My Noisy Fan from Brent Spore on Vimeo.

3 years of owning my Mac with no major issues. JUST after it’s AppleCare expires, it decides to start freaking out.

Yes! I’m a sucker for my kid but how cool is it to be able to upload a bunch of random pics and have them put together so well in 30 minutes or less?

Dang! this is cool and what kid wouldn’t want their face plastered on the interwebs in this way? I uploaded, I bought and I’m sold!

Animoto… (and Viddler too) You rock! Thank you!

So, I’m sitting here watching the (freaking amazing) closing cerimonies of the olympics in Beijing and I am reminded of another summer back in 1984. I thought I would share my experience. Travel back with me for a minute…It’s the summer of 1984, I live in eastern Washington, I’m 10 years old and I’m about to enter the 5th grade. I do remember that in the 80’s there wasn’t a lot of economic fortune traveling around and our family was definitely no exception. In fact, times were pretty tough for us in the Spore household. It was especially tough that summer and there wasn’t a lot of hope anywhere around. We were basically reduced to eating stuff you could get in bags for under 99 cents (like beans, potatoes and stuff like that). Don’t get me wrong, I was fine but I can imagine the stress on my parents wasn’t too much fun at all.

Subsequently, McDonald’s was sponsoring the 1984 Olympic Games and ran a campaign (video shown above) titled, “When the US Wins, You Win!”. Not really any different from any other campaign they have run except somewhere in the mix of it all, in response to the American-led boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, 14 Eastern Bloc countries and allies including the Soviet Union, Cuba and East Germany (but not Romania) boycotted the Games. For differing reasons, Iran and Libya also boycotted.

This created a problem for good ‘ol Mickey D’s. Suddenly, nearly every game card issued was a winner in some form and in a lot of cases, the events were a complete sweep by the US. It was a funny situation because when you went in with your game card that won a Big Mac, Fries and a Drink, you walked out with 3 more game pieces that almost assuredly won more food.

Tie this into the economic distress that my family was experiencing and there wasn’t any better timing at all. I can truly say that McDonald’s saved my life in 1984. I understand that MD’s really hurt from this, but they survived and so did I, so we all win, right?

Imagine me, a 10 year old boy being told “You want McDonald’s for dinner tonight, son?” HECK YES I DO!!! It’s like a dream come true. All I can say is “Thank you McDonald’s!” … or should I say “Thank you boycotting crew!”

Either way, this years olympics was stellar, but I will NEVER forget the 1984 summer games. Good times!

If you follow my Twitter updates, you probably have noticed that I’m not getting too much sleep at night. Well… I figured I would use this time semi-wisely and build a website for Cadie. This morning I have officially launched cadiespore.com. I’m gonna try to lifestream her as much as possible but I’m sure you’ll understand if it’s not 24/7. Follow Cadie on Twitter to know when we’re broadcasting.

Swing by and check it out. Let me know what you think.

Well, if you haven’t figured out by now, we went and had ourselves a kid over the weekend. Her name is Cadence Elizabeth. She was 7 lbs. 8.6 oz and 21 inches (really) long. I’m thinking she’s gonna be a tall one too ‘cuz her feet are pretty freaking huge (like her mom and me). Anyway, I wanted to link to the pics and let you guys get to know her a little bit better. I’ll do my best to write a mega post later (maybe) if I get a chance. Also be on the look out for her tweets, vids, pics and most of all her semi-infrequent lifestream!

Thanks to all who sent tweets, emails and comments. You guys are awesome!

Most of you know I am having a kid any day now. I decided to poll the Twitter-verse and see what came up as ideas for Cadie’s onesies. I gotta say, I got some really cool ideas and started printing right away. I can’t wait to make more.

Update: These suckers are now on CafePress

Back soon,

Brent

What does this mean and how do I fix it?

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Hopefully that’s all I lost… we’ll see

Sorry everyone!