MUSIC

So I must deviate a bit from my norm.  Although I really don't have a norm, but still.  I have to share a very important part of my life:  MUSIC

Using a new site I just found:   TasteKid I have found some new-to-me bands that I have to share, because the music is awesome--

Meiko
 Info from Tastekid/Picture from Amazon (clicky clicky)

 

Meiko (pronounced MAY-koh), is an American singer/songwriter, born and raised in Roberta, Georgia and currently residing in Los Angeles, California. She independently released a self-titled album on September 1, 2007. All of the tracks from the LP have been featured in major network TV shows. Her sophomore full-length, titled The Bright Side, was released through Fantasy Records on May 15, 2012.

Biography

Raised by her father in the small town of Roberta, Georgia, Meiko first stepped in front of an audience at the age of eight, singing “White Christmas” for parishioners of a Southern Baptist church. In the years that followed she performed everywhere from talent shows to Little League baseball parks. When she was not performing, she was practicing - spending countless hours singing into the family's clothes dryer.

Imagine Dragons
info pulled from Tastekid/Picture from Amazon (clicky clicky)
~ is an alternative rock band based in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States.

 

Band history
Imagine Dragons is a four-piece rock band based in Las Vegas, Nevada; they formed in 2008. After winning several battle of the band competitions, the band entered the studio for the first time in 2009. They released two EPs titled Imagine Dragons EP and Hell and Silence EP in 2010, both recorded at Battle Born Studios.
Imagine Dragons signed to major label Interscope Records in November 2011. They are working closely with producer Alex Da Kid with whom they recorded their first major label release at Westlake Recording Studios in West Hollywood, California. The EP is entitled Continued Silence and it was released on Valentine's Day (February 14, 2012) digitally.

Walk the Moon  
info nabbed from TasteKid/Picture from Amazon (clicky clicky)
 

  
(stylized as WALK THE MOON) is an indie rock band based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Lead singer and Ohio native, Nicholas Petricca, started the band in 2008 and went through several member changes before finally coming together with current members, Kevin Ray, Sean Waugaman, and Eli Maiman sometime in 2010 . The band derives their name from a record by The Police. The group independently released their debut album, i want! i want!, in November 2010, receiving airplay for the track "Anna Sun" on WCRD, WFPK, WKNH, and WTMD. In February 2011, Walk the Moon signed with Mick Management. They signed to RCA Records and released their first official album, Walk the Moon in June 2012. Their self-titled debut is composed of many of their original tracks from i want! i want! in addition to new tracks that were written specifically for the album and were meant to reflect the kind of energy the band produced in their live shows.

This next one didn't come from taste kid, instead it came from a teaser trailer for one of my favorite games- Assassin's Creed-

Woodkid
Info snagged from Tastekid/Picture from Amazon (clicky clicky)

Yoann Lemoine (born 16 May 1983) is a Frenchmusic video director, graphic designer, and musician. His most notable works include his music video direction for Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream", Taylor Swift's single "Back to December", Lana Del Rey's 'Born to Die" and Mystery Jets' "Dreaming of Another World".
Lemoine is also an alternative indie musician, going by the stage name Woodkid. On March 28, 2011, Woodkid released his first EP Iron EP.

Life and career

Yoann Lemoine, born in Lyon, studied illustration and animation at the Emile Cohl School, where he completed his diploma with honours. He left for London to follow a silk screen printing process course at the Swindon College. In 2004 Yoann moved to Paris. After a brief experience at H5, he joined Luc Besson's crew and worked on the project Arthur and the Invisibles for a year.


There are TONS more, like seriously TONS more but these specifics are what have been dominating my playlists and my brain as of late, and throw in piano versions of a ton of Anime and Game soundtracks and then the sound tracks themselves.

I am such a nerd.
Because this is soo cool!!!!!

 

Road Rage!

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... and for once not toward other drivers.

