I wrote my undergraduate thesis on the impact of music videos on the viewer’s level of aggression. In order to collect my data, I needed to have some ungodly number (fortunately, I have since forgotten the specifics) of test subjects watch music videos and complete a pre and post survey for me. In order to …
Author Archives: admin
Earworms
This week I missed seeing They Might Be Giants because I was on the wrong coast. Unlike some other bands I have mentioned recently, I am not too upset that I am missing them this go-around because they tend to tour on a regular basis. And, since the Johns are not shy about saying how …
Musical Youth
I was reading an article recently that explained why adults identify so strongly with the music we listened to as teenagers. Apparently, as our teenage years are all about identity formation, we form an unconscious link between the music we listened to and our identities. Ergo, once our identities are (somewhat) established, the music stays …
Games People Play
Yesterday my mother suggested that I play Othello with my father. Her suggestion brought a whole flood of memories with it. I used to play games with my father all of the time. My father insisted that he would only play “thinking” games with me. So, Parcheesi, Othello and Boggle were in. Hungry, Hungry Hippos …
Price Points
Manhattan is not a very family-friendly city for anyone but the wealthy. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know that everything in Manhattan is over-priced. Stores sell groceries in small packages because both they and their customers have limited shelf space. The small sizes used to run the same as the larger family-sized …
A Bittersweet Memory
This weekend marked the 4th anniversary of the closing of CubeSpace. The anniversary was very sweetly noted by Rick Turoczy on Facebook. I mention that specifically because this is the first year since we closed that I was not acutely aware of the anniversary. This is also the first year that I can think about …
Don't Call Me Shirley
Yesterday, I spent yet another day of my life hanging out in airports and being squashed in airplanes. Given the amount of traveling I have been doing, I have established a bit of a routine. The day begins way too early for any sane person. The trip to the airport is always a bleary-eyed affair. …
A Requiem for Google Reader
In about 3 weeks Google is pulling the plug on Google Reader. For those of you who don’t what Google reader is, you’ve been missing out. What Reader does is take content that I have subscribed to by RSS (Really Simple Syndication) and collects it all in one place. No more bouncing from site to …
Don't Feed Them After Midnight
I seem to have acquired a gang of gremlins sometime in the last 48 hours or so. The calendar app on my Android phone stopped working. A bunch of apps keep freezing and the touch screen has gotten wonky on my Android tablet. Apple doesn’t do much better. My Ipod has been having its share …
Using Last Century's Technology
This may sound strange coming from a TechWhisperer, but I am not an early adopter. When it comes to technology (including cars and appliances) I like to wait until the bugs have been worked out before I make my investment. That being said, I love to read about bleeding edge technologies. I find it fascinating to watch …