Dan

slightly shocked

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 15:42:14 GMT

i get the first three, but 21% in history/literature? i like history/literature. and only 3% in dumb/dork/awkward? i know i get points for being married, but now i have to question their whole methodology.

normally i don't care for these quizzes, but this one was playing on my turf.

Sun, 29 Apr 2007 03:58:47 GMT

party_music_here.mp4 (view in quicktime player or other such media player)

i took a brief video with my camera while robyn was driving to augsburg, germany. from the radio selections in the car, it appears that radio waves take at least 20 years to cross the atlantic. by far the best thing about this clip is the german DJ's comment immediately after the song at the 27-second mark.

other pictures from our trip to germany/austria are in the process of going up here (not all pictures are public - post a comment or send an email with your flickr id here and i'll add you as a contact if you want to see them all).

moving day

Thu, 28 Sep 2006 01:04:59 GMT

for four years, the scourge was believed banished from the land, exiled to a far-off realm...

there was much rejoicing amongst the people of minnesota...

but recently, rumors of a growing menace surfaced...

and the people grew wary...

those rumors are true, and the allies of this evil bane are now celebrating...

the people of the twin cities quake in fear, and well they should, because...

on october 6, 2006, i return to minneapolis.

digital pimpage

Thu, 25 May 2006 00:37:08 GMT

for my birthday the other week, robyn got me an ipod (after some return business with amazon, a 5th gen video ipod). this has rejuvenated my unhealthy appetite for digital video encoding and things of that nature, which i was quite obsessed with about four years ago. if you look at my livejournal user info, which hasn't been updated in about that long, you can see a couple of references to that.

after some research on the internet and the purchase of a firewire cable, i've found that i can connect our comcast DVR to robyn's ibook and digitally record video from the DVR to the mac. i can then transfer the video file (which is an MPEG-2 transfer stream for the curious) to my PC, where i should be able to encode it to divx/xvid, encode it to a format compatible with the ipod, or perhaps burn it to DVD. i haven't figured out how to do that yet, as i wasn't sure i could get the shows off the DVR.

i'm now recording that south park from a couple months ago where chef dies.

true spirit and personality

Sat, 15 Apr 2006 03:30:26 GMT

some of you may have noticed this userpic of mine:

four years ago it was my default livejournal userpic and thus i felt a need to both defend and attack it, but today i feel like at that time i only scratched the surface of what it means. perhaps it takes four years of contemplating the meaning of such an image to fully appreciate it. like a fine wine, the justin & britney icon matures with age. and thus it was that i was finally ready to find this:

http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release783.html

i can't explain what it was that originally drew me to this icon, led me to save it off of a yahoo! ad and use it here. i think it was a feeling that when some future scholar is documenting our civilization 5000 years from now, this image will serve as sort of a keystone that everything else falls into place around. the press release linked above only cements that belief.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

YAHOO! SHOPPING TAKES FANS ON A SHOPPING SPREE WITH BRITNEY SPEARS AND JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE

Watch YOUtopia.com's Exclusive Footage of Britney and Justin Shopping and Simultaneously Buy Their Favorite Fashions on Yahoo! ShoppingVision

yes! i'm hooked... tell me more!

June 11, 2001 -- Yahoo! Inc.(Nasdaq: YHOO), a leading online shopping destination, today announced that for the first time ever, fans can shop alongside pop stars Britney Spears and N'SYNC's Justin Timberlake as they shop in New York and London retail stores. Yahoo! Shopping (http://shopping.yahoo.com) will be webcasting previously unseen footage of Justin and Britney shopping in some of their favorite stores through a custom Yahoo! ShoppingVision player, which enables consumers to buy contextually relevant merchandise while they simultaneously view a video stream.

yahoo, you had me at "buy contextually relevant merchandise." the video stream is just gravy.

i've always thought i might like to buy something solely because a famous person has bought that item, but it's always so much work. reading tabloids, squinting at the television watching E! trying to make out what brand of purse a celebrity is carrying, trying to determine what options ashton kutcher has on his CXT. finally, someone figured out how i can simply watch a celebrity shop and buy contextually relevant merchandise as i watch them! i barely even have to be conscious! in fact, it's better if i'm not.

