what a kick in the nuts

today at lunch i find out that the last feature that i was on will not be purchased by a single customer. even worse was that we warned management that no one would buy it with the functionality that we stripped out of it to meet the dates. this is the project that i gave up the last year's worth of nights and weekends so that we could finish on time and have a killer product. i had a buddy of mine in project management run my timesheet and over the course of the 14 months on this project, i worked an additional 9 man-months. it made me feel kind of sick when i was told that all that work was pretty much for nothing.

ok, enough bitching.
apparently, i've not learned my lesson, since last night, i got out of work around 1:30am (with a break for food and 20 minutes of a very scary illinois game). i get home and am whupped so i climb into bed and pass out. 2 hours later, i wake up. and i mean i'm WIDE awake. was it my alarm? no. passing snow plow? no. some fat man in a sleigh letting his reindeer shit all over my roof? no. it was my stomach. i was hungry. and not just hungry...ethiopian hungry. and thus marks the beginning of running season.

and now it's time for dinner!

one little sticker

lately i've been paying a lot of attention to store displays and why they are placed where they are. it's turning into a hobby of sorts. tonight i stopped by wendy's in between disasters at work for some grub and came across my latest tidbit of knowledge. as i was standing in line waiting for the staff to slaughter another cow and reinvent the secret recipe for coca-cola, i made up my mind on the purchase of 3 bacon cheeseburgers and a large fry. i decide to forgo the drink deciding that i don't need the caffiene and sugar. while standing there in this "fast" food line, my eyes wander around the counter and come to rest on the soda machine. it's one of those dealies with just the top poking out where the consumer can see the stickers for each type of fountain drink on hand. one of these stickers is missing. i start to think how tacky it looks and then begin searching for what it might be. i eventually learn that the spigot belongs to dr. pepper, one of my favorites. from this experience, i've learned two things:

lesson number 1: the longer you can keep somebody in the store or in front of the product without upsetting them, the more likely they are to spend money. had i not had to stand in line for damn near 10 minutes, i never would have coughed up the $1.29 for the XL dr. pepper.
lesson number 2: product placement that can engage a consumer is more likely to sell. had that sticker been there in the first place, i probably would not have bought it. the blank space stuck out and made me first, think about it, second, seek it out, and finally impulse buy it.

Number 1 seems fairly straitforward. The real trick is going to be applying that second one.

jeez, i'm popular today

that last post must have got a few people going or something...three of you i didn't even know read this thing. i've got a whopping 7 readers now! woo! my peanut gallery is growing. the pressure is on for me to post more entertaining/embarassing content to the world. so here's your daily dose of insight into how my brain works:

the lab is tons warmer today...TONS warmer. as i mentioned in a previous post, it used to be about 40 degrees in here. today it's closer to 85 and the geeks are starting to get a bit ripe. i walked back by the bathroom and would have screamed if it weren't for the green hand of death that choked off my air supply. somebody light a damn match.

i think our thermostat is controlled by a manic-depressive.

WOO! (stream of consciousness post going here)
in geek-land, there's nothing more satisfying than tearing your hair out for three days on a problem and then having the solution smack you dead in the face.