Voiceover gods

Voiceover gods:



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Get Ready To Bum Rush The Charts

In about 7 hours we are going to Bum Rush The Charts!



Starting at midnight Eastern Daylight Time, I want everyone reading this post to go to the following link and buy "Mine Again" from Black Lab is:

http://www.FinancialAidPodcast.com/bumrush

Using this link will net 5% in affiliate fees from Apple on top of the 50% donation from the band to a scholarship fund.

You can GIFT "Mine Again" using this link as well, so if you already own it, you can gift it to a friend, colleague, or associate who may not have heard of Black Lab before.

If you or someone you know is in college or graduate school, in order to be eligible for the scholarship, you need to set up a free profile at:

http://www.ScholarshipPoints.com

If you haven't already done so, you need to download and install iTunes, plus open an iTunes Music Store account with a valid credit card and/or PayPal account. You could also buy and redeem an iTunes Gift card, which is what I did.

http://www.iTunes.com

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Frustrations with hearing impairment show need for sensitivity

Earlier I made this post on Twitter:

*!$% hearing impairments! Ugh. So frustrating sometimes!

Then I put my daughter to bed, cooling off a little bit. I returned and decided I should post again:

Clarification on my last Twitter: I'm just frustrated at hearing impairment. Ppl who know me understand that we deal with it every day

Now the real back story. Earlier as I was trying to get her into bed, different things kept coming up to hinder that. Then as she was getting her bed ready, I was in the living room, and she called out. She needed a pillow because hers were in the dryer.

So I told her to get one from our bedroom. She apparently didn't hear me - go figure. So I called out a bit louder for her to get one from our bedroom. Again - so I basically called out as loud as I could for her to hear.

A few minutes later I went to her room to tuck her in, and she had this hurt expression on her face. "I don't like when you yell at me," she said.

That's what I meant by hating the frustration of hearing impairment. I need to remind myself constantly that I practically need to be in the same room as Keisha in order for her to hear me; especially when she has her hearing aids out at night. If I'm going to be sensitive, I need to make this kind of effort.

I have written about our experiences with deafness and hearing impairment a lot in this blog, but I'd love to know what you have to say.

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Brands, Sub-brands, and stuff

I've been thinking a lot about branding lately, both on a personal level as well as on a company and employer level. I have often thought about reorganizing my blogs under one domain and making them subdomains. I do, after all, have many of them.

Today I read this article on Ask Pud saying that sub-brands haven't been that successful. He's got a good point.

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The Jonathan Coulton Soft Rock Collection

Someone put together this mashup that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.



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Refocus and Hiatus

Refocus is a natural part of life.

If you have listened to the most recent episode of the Journey Inside My Mind Podcast, you'll know that I have put it on hiatus until the end of this month. I have spent the month thus far listening to lots of other podcasts and thinking about the direction I want the show to take. Here are the options as I see them:

1. Keep on doing the show as I already have
2. Change the format, and
3. End the show completely and start a new one

I'm like a pressure cooker now, though, getting eager to record something. So stay subscribed or get subscribed, and you'll be able to hear what I have got to say.

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My dreams are weirder than yours - mid-March 2007 edition

I've often said in this blog that my dreams are weirder than yours. This morning as the alarm started going off and I went through the usual routine of hitting the snooze button every 9 minutes, falling back to sleep, guess what?

I started thinking about my day, previous days, and my mind went off to Twitter. I thought about how frequently some of my friends update and how I've stopped getting notified via IM because of frequent notifications. I now prefer to get updated via the website. As I was thinking about these interruptions via chat, the alarm went off again. Thinking about one interruption interrupted by another.

I thought that was weird, or at least interesting. Have you ever had something like that happen to you?

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journey+inside+my+mind journeyinsidemymind jimm daniel+johnson+jr dreams twitter interruptions snooze+button

Customer No-Service Rant - Local Gas Station Public Restroom

It takes a lot to get me outwardly upset. One thing that does it for me, though, is poor customer service.

We just came from the Marathon station on Colerain Avenue, north of Banning Road, in Cincinnati, Ohio. I paid at the pump for gas, and, as Keisha and I are cleaning off the windows, she says she has to go to the restroom. When she says it, she means it and usually needs to go right away. That's what we have learned from the past anyway.

