Archives for January 2010

I’ve really gotten into Springsteen over the past couple years… his approach to composition and performance bring something to the table that other artists are missing. He almost seems like he is narrating a personal story the way he plays music and it is totally relateable.

I wish that I could have seen him perform in his heyday. My Dad saw him a bunch of times back in the 80’s and took some bootleg videos (I think my sister has them now). I have thought about going to see Bruce live, but I feel like it probably isn’t going to be anything like it used to be. Things are totally different now.

Here are a couple of videos to show the steez that Bruce brought to the stage (you’ll know what I mean, just watch them):

A majority of my life I didn’t really pay much attention to what I wore. I would mainly wear a t-shirt or sweatshirt reflecting one of my interests (a band, sports team, etc…), a pair of pants that I got at the mall, and a cheap pair of Nikes or Airwalks.

I had always been somewhat envious of the kids at school that wore “cool” clothes… Abercrombie, Quicksilver, Element, and the rest of that elite bunch of brands. I would have considered buying clothes from those companies, but I couldn’t justify the price.

I was a short kid until I finally grew during my first year or two in college. I figured that if I were to buy any expensive threads, they might be too small for me in a month if I started growing and I wouldn’t be able to wear them anymore.

Once I finally grew to my full height, I thought to myself “Shit… now I can buy myself something nice at it will actually last a few years.” I could finally justify dumping money into my wardrobe.

The first aspect of my look that I thought I should improve was my jeans. I thought skinny jeans were “cool” (I always think of how my Granny says cool when I use it in quotes…it makes the word sound less and more cool at the same time), so I bought a few pairs of skinny jeans off ebay (Matix and Krew were the brands).

I probably looked like an idiot (and still do), but I thought I was styling in my new duds. However, being as neurotic as I am, I had to see if I could get some even better pairs.

After wasting an insubordinate amount of time rumaging through Google, I came across MyNudie forums. Nudie is a designer brand of jeans that specialize in raw denim. It’s denim that hasn’t been prewashed (as all jeans you find in a store will be). They were supposed to be better quality and worn daily without washing to get unique fades.

This intrigued me, that over time your jeans could improve. The more time you put into them, the better they’d look. After some research, I found out that Nudies weren’t the best quality, but they did lead me to finding the Superfuture denim message board.

This place is basically the Mecca of all things denim. They mainly specialize in discussion about expensive Japanese brands. To say the least, I was blow away by the pictures of the well worn pairs on the site. They were like nothing I had every seen…I knew that these were the kinds of jeans I must have.

Here are a few of the first images I saw that got me stoked on high end denim:

These kinds of jeans will run you in the area of 300 bills… so you have to be committed to purchasing them. It can be difficult to choose the right size too, just because when you buy the jeans they are raw, meaning they haven’t touched water, and thus have not been shrunked down to their true size. When you give them a hot wash, they may not shrink to measurements suitable for you.

I’ll admit I’ve made mistakes sizing on a few pairs and had to let them go… it sucks, but you learn.

At the moment I am in a contest where 100 people bought the same model of jean at the same time and everyone wears them for a year. At the end of the year, all contestants submit pictures of their evolution. Whoevers jeans are judged to have faded the best over the year win a new pair of jeans.

The contest ends in about a month… not really sure if I have a chance at winning, but I’m happy with how my jeans have turned out. The biggest thing is that they still fit great after a year, which means I can keep on wearing them and they’ll only get nicer in the months and years to come.

Once you buy a pair of Japanese denim, I don’t even know if it’s possible to go back to regular brands… they are just so much nicer. The denim is unlike anything you’ve ever felt before and the fade patterns are unmatched by any predistressed jeans.

I justify the price because I wear them every day…yeah they do get pretty nasty after a month, but most people don’t notice… ;)

Wednesday 8:14 PM
Dog Barking Oustide (as it does every night)

I have become fascinated with the success of McDonald’s since reading about their “turn key” operation as detailed by Michael Gerber in “The E-Myth Revisited.”