*****UPDATE  9/20/12*****

Okay so this made me laugh.  On my way into work this morning they (they being VDOT) said that all of the construction would be postponed because of the horrible conditions of last week.  We are talking 6,7,8 hour back ups in three days.  AWFUL horrible terrible traffic jams.  And they still don't consider the bridge (not bridge tunnel) a 'main route across the bay.  I truly hope that the officials of this area learned a valuable lesson~at the expense of all of those people who where trapped in traffic for like all day.  I mean people were calling in 'stuck in traffic' to work, because by the time the traffic started to move- their shift was over. I luckily was not one of those poor saps, but still.  What did the construction crews and highway officials think would have happened? 

I am still laughing about this, and will be until they announce their next BRILLIANT plan for our roads.


Our roads are bad, like tire busting bad, and I am talking major highways.  So logically road work is in order.  Welll, the lovely common wealth that I so happen to reside in has decided to work on every major highway, by way and surface street at once, with multiple construction zones with in a 10 mile stretch, some of which forcing drivers to drive in the shoulder.  They are intelligent enough to do almost all of their work at night... when I have to drive through it.

So that doesn't sound too terrible right? Really it's not, but what is, is when the area in which I live is like the WORST, I mean WORST when it comes to car accidents.  We have at least 4 a day- four that slows down one highway or another. So add this with the construction, and some nights I don't get to drive, I get to inch down the road- I could probably walk the 40 miles home faster.  No kidding.

Now let's add another layer to this fun filled driving nightmare. There are only three ways between the two major metro areas, two are tunnels and one is a draw bridge.  The tunnels get backed up, one direction or another, at least once a day- and the bridge goes up at least once a day, if not twice- during rush hours.  So in the Department of Transportation's infinite wisdom they are closing down one direction of one of the major tunnels for three weekends in a row and one direction of the draw bridge for the same amount of time leaving ONE way for me and the rest of the cracker jack drivers to get to work.  ONE WAY.  With three ways, I am lucky to not get slowed down, or have to find an alternate route- NOW they are leaving NO alternate and forcing every one through a very tiny funnel - OUT of my way mind you - during the WEEKENDS. When everyone is driving to go out, to go to the beach while the weather is still nice, to shop, to take the kids to sports, and concerts and all the other stuff we have to do around here- which is a lot, and which is scattered across like 7 cities that makes up two metro areas.

This makes me want to cry.

EEEEEE New Game!!!

Okay, really, not new but new to me.  Persona 4 Arena on PS3!  I has it because of amazing budgeting and it is gooooood.

Check it out! Youtube it if you have to, and if you're not a fan of Shin Megami Tensei I pity you and your soul.



Also I found a new veggie that was cooked for me and I ate, well again not new per se but you know - Fried asparagus is like AMAZING. (and it took me five times to spell it close enough to get spell check to actually agree that I was looking for the word asparagus and not supergrass.)

Another note about games:

Really this is a note to game developers, and publishers-- PLEASE if you put a 'manual in the case, make it complete! Don't put in half of the stuff you see on the screen, and leave out the important parts!!!

This is the promised write up of the places where I am trying to earn a bit of money, so that I can do something a bit more serous, and be a little more comfortable in life. 
MyLot

Mylot is a social website that encourages their members to participate by paying them.  There is no exact amount per post that you earn and they actually keep all the money stuff very secret so that no one scams them. However, they are paying and it's pretty easy to reach their pay out as long as you are active and post meaningful discussions and responses. I have to emphasize that because, well it's important.  I have seen a lot of people bash myLot because they think they can sign up and just get money.  Nope, you have to work for it, and if you get referrals, well you earn all the faster and better!  So sign up here!


MTURK


(This paragraph wants to be in purple.) So Mturk is ran by Amazon.com and is totally awesome. Signing up is easy, even easier if you already have an Amazon account.  Now just work.  The jobs are worth pennies, but so it the time it takes to do them, and they add up quickly.  You can have your earnings deposited into your personal bank account OR you can spend them right on Amazon to buy stuff.  I have done both, and let me tell you having mturk funds really is amazing when you don't feel like paying for shipping.
 A few pointers for Mturking-
 - READ the instructions.  You never want to spend too much time doing anyone job, unless the pay is really really good.
- Do jobs that are easy to understand and easy to repeat. I've done nickle jobs for an hour and got like $9.
- Your time is money. And never forget that.  If they want you to do four or five things in one 'hit' (job) and it takes a few minutes (more than 5, but less than ten) and they are only paying .01 cents... DON'T do it! It's not worth it!


