School Suspends Girl for Casting Spell An Oklahoma high school suspended a 15-year-old student after accusing her of casting a magic spell that caused a teacher to become sick. Betcha every kid in the world would like to talk to this girl.

The Fat Project – Eric and Nicole set out to gain 30 lbs in 30 days. This is their story.

A step in the right direction? Napster and Bertelsmann, parent of one of the five major music companies that is suing Napster, have announced an alliance to develop a new secure file-sharing music service. Bertelsmann agreed to withdraw its lawsuit once Napster successfully introduces the new membership-based service.

It’ll be interesting to see how this all works out – will Napster’s 20 million users stick around if they have to pay a membership fee? Or will they flock to the likes of gnutella or other file-swapping services?

A client approaches you about a fairly substantial project with an already fairly tight time-line. You take on the project because it will be good experience, and it will look good for you and your group in the long run. You spend a lot of money and time having a script written according to what the client has envisioned. The client then chews up most of your production time with re-writes and bullshit politics. The script is finalized with maybe two weeks of production time left for a project that should have at least a month of production time. You pull a bunch of 13 and 14 hour days to get the thing done, following the script (which they’ve signed off on) to the letter. The project is mostly done with about 4 days to spare so you present it to the client. All hell breaks loose – the client makes all kinds of comments and suggestions – things they want changed – big things – things that were written into the script that they signed off on. And they’re giving you a day to do it. You want to scream. You want to pull your hair out. You want to hit the client with a bag of hammers. What do you do? You pull an all-nighter to get the bitch done. Because it will look good for you and your group. grumble grumble.

Sorry there haven’t been any posts lately… Been pulling 12-13 hour days at work. Been crazy busy with a multimedia project. It’s strange – since I left school I haven’t touched this type of stuff – it’s all been web-based work – I’ve had to dust off whatever Director knowledge I had tucked away for safe-keeping in the far recesses of my brain. Good thing it’s still there – just gotta dig deep sometimes.

If you’ve known me for a couple of years, you know about my Halloween parties. This year is no exception – been pretty busy, but the party is still going ahead. This year it will be pretty rockin’ – it’s our Fifth Anniversary party. It’s really too bad Kat’s going to miss it, but she’ll be there in spirit. Come one, come all – and bring your friends – it’s going to be a helluva time! Here’s the details:

The Dialectizer – View your favourite website in any of a number of dialects, including : Redneck, Jive, Cockney, Elmer Fudd, Swedish Chef, Moron, Pig Latin and Hacker.

Owners who look like their dogs (via metafilter)

My brother Phil proposed to his girlfriend Emily this weekend. She said yes. Congratulations guys! (that’s them on the right)

Mr. T vs. The Matrix

Couple Sues Over Hot Pickle Burn (via metafilter) – Y’know, maybe McDonald’s should just serve everything cold. A woman says she’s permanently scarred after a hot pickle from a McDonald’s burger fell on her chin and is suing for more than $100,000. Her husband is suing for $15,000 because he “has been deprived of the services and consortium of his wife.” What the hell does that mean? Her lip got burned, and he’s “been deprived of the services … of his wife.” Oh… uh… yeah, ok…