"We are thrilled to work with Yahoo! to help deliver teens an exciting new way to shop online and to offer Yahoo!'s users the opportunity to see Britney's and Justin's true spirit and personality," said Randi Shinder, chief executive officer of YOUtopia.com.

i thought i knew their true spirit and personality from the "hit me baby one more time" and "cry me a river" videos, but i thank yahoo! and YOUtopia.com for this opportunity nonetheless.

according to the press release, "YOUtopia offers teens between the ages of 13 and 19 the opportunity to earn their own online currency, "YOUdollars", in exchange for participating in a host of entertaining interactive activities at www.youtopia.com." sadly, YOUtopia.com appears to have gone the way of the link farm. i'm not entirely sure how that could have happened to a business whose primary functions appear to have been hiring britney spears as a spokesperson and giving teenagers fake currency on a website, but it saddens me all the same.

still, take heart, there is much that future historians will glean from this singular moment in history. in 2001: A Space Odyssey, stanley kubrick and arthur c. clarke envisioned humanity in the year 2001 on a mission to jupiter that would lead to the next step in mankind's evolution. history may not have played out exactly as kubrick and clarke had imagined, but perhaps in some way, thanks to the boundless imagination of yahoo! shopping, YOUtopia.com and pepsi, we have surpassed their wildest dreams.

a helpful guide to holiday offense (over at disconnect.net)

Fri, 24 Mar 2006 00:00:50 GMT

for those of you who might not know, i have another blog over at disconnect.net. i originally created it for the 2004 election for political stuff, and since then i'll use it if i have something vaguely political in nature to say, but mostly it just sort of sits around with not much going on.

today i wrote up a nice rant, which i like to post here, but it was vaguely political in nature, which i like to post there, causing a terrible conundrum as to which bloggy wasteland i should exile it to. i put it on disconnect, but i wanted to mention it here because i believe you can simply befriend disconnectnet and read disconnect.net crap here, thereby killing two birds with one stone. then instead of reading one post by me every few months, through the miracle of syndication you can read... two posts by me every few months.

red octomber

Sat, 28 Jan 2006 19:04:22 GMT

i got this ebay spam email this week. as far as i can tell, according to the headers, it's from china. even for the standards of chinese ebay phishing spam, i found this to be especially funny.

Dear sir,

We recently have determined that different computers have logged onto your eBay account, and multiple password failures were present before the logons. We strongly advice CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD.

If this is not completed by Octomber 20, 2005, we will be forced to suspend your account indefinitely, as it may have been used for fraudulent purposes. Thank you for your cooperation.

damn, have i missed the deadline already? those octomber days just fly by so fast...

cnn and the demise of western civilization

Sat, 02 Jul 2005 21:46:32 GMT

check out this excerpt from cnn's article about a police chase ending up at an airport:

The driver kept mostly to the speed limit on the highways but then burst through a restricted area at the airport and drove onto the taxiway, where aircraft can roll, or taxi, from one part of the airport to another.

"We're really lucky he did not make it onto a runway," said airport spokeswoman Debra Osteicher. "He was on a taxiway going past planes that had come to a stop because we had known he was out there and going to be near them. So they did all come to a stop."

The runway is the strip on which aircraft can take off and land.

this is why i pay no attention to cnn anymore. well, this and the fact that every story they run nowadays seems to be missing children and white women, the 24-hour news equivalent of the side of a milk carton. and their incredibly stupid decision to move further to the right in an attempt to attract conservatives who are perfectly happy with fox news and will never think of cnn as anything other than left-wing propaganda no matter what they show.

anyway, apparently their readers are so dumb as to need to be told what a runway is at an airport, thus wasting my time as i have to read through explanations of what every word in the article more than six letters long means. i was forgiving of their definition of "taxiway" because that word isn't really used much, but honest to fucking god, if you don't know what a runway is i'd be surprised if you're able to click a link on a webpage.

now i know what you're going to say: people are idiots. but i mean, you always see studies that show things like 75% of americans can't place the state of wisconsin on a map, or that segment on the tonight show where jay leno asks people questions like "what war started in 1776?" and people answer shit like "the civil war". so even if half of cnn's readership is too dumb to know what a runway is, if we start explaining definitions of words that kids learn in first grade, we're going to be here a while...

The Pentagon has confirmed that one of their aircraft has gone down. Reports are that the military cargo plane crashed in Lake Michigan five miles from Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Wisconsin is a state in the north-central part of the United States.

The military is a part of the government that fights wars.

War is when people hurt each other.

