Tune your Tivos, Ray’s piece on Dateline NBC is finally airing tomorrow night! He flew out to New York back in February to do an interview about Spam. And not just spam, porn spam. That’s right, Ray is talking smut on NBC at 8PM ET/PT. I’m so proud.

I got a voicemail this evening from my friend Stephanie. We live on opposite coasts, so imagine her surprise when Ray’s voice came from her living room. Unbeknownst to us, Ray was also in the promo for the ad. We’ve Tivo’d every bad Thursday night NBC so far and no luck on a repeat.

It was an educational evening though. I hadn’t realized Joey was still trying to pull off “boyish,” that Will & Grace was even still on, or that ER has replaced every cast member I have ever seen. In other words, must see TV is still must be seen on a Tivo at three arrows.

If you are reading this on Fullasagoog, you are probably thinking “well, duh!” For anyone else this means an increase in my site traffic and a place where you can see my blog entries, a cyclops and an egg all at the same time.

Seriously, if it weren’t for aggregators, I would never be able to keep up with all of the Flash blogs. Between MXNA and FullAsAGoog, I can stay informed. Well, OK, not today and yesterday; both services have been just a wee bit crazy with a certain big announcement this week.

Anyways back to work, and thinking about Flash 8 goodness.

Each upgrade of AIM shows a new way that AOL continues to not get advertising. Yesterday was the last straw for me though as AOL has added pop-unders to AIM. Previous versions of AIM have also done pretty unsavory things like install weatherbug (spyware) and have non-user initiated audio (!!!!). Why AOL pursues rapid revenue from these unsustainable practices is beyond me.

Advertising that doesn’t start by respecting the viewer can only lead to user annoyance and a backlash at both the advertiser and the advertising medium. In my case, the backlash comes in the form of uninstalling AIM. If I can’t control the experience, I’m simply not interested.

As for the pop-unders, they surfaced for me in a new and even more annoying way. I have now become a complete convert to Firefox. One of my favorite settings and plugin combinations is a setup where all new windows in browsers go into a new tab in one Firefox window. This way I can keep all of my browsing in one window.

When the pop-under happened yesterday, I was trying out a new Flash game at tea games (fantastic games BTW). The pop-under happened but was redirected to a new tab that came up in the foreground of my browser causing me to lose my game. Installing this setup was my choice, but when it comes down to uninstalling a useful productivity tool, or an application that uses poor advertising practices, the choice was pretty clear.

For those that have me on their AIM buddy list, contact me on Yahoo! messenger under the same ID. It is a better IM tool anyways. It looks better, works better, and oh yeah, it has respectful (but really effective advertising).

I bought a great TV stand on bestbuy.com using in-store pickup (with verified inventory before I run around). At the end of the purchase process there was one of those customer surveys asking about the process, this one is run by bizrate. Though I didn’t use bizrate for this purchase, I have used it several times before, so I figured, “what the heck, I don’t want to get back to work anyways.”

These surveys are always started with some nebulous offer for participating in the survey, like a contest or a starbucks gift card. While I thought bizrate was a reputable brand, their offer was a “$100 value.” While I know that is unrealistic, I was a bit shocked at how brazen their ploy was.

Only after giving Bizrate information that is valuable to them (real customer reviews are second only to price data for sites like bizrate), Was I told what the offer was for. For free* I could subscribe to 4 magazine subscriptions except that I would have to pay Bizrate $8 for the free* offer AND have to authorize the renewal for the magazines (which you pay $100 for the next year). This is a bait and switch and is fraud plain and simple.

I have no doubt that no one is shocked by this sort of tactic. Magazine scams have always been around. The shock to me is that a company like Bizrate that has worked at its brand would use a bait and switch tactic. For me their brand is gone, and I will be leery of using them in the future.

I’ve also submitted this to the FTC. If you have gone through this as well, please take a moment to fill out the FTC complaint form. You won’t get a coupon from them but you will get the satisfaction of knowing that one scam may leave the net.

For the naysayer readers of my blog here are the three screens of the process. (note, the official rules link has no info about the bait and switch).

Like many folks, I have ADD. For the past nine months I have been taking 15 mg of Adderall XR (the XR means extended release) a day to treat it and until this week I had no idea how well it has been working. Today is day ten without the Adderall in my system.

Feeling like the medicine was not working as well as it initially did, I told my doctor and he decided it was time to try a “drug holiday” and evaluate how I felt after ten days. Honestly, I was pretty surprised how nervous I felt about going off the medicine. For the past nine months I have felt like most of my ADD symptoms were gone for the first time in my life.

Days 1-6: Getting Adderall out of my System

After stopping the medication it was all I could do to stay awake. Most ADD medications are stimulants, with the notable exception of Strattera which is stimulant free. Adderall is a form of amphetamine salt that is believed to increase the production of neurotransmitters to counteract the ADD symptoms. It took me about five unpleasant days to get to the point where I felt back awake.

