do better.

I’ll post a couple more fun updates about my ‘stache adventures throughout the month (and pics of course) here on the blog.

You can also follow me on Dailybooth as I’m taking pictures almost everyday of my ‘staches progress.

So please, think about donating to the MOvember initiative. Support someone you know growing a MO or Click here to donate and support my MO

Now, for one last treat. Last year at TEDxToronto I actually got meet the founder and CEO of the MOvember movement, Adam Garone. We sat down and had a little chat about how MOvember got started, the kind of good things it accomplishes and how social media plays a roll in the movement. Check it out here:

Movember from Marketwire on Vimeo.

And PLEASE consider donating to this great cause.

Do people that live on the West coast of North America see more television reruns than those on the East coast?

I was thinking about how the World Series starts tomorrow. Game one is being played in San Francisco on the West coast, but the game is scheduled for 8pm(EST), which is 5pm(PST), so that big TV networks can have the game in the middle of East coast prime time. So there goes regular prime time programming for whatever network is showing it on the East coast. BUT, the game should end mid-prime time on the West coast. So while that network didn’t show a new episode of whatever it shows on the East, is the West coast forced to watch reruns when that time-slot hits on the West?

Just wondering.

I usually tend to not let myself get caught up in petty shit.

Nay, I go out of my way to avoid petty shit in life.

I don’t know why, but this was bothering me all last night, so I’ve decided to throw my hat in on some of this petty stuff and then I’ll shut the hell up.

I guess the real grit of this started here in my home town of Toronto. Some blogger found a new online service called StatusPeople that somehow scans a persons Twitter account and tells you what percentage of their followers are fake. An interesting idea if you care about this kind of thing, but I have no idea how it works. So of course, once this service was found people didn’t really use it to look at their own group of followers, they used it to look at other people and then attempt to call some of those people with high “faker” numbers out.

I mean, if you can’t use social media to call people out on stupid shit and make yourself feel good doing it, what’s the point in even using social media? =\

Anyways, people here in Toronto then became obsessed with looking up other people’s accounts and telling the world that they have fake followers (implying that they bought said followers). I ignored that. But then towards the end of yesterday the lovely Amber Mac wrote an article about the service for Fast Company (but in a less petty way, by looking at politicians, but I digress). This article means that a lot more people are going to find out about the service and I can guarantee that my next week will involve watching people go on a witch hunt to call out Twitter personalities, brands, and everyone’s mother.

Here’s the thing though; it’s no secret that there are fake accounts on Twitter or that people have bought followers. Everyone knows about this.

What’s even funnier about this situation is that the usual “social media expert” folks who usually say that the number of followers you have doesn’t matter, all of a sudden care about these follower numbers.

I haven’t tried the service for my own account yet because I personally could care less. If you asked me what percentage of my Twitter followers were fake, I’d guess about 85% because for the life of me I can’t understand why any real person would ever care to hear what I have to say anyways.

For those of you that do seem to care about this kind of thing, I’m going to give you my advice that I’ve been giving people for years. Here’s how you deal with followers on Twitter:

• Follow people you like
• Follow people you think are interesting
• Follow people that you would really like to work with (this one holds true for both everyday people and brands/ marketers looking for social media people to work with)
• Don’t worry about other people’s numbers
• Don’t worry about catching your numbers up to other peoples
• Don’t do business on Twitter just because someone has a lot of followers (unless you really like that person and think they deserve to have that many followers)
• Worry about your own stuff
• Worry about doing what you do well
• Fuck the haters

That’s it. Call me out for whatever you want now. I don’t care, because I’m going to keep on doing what I do the way I do it and that’s that.

END RANT

As I’ve said before, I love cooking. That’s why I was super excited when I got contacted about a cooking contest being put on by Courvoisier. The best part is, the contest is open to you as well as me.

The Courvoisier Collective is a cool contest where they’re putting out an open call to anyone who cooks to come up with a recipe that uses Courvoisier. Create your recipe, make it, take a picture, and submit it. That’s pretty much all there is to it.

Well, maybe not all. There’s a few guidelines to follow:

• You have to be a resident of Ontario
• Recipes have to fall under the categories of: soup, salad. h’ors d’oeuvres or entree
• All recipes must contain Courvoisier cognac
• You HAVE TO include a picture of your dish in your entry

The deadline to enter is August 24th. After that finalists from each category will be selected. All the finalists will also be invited to a big event in Toronto where all the other finalists will sample each others’ creations and two winners from each category will win $1,000.

So, what are you waiting for? I mean aside from the fact that you know I’ll beat you?

Get cooking and submit your recipes at The Courvoisier Collective.

I still haven’t decided what I’m going to make for my recipe entry yet. I’ve never cooked with Coirvoisier before, but I’ve got a few ideas brewing. I’ll also post my entry here… once I figure it out.
Happy cooking!