So I Figured Out Gift Cards Today

For years I have been given Visa or Amex gift cards during the holidays.  (I have never been given a MasterCard gift card.  They must exist.  No?)  I think we all agree that cash is easier to use, and if you search the Interwebs, you will find masses of people that prefer gifts of cash over a gift card.  I do like that a gift card forces you to spend it, however.  Cash gets deposited into a bank account and then siphoned out to pay for such exciting things as groceries and gas.  Gift cards tend to go towards special purchases or dinners out.  When spending the gift card, you remember the person that gave it to you.  When spending cash, it's hard to delineate your twenty dollar bill from the one Aunt Edna gave you.

There are some annoying things, however, that go into using a gift card.  For some reason, it's a pain to spend the entire value advertised on the card.  If you have a $120 tab at a restaurant, for example, and you hand the server a $100 Visa gift card along with your bank card to cover the balance, the gift card will often be rejected if the full $100 is applied to it.  If the server puts $99 on the gift card and $21 on the bank card, then all is well.  Likewise, I have used a $50 gift card to pay for a $47 dollar item, leaving me, in effect, with a $3 gift card in my pocket.  The odds of me using the remaining money on that gift card for another purchase are pretty long.

So here is what I stumbled upon this week.

I have been using Google Wallet for a while, both for online purchases and for NFC payments with my phone.  Recently, Google has been shipping physical cards to users whom have requested them.  It's basically a prepaid debit card, very similar to what PayPal offers its users.

I did not know what I would do with this card, but being the Google fanboy, I got one.  Heck, it was free.  Shortly after receiving the Google Wallet card, I received my first gift card of the season.  (The Visa gift card pictured above.)  So I performed a little experiment.  I added the gift card as a payment source in Google Wallet.  I then tried to transfer the $100 from the gift card to my Google Wallet balance, but was denied.  I then tried transferring $99, and it worked!  So now I had a balance on my Google Wallet card and could toss the gift card.

Today, I went into a store and made a purchase with my Google Wallet card for the first time.  The vendor had never seen one before, but when he swiped the card, it worked, and that was the end of his questioning (it functions as a MasterCard debit card would).  I then had a balance left on my card, but when I went into the phone app, I saw the option to transfer the balance into the checking account that I already had associated with my Google Wallet account.  That was easy.

One caveat ... Google withheld $60 for my $50 purchase, until the payment goes through.  I'm not sure how long it will take for me to see that $10 again.  I imagine in a day or two everything will clear.

So if you want the forced experience that is intended by the gift card, then go out on the town or buy yourself something nice.  If you actually want the cash, then you can funnel (launder?) the monetary value of a Visa or Amex gift card into Google Wallet, and then send it to your bank account.

Your choice.  Oh, and thanks Aunt Edna!  I write your name on every bill you give me.

Setting NASCAR Back, One Daughter at a Time

It has been a while since my last post, but I'm on a little vacation right now, so it's time to dust off the keyboard.

One of my earliest posts details the demise of a Matchbox car that my then one-year-old daughter stuck into the opening of my subwoofer.  It appears that the report of this death was "greatly exaggerated."

It's Alive!

I could not stand the thought of this thing rattling around while I had the volume cranked during the dramatic finale of G.I. Joe: Retaliation, so I spent a good hour of contorting, prying, and swearing until the car came out.

Fast forward about a year and a half later to the present day.  My, now very verbal, daughter likes to know the names of everything.  When she held aloft this toy, which she once tried to cast out of our family, she smiled and inquired, "What's this called?"  I told her that this is a car that was driven by Bobby Labonte.

"Bobby the Bunny?"

"No, Bobby Labonte?"

"No, Bobby the Bunny."

"OK."

So I'm sorry, Mr. Labonte, some fights are not worth having.  I do feel bad about this, but it turns out that my daughter's mis-pronounciation was the least of my failings.  As I looked more closely at this car, it occurred to me that this was not a model of a modern car.  A little research in the Interwebs revealed that this Hotwheel was actually meant to represent the 1974 Dodge Charger driven by Richard Petty.  Yes, I confused Bobby Labonte and Richard Petty ... and then passed along that misconception to my daughter.

What makes me feel better, however, was this YouTube video that I found today.

Somebody (an adult) posted this high definition video of the exact Hotwheel car in question.  I love the Internet!

To make things up to the NASCAR gods, I did have another conversation with my daughter today.

"Sweetie, can you get my car keys for me?  They are the ones with the #2 on them."

"Why number two, Daddy?"

"The number two represents a great man, Rusty Wallace.  One day, when you have to do a school project about a person in history, we can make a diorama of Rusty Wallace together."

Perhaps we can recreate one Rusty's reverse victory laps in honor of Alan Kulwicki.  The 1993 April Bristol race was a particularly powerful tear jerker.

Let's Make These Things Real

Two phrases that were recently mispoken which I prefer to the correct versions.

One -

A person stated that they were recently "put on a Lurch."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/16/Fester_lurch_1966.JPG

Two -

I overheard somebody compare the look of something to a "Horshack Test."

http://packagetalk.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/horshack3.jpg

I would like to see these things done in real life.

