BlogSoop & AdRide - A recipe for success?

I got a nice note today from Anthony at AdRide. From what I can tell they're a creative marketing firm. Anthony tells me:

BlogSoop is my favorite restaurant info website. I use it to not only get restaurant reviews, but locations and neighborhood eating ideas. I can't stomach the idea of using Citysearch or Menupages because I don't trust the reviews....I think a lot of New Yorker's feel the same way. Anyway, every time I mention your site to someone they've never heard of it..."Blog what?"

Thanks for the feedback! But is this true? Are there people who know not of BlogSoop? Anthony goes on to suggest that I look into an Adbike campaign. For those not in the know, Adbikes are high tech quadri-cycles, integrating two 6' x 4' poster panels on the chassis.

High tech quadri-cycles?? Anthony is clearly a sales genious.

He goes on to tickle my imagination with luscious imagery:

Picture the BlogSoop AdBikes cruising around NYC near the 9th Avenue Food Festival or around the Meat Packing district on a nice spring day! What do you think?

What do I think? I think its awesome. I can see it now...the BlogSoop AdBike cruising down 9th Ave., techno blasting from the bike's integrated speakers. Or perhap's the company's AdScreens are more up my alley?



One can dream.

Party at the Building Collapse

The collapse which shut down the 4, 5, 6 train is located 4 blocks from my house. I'll stop by during the day and get some better pics.

It was like a party down there!

Odiferous

I can smell the homeless man from the train this morning. Everyone avoided the area where he was hunched. The odor was overpowering - rotten animals and dead shoes. I can still smell him and I don't want to. I breached the quarantine - infecting myself - and others fled.

A woman's worst workplace enemy? Another woman.

According to Psychology Today - women, it is widely felt, hold other women back.

The author admits there is not data to prove this theory. Women do however perceive other women as holding them back - this according to survey findings. This belief may be powerful in and of itself.

"Women blocking other women is a dangerous perception. It reinforces some inchoate portrait of the woman executive as insecure *****, easily threatened, overly emotional, less able to focus on achievement because she is preoccupied with squelching younger talent. In this scenario, female managers are all hard-edged Bette Davises, eye out for the rest of us incipient Eve Harringtons, turning the workplace for women into one hell of a bumpy ride."

A response to 'A Dream I had'

It was June 3rd, 2005. I decided to be brave and take the train to NYC by myself - I was still shaky and I went in to meet my mom and Phil for dinner - I clutched that phone - it was my life-line.

I had a belt clip for the phone and just when the train was pulling into grand central I clipped the phone to my pocketbook - I got off the train - as I crossed through the doorway my elbow brushed against the clip and then - my heart stopped - my phone had fallen between the platform and the train onto the tracks. I was seized with panic. I was late to meet my mom and had no way to tell her where I was. I was meeting my brother in law and forgot where his office was and didn't know how to find him.

I just stood there staring. Are you riveted?

Next chapter - the fairy tale.

Some cool new things being done with blogs and RSS aggregation technology

1) Post Genomic - Collects posts from hundreds of science blogs. Uses tags and popularity to allow the user to sort through the sites.

2) Blogsoop - Aggregates blogger reviews into a searchable database of restaurants. Currently available in NYC and San Francisco.

3) The Hype Machine - Music aggregation from music blogs. A worldwide resource offering a list of playable music.

4) MetaxuCafé - Recent posts from the 'litblogosphere'. 100+ blogs are included. Members can cross post, or make original posts of any essays or reviews or anything topical to discuss on the site.

5) Military Webcom News - Military News. Covers a number of narrowly focused military blogs.

A Dream I Had

I dropped my cellphone onto the subway tracks.

It was a big subway station and I had to run all over to find the operator.

At last I found my iconoclast in a burgundy blazer.

She told me to retrieve the phone myself.

But I was too scared.

The Next Big Thing

Young New Comic

This burgeoning comic hosts a regular spot on Youtube which attracts thousands of viewers on a weekly basis (nearly 250,000 views for this video alone). The nebish character he portrays is all too believable.

I have a feeling it won't be too long before he's picked up by the main stream media.

Tatanka and I circa 2002

Reess, Wilansky, Tatanka and I had a crazy weekend back in 2002.

It was then I learned a novelty tomahawk - in the eyes of the law - is considered a lethal weapon.

Winning the Peanut Butter Lottery: First Prize, Salmonella

(Doug, pictured here with his winning jar of PB)

I was perusing some news on the NPR website when I came across this tidbit which I found interesting:

CDC Tracks Salmonella to Batch of Peanut Butter

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has linked peanut butter to a salmonella outbreak that's sickened almost 300 people since August. No one has died — but dozens of people have been hospitalized....

...investigators narrowed the outbreak to jars of Peter Pan and Great Value brands of peanut butter made at a processing facility in Georgia. The plant is owned by ConAgra foods, which has now recalled all jars of peanut butter that are labeled with a product code number that begins with 2111."

I found it particularly notable as I have been experiencing some gastric distress as of late. Not severe mind you, but far from normal - I prefer to keep things running on all eight cylinders.

I think I may have discovered the cause: