bwb's blog

Toothpaste Series Part 1: Kolynos

bwb — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 23:52:53 +0000

This is part 1 of my riveting ongoing series on toothpaste…

Name: Kolynos
Owned by: Colgate-Palmolive
Bought Where: Peru

Verdict: It brushed my teeth just fine.

Super blanco.

Wow we can not find any related posts, awesome!

KickStarter Project I’m Backing

bwb — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 19:11:19 +0000

Sounded cool:

Wow we can not find any related posts, awesome!

Amazing Song + Video

bwb — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 23:14:32 +0000

Florence blows my mind again, amazing song and awesome video.

Florence + The Machine

The MPAA Have Jumped The Shark: Chris Dodd You Are A Tool

bwb — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 01:36:03 +0000

Listen at this idiocy by the MPAA and their mercenary leader Chris Dodd:

” It’s a dangerous and troubling development when the platforms that serve as gateways to information intentionally skew the facts to incite their users in order to further their corporate interests.

A so-called “blackout” is yet another gimmick, albeit a dangerous one, designed to punish elected and administration officials who are working diligently to protect American jobs from foreign criminals. It is our hope that the White House and the Congress will call on those who intend to stage this “blackout” to stop the hyperbole and PR stunts and engage in meaningful efforts to combat piracy.”

Clearly the guy is confused about what side he is on, he is the one on the sinking ship trying to bail water as fast as possible instead of building a better ship. Of course he is just a merc and making a living. It’s sad to see yet another failed business model sliding away and instead of learning from their retarded brother RIAA they continue down the same path.

Hey MPAA, here are some things to think about…

The internet is going to get faster and faster with bigger pipes. People want things to be easy, if you don’t provide an easy way to watch any movie or tv show someone else will. Before you run out of money I suggest building a robust platform where ANYONE can access your movies through an API and is charged for them. Then you can have Netflix competing with lots of other startups and you still get paid. Or just buy Netflix or Hulu and put all the movies/tv shows there and knock down the old archaic licensing system. If you can’t adapt you will die.

Political action to stunt the technological growth of your own country will not end will. The current bill amounts to treason in how horrendously it deals with the actual problem. I will be striking against watching any movies in the theater or rented until you stop this nonsense. Which is sad as I watch a ton of movies and now you don’t get to have money.

Peru: Cusco, Sacsayhuaman, and Pisac

bwb — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 04:00:18 +0000

Flying from the humid coastal jungles of Panama to the high altitude and cold of Cuso Peru was a bit of a shock for my system. Cusco is located at ~11,500 feet altitude and there are 40% fewer oxygen molecules per breathe. So for the first few days I didn’t do much beyond slowly walk around the city, drink copious amounts of water and coco tea, and wonder what the hell ancient people were thinking when they decided to live here. Seriously!!! I like jogging up the stairs or jumping around, but not when it feels like my heart is going to explode and I can’t talk because I’m so winded. Did you know this is the continent’s oldest continuously inhabited city? Maybe it was just super defensible because half the attacking army coming up from the valleys would die during the march or not be able to swing a sword or throw a spear due to lack of oxygen. I can’t believe the Spanish were able to conquer this place.

Rose and Steve made it into town last week and we went up to the ruins above Cusco (Sacsayhuaman), we didn’t go in as the tourist tickets are way too expensive (we didn’t have enough cash). Peru is gouging the crap out of people. It was $28 USD just to go in plus it included 3 other places that you might go too, or you pay ~$60 bucks for a ticket to a lot of places. But the shitty thing is it is only good for 2 or 10 days, and some places you can’t even buy a solo ticket if you wanted too.

Yesterday we did a big trip to Pisac to go to the market and do a big hike above the city. Most of the pictures are of the amazing ruins there. It was a pretty tough climb but worth it. Once again the ticket was ridiculous and they wouldn’t take our slightly old student cards. In Peru you are only a student if you are under 25… We ended up bribing the guard $28 USD to let the 3 of us in, instead of the listed price of $28 USD each…

Things not to do when you are living at ~12,000 feet:

1. Get your hair buzzed, then wear a visor with no top. It results in a bad sun burn on the top of your head despite thick hair.
2. Move quickly, your heart/lungs might explode.
3. Hangovers are 100x worse, don’t get one.
4. Try to play any type of instrument involving air. Peruvian kids trying to sell flutes at the top of mountains need to move their marketing to the bottom of the mountain. Or carry mini oxygen cans around.