If you haven’t read the book, Gerber basically talks about how you want to strive to make your business run like a well oiled machine, similar to what McDonald’s has achieved. Your business should not depend on your every action in order to succeed.

It is pretty remarkable if you think of the case of McDonald’s…you are going to get the same burger and fries no matter which McDonald’s you go to in the country. You can expect the same “quality” of food in Hicksville as you would find in Hollywood.

The secret to this consistency is in their system…I am sure there have been many to take the majestic leap over the fences at the US border straight into the kitchen of a McDonald’s.

It shows that anyone can be shaped into a piece of the McDonald’s jig-saw puzzle.

But that is not the point of this post…I want to talk about something else that makes them so prominent, and that is the colors of their logo.

I am not sure if Ray Kroc is the man behind it, but whoever came up with the logo for McDonald’s is a genius. It’s not even necessarily the shape of the golden arches which draws our eye towards it, but the combination of red and yellow.

They are two of the loudest colors out there, as they rarely occur in nature. Psychologically, we can’t help but notice the colors like red, orange, and yellow more than we notice colors like blue, green, and brown. It’s human nature.

Yellow, orange, and red signal danger or caution in most cases, as evidenced by street signs, but they also seem to serve as an indicator of food quite often nowadays.

Next time you go for a drive (or walk), take notice of how many restaurants use the color red and yellow in their logos. Almost every single one of them will use one or the other.

They know that when you are cruising around and your stomach starts grumbling, your first instinct will be to eye up the passing signs, looking for sources of nourishment. Restaurants probably rely more upon impulse decisions than any other business, so it’s of utmost importance that are easily seen.

You may not realize it, but when you see the red and yellow together, that triggers the notion of McDonald’s in your brain before you actually perceive the shape of the arch and read the letters on the sign. You have been conditioned to associate the combination of those pronounced colors with the restaurant.

I am not sure if McDonald’s was the first to use red and yellow, but they have really set them apart as the only big fast food chain that uses solely those two colors on their signs. They may have trademark rights on the use of those two colors in the way they use them.

Anyway, the point is that the McDonald’s sign protrudes from the landscape… you can’t help but notice it. It serves almost as Batman’s bat signal, herding in the hungry of America. This I believe is one of the unheralded keys to their success.

The psychology of colors is an interesting topic…maybe I’ll delve into that later on. For now, just remember that getting noticed, even subconsciously, is important for a business.

Take it easy,

Adam

I’m going to be straight up here and make a startling confession: I am not a social media expert. I know, I know, all credibility of this post is swirling down the drain. You might as well hit the back button on your browser while you still can.

(I probably should have started off saying that I have something like 154,927 followers that keep messaging me about their free webcams…now THAT would certainly have qualified me a Twitter authority.)

For anyone that is still reading, I am going to talk about one of the topics I’ve noticed on Twitter and Facebook that seem to spark by far more conversation than than any others. That topic is food.

Even my wittiest tweets are no match for a simple update notifying my friends and followers that I am eating a boring bowl of lentil soup for lunch that day. People seem to love weighing in on their opinions about food.

Why is this so?

Food is a common ground for all people. No matter what background you come from, what interests you have, or what beliefs you stand for, you eat food.

This makes it the perfect subject to tweet about, as all of your friends can easily join the discussion. They don’t need to be in the loop per say, to be an aficionado about their tastes in food. You involve everyone in the conversation by bringing food to the table.

What other topics are good to tweet about? I think it’s as simple as looking at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The topics toward the base are things that just might make for decent conversation.

Of course I would not recommend updating everyone that you are on the toilet or undergoing homeostasis, but anyone is going to be able to relate if you bring up conversation about sleep or health.

The most basic aspects of your life are the areas that a majority of people are going to be the most interested in, as we all have an urgent need to fulfill these basic areas. So next time you tweet, remember to keep it simple and think of Maslow.

Creedence Clearwater Revival (CCR) is by far one of my favorite bands. They just have such a unique sound and style which they pull off ever so effortlessly. Classified as “swamp rock”, they truly do capture what the sentiments and feelings are probably like down in New Orleans and the encompassing area, but surprisingly they are from California. (Who would have thought?)