Clickworker.com


I am still trying to figure out Clickworker.com but it is basically like Mturk, just more strict.  Before you can even start working you have to complete assessments.  I've earned .10, which I think is a freebee but I am really looking forward to finishing up the assessments so that I can start earning.  They seem to want more, but from everything I've read they also pay more and want you to jump through less hoops to do it. Once I get a bit more experience here I will update this post.  HOWEVER like I said in my last post they do offer $5.00 for referring other clickworkers. So CLICKY CLICKY CLICKY and try it for yourself!
 

If I hear ... ONE MORE TIME!

If I hear "I need an educational toy for a two month old." ONE MORE TIME, I am going to rip the askers throat out and feed it to them.  EVERYTHING is educational at that age, and kids need time to be kids.  They learn WHILE they play.

Yes, I sound evil, and very angry but I am.  I *loath* willful ignorance and stupidity, and believing A TOY will educate your child really gets my knickers in a knot.  PARENTS educate, kids learn by mimicking.  By watching what their care takers do, not from a brightly colored flashing ball toy that does everything for the poor child, short of pushing a very simple to push button.  I could rant on and on about this, and I am pretty sure others have, so I'll leave it alone.  But again, people think.  Friends of people with kids THINK.  Human interaction trumps a 'educational toy' ANY DAY.

On a happier note, one that isn't ranting and raving and being otherwise pissy-

I am a gamer.

Having said this, three very amazing games are coming out in a very short amount of time.

Dishonored


Assassins Creed III


 Assassins Creed Liberation for PS Vita.


My head is going to explode. Like seriously explode.  And they all are around-ish my birthday :D :D :D The video game gods LOVE me!

While I rot my brain on eye-hand and critical thinking exorcizes I am also trying to learn Binary Trading.  I haven't got the money up to fund an account yet, but I am doing pretty good watching trends and practicing.  I will keep updating how I do.  Right now I am writing over at Mylot (it's a great place to converse and earn at the same time, I will do a whole write up on it later. but for now join me, and help me earn!)  I am also Mturking my butt off and Clickworkering because I am trying to earn the $100 I need for Any Option, so that I can start binary trading and maybe, just maybe get ahead.  OR get stable enough so that I don't have to be so scared IF my seasonal job goes by by.  OH By the way Clickworker is an affiliate site too. For every person you get to sign up, it's $5 bucks. :D


Very soon I will do a complete write up of every site I mentioned too.

Okay, So I'm a Bit Off

... But that doesn't mean I'm not angry anyway.

First thing is first, HI! I'm trying this whole blogging thing again, and hopefully I can keep up with it, hopefully. But that is not why I post, nor why I am angry.

http://www.change.org/petitions/us-cpsc-cease-magnet-prohibition

Sign Me
BUCKYBALLS!! I want them back on our shelves.  I want them to be sold, like any other 'adult marketed desk toy' I WANT MY BALLS.

A little back story: I work in a place that SOLD them.  (Yes this is in the past tense and I am about a month behind this whole breaking news story, but life gets in the way of internet ranting.) And we were told they were being PULLED off the market, by the FEDS.  HOWEVER, it was a voluntary pull because everything is still in litigation.  Nothing has been finalized, Maxfield and Oberton is fighting back.  As they should.

This is not an issue of a manufacturer trying to harm consumers, it is an issue that we, Americans, can't read instructions or properly protect our children.  Or for that matter teach them how to read.  The warning labels are clearly defined and if the warning labels weren't enough (you know all THREE of them on the outside of the package) then the fact that the resellers had to warn people of their hazards or they couldn't sell them.  IF that still wasn't enough- then we have no common sense. NONE.  WHY in the living seven realms of hell would you give your small child SMALL objects of any kind?! 

We keep all other small parted things away from small kids who swallow things, so what's so special about Buckyballs that parents just had to give them to their 5 year olds?  Come on. THINK PEOPLE!

And sign this petition - http://www.change.org/petitions/us-cpsc-cease-magnet-prohibition - save a corporation that has done nothing wrong, from people who can't seem to do anything right.

OH yeah, if you want to look at the actual litigation and crap and legal stuff then look here.