Cynical

I am a horrible person.

I was just referred to Adam Young's Twitter feed  (@owlcity) and informed that I should follow him.  His off-beat sense of humor meshes with mine:

Can't decide whether I like John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme" or One Direction's "Take Me Home" better.
— Owl City (@owlcity) April 11, 2013

I'm not breaking any ground here.  He has a million followers already, and I'm just learning of him.  Apparently I am not as hip as I used to be.  In fact, I may not have been hip since the last time people used the word "hip" in reference to anything beyond an acetabulofemerol joint.

flickr user: prodigaldog

So I quickly hit the follow button and scrolled through a few of Adam's Tweets, chuckling along the way.

I have a lot of anxiety attacks. When should I start seeing results?
— Owl City (@owlcity) April 11, 2013

I then went to his profile on Twitter and found the link to his blog: http://www.ayoungblog.com/

Looking for more funnies, I discover personal philosophies and Christian teachings.  I immediately resent having to read this material (that I snooped around and found on my own) and began liking this stranger less.  Despite my Catholic upbringing, I still have this visceral response to unexpected evangelizing.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with the act; I'm just a cynical bastard.  I actually considered unfollowing Adam, even though he made me laugh for several minutes.

What's wrong with me?  He didn't make me read anything.  His writings are inspirational and completely positive, no judgements at all.  I was the one judging him.

Then it hit me ... I am the reason why the middle of the country dislikes "Liberal Elites."

By Angr (self-made; base map is Image:Blank US Map.svg) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons

So I'm sorry for thinking less of you, Adam.  Thanks for the all of the Tweets.  I really enjoy having you in my timeline.

I think I'm going to call my mother and then do something to get in touch with the Red State side of me.

Update

Mom is doing fine.  Now I'm looking for somebody that owns a gun.

Update #2

Shockingly few number of gun owners in this part of Massachusetts.  I may just watch Fox News for a while, instead.

Update #3

Could not tolerate exposure to Fox News, so I went outside and threw a rock at a tree.

Update #4

Have not apologized and/or hugged the tree, yet.

A New Spin on the Mobility Scooter

My parents live in a condo that is part of an "Active Adult Community."  The place is basically a three-dimensional advertisement for assistive walking devices and other mobility aids.  The word "active" is taken with a pretty large grain of salt.

Each unit in the building has assigned parking spaces.  Next to one of my parents' spots sits this beauty:

I have yet to see the resident that sits upon this fine chopper and sports the matching helmet.  I do want to point out something that you may have yet to notice:

Yes, this scooter has a handicapped license plate.  I am of the firm belief that if one is able-bodied enough to navigate a red scooter through the streets of suburban Connecticut, then one should not qualify for handicapped parking.  Apparently the the Powers-That-Be in Connecticut's Department of Motor Vehicles do not agree.

Spot the Lie

So I may have fallen asleep last night while watching Buck Rogers on Netflix and eating goat cheese on crackers.

For those of you that prefer Twitter over a traditional blog, I shared a little of this experience with the world:

Anybody know the best way to get goat cheese off a tablet screen? #askingforafriend #really
— Chris Conley (@CConley25) March 19, 2013

Last tweet taught me to clean goat cheese off your fingers before typing a question about cleaning goat cheese off a screen. #itwasme
— Chris Conley (@CConley25) March 19, 2013

Nobody offered me any helpful suggestions, and my tablet is still showing some ill effects from this wild and raucous evening ... of me, sitting alone on my couch, watching Buck Rogers, and eating goat cheese. Oh yeah, and tweeting about it.

Not so fast, RSS.

Let me begin by stating that I was going to title this post "RSS is dead. LONG LIVE RSS!"  I thought it was catchy, and to the point.  So I Googled the phrase, and came up with 21,200 hits from that direct quote.

So I guess I'm not particularly original (nor is this topic, it seems).

I've been trying to shift away from RSS feeds for a while. A number of blogs and news "news" sites that I follow have been posting their content on Twitter and other social media outlets for years.  As I started to see duplicate posts on my Twitter timeline and my RSS reader, I began to unsubscribe from the RSS feeds and rely more upon Twitter.  As I have become more involved with Google+ (say what you want, but there is great content out there), I have repeated the process and have begun unfollowing Twitter profiles and circling them on Google+.  The problem is that not all of the sites that I follow push their content through social media.  That's not fair ... they all do, to some extent.  What I have found, however, is that not all of these sites are pushing ALL of their content out through social media.  They cherry pick a few articles and Tweet or post them for their followers.  Of course this makes sense, as they are hoping to draw traffic back to their websites and garner those valuable clicks (and ad revenue).    The reason I started using RSS, however, was to avoid just that.  I want the information to come to me, and then I can pick and choose which articles to read and which to ignore, all in one spot.  So I am in this information limbo, where some of my content is coming through RSS, some through Twitter, and some through Google+.

Now our friends at Google clearly want everything to come through Google+.  They want it to be less of a social network and more of an information portal.  To that end, Google is shuttering their RSS reader.