Hurt is when you get a boo-boo.

tell me i'm crazy here.

the vegas thread

Sun, 30 Jan 2005 22:02:45 GMT

after several weeks of dicking around, looking for cheaper flights, debating over which hotel to stay at, which days to go, or even whether or not to go, robyn and i booked a trip to milwaukee and las vegas between march 5 and 11. we'll be in milwaukee on saturday, sunday and monday, to make up for when we were supposed to be there at christmas but couldn't make it through due to the huge snow/ice storm. then we'll be in vegas tuesday, wednesday, thursday and half of friday, staying at the luxor and returning to atlanta friday night. the return flight was the sticking point - a flight leaving las vegas and arriving in atlanta at a reasonable time was generally hard to come by. we settled on one arriving in atlanta pretty late under the assumption that we'll be on pacific time anyway so it won't feel quite so late. and also the fact that anything else would require at least 200 additional dollars.

this'll be our first real vacation of decent (week-long) length since we went to paris on our honeymoon almost two years ago. i've developed a nice fear of flying, so three flights and 10 hours in the air isn't exactly sounding fun, but what'reyagonnado.

does anyone happen to have any suggestions of things to do in vegas? nice restaurants, good casinos, etc. i figure i'll probably play a lot of poker while i'm there, so good places to do that would be most appreciated. i don't want to make the mistake of thinking i can whip everyone's ass in poker, but i do think i'm better than most, and stand a decent chance of winning some money over a few days at the right tables. when in biloxi/new orleans last year i won about $85 at a few places despite it being my first time playing with real money, and the canadian fbi can neither confirm nor deny rumors of being up a substantial sum in the dark underworld of online poker.

Thu, 30 Dec 2004 17:34:21 GMT

you know, i was going to write a post in here about the fourth harry potter book and why it's my favorite, and all the nice stuff i think about it (i finished rereading it last night). but i was thinking to myself, who the hell cares what i think about the fourth harry potter book? and this is going to be the topic that breaks my long livejournal silence? harry potter and the goblet of fire? have i lost my mind?

of course, now i'm breaking my long livejournal silence by writing a post about how writing a post about harry potter is dumb. so i'll leave it to the reader to determine whether or not this is a step up.

i've been on a real misanthropic kick lately, which might be contributing to the feeling of "what the hell does this matter?" contained in this post. even writing about semi-serious stuff over at disconnect is feeling kind of worthless. i'm not exactly sure why this is... i'm sure current global events contribute to it. i debate how much bush winning another term might have kick-started it, but i can't seem to shake the feeling that people are simply dumb. ...not you people reading this of course... other people. and i know it's not a gigantic surprise that people do stupid things, but usually, you know, you have more of a hope that people will overcome this and do good in the end. lately such hope has been severely lacking for me, i suppose.

i guess this is one of the nice things about the fourth harry potter book too, the fact that it's kind of the first of the series where the adult world sticks its ugly head into everything. where you see that there are nasty people and nasty things out in the world, and no one's going to protect you from them. where you kind of have to the face the possibility that what's good and decent might not win out in the end. of course, there are many other things that i enjoy about the book that don't require a general pessimism towards humanity at the time of reading, but that's just what's striking me right now.

this post is about nothing in particular. or is it...

Tue, 03 Aug 2004 02:50:25 GMT

i was looking through my hard drive for something to use as a livejournal icon since my current ones are so old. through various computer upgrades and several hard drives, my old data has remained more or less intact so there's some interesting old stuff on here. to wit:

that was an old ad graphic from outpost.com, i think. i don't know why that amuses me so much other than just imagining what that math must be. 175,000 products... one gerbil... that's the answer, but what's the question? what's that gerbil up to, and what does it have to do with 175,000 products? solve that, and it all fits into place. truly vexing. and no, i haven't gotten enough sleep lately.

the highlight of the archaeological dig through my hard drive though has to be this:

this was just sitting on a table in the old architecture building at the U of M campus in 1999, before they remodeled it. that adds the "where did it come from?" component to the mystery of "what is this?".

i'm using the name "canadian fbi" on partypoker now, and it's prompted several people to ask me what the hell the name means, or inform me (in both english and french) that there is no canadian fbi. i know this. that's part of the point. when asked to explain what the canadian fbi is though, i find it difficult. so deeply veiled is the intrigue of the canadian fbi that not even i fully understand it (ok, now i'm starting to sound like fred durst searching for teddy swoes). all i can say is that if you understand the kitten conspiracy, you're on the right track.

