Biography

First off, I’m an Information Architect for a living. Owing mainly to that, I’ve got a real love-hate relationship with the more cannonical organizational schemes for websites. Especially blogs. Now, most of the time I live in the -love- side of the street, but all these blogs, microblogs, whatevers, et cetera are playgrounds and I kind of treat them as such. So hopefully you’re not the kind of dork who gets all self-righteous if the “About” page is off-topic. And if you are, well, I love you but get over it.

So when I grabbed this blog address a few years ago, here’s what was going on: I had used wordpress as a stand-alone on a number of sites, including my own, way too personal blog site. Any veteran WP users can attest to the spam/hijack vulnerabilities that such installations represented. After a couple of years of it, I was fed up. I got tired of the constant vigilance involved with maintaining WP on my server, so I was drawn to this easier way.  I found a kickass subdomain on WP, traded in my domain addiction for simplicity, and washed my hands of the hassle.  I’ve been let known that I “should” post a lorem ipsum generator on this site, but there are a bundle of good ones out there already. If that’s what you’re looking for, follow this link.

Second off, I do relatively serious stuff a lot of the time (read: work). Which makes me a frustrated artist. Yeah yeah, it’s a stereotype, but it reflects reality. It’s not to say my job’s not creative, because it sure can be and often is. But I went to school not once, but twice, for fine arts. BFA 1994 from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (no, I wasn’t pals with David Sedaris, though we shared writing workshop teacher Jim McManus) and MFA 1997 from the University of Oregon. Both degrees were, more or less, in painting. I taught painting at the Savannah College of Art and Design from 1997-2001. I showed and sold paintings pretty intensely. Painting was my life until my second son was born, which was only 8 years ago. So to end up practicing something as straight-laced as IA for a career means there’s a flipside that needs some serious outlet time. No single dumb blog’s got the facets to be the everything, but this is sometimes a good start.

Some of the rest, in no particular order:

I also spend cycles analyzing anatomies and classifying various types of tweets and trying to figure out the inflection of that galaxy.
I’m genuinely into the structures, movements, & relationship potential of social networking.
I paint when I can, I make things like furniture and dinner and all that jazz.
If you’ve ever gone to a Rite Aid to buy pencils and been shocked to find one in your pack of 10 replaced with a counterfeit pencil made entirely of wood, lacking lead or eraser, I may well be the responsible party.
In 1998, I opened an online confessional called confess-it.com, and received/collected thousands of mostly boring submissions – and a handful of the most disturbing confessions I’ve ever read. Confess-it.com is online today, but updated and changed and operated by New York State Council of the Arts.
I’m also responsible for a modest number of photos on flickr, and you can check them out but I’m not making any quality claims.
I’m the single father of three totally kickass kids who challenge me to grow more than I’m comfortable with nearly every day.

If you want to get in touch with me, use the contact/comments thingy on this site. I get stuff, and I write back. Follow me on twitter too if you don’t already. Find me there at www.twitter.com/texburgher and follow. And be good. Until then,

Geoff

Yahoo! chat is full of these, um, bots?

Lovely conversationalist, that Jordan. Er, I mean Bob…

bobsheppard61: rnganbfrchR u there?zrfbykghaakxrclpazaozzofy
Geoff Barnes: Yes, I’m here.  Are you there?
bobsheppard61: wbsvyhi emailgeoff, i got urwbbxvinfo from Angela, i hope u dont minduqgja
Geoff Barnes: nah, I don’t mind a bit. Angela’s a real peach.  What’s up?
bobsheppard61: xjqftI’m Jordan BTW LoL,uupafI just moved here from outta town ezdnu
Geoff Barnes: Hi Jordan, where did you move here from?
bobsheppard61: jdxgzR u busy this weekend?udbnci’m looking for some one to have a little… fun with hcxfe
Geoff Barnes: Oh that’s a shame, because I’m really busy already.  But I’m interested to know where you moved from.
Geoff Barnes: Why do you type so funny?
bobsheppard61: ilzxgTo remove your id visityzshthttp://yremoveyourid.com    ykgbhhjlgv
Geoff Barnes: idsfdfecbksOkay I’llfherfblqexbdo that fdfgwsgalater.
bobsheppard61: hxeio here are my details if u wanna meet uptifruhttp://www.%61%64u%6c%74h%6f%6f%6b-u%70s%2ene%74  ojofghfqlh
Geoff Barnes: Really?  adulthook-ups.net?
bobsheppard61: bgrlu here are my details if u wanna meet updwlzfhttp://www.h%6fok%2d%75%70s-%72%2d%75s%2e%63o%6d  vlplrjypau
Geoff Barnes: That’s your site?  Good work on the home page.
bobsheppard61: pipoo here are my details if u wanna meet upkrobfhttp://www.%61d%75%6c%74%68%6fok%2du%70s%2en%65t  hnxnzmrynf
Geoff Barnes: Uh oh, I think I broke you.
bobsheppard61: qqblv here are my details if u wanna meet upkpwbjhttp://www.%61%64ul%74hoo%6b%2d%75%70%73.%6e%65t

