Sunday, July 20, 2014

"Is My Cat Happy?"

Cat owners love their pets, but often ask the question, "is my cat happy?" It can be very hard to tell.

This is because unlike most mammals, cats only experience two emotions. However, these emotions have no direct correlation to human emotion or anything we might traditionally term "happiness." According to experts, the cat emotional diad is a rapid binary fluctuation between the states of "urgency/warfare" and "sedintary malice."

Watching the electrical activity of the feline mind can be likened accurately to watching a primitive game of 'Space Invaders.'

Dr. Pipka Dobbins explains, "Cats experience the world as a grid of flashing pulses, which effectively enable and disable the cat's rage response." This is part of the reason scientists believe that if you were smaller than your cat, it would most likely playfully remove your arms and paw you to death.

"This is the special bond that cat lovers share with their pets -- a brutal kind of honesty that basically let's us know, 'Hey, if you ever lay still for too long, I'm eating off your face.' We appreciate this candor."

But, when asked directly, experts agree. Your cat most likely isn't happy.

Monday, July 7, 2014

Is My Exit Row Seat Dangerous?



Have you ever been drawn to "upgrade" to an exit row seat on an airplane? These seats are sometimes framed as being "premium" and closer to the front of the aircraft. Travelers hoping for a couple extra inches of leg room, or those dealing with bloating or obesity are the primary victims of the greedy airlines' exit row trap.

In reality, the exit row seats are unsafe for all passengers, and should be left clear no matter what kind of perks might otherwise be associated.

Why?
  • Air Pressure can cave in the doors of older aircraft. These are the situations you hear about where the metal buckles inward and crushes the legs of window seat passengers, making rescue impossible as they plummet to their fiery deaths.
  • Foreign Entities will usually target the exit row seat with missiles or other explosive projectiles before forcibly boarding an aircraft. You don't want to be the poor schmuck behind this flimsy barrier when the latest new terror cell comes knocking.
  • Honor and Duty dictate that when you sign for the exit row, you're signing up to up go down with the ship. Even the captain will be escaping before you, in the case of an event. This is why the flight attendant pummels you with legalese when you plant your butt in this row.
  • Airborne Bacterial Pockets can seep in through the cracks of the exit door mid-flight. If you land with a nasty cough that turns into something much worse, you'll need to consider whether you have been exposed to some sort of malevolent alien virus drifting atop the stratosphere.
You are already risking your life for the sake of convenience every time your board an airplane, but why would you pay extra to just to enjoy the unconscionable dangers of the exit row? Next time you're tempted by that little glowing "upgrade seat" button, try to see the words "destroy me painfully" instead.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

Official State Religion?

In a recent survey, the Huffington Post discovered that 34% of respondents would be either in favor or strongly in favor of making Christianity the official religion of their state. This undermines my ongoing efforts to make Christianity the state bird, or official state flower of Missouri and must be stopped.

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

MixiMobile's First "Real" Citybuilder Costs Players Billions

Social game "city-builders" like Zynga's popular Farmville, and Cityville are among a long-storied genre of games dating back to 2250 B.C. when Sargon the Great vanquished his foes to found the empire of Mesopotamia.

However, more recent entries into the genre rely on colorful digital representations of buildings and animals, placed around a fictional world in order to create the illusion of a booming metropolis, customized to players' taste. Many such games are funded by relatively inexpensive "in-app purchases," costing even players who choose to "monetize" only a couple of dollars during their entire time playing the game.

MixiMobile believes it has the answer to this. CTO, Flan Yazzer explains.

"We believe that fun comes from risk, and risk is something we are putting back into the equation for players. Our player wants a highly immersive experience."

To that end, MixiMobile has partnered with three major nationwide realtors and eight rental property managers to provide players real-world access to undeveloped land, raw materials, foreclosed homes, timeshares and waterfront views. Of course, all of this comes with a price tag.

"The first thing a player does when they open our game is remortgage their home. This provides an initial burst of PigiPoints with which they will buy a small plot of marshland paradise."

"Players will then clock in and begin working at one of our factories to earn additional PigiPoints for decorations, plants and eventually security systems to protect their treasures from real-world burglars. By the end of the tutorial, players will have adopted a cat and visibly aged."

The formula is working. "MixiTown" is boasts incredibly high player retention as participants begin to acquire household electronics and cement yard decorations.

"Some players even choose to make this a fashion-focused game, buying custom garments and maintaining expensive hairstyles in order to impress their friends."

No matter how you choose to play MixiTown one thing is clear, "There has never been a better time to buy beachfront property."

Thursday, January 17, 2013

5 Exciting Management Concepts to Super-Charge Your Authority


  • Potentialize - This super-functional combo term marries the words "potential" and "realize" or "to make real the potential." As a manager, you will be potentializing everything around you, so this is an indispensable word. Be sure to let others know when you feel you can "potentialize" their work.
  • Undervise/Undervision - Nobody wants to be "supervised," but what would you say to your "undervisor?" Undervision is the concept that we can see more from below. Increasingly, we recognize that if there is a glass ceiling, there is also a glass floor. Are you the undervisor?
  • Turbo-Target - The modern consumer is a fast-moving target, surrounded by distraction. If you want to capture attention nowadays, you will need to "turbo-target" your audience. Be sure to bring this up any time you feel something is anything less than perfect. Time to "turbo-target!"
  • S.A.L.A.D. - The S.A.L.A.D. style of management is based around the classic structure, "Say And Listen And Do." If you are saying, listening, and doing, you are a S.A.L.A.D.
  • Sticky Toes - What happens when a topic keeps coming up in your department? Perhaps it's another case of "sticky toes." Some workplaces send out a bi-weekly "Sticky Toe" memo, just to clear the air.