Wed, 02 Jun 2004 22:29:09 GMT

a week or two ago, i wrote a post about this interview with billy corgan, specifically about a) how there aren't really any bands (that anyone knows about, anyway) who really blow you away, and b) about selling out, at least as far as having your song be on a commercial, which is a gigantic pet peeve of mine and i was pleased to see he didn't do.

then i deleted it accidentally before i posted it. so you get the above one line summary for now.

anyway, this spring i ripped all of my cds to mp3 and got a lot of old mp3s that i had burned to cd-r back on my hard drive, the result being 30 GB and 4974 songs (and there were more that didn't make the cut). however, once you get past 2001 it gets kind of spotty, and i already listened to most of that stuff a lot back in the day anyway. basically, i would like any suggestions as to new bands i might like. old ones are fine too, and also good would be suggestions of websites or maybe independent music store-type things where i could find plenty of bands. it's been over half a year since i bought a new cd and much longer than that since i was blown away by any new band or cd. also, i don't use kazaa and don't plan to.

i literally would be interested in about every single genre of music you could suggest so fire away. if it's good i think i'll appreciate it. i was going to post the first 25 random songs winamp spit out, but it gave some really weird tracks that wouldn't have helped. plus most of them were from 1997 or so anyway. actually, two tracks by mako and girl next door were in the first 30... :)

trolling for birthday wishes

Tue, 11 May 2004 16:23:29 GMT

this was the post in which i informed everyone who already knew that it was my birthday that it was my birthday.

now it's unofficially official

Tue, 27 Apr 2004 00:18:46 GMT

ok, i now have launched my blog at disconnect.net. i wasn't doing anything better with the space so i figured i'd put the site right up on the front page there. all i have up there now is a post i wrote wednesday explaining what i intend to do with the site and the design is rudimentary at best, but now i at least have a space where i can easily post links and comments the next time the mood strikes me (that being the "goddamn bush is ruining our country" mood).

making it officially unofficial

Thu, 15 Apr 2004 16:07:53 GMT

i thought i should mention that i've decided to return to the blogosphere. probably. primarily to annoy people with links to articles and commentary about how george w. bush and his cronies are idiots and need to be removed from office in november, as i have been doing to a select few via email for months now. i decided to expand it to the whole world (or the ten people that will visit my site). this will probably be happening over at disconnect.net. i will also possibly have a separate site which isn't political and deals with the mundane goings-on of my life. that may or may not be at disconnect.net, or it may be in this space. i don't know yet. robyn and i are going on a four-day trip starting tomorrow night to new orleans and biloxi, MS for our anniversary however, so this may be a week or two away from happening.

actual goings-on in the greater chattanooga area

Tue, 09 Mar 2004 20:21:15 GMT

ok, for all those who wanted an official dan update: i got my wisdom teeth taken out yesterday. one of them was rubbing into my cheek so i decided to get all four taken out in order to just get it over with... in hindsight that may have been a mistake. the two bottom ones were impacted and the bottom left in particular was a bitch. i also accidentally bit the dentist when i misinterpreted a request to the assistant while under the gas.

anyway, i got no sleep last night because they wouldn't stop bleeding until 2-3 am. now i'm all puffed up like a blowfish and still can't really sleep for various reasons. perhaps if anyone has wisdom-teeth-related... wisdoms to share it would be appreciated. otherwise i would give the advice to do one half and leave the other half as-is.

unlimited posts in dan's livejournal!

Sat, 06 Mar 2004 15:18:19 GMT

i don't really post much here. i've mostly been using it to read various people's journals on my friends page, but still, sometimes i feel like perhaps i should post a little on what i'm doing here. perhaps at some point i will write more here or on my website, but until then, here's a link you can follow to enjoy unlimited surrogate livejournal postings, on behalf of me:

more journal entries

shamelessly stolen from the brunching shuttlecocks.

Thu, 25 Jul 2002 19:08:39 GMT

i read an article today in the n.y. times about how much information one can find out about someone on the web by just doing a google search on their name. which i've known for quite some time, but haven't done in a very long time, so i decided to do it again. check out www.google.com with a search for "dan coates", note how many results you get (courtesy of all the more famous and accomplished dan coateses in the world), and see what the very first result returned is.

Mon, 15 Jul 2002 18:16:12 GMT

new stuff!

http://www.disconnect.net/

the cutest kaboom

Thu, 14 Feb 2002 22:47:27 GMT

CNN.com - Alert issued for potential teddy bear bombs - February 14, 2002

CNN.com - First cloned cat is born, scientists say - February 14, 2002

put two and two together here..... what do you get?
no, not four.
no, not twotwo either. dumbass.
KITTEN BOMBS.
be on the lookout. don't say you weren't warned.

britney and justin are dead. long live britney and justin.

Thu, 24 Jan 2002 04:37:11 GMT

new livejournal icon! dan's journal now with 72% less teen pop idols.

