hangin' with Mel and Tabitha. :o)
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Tweeting from the Womb...
This is pretty weird. I support technology, but this idea is just ridiculous. If you are going to "tweet", then why not actually "tweet" it?How much do these devices cost? The only good thing I can see is that instead of sitting in front of the computer saying "I am giving baby a bath", you are ACTUALLY doing that and transmitting it.Other than that, I think it is silly.
Unborn babies can now use Twitter
No you didn't read that wrong, unborn babies can now send Tweets from the womb. Creepy sounding isn't it?After you get past the initial "ick" factor of this, it's not that disturbing... actually it's quite interesting but, do you think Tweeting from the womb is taking social media too far? Tell us.Corey Menscher, an NYU student, has developed a suite of devices entitled "The Honeycomb", the first of which is "The Kickbee".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiUq-iMQy7E&feature=player_embedded
The Kickbee allows physically separated spouses to connect with one another by transmitting fragments of sensory experiences of prototypical parenting activities from various stages of babyhood. In order to pass long the information, The Kickbee utilizes the popular microblogging service Twitter as a platform to record and distribute “kicks” to fathers as mobile phone text messages, thanks to its publicly available Application Programming Interface (API).
In layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo kicks... you get a Tweet about it.
On the technical side of things, a series of vibration sensors are attached to the belt longitudinally so their sensing areas can register the vibrations within the torso generated by a third-trimester baby. A microcontroller receives these signals, performs software filtering and processing, and transmits validated “kick” signals wirelessly to a custom Java application running on a personal computer.
Personally, back when my wife was pregnant (my son was born January 15, 2009) I would call my wife several times a day for general check-ins to see if the baby had been kicking much. I always enjoyed hearing about it, as it helped ease my worrisome mind, I guess.
I'm not saying that we would've used this product, but it would've been nice knowing when the baby was kicking.
As I mentioned above The Honeycomb also has two other stages, they are "The Burpbee" and "The Bathbee". Judging by the names you can probably tell what they're about.
The Burpbee transmits the warmth of a baby’s body on one parent’s shoulder to the other over a distance. It consists of two objects: a “transmitter” in the form of a burp cloth, and a “receiver” in the form of a men’s button-down shirt. The heater warms slowly, and after 30 seconds has reached its peak temperature of about 110º fahrenheitIn layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo is burping... your shoulder area gets hot, as if you're the one doing the burping.
The Bathbee is an olfactory bathtime awareness device for a parent who is away from home. It consists of two objects: a “transmitter” in the form of a rubber ducky bath toy, and a “receiver” in the form of a rubber ducky-themed children’s lunchbox. When the bath toy is being actively played with in a bathtub, it transmits the smells of bathtime over a distance by filling the room with the scent of baby oil.
In layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo is getting a bath... your room begins to smell of baby oil.
I can see the allure of The Kickbee... but the other two are kind of a stretch in my opinion.
What are your thoughts on The Kickbee and the other Honeycomb devices - Creepy or Innovative?
Unborn babies can now use Twitter
No you didn't read that wrong, unborn babies can now send Tweets from the womb. Creepy sounding isn't it?After you get past the initial "ick" factor of this, it's not that disturbing... actually it's quite interesting but, do you think Tweeting from the womb is taking social media too far? Tell us.Corey Menscher, an NYU student, has developed a suite of devices entitled "The Honeycomb", the first of which is "The Kickbee".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiUq-iMQy7E&feature=player_embedded
The Kickbee allows physically separated spouses to connect with one another by transmitting fragments of sensory experiences of prototypical parenting activities from various stages of babyhood. In order to pass long the information, The Kickbee utilizes the popular microblogging service Twitter as a platform to record and distribute “kicks” to fathers as mobile phone text messages, thanks to its publicly available Application Programming Interface (API).
In layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo kicks... you get a Tweet about it.
On the technical side of things, a series of vibration sensors are attached to the belt longitudinally so their sensing areas can register the vibrations within the torso generated by a third-trimester baby. A microcontroller receives these signals, performs software filtering and processing, and transmits validated “kick” signals wirelessly to a custom Java application running on a personal computer.
Personally, back when my wife was pregnant (my son was born January 15, 2009) I would call my wife several times a day for general check-ins to see if the baby had been kicking much. I always enjoyed hearing about it, as it helped ease my worrisome mind, I guess.
I'm not saying that we would've used this product, but it would've been nice knowing when the baby was kicking.
As I mentioned above The Honeycomb also has two other stages, they are "The Burpbee" and "The Bathbee". Judging by the names you can probably tell what they're about.
The Burpbee transmits the warmth of a baby’s body on one parent’s shoulder to the other over a distance. It consists of two objects: a “transmitter” in the form of a burp cloth, and a “receiver” in the form of a men’s button-down shirt. The heater warms slowly, and after 30 seconds has reached its peak temperature of about 110º fahrenheitIn layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo is burping... your shoulder area gets hot, as if you're the one doing the burping.
