My Worlds Collide

Why this hasn't happened before is beyond me. My obsessions with Yelping and blogging haven't ever been combined into one MEGA obsession, but it has come, my friends. It has come. I am now Yelping about my blog and blogging about Yelp. My world is now complete.

1. Co-best website ever (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yelp!)- Anyone who has spent time with me lately knows of my increasingly-unhealthy obsession with this site. I refuse to patronize a business unless I know how my fellow Yelpers have rated it and have drank enough Kool-Aid to believe that my single opinion matters. I mean, I get notes from business owners all the time, so maybe it does, but whatever. I. LOVE. YELP. I said it. Sorry Adam. Love you too, but you can't compile the opinions of many into one, 5-star scale on which I can judge a business. You guys know I can't make my own decisions, so I joined a community of opinionated bastards... and I love it. Okay, so what does my one favorite site have to say about my other favorite site? Let's see... It is a Web 2.0 company (yah, knew that) that operates a social networking (love it), user review (awesome), and local search (sweet) web site of the same name. Okay, I don't know about you, but I'm sold. Where do I sign up?!? Oh wait. Nevermind... Okay, focus! Back to Wiki... Whoa. No. way. Over 25 million people access Yelp each month?!?! Dass cwazy! So this is cool, it's name is a contraction of Yellow Pages. But it's way cooler, so I guess one could say that Yellow Pages 2.0 whooped Yellow Pages 1.0's ass. It's based out of San Fran, but there are 18 communities (the coolest of which is the Chi, ya know, the Windy City) where it's heavily trafficked. I think that's how you spell it. If not, I'll get comments, so I'll find out. Before I forget, STAY AWAY FROM THE MESSAGE BOARDS. Oh man, there are som Judgey McJudgersons on there... and they jump to conclusions. Not a fun deal... Stick to the reviews, fo sho. Okay, so onto fun stuff... let's see where this hyperlink sends us...

2. Google Maps (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Maps)- Also a very cool creation of web 2.0. Yes, I'm fully aware that Northwestern has created yet another obsession; I'm an obsessed person, what can I say?!? I love web 2.0 and the possibilities that it creates. I'm so excited to finally be dedicating a blog to my friend. New Webby, call him, we shall. Okay, so Google Maps was once called Google Local. Not nearly as cool, but obviously they learned that. It can be seen at http://maps.google.com/ in case you didn't already know. So I think that the coolest part of this whole Google Maps revolution lies in the creation of the Google Apps. Like Google Earth, Googel Mars, Google Moon, Google Ride. Anyway you slice it, those are cool. It's incredible how some geeks can sit around and figure out what people want and then they're able to completely change the American vernacular. Nobody "online searches" the web anymore. Everybody Googles. Even un-web savvy people know what you mean. That's increible to me. Okay, but this is all related stuff. I gotta have some random variables in my life. Lemme find a good hyperlink on here...

3. U.S. Virgin Islands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Virgin_Islands)- Never been there but wouldn't mind going. They are an "insular area" of the U.S. Whatever that means. I'll wiki that later, but I gotta find out the deal behind these lil spots. The total area is only 133.73 sq miles. That's little. They're only slightly larger than Malta and I lived there. Trust me, it's small. They were originally settled by the Ciboney, Carib, and Arawaks and were given their modern name by Christopher Columbus. Columbus "discovered" them, but yet they're 74% Afro-Caribbean. Yeah, apparently he didn't do his job of commanding and conquering (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Command_and_conquer). Yes, I did reference a SUPER nerdy game that I still play to this day... Ah the days of endless summer CNCing. Anywho, I'm pretty sure that Columbus was a douche, let's see if wiki agrees...

4. Christopher Columbus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus)- We all know that he was born in Italy, switched sides for money, and eventually dies Spanish. If there was ever any question about his ethics, I think that single fact sums it up. Oh man, I desperately want Photoshop right now. So. very. expensive. Want. Photoshop. anyway. Dang. Okay, I fully intend to rectify my inability to photoshop a Yelp t-shirt onto Christopher Columbus. That would be sweet. Anywho, Christopher Columbus heading this way is the direct result of the fall of the Mongol Empire to the Ottoman Turks. Silly Turks. Apparently he was quite the adventurous little trader... he went to Iceland, Ireland, and, obviously, North America and all over Africa. In 1479 he married Filipa Moniz Perestrello who was the daughter of the Porto Santo governor (obviously a political play) and they seperated in 1485. Yeah, see, marriages failed just as much back then, it was jsut handled differently. Ya know, the wife disappeared, or the marriage "never existed"... fun things like that. Hey, well, I've rambled on enough, and I hope that I've planted the seeds for you to keep on-a-readin about Columbus. Bastard.

(Editors Note: I pretty much dislike all pre-Industrial Age Spaniards... Nothin personal with Mr. C. Colombo. Not as much as Canadians though, of course. Although the introduction of Eurpoean illnesses to the new land is always fun and much appreciated, the uncanny ability to take over a land, rape it of it's resources, convert it to catholicism, and then leave it with little to no sustainable governmental structure does not lead to fun times. See http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war Modern Spaniards are aight, they just like to eat, drink wine, and take siestas but the olden-days ones were a bunch of ruthless meanies and that, my friends, is never kosher in my book.)

Until next time, don't forget "In the Congress of Cool, I'm the Whip."