Author: Dan Dickinson

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Happened

J6P

I’ve been enjoying the various forums this morning to watch people freak out about Warner going exclusively to Blu-Ray, more or less killing HD-DVD and ending the hi-def video format war. Format fanboys are akin to mutated console fanboys – the lack of logic is truly astounding.

But there’s a lot of acronyms that get thrown around in these circles – circles I am not usually native to – but I’ve been able to gradually piece them together. HDM is “high definition media”, DD is “digital distribution”, or perhaps “digital download”. I did get stuck on “J6P”, as in:

I’m hardly J6P, but I prefer to stay off of the bleeding edge.

Getting a huge sum of money or not, Warner is making a decision based on it’s sales numbers for both sides and deciding they need to pick one in order to get behind it completely and get J6P to get behind it.

After a few minutes of pondering, I decoded this as “Joe Six Pence” instead of (what I later discovered to be correct) “Joe Six Pack”.

Lesson learned: my brain is innately British.

(Katie, upon hearing this story, retorted with “Your brain is not innately British, it’s just *innately retarded*.” This is also an acceptable lesson.)

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Debated Disliked Narrated

Morning Tech Support

If the experiences I’ve had over the last hour are any indication, 2008 is going to be the year where everyone forgets how customer service works.

I have attempted to deal with three separate organizations. All three have failed even the most basic of requirements for making a customer happy.

Continue reading “Morning Tech Support”
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Happened Narrated

One Last 2007 Story

In lieu of my traditional end of year posts, I instead offer an anecdote I offered a friend when summarizing my year, one that was left out of the relevant post:

On September 9th, around 3 PM, I went on the Cyclone at Coney. It was the last day that Astroland was going to be in existence; I had already seen the Zipper get driven away. In an effort to get the ride finished sooner (always hate the lines!), I opted for the last car – which I would be sharing with someone else. Someone considerably larger than me.

Sure enough, I had forgotten everything I had ever been told (NEVER RIDE THE LAST CAR) in a wave of nostalgia.

The first 30 seconds were fantastic, even as my back was reeling and my chest was crunching into the bar as we free-fell over and over again. Then we hit a sharp turn and my seatmate slammed into me, nearly breaking my ribs. It wasn’t much fun anymore, it was just pain – so I braced myself to avoid a repeat, and held on for the remainder of the ride.

I got off, collected my bag – cursing myself for deciding to lug all of my lenses and a monopod with me that day. It hurt enough to nearly bring me to tears, but not nearly enough to have me call an ambulance. At the same time – that was going to be my closing memory on Coney Island? I was livid in my pain – walked onto the beach, shot a 270° panorama, and hobbled to the train home.

It would hurt to breathe for the next week, and the pain would continue for about three weeks – and I think it ended right around the time they announced that, surprise, Astroland will be open again next year!

2007 is all right there – the joy, the pain that makes you wince, the regret and the stupid dramatic twist at the end.

Rollercoaster of a year, indeed.