The Bathbee is an olfactory bathtime awareness device for a parent who is away from home. It consists of two objects: a “transmitter” in the form of a rubber ducky bath toy, and a “receiver” in the form of a rubber ducky-themed children’s lunchbox. When the bath toy is being actively played with in a bathtub, it transmits the smells of bathtime over a distance by filling the room with the scent of baby oil.
In layman’s terms: Whenever your kiddo is getting a bath... your room begins to smell of baby oil.
I can see the allure of The Kickbee... but the other two are kind of a stretch in my opinion.
What are your thoughts on The Kickbee and the other Honeycomb devices - Creepy or Innovative?
Friday, May 22, 2009
Hundreds see UFO’s over city - Helicopters Investigate
Hundreds see UFO’s over city - Helicopters Investigate : thecrit.com
May 20th 10:30pm (ish), glowing lights appear in the sky. Some move. Some appear out of nowhere. Some move vertically or horizontally. Half a dozen helicopters fly around and near the glowing lights.
Around 10:30 a formation of lights sit in the sky as helicopters head for it. And towards the end watch as 3 lights appear below them. You get to see one appear out of nowhere. Its amazing thing to see.im excited.Hope to get more videos of these strange lights. We did go down to memphis but its too far so we stopped.
This video is spreading like wildfire among the various online communities. Military verterans are saying these lights are in no-way related to flares whatsoever. That it is impossible for these lights to be flares.
rrorrimruoy says:
FLARES!?!?!?!LMFAO…I served in the Marine Corps for four years active duty and have seen plenty of flares my friend and those ARE NOT flares. For one they do not sit for that long…they move and they have a trail. You know when you see a flare or flares. LOL…flares…how about some swamp gas too…LOLPeace
May 22, 8:15 PM
We are still waiting for better footage as it is strongly believed that at least one helicopter on the scene, had a video camera.
Stay tuned for updates!
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Sunday, May 17, 2009
"I'm gonna wash that gray right outta my hair" today...and for those of you old enough, you will get a kick out of these flashbacks! http://ping.fm/lqnNT
Friday, May 15, 2009
Monday, May 11, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Jeannie Toohey Announced as 2009 Mother of the Year
My friend Mel sent me the following video from CNNBC: "Jeannie Toohey Announced as 2009 Mother of the Year."
Watch it here
Watch it here
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Happy Cinco de Mayo - A Little Info...
| Cinco de Mayo | |
 |
Cinco de Mayo (Spanish for "fifth of May") is a regional holiday in Mexico, primarily celebrated in the state of Puebla, with some limited recognition in other parts of Mexico.[1][2] The holiday commemorates the Mexican army's unlikely defeat of French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, under the leadership of Mexican General Ignacio Zaragoza Seguín.[3][4]
While outnumbered, the Mexicans defeated a much better-equipped French army that had known no defeat for almost 50 years.[5] However, Cinco de Mayo is not "an obligatory federal holiday" in Mexico, but rather a holiday that can be observed voluntarily.[6][7]
While Cinco de Mayo has limited significance nationwide in Mexico, the date is observed in the United States and other locations around the world as a celebration of Mexican heritage and pride.[8] However, a common misconception in the United States is that Cinco de Mayo is Mexico's Independence Day,[9] which actually is September 16 (dieciséis de septiembre in Spanish),[10] the most important national patriotic holiday in Mexico.[11]
Monday, May 4, 2009
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Staples: They have what we need...for "the flu"
It seems everyone these days are ca$$hing in on the Swine Flu Virus Epidemic. Shawn was saying the day before yesterday that CVS was selling those breathing masks that painters use for around $5.00. And now, Staples has this ad right on their homepage.Staples is now advertising that they have what you need to protect yourself from The Flu. Really? Seriously? Since when did an office supply store become a pharmacy? And by the way, did you notice how they said "Protect yourself from "the flu""? There is a difference from "the flu" and "The Swine Flu"...did you notice how they are capitalizing on "the flu" but didn't Capitalize "The Flu"? {:o)
Gotta love marketing!!
I am thankful everyone I know has not caught any of the flu's.
Inside Edition - Real Estate Infomercial Investigation - John Beck
If you are up late for any reason, you have probably seen these John Clark Infomercials. I have gone to bed with them on because that is the only thing on tv. (We have basic cable - $5.00 cable tv plan.) I remember thinking how great it sounded and what if it was really true? My husband never likes infomercials and thinks that they are all scams. I am beginning to think that he may be right. (Don't tell him I said that.)
And then it gets me thinking, what if there are infomercials that are really true, no gimmick. John Clark very well may have screwed up the integrity of everyone else's business. Because of this, people will always beware...thanks to all the snakes out there.
I am thankful that I don't have the money to invest in something like this because if I did, I may have been one of those unfortunate people that got caught in his scam.
I found it very interesting that Inside Edition's Video showed what the house REALLY looked like and interviewed the people who fixed them up. They said that the houses DID cost that much, but they were un-inhabitable. It costed the buyers 3 times the amount they paid for the house to fix it to make it inhabitable and look like the pictures the infomercial shows.
I also love that they went and interviewed the owners. The infomercial states that the cost of the houses was the amount they owed on the back taxes and the houses were up for foreclosure. When Inside Edition interviewed the owners, they said that was NOT true. They did NOT lose their house to foreclosure at all.