I also immediately became hungrier. A very common side effect of Adderall is appetite suppression. Amphetamines were used as diet pills for a long time. I’ve a pretty good sweet tooth normally, but it went off the deep end for the last few days. I’ve wanted breakfast (very rare for me), and invariably wanted sugary things. I ended up getting desserts at meals and wanted snacks. I got cookies and M&Ms from the vending machine. At one point of desperation with the tiredness and sweet tooth I actually got a frapuccino (I HATE coffee).

Days 7-10: Just How do I Feel?

By Thursday I was conscious again. This was about the point where I could really start to analyze the effect of the medication (or lack thereof). I was stunned to see how little I got done this week (sorry co-workers reading this!). For me, the best way for me to describe ADD is that I know what I need to be doing, and I can do anything but that. I am productive, just on everything that I’m not eager to be productive on (notice the relative frequency of blog posts this week). It is deeply frustrating and troubling to not be able to do what I need/want to do.

Over the next few days I’ve been thinking to myself “Yes! this is what it felt like a year ago where I would go through a days at work getting lots done but never what I needed to get done. Now that I have had nine months of relative control, a week without it feels pretty devastating. Before, I never had any other perspective to know how bad things were. Now I know what treatment feels like and I will be very very prompt for my appointment tomorrow.

It is interesting that since I had no context for feeling any way other than I did before treatment, I had no idea how bad things were. There is really very little way for us to ever know how “normal” something is that is going on in our brain since we have no way of experiencing anyone else’s brain. Now that I at least have the context from the medicine, it is a wonder I made it through school!

Some interesting behavior changes I noticed this week in both work and play:

• I’ve blogged more
• I’ve read blogs less
• I’ve read novels more (I feel like I can’t put the book down even though I am tired and need to get up for work)
• I’ve played video games more
• I’ve been making more “To Do” lists
• I’ve needed to listen to music at work
• I forgot a meeting

The reading part is pretty expected for me. Non-fiction has always been very difficult for me to read. Unless I am reading something that I think of as entertainment I have a very difficult time focusing. In fact, one of the things that I am least proud of is that I rarely read in college. I made it through a few novels in English and Spanish Literature courses, but the rest I just faked it and went off listening to lectures. It is something I wish I could go back and redo. I can’t imagine how much more I would have learned! On the medication I’m still not an avid reader of non-fiction, but I can apply myself to reading documents at work without too much problem.

I am a bit more surprised about the gaming though. After spending the weekend playing Metroid Prime Echoes (a game I bought but didn’t really play right when it came out) I realized that I really have played very few games recently. I play some games with friends at work, but have played almost nothing at home in almost the whole time I’ve been on Adderall. I never really noticed until this weekend.

Day 11 (Tomorrow): What is Next?

I plan to ask my doctor to put me back on Adderall. This is pretty significant for me as I really don’t like the idea of patients requesting things of their doctors. I’m generally of the opinion that a patient should describe symptoms and the doctor should reach a diagnosis free of coaching. For this, I am pretty sure that the doctor will reach the same conclusion as me, but I am completely prepared to ask for what I want if he disagrees.

The reason I feel this way is that even though there are some trade offs for choosing to treat ADD, I like myself a lot less when I am off the medicine. I waste a lot of time and it impacts my life both personally and professionally. If taking a small blue and white capsule a day can change that, it is well worth it.

If you don’t believe in ADD, or feel like writing a negative comment, please read this “

David Lawrence asked me on his show tonight to talk about my recent experiences with ADD treatment and lack thereof, and to generally talk about my experiences. It should be interesting. If you want to tune it, it is available on:

XM Satellite Radio - 152 Extreme
Sirius Satellite Radio - 148 TalkCentral
KBNP/Portland

Over the last 25 years I’ve gone back and forth on being open about my ADD and learning disabilities. Since I am going on the radio, I guess I am back in an open phase.

Well, sort of. Until my blog post I actually was pretty quiet about getting treatment. I was a bit surprised by the negative reaction I got from a fair number of friends when I mentioned I was even thinking about going on medication. If I was getting the reaction from friends I figured it would be better to keep it pretty quiet overall. After a week though I felt quite a bit better hearing comments like, “Ok, something is very different with you recently (in a good way), what gives?”

Before seeking a drug for ADD, I concentrated on behavioral changes to deal with it. This includes changing some of my techniques for getting things done, but also it is about creating a good environment that is more conducive to my needs. In a workplace though, creating a good environment often required asking for thing that you need changed at work, whether is your workspace or your work tasks. This is when it gets pretty sticky.

The sort of modifications that ADD folks need for their work space are things like privacy, quietness and no visual distractions. These needs make cube life very difficult. A private cube is better than a bullpen. A cube on the edge of a cube pool is better than one in the middle. An office trumps any sort of cube. Do you see the sticky spot? Things that help an ADD person are environmental elements that everyone wants, and are often granted by seniority or rank rather than need.