Things to do when you are living at ~12,000 feet:

1. Drink, my drinking efficiency is equal to a small asian woman. I have a couple Pisco Sours and I can’t walk straight, it’s fantastic.
2. Eat lots of carbs, it helps with the altitude so I’m eating my weight in bread daily.
3. Eat fruit and veggies. I’ve had the best avocados, mangos, and oranges I’ve ever had in my life. They beat hawaii, florida, thailand, egypt, etc. Plus they are huge!

I’m taking Spanish lessons too which have actually gone pretty well. I’m terrible at languages but so far I seem to be picking up a few things here and there. For example I can recognize that everyone keeps saying I’m tall (alto!).

What else?
- I haven’t been able to run yet because of altitude/cold, but that is probably good as there are a ton of dogs around. Looking forward to sea level!
- Peruvians are super nice and chill. This is a huge tourist town but they are not too pushy and pretty respectful. Really digging it.
- Internet is a bit slow, I can do voice and all my work but sometimes voice isn’t perfect. And it went down once late at night for a few hours, as well as my backup 3g connection. At which point I went into shock.

I think that it for now!

Plans For The Next 18 Months…

Panama!

bwb — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 05:22:23 +0000

So I finally uploaded some pictures from Panama! I spent Dec 15th through early January in Panama and I had a great time! I spent Christmas with my dad, stepmom, and their friends in Volcan. Volcan is at about 3,500 feet altitude and an amazing place. The weather is perfect, no bugs, and beautiful views. Plus the beach is only 45 minutes to 2 hours away.

After that I headed back to Panama City for New Years with Sara who is in Panama for Peace Corp and Rose/Steve who are traveling in the area. Post New Years we all went to Sara’s site out in the Jungle which was fun. I only stayed for one night due to work and I’m super impressed with what Sara has done out there. The pictures are a mixture of Volcan, the apartment we were at staying, the city and skyline, etc. There are a few with some crazy colors, the sky was intense and my camera went crazy trying to capture it.

There is a really great one of the Rose/Steve cooking process too :)

Running Summary For 2011 + 2012 Goals

bwb — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 18:44:22 +0000

This year was a great year for running goals! I ran two marathons on my own before getting injured due to changing my desk/chair setup and needing to take a long break. I basically got sciatic and learned to do some better core stretches. I’m rebuilding now and hope to get back up to speed soon.

For 2011 I ran 1,198 miles in a total of 175 hours. Which breaks down to 8 minute 46 second miles.

For 2012 I’m going to be traveling a lot through May so it’s going to be hard to do a lot of running, especially in South America where there are not great trail runs in cities. So I’m going to take it slow and try to rebuild up to about 100 miles a month and I hope to get up to marathon length again by the end of the year. And depending on how things go maybe an ultra at some point if I’m feeling great!

Year end book roundup for 2011!

bwb — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 18:00:35 +0000

There is a great online challenge called the 100 book challenge with the goal being to read 100 or more books in a year. In 2011 I beat 2010′s record of 111 books with 131 books read. I think I read a lot more fun ones this year as when I got a pretty bad case of burn out I just read and ran a lot. Here is the big list of all the books I read and short little mini reviews!

And now for my big roundup, I try to feature the top 2 books in each category plus a runner up….

Best Business Books

1. First, Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently – This was the most valuable book I read this year and I hope to read this every year. It basically explains what great managers do to keep their team happy and backs it up with as much data and examples as possible. And above all it makes the point I’ve come to believe that people don’t change. At best they can pivot 10% to 20% from where they are now, and it is more valuable to focus on their talents, and find ways to neutralize their weaknesses.

2. Good to Great: Why some companies make the leap… and others don’t. – Fantastic book by Jim Collins, this is a followup to his previous. This covers a lot of companies and what enabled them to become great companies.

Honorable mentions to The Six-Month Fix: Adventures in Rescuing Failing Companies, Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big, and Business Model Generation.

Best True Books

1. Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China by Leslie Chang -This book is a must read for those interested in China and how rapid industrialization is creating huge social changes for women. The story of the girls working in these factories is just amazing, an entire generation of hustlers who could become entrepreneurs is emerging. I can’t wait to see what they do next as more opportunities become available to them and what values they instill in their children.

2. The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean. This was an awesome awesome book and one of the best so far this year. This is about how waves are generated, the guys that ride them, and even some quantum mechanics.

3. Born To Run – The book that started the barefoot running movement, and just makes me want to run more and more! Even for non runners its a great book about what humans are capable of and how we might have run down our game by outrunning them. All in a well written book about a hidden tribe of super runners and a race against them by some American ultra runners (very short summary).

Honorable mentions to Brazil on the Rise and Out of Mao’s Shadow.

Best Travel Books

French Lessons: Adventures with Knife, Fork, and Corkscrew – An awesome book about traveling around and living in France and going to all these different food festivals! I highly recommend it, covered things like eating truffles, cheeses, snails, a wine marathon, etc!