This is just a screenshot.  You can click "OK," but it will only give you a bigger picture.

Being the Google fanboy that I am, clearly Google Reader was the RSS reader I used.  When this announcement came out on Wednesday, I was a little peeved.  So were a number of folks on the Interwebs.  I am particularly fond of YouTube user leebdough's version of the famous Hitler rant from Downfall: (Warning, some salty mis-translations in the subtitles.)

I actually want Google's hopes to come true for Google+ (or something else) to become a one-stop hub for information.  (I really don't mind if they are taking over the world.)  We are not there, nor are we close to that point.  Shutting down Google Reader may push some content providers to use more social media; I still want a good RSS reader.  Fortunately, a number of articles were written after Wednesday's announcement recommending alternatives to Reader.  So on Thursday I deleted Reader from my phone and Tablet, and installed Feedly.

I wish I had done this sooner.  I always enjoyed Google Reader's stark, utilitarian interface.  It helped me roll through a great deal of content very quickly, and I was able to easily share any articles I wanted.  I have to say, however, that the graphic-rich look of Feedly is pretty sharp.  I can go to a more Spartan list style, like Reader's, but am enjoying the magazine look at this point.  I know there are other options out there, but what hooked me to Feedly was the ease of switching from Reader.  All I had to do was log into to my Google account, and Feedly rolled over all of my subscriptions.  I repeated the setup on my browser, phone, and tablet.  It worked perfectly.  Once Reader closes up shop on July 1st, Feedly promises to keep all of my subscription information on the back end, so I won't miss a beat.  (Fingers crossed.)

I have also dusted off my Pocket account, which I never really used.  I had a number of old articles saved in Google Reader for a variety of reasons.  I used this opportunity to comb through them all, discard most, but then push the ones I still wanted up to Pocket.  I was then able to organize those articles using Pocket's tagging system so that they are now stored in a useful and accesible manner.  Feedly will also allow you to push articles up to Pocket, so this is a system I plan to keep employing.

I do want RSS to go away and be another three-letter acronym that our grandchildren will never know.  For the time being, this is how I'm dealing with the Google Reader shutdown.  It works, and I think it is even an improvement.  It has taken me a day or two to get used to different interfaces, but I like the results.

Anybody have advice on a good VHS digitizing technique?

So This Happened Today ...

Imagine my surprise when I looked down at the sink this morning as I prepared to shave ...

Don't see anything amiss?  Look closer.

Yes, there was a death's head skull staring up and me from the drain of my sink.  Somehow, the toothpaste residue from the night before had dried in that fashion.

I don't think that this is a sign of good look.  In fact, this has been a week of strange omens for me.  First, the new Pope is announced, and he chose to take the name of my brother (not the brother I would have guessed, mind you).  Now, my bathroom sink wishes me dead.

Hopefully you will check in on me from time-to-time over the coming days to make sure all is well.

Speaking of the new Pope ...

Does anybody else think it is strange when the media refers to Pope Francis as the "First Pope from the New World?"  I think it is time for the Italians to get over the whole Christopher Columbus thing.  1492 was a long time ago.  There isn't very much that is still new on this side of the Atlantic.

In Recent News from Connecticut - Updated!

I love that my family and the Internets still keep me up-to-date on news from my home state.  My sister shared some information about State Representative Ernest Hewett with me this morning.

Click on image for larger view.

Apparently, he should change the quote on his official website to "Never get so low in front of a live mic."

Here's the article from the local paper: http://goo.gl/dorX2

More People Should Read Mental_Floss

I love +Mental Floss.  I can't get enough of their blog, their magazine, and even their Twitter feed, which gives us nuggets like this:

49ers coach Jim Harbaugh played Screech's cousin on a 1996 episode of Saved by the Bell: The New Class. twitter.com/mental_floss/s…
— Mental Floss (@mental_floss) January 13, 2013

Hide the Women!

Looks like that crazy, Irish uncle that nobody talks about anymore went and got himself a hardware store.

I have no idea how I got on this mailing list, but this catalog came in the mail earlier this week.

There are so many things that impress me, here:

1. The corporate logo seems to be McFeely himself holding a large screw.
2. McFeely went and put himself on a dollar bill, and one can use said dollar bill to pay any shipping AND handling costs that may be incurred while making any purchases.
3. McFeely is clearly a huge proponent of square drive screws (hard to miss from the cover shot).
4. www.mcfeelys.com is somehow a legitimate website.
5. www.mcfeelys.com/screws is still, somehow, a legitimate website.
6. Even www.mcfeelys.com/tech/screw-index.htm ... totally PG.

Time To Reevaluate My Priorities

+Henry Reich tweeted this out yesterday:

How happy are you when you go grocery shopping? I bet you're not as happy as this guy: youtube.com/watch?v=vC8gJ0…
— Henry Reich (@minutephysics) January 9, 2013

Maybe I should expend less energy remotely encouraging or discouraging professional athletes and spend more time reflecting on the scientific marvel that is a cheese doodle.