One woman they interviewed said that she paid her taxes, but the city had applied her taxes to the wrong property, the city's fault. They fixed the problem and she did NOT lose her house. She sold her house on her own, it did NOT foreclose.
It's funny (not really) how you can stretch the truth and twist it for your own benefit. It is awful and dishonest. Why lie?
I will be honest, though. I have seen the infomercial many times and they did a great job explaining how it was possible to buy a beautiful house for under $600. I guess next time, I will be better off just turning the tv off.
Thank you so much to Inside Edition for uncovering this story/scam. You have saved one person - ME!
The moral of this story; Buyer Beware, If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is, Don't believe everything you see/hear, Turn the Boob Tube OFF!
Real Estate Infomercial Investigation:ORIGINAL AIRDATE: 4/28/2009
| "You're about to learn how you can start buying homes like these for just a few hundred dollars," says the announcer at the start of real estate guru John Beck’s infomercial. The infomercial airs morning, noon and night all across the country. In it, Beck says if you send him just $39.95 he'll teach you how to buy beautiful homes for next to nothing. According to Beck, buyers can get incredible deals when people fail to pay their property taxes and the houses are auctioned off by the government. The hostess in the infomercial says, "We could not be telling you about it on national television if it was not true." INSIDE EDITION’s Senior Investigative Correspondent Matt Meagher went to Oklahoma where every house featured in the infomercial is located. There, with just a little digging, Meagher discovered, how Beck misleads viewers about the homes featured in the infomercial. On his infomercial Beck boasts about how a big two story home was purchased at a tax foreclosure sale for only $521.56. However, INSIDE EDITION learned that it actually cost three times as much, which would still be an amazing deal. But what Beck didn't show is what the home really looked like when it was purchased. It was completely dilapidated and took ten years and more than $100,000 for the current owner to make it look as good as it did in the infomercial. The current homeowner tells INSIDE EDITION the house was “pretty much…uninhabitable” when he purchased it. Also featured on the infomercial is another dazzling house that Beck says was actually purchased for less than $100. But, that’s not true. County records show it was acquired for more that $2,200 and was a falling down piece of junk at auction. It took four years and $40,000 to fix up. Beverly Glover was shocked when INSIDE EDITION showed her the infomercial. The infomercial implied that she lost her home because of just $329 in back taxes. Glover says, “That's a lie.” In the infomercial, Beck claims "[Glover’s home] was purchased free and clear for only $329.90." However, she actually never lost possession of her home. A clerical error had applied her tax payment to the wrong property. The mistake was corrected and she never left her home until she sold it for $158,000. Freeman says that not one of the homes featured in the infomercial has sold for the price John Beck has quoted them at. As many as 15,000 people a week cough up nearly $40 for Beck’s instructional DVDs and booklets. But that's just the beginning. Everyone who responds to the infomercial soon gets a call from a telemarketer at a company called Mentoring of America. It's owned by the same people who own the John Beck infomercial and several others like it. This is where the company makes the real money. Telemarketers follow a script that says the potential buyer is being considered for a select team that will be trained by John Beck himself, but that’s baloney. The telemarketers urge people to put up to $15,000 on their credit cards to pay for private over-the-phone tutoring, and say they’re almost certain to make that money back in just a few months Dawn Zuvic of Mississippi and Lani Maplesden from California both say they fell for the pitch. “I know that there's always money to be made in real estate,” Maplesden tells INSIDE EDITION. Zuvic says, “I was always hoping that eventually that I would be able to be make a good living at it.” They each paid more than $10,000 for the tutoring and have had no success. “It makes me cry a lot,” laughs Maplesden. “I'm still paying on the bills.” Dawn Zuvic says her mentor talked her into buying a tiny piece of land in Pennsylvania at what was supposed to be a huge discount. But, INSIDE EDITION found property records showing the land had been bought for only $585 and then sold to Zuvic for more than $2,595 only five months later. That wasn't a discount, it was more than a 300% markup! The land was sold to Dawn Zuvic by none other than John Beck himself! She's never been able to resell the land and has now had to take a second job as a waitress. Zuvic tells INSIDE EDITION, “I felt like, like I was taken.” Bill Mitchell of the Better Business Bureau in Southern California says John Beck's infomercial has generated hundreds of complaints and the company has received an “F” rating. “Their real business is selling blue sky, hot air,” Mitchell says. When Meagher asked how his companies helped people, Hewitt responded, “Why are you confronting me like this?!” He says that Mentoring of America is not a scam. “It is not [a scam]. First, first of all...you have your facts wrong.” His attorney later supplied INSIDE EDITION with a list of 13 people who said they had a good experience with the program, earning between $550-$39,600. But Lani Maplesden isn't convinced. She's $20,000 in debt and in danger of losing her home. She says if she could talk to John Beck, she’d ask him, “How can you sleep at night? Do you have any conscience at all?” The company says they dispute the Better Business Bureau's ratings system and claim they work to resolve consumer complaints. As far as the houses, they say Beck never states in the infomercial that the homes were in the condition shown when purchased. |
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