I read a lot of nice normal travel books too, but nothing that stood out as just amazing besides this one.

Best Thrillers

This was an easy choice this year, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and the two sequels were mind glowingly awesome! It was if someone combined the best of Law and Order SVU with hacking and a great mystery. Just fantastic writing, great plot lines, and the best thrillers I’ve read in a really long time. Go buy them!

Best Science Fiction / Fantasy Books

1. Hounded, Hexed, and Hammered. Fun books I highly recommend! Basically imagine all the religions and gods of the world do exist, on multiple planes, with earth being a place they can all jump into. This follow a very cool 1000+ year old Druid character living in Arizona and having gods mess with him.

Just an ok year for finding new scifi/fantasy.

Best Books About History…

1. At Home: A Short History Of Private Life by Bill Bryson. This was an interesting funny book about how the modern house and all it’s parts came to be. Plus all the segways and humor that only Bryson can bring to the table.

2. The Defining Moment: FDR’s Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope – What an amazing man with the luck of timing, this book was fantastic and I hope we get another FDR soon so we can rewrite the social contract a bit more.

Honorable mention to The Wall: Rome’s Greatest Frontier about Hadrian’s Wall which is a trip I want to do at some point.

Best Bibliographies

1. The Faraway Horses – The story of Buck Brannaman who is the “horse whisperer”, really amazing guy and great story about his life. Check out this documentary on him too, just an amazing person.

3G Modem + Digicel Panama + OSX Lion

bwb — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 16:21:17 +0000

I grabbed a $40 3g Huawei E173 modem from Digicel here in Panama and I’ve been super impresed with the service. It’s fast and really nice to be able to go anywhere and have internet. I decided to unlock the 3g modem so that I could use the same one on other providers as I travel through Argentina, Peru, Brazil, Australia, and so on.

I haven’t unlocked it yet, I’ll post as I finish that project. But I knew that would wipe out the profile so I had to dig up the APN and other settings for Digicel Panama. Below are the settings to use for your 3g huawei modem to connect to Digicel Panama:

In OSX Lion for the number put “*99#”, and for the APN put “web.digicelpanama.com”. Screenshots below:

Plans For The Next 18 Months…

bwb — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 23:49:01 +0000

So, in short here are my plans for the next 18 months:

Jan – Month in Cusco, Peru (at 11,000+ feet)
Feb, March, April – Buenos Aires, Argentina.
May – Santiago, Chile.

I scored apartments with internet in each place and hopefully going to visit Brazil from Argentina quite a few times. I’ve got plenty of space at most places so hopefully some friends will come visit!

Still working down ideas of what I’ll do while I’m in each place, but the general idea is Mayan ruins, old churches, museums, food, steak, wine, vineyards, lots of fun work (webpub/wwwh), wine, beach, patagonia, etc. May 30th I fly off to Australia, still waiting to figure out that stuff, but I’ll be there for a year! And hopefully quite a few trips to Asia and surrounding regions.

Panama + Start Of Some Travels!

bwb — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 03:41:06 +0000

I flew out of DC Dec 15th after a hectic last week of errands and some hard goodbyes! I’m on the road and ill do a big post with more details soon! Right now i’m hanging out with my dad and stepmom in Panama (Volcan) for Christmas! A few pictures below…

RIP Kim Jong…

bwb — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 18:34:07 +0000

I will miss you Kim Jong, you were a crazy fucker and it was one of my dreams to drink and party with you. Hopefully your sons are a million times less crazy and the people of North Korea get some hope (and some food).

And, I want to start a clothing line called “Kim Jong, KJ!” one day. Because everyone should believe they are why the sun rises.

Good Vacation!

bwb — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 21:21:39 +0000

I had a great vacation on St. Maartin, it was the first time in maybe 6 or 7 years I’ve gone a long period with no internet (10 days). It wasn’t hard at all which was surprising too.

I went snorkeling every day, swam for hours, and just read under a nice awning right on the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen (mostly because I think the water is an amazing color). Plus enjoyed some rum, got a zillion new freckles, rented a jeep for a few days and drove all around the island to try other beaches, sampled a lot of french bakeries, ate a lot of fish, etc. And I read 21 books while on break, so I’ve hit my goal for this year with having read 124 books so far!

Ben -> Vacation Town

bwb — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 02:14:21 +0000

I will be on a much needed vacation after a vicious burn out cycle the last month. It reminds me how important it is to take a long break every year or else you just hit a emotional and physical wall of terribleness. Especially when working 24/7 on multiple projects. I have a box of Christmas presents I still haven’t sent out after 10 months because every moment of downtime I’m trying to recover from uptime (I’m going to try to work that into a web hosting joke one day).