Mon, 21 Jan 2002 07:59:03 GMT

since i haven't used this much, i think i need to change my user icon soon before people know me through my replies in other people's journals as "that guy with the justin & britney icon". i just love it though - it's so obviously despicable that it's a perfect commentary on how low this culture has sunk. it doesn't even need any parodying or anything, since one look at it should cause such immediate revulsion, yet you know someone created that (as a yahoo banner ad, originally) as a serious thing. and there are people out there who would go "ooh!" and click on it. and that fact is at once funny, and sad, and profound, in its own way. so i keep it there, instead of a picture of myself or something, because if you're reading this you probably know what i look like anyway, and if you're reading this you're probably bored enough to contemplate such things as the astoundingly large influence of britney spears's and justin timberlake's shopping on our world today. and if you don't know what i look like, then here's a woefully outdated picture of me, but i still wear the same clothes now anyway so it's pretty accurate.

all-natural, proven breakthrough!

Mon, 21 Jan 2002 07:45:08 GMT

is there anyone who would trust buying medical supplements or enhancements through spam e-mail? like, "what's this? there's been a breakthrough in [penis enlargement]/[breast enhancement]/[fat reduction]/[hair regrowth]/[pheromone technology]??? well, surely these people who have sent me an unsolicited junk email and run a shoddy website are providers of legitimate, proven, quality medical supplements. i think i'll just buy whatever they're selling and put it in my body and see what happens next."

Thu, 17 Jan 2002 20:59:59 GMT

the following email was sent to my perfect song facsimile account (which i never check anymore), but was thankfully forwarded to me by jyll, who also has an old disconnect.net email address.
if it's spam, it's certainly the most entertaining spam i've ever received.

Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2002 12:29:25 -0800
To: ken@discnet.com, tpv.dvt@discnet.com, lithron@discom.net,
apathy@disconnect.net, psfacsimile@disconnect.net,
popeingrid@discordiaonline.com
From: webmaster@epi.com (Frank Young)
Subject: Time Travelers PLEASE HELP!!!!

Below is the result of your feedback form. It was
submitted by Frank Young (webmaster@epi.com)
---------------------------------------------------------
message: If you are a time traveler or alien disguised as human and or have the technology to travel physically through time I need your help!

My life has been severely tampered with and cursed!!
I have suffered tremendously and am now dying!

I need to be able to:

Travel back in time.

Rewind my life including my age back to 4.

Be able to remember what I know now so that I can prevent my life from being tampered with again after I go back.

I am in very great danger and need this immediately!

I am aware that there are many types of time travel, and that humans do not do well through certain types.

I need as close to temporal reversion as possible, as safely as possible.
To be able to rewind the hands of time in such a way that the universe of now will cease to exist.
I know that there are some very powerful people out there with alien or government equipment capable of doing just that.

If you can help me I will pay for your teleport or trip down here, Along with hotel stay, food and all expenses. I will pay top dollar for the equipment. Proof must be provided.

Please be advised that any temporal device that you may employ must account for X, Y, and Z coordinates as well as the temporal location.
I have a time machine now, but it has limited abilitys and is useless without a vortex. If you can provide information on how to create vortex generator or where I can get some of the blue glowing moon crystals this would also be helpful.

Also if you are one of the very, very, few beings with the ability to edit the universe PLEASE REPLY!!!

Only if you have this technology and can help me please send me a (SEPARATE) email to:

Robby0809@aol.com

Please do not reply if your an evil alien!
Thanks

Wed, 24 Oct 2001 23:27:46 GMT

i dunno if i'm going to use this space or not. i just came across the following tidbit and i thought i'd share. so this is for anyone who might know i have this site and stumbles across it.

background: my professor for internet programming is carl sturtivant. he is from england, and looks a bit like a cross between mr. bean and mr. burns. for more background info go here. at first i didn't like his classes that much but now he has progressed to be probably my favorite teacher. i've come to the conclusion that carl likes frogs. various examples of things in the class use the word "frog", and it's generally a prevalent word in the class. frogs and other amphibians, to be correct. then, in some sample code for tomorrow's midterm, i came across the following bio for a user of a chat program he wrote for last year's final. for some reason i found it very funny. you probably won't after this long explanation, but something about it just got me.

Autobiography of Freddy Frog

Freddy Frog is an underwaterate at Lake Minnetonka. He was born yesterday, and has progressed by leaps and bounds to his present internet fame. His favorite color is green, and he likes tadpoles.