To get a better workspace based on need before you would have “earned” it in that passive aggressive office one-upmanship, marks you to your co-workers. Getting what you need means frequently damaging relationships with co-workers. Mentioning that you have a medical condition requiring it, will generally just make things worse with comments about how ADD is a fad condition, or that you must have some sort of unscrupulous doctor.

This is all to say that behavioral treatment can get you where you need with a lot of work, but often with a lot of social consequences. Taking a small pill once a day gets me to the same place or better without the need to “stand out” in uncomfortable ways. A more positive way of looking at it though is that Adderall gives me the ability to function in a variety of environments now, where before I was limited to working in optimal conditions. That flexibility is worth a lot to me.

My guess is that we will be talking all about this tonight 8-9PM PST.

I’m heading off for a whirlwind tour of Seoul and Hong Kong talking about design and development in Flash Lite. In Korea I’ll be giving a presentation on Advanced Flash Lite Development (pretty much the same presentation that I gave in Anaheim) . For Macromedia MAX, Greater China (Hong Kong) I’m presenting twice, the first session is on visual and interaction design for Flash Lite, and the second will be a more in-depth presentation on my NYC traffic cam viewer.

Having never been to Asia before, I am really looking forward to it. I am however a bit nervous at the same time. I’ve never been to a place where I have no linguistic intuition on written or spoken language. One of the travel guides was suggesting taking the subway into the city from the airport. Considering that I barely get where I need to go on the New York City subway where I do speak the language, I can’t imagine trying to get along not understanding the signs or the conductor voice (thank goodness for taxis and western-style hotels).

The dread though comes from the prospect of a 13 hour flight to Seoul! Probably by the time I get off the plane I won’t be able to speak English either. See you all again on Friday. I’m still working on the update to the pirate maps game, but hopefully I will ge

I’m heading off for a whirlwind tour of Seoul and Hong Kong talking about design and development in Flash Lite. In Korea I’ll be giving a presentation on Advanced Flash Lite Development (pretty much the same presentation that I gave in Anaheim) . For Macromedia MAX, Greater China (Hong Kong) I’m presenting twice, the first session is on visual and interaction design for Flash Lite, and the second will be a more in-depth presentation on my NYC traffic cam viewer.

Having never been to Asia before, I am really looking forward to it. I am however a bit nervous at the same time. I’ve never been to a place where I have no linguistic intuition on written or spoken language. One of the travel guides was suggesting taking the subway into the city from the airport. Considering that I barely get where I need to go on the New York City subway where I do speak the language, I can’t imagine trying to get along not understanding the signs or the conductor voice (thank goodness for taxis and western-style hotels).

The dread though comes from the prospect of a 13 hour flight to Seoul! Probably by the time I get off the plane I won’t be able to speak English either. See you all again on Friday. I’m still working on the update to the pirate maps game, but hopefully I will get it posted this week.

Lewis Black has a routine where he scoffs at the optimism of each new year filled with thoughts of “this is going to be the year!” asking where the poor soul is sobbing in the corner mourning the ending year saying things like “NO!, no! *this* was the year, it can’t be over already!”

While I am looking forward to the things to come in 2006, 2005 has been an amazing year. 2006 has some big shoes to fill. In 2005 I celebrated my tenth anniversary with Ray (the best meal I ever had EVER was our anniversary dinner), celebrated my 30th birthday, and made many new friends. I also finally got treatment for ADD which enabled me to get my life back in order.

Professionally, I have gotten the job I have really wanted, and have been very fortunate in my personal Flash development, winning a TV, and getting to travel to Asia and speak at several conferences. I know nothing is more obnoxious than people gushing about their success so I’ll stop now, but 2005 pretty much started off with a bang and kept going.

And the icing on the cake is that I actually started a new blog and kept blogging. Thanks for reading it!

Our cat Tiki passed away yesterday. Ray posted on his blog a very good description of what happened.

Tiki, of all my pets, has had the biggest personality. He was a dignified cat constantly foiled by his own klutziness. There was a meow (a very Siamese cat meow) for any and every occasion. I’ve never seen an animal so able to accurately get his message across. He had us trained to his whims in a matter of weeks.

He loved to sneak up behind ray and I and poke us in the side with his paw. The higher up on us the better. It proved to the world just how long a cat he was, a fact that he was always willing to demonstrate. He seemed particularly proud when he got my attention by getting into a chair backed up to mine and reaching up about three or four feet to whack me on the top of my head.

You couldn’t help but laugh when you would see him barely hanging onto furniture with three legs while reaching out as far as he could to tap ray when he would be just out of range. The scourge of sweaters just in range, Tiki’s paw was know as the “meathook.” I’m really going to miss the look of guilty innocence he would give when Ray would turn around and catch him in the act.

The death of a pet is difficult in a way that only pet owners know. The happiness and inevitable humor of having a pet more than make up for the pain