Anyway, i’ll be on an island (St. Maartin) with no internet for 10 days!

While I’m gone please take the time to enjoy the following hilarious jokes: Best Chuck Norris Jokes, Top 50 Chuck Norris Facts, And more CN jokes…, and 100 funniest jokes of all time!

My First Earthquake! In DC!

bwb — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 20:53:09 +0000

What a crazy expierience! First I thought it was just the washer being unbalanced, but then it kept getting louder and the house was just shaking like crazy! A few plastic things fell down but no damage that I could see, going to check further in a second.

I’m very glad it wasn’t an explosion, as at first thought it might be. I didn’t know they had earthquakes in this area though. More at CNN too, it was a 5.8 about 88 miles away.

My First Marathon! Finished in 3 hours 54 minutes, and I don’t feel too bad yet…

bwb — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 19:16:58 +0000

I ran my first marathon today! 26.2 miles! I was planning to run 22 to 23 miles, but felt good around 21 and decided to just go for it. I think I can go a lot faster as my last 6 miles were all under 8 minute miles as I figured out I had to start moving if I wanted to finish in under 4 hours.

Running conditions

2. Carrying 3 liters of water, pair of socks, gels, salt pills.

I tarted at 9.35am and finished at 1.29pm. Temp wasn’t bad like 85 to 80 most of race as I picked a path that is 70% on trails surrounded by woods. Some hills.

Totals and cool stats…

I have no idea what VO2/EPOC and some of that is.

Splits…

You can definitely see the water breaks to refill my giant water backpack, or change socks. Plus when I figured out at Mile 21 that I had to book if I wanted to stay under 4 hours.

Fun!

Red Tails: America!

bwb — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 05:04:45 +0000

I’m a trailer whore it’s true… so check this out, a movie about the Red Tails.

I love a good drama it’s true, but what is amazing are true stories like this, American fucks over huge groups of people, and yet the vision America presents seem to be worthy of the sacrifice even when groups face huge discrimination back home. One thing I love about America is that it is defined by the people who choose to be here, and that the people who make up America believe they can define the reality American will present in the future. I hope this continues forever.

Plus if it’s all made up, that seems almost even more American :)

Guess who turned 30!

bwb — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 01:20:48 +0000

It doesn’t feel so bad, I’m probably in better shape then any other point of my life, even with death sitting on my shoulder ;). Plus just imagine how awesome my mid life crisis is going to be considering I buy night vision goggles and python skinned cowboy boots in my teens and twenties. Certainty something to look forward too.

I also made some plans for the next couple years. I’ve been wanting to travel some more and spend another year abroad. So in late December or January I’m going to head down to Nicaragua for a while to visit Joel and Laura. And then travel around Central and South America until late May. I will spend at least a month in both Argentina and Brazil, and I’m still working on other locations (probably Uruguay/Chile, and hopefully Panama to visit a friend). Then in May/June I’m heading to Australia for a year as I got my visa to go there! I haven’t done any reading yet but I believe they have nothing poisonous or deadly on the entire continent, just cuddly little koala bears.

2 Great Trailers! Laugher!

bwb — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 06:07:36 +0000

Check out this great trailer for an upcoming movie! Really well done trailer (and i should know as I watch them all)!

And also check out this one, looks amazing too!

Red Tails: America!

Swiss Family Robinson Tree Found!!

bwb — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 04:21:24 +0000

Check out this awesome article here about finding the tree used in the filming of swiss family robinsons! I’ve been wanting to go to Tobago for a few years to try to find it, I think I’ll plan a trip and it will not be easier to find that, their swimming area, and their beach! Awesome! (Maybe for my birthday!)

As a kid seeing the fake tree as disney world was awesome. I always wanted to live in a tree.

bwb's blog

Toothpaste Series Part 1: Kolynos

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KickStarter Project I’m Backing

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Amazing Song + Video

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The MPAA Have Jumped The Shark: Chris Dodd You Are A Tool

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Peru: Cusco, Sacsayhuaman, and Pisac

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Panama!

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Running Summary For 2011 + 2012 Goals

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Year end book roundup for 2011!

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3G Modem + Digicel Panama + OSX Lion

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Plans For The Next 18 Months…

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Panama + Start Of Some Travels!

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RIP Kim Jong…

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Good Vacation!

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Ben -> Vacation Town

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My First Earthquake! In DC!

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My First Marathon! Finished in 3 hours 54 minutes, and I don’t feel too bad yet…

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Guess who turned 30!

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2 Great Trailers! Laugher!

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