Finally, a discreet cure for your embarrassing flatulence odors!

Last night’s fun-filled trip to The Silk Elephant for Thai food, drinks, and revelry with friends led to a not-so-fun-filled wake-up this morning.  An abundance of spice made my belly ache terribly and the first two hours of the day were spent moaning and wishing for a magical cure for my pain.  Luckily for my girlfriend, but painfully for yours truly, there’s been no release/relief, and the search for an easing of the pain has yielded a hilarious – and potentially useful for you, dear reader – discovery.

Behold, Flatulence Deoderizer!  This handy youtube video will explain the “installation process,” which in and of itself landed it a spot on this blog.  Enjoy:

Love jewelry? This bracelet loves dummy types back.

Frequently find yourself searching for placeholder text, placeholder thoughts, placeholder feelings, placeholder excusese? How about placeholder jewelry?

Brian McNitt honors us by having found (lord only knows how) this sublime piece of jewelry for dummy types like you and me. The unscripted bracelet. Finally, jewelry that loves you back.

David Sedaris figures out how to pee himself

David Sedaris and I went to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago at around the same time. We took writing workshops with James McManus (himself quite a writer, from whom Sedaris apparently learned where I did not), and were into the same embarrassing type of performance art.  Ahh, the early 90’s.  In response to Ariel Waldman’s post, Wine Rack, I recall Sedaris’ essay on the Stadium Pal, an absolutely terrible idea just for men.

Rapcat – meow meow meow

“You can trust me: I’m a record executive!”

Best.419.scam.sender.ever

It doesn’t get any finer than this. SUPERFINE.

Hello,

I am Mr. Corin Superfine, Account Manager Royal Bank of Scotland United Kingdom I am contacting you for a possible business transfer worth 10.4 Million Pounds Sterling.It will be in my interest to finish this transaction with you hoping that you will not cheat or blackmail me at the conclusion of this goal because i have planned it for long.

If you can be a collaborator to this transaction, please indicate your positive interest immediately for us to proceed. Remember this is absolutely confidential because my Bank does not know about it.Your contact phone numbers and name will be necessary for this effect.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Warmest regards,

Mr. Corin Superfine
Royal Bank of Scotland.
Andrew Square,
Edinburgh, EH2 2YE.
United Kingdom.

P2P: Picard vs. Palpatine

If you, like a lot of totally hopeless geeks out there, ever wonder which galactic force is more formidable – Star Trek’s Federation or Star Wars’ Galactic Empire – then you’ve come to the right website.  Thanks – oh so many thanks – to whomever posted this on Youtube.  I think it puts the issue to rest once and for all.  Hailing frequencies:

Consumer spending up, ad creativity down

Gone are the days of unexpected ads, you say?  I’d tend to agree – for the most part.  But vanquish the thought that there are no new ideas yet to be had.  Ideas are contextual.  New ideas will continue to blossom as culture changes around us.  That said, cultural change of the sort that opens the door to genuinely new thought is slow and often imperceptible.  So for now, it’s safe to say we’re stuck with idiomatic recycling as our primary source of “new” ideas.

It is in that context that I approached this recent ad from John Lewis department stores in the United Kingdom.  I won’t deconstruct its use of consumer goods to create an assemblage object which casts the shadow of an idyllic scene on an empty wall – wayyyyy too much to sort through in that tangled mess of meaning(lessness).  For now, I’ll just enjoy its surprising sensory delights.  And I hope you do too.

Are you smarter than an American?

They should rename the game show. The humiliation this woman should feel is beyond words. Here’s wishing that American men and women everywhere will let their vision wander beyond the dashboards of their worthless Escalades and Hummers, and take it upon themselves to become meaningfully aware of the world around us.