She went inside and came out a few seconds later. "Daddy, they don't have a restroom."

I went inside and asked the attendant if that was so. "Our public restroom is broken."

"But where do YOU go then?"

"Oh, we have our own."

"Okay, so let me get this straight. You're going to let this little girl have an accident here on your floor because you don't have a restroom for her to go to."

"Yeah. The one we have for customers is broken."

"I understand. But YOU have one that's working, but you're not going to let her use it."

Why not provide a great customer service experience, huh? Whether it's buying gas or needing to use a restroom or buying a refreshment, why not make it great for customers so that they will tell their friends and will return? Why not go the extra mile to help customers out?

I now understand why we go to the more modern stations that have restrooms for everyone.

None of this probably makes any sense, but I just had to get it out here.

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Props to the Library!

Checking out the labels on the Journey Inside My Mind Blog, you will discover that we have enjoyed the public library long before we started homeschooling. It was one of my favorite weekend hangout places when I was growing up. Seriously. I remember the first time I ever rode the bus downtown unaccompanied by an adult - just me and my best friend - we went to the public library downtown.

I love how the library systems have progressed with technology. I remember the long checkout lines, where the staff would lay your library card and the card that was stuck in the pouch of the book in front of a camera. I remember when we lived in Middletown, Ohio in the late 1990's, you could call a phone number and renew items from the automated voice system. Now everything is bar-coded and runs much more smoothly.

We also used to get notices in the mail whenever items were coming due or were overdue. Now these notices get sent through e-mail, which brings me to the purpose of this post.

Since I work in front of a computer, I'm able to check my email many times throughout the day, so I've set up notices for Jennie, Keisha, and my library card numbers to be sent to my email address. So I get notices that items are coming due or are overdue, that my library card has expired, and whenever items placed on hold have arrived.

As homeschooler parents, we use the library extensively. In fact, we help their circulation numbers so much that they've given us extra bags - the ones that normally cost a quarter. This past week when I was home sick, Jennie and Keisha went to the library. Apparently they put a lot of items on reserve because every day since I've been getting email notices that the items are available.

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Quick Updates

Geez. I was feeling better over the weekend. Now I'm experiencing the full-on, head-in-a-vise sinus congestion, and I'm leaving work to go home and get better.

Speaking of which, yesterday Jennie and I spent the afternoon and evening bagging, vacuuming, and general cleaning our room to take care of the bedbug problem. We went to Wal-Mart beforehand and bought a new Bissel vacuum, which I put together myself with ease. We also bought some mattress covers for our mattress and boxspring.

I thoroughly vacuumed our mattress, boxspring, bedframe, floor, and baseboards, as Jennie put a bunch of stuff into bags- some bags to throw away; others to set aside for later.

It was a better night's sleep for us, I think.

Well, time for me to get on home with a quick detour to the pharmacy for some major non-prescription sinus medicine.

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Don't let the bedbugs bite!

Growing up this was something my Mom would say to us kids before we went to bed. We have said this to Keisha, too. Little did we know how true we wanted it to be.

We apparently have a bedbug infestation in our apartment. We are having to get rid of a lot of things. Probably will have to get rid of our mattress and boxspring. And, of course the sofa and chair we picked up outside that someone was getting rid of some months ago.

That may very well be where they came from, since before having that in our home, we were all fine. Since then we have felt itchy when we wake up, thinking that it may have to do with our laundry detergent.

But then last night I actually felt a sting, and that's what prompted us to check our mattress and elsewhere in our bedroom.

If we needed further motivation to clean up around our apartment, I guess this is it!

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Getting sick despite my best efforts not to

Despite my best efforts this week, including working away from home and taking lots of Vitamin C, I seem to have caught Keisha's and Jennie's cold. I'm sitting here in the office, feeling a serious draft. All of a sudden, my head starts feeling stuffy and achy. My coworker says that he can tell something is going on because my voice sounds different.

I went to the restroom and blew my nose - nice and green. I came back here, and now I don't feel like doing anything. Yuck.

I want to call Jennie and let her know.

Update: It appears that, after some sinus medicine and a good night's sleep, that I'm better.

JIMM 81 - Comedy/Music II

Great mix of comedy and music with a very important announcement at the end. What are you waiting for? Go check it out!

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