Radio Free Burrito Episode Zero

Posted on By Wil

Alive
Well, here it is! It’s alive!

As I wrote earlier today, "It will either be really cool, or the stupidest fucking thing in history, and I’ll proceed accordingly."
My initial feeling is that it falls somewhere in the middle: it’s
longer than I wanted, and it’s a little unfocused, but I’m willing to
allow myself the freedom to make as many mistakes as it takes to either
come up with something cool, or accept that I just don’t have what it
takes to make a podcast.

Observations on getting this thing from my brains to your ears: I
thought the recording would be very hard, but it was actually super
easy. I’ve tried in Audacity several times before, and it never wants
to work, so today I just followed the instructions from Apple for creating podcasts in Garageband,
and it was simple and easy. But holy shit the converting and the
uploading was so hard, I felt like I had no thumbs and an IQ of 24. I’m
sorry to report that this episode is only available in the stupid,
proprietary, Apple AAC format, but that’s the only format I could get
to upload (the .aiff file was over 300MB, and TypePad just wouldn’t let
me upload it. That was really annoying.)

So now I need to know what you, the audience, think. What would you
like more of? Less of? Is it too long? Is it too narrowly focused, or
not broad enough? Most importantly: when it was over, did you feel like
I earned your 30 minutes, or did you feel like you wasted your time?

Heh. The last time I felt this nervous about releasing something into the wild, it was the first version of Dancing Barefoot. This is both cool and scary.

Afterthought: I just realized that I stupidly recorded this thing in super-ultra-hyper-mega-stereo, when nifty-old-mono would have been just fine. The result is a ridiculously large file (71.8 MB) which I can only leave up for a few hours before I blow through all my bandwidth. I’ll see if I can convert the file I have to mono, and if not, look for Episode .05 to hit the airwaves in the next 48 hours. Yeah, I am really a moran. iTunes won’t let me convert it to mp3, and Audacity won’t even open it. So this file will stay up until about 8:00 PM Pacific time, when I’ll have to take it down. If someone wants to mirror the file, go nuts. Gods, I am sofa king stupid. I blame my nervousness for this ultrarookie error. When you mock, please mock me gently.

AfterthoughtAfterthought: I owe Shane Nickerson a huge debt of gratitude, because he pointed out to me my stupid mistake. I’ll reveal my shame a bit later on. In the meantime, here is a .mp3 file, which is much smaller: "only" 27.3MB:

Download radio_free_burrito_episode_zero.mp3

Oh boy! Several Mirrors!

Mirror one, from WWdN:iX reader buford: radio_free_burrito_episode_zero.mp3

Mirror two, from my friend Kathleen: radio_free_burrito_episode_zero.mp3

Mirror three, from WWdN:iX reader  UglyRedHonda: Unauthorized low-bandwidth-friendly re-encoding

And the coolest of them all . . . a .torrent. Man, do I feel like I’ve arrived now! Thanks, Brian! 🙂

 

WWdN podcast idea

Posted on By Wil

I am a big fan of the Family Guy Freakin’ Podcast. I love hearing the people who create the show talk about how they do it, and it’s especially awesome to hear how much they obviously like each other, and the work they do.

Near the end of the podcast, they always answer some listener e-mail (I sent one last week; I don’t know if they answered it or not and they totally answered it on the podcast for Fat Guy Strangler, and they didn’t even make fun of me. Freakin’ Sweet!) and it’s always funny and informative.

So I thought, "Hey, I can be funny and informative, and I want to do a podcast . . ."

So let’s give this a try: Send me a question or comment, and I’ll respond in a podcast. It’ll be sort of like Ask Wil Wheaton Anything but you listen to it and it’s not at Slashdot. It will either be really cool, or the stupidest fucking thing in history, and I’ll proceed accordingly.

Questions or comments can be sent to ask at wil wheaton dot net. When I have enough questions to fill about seven minutes of podcasting, I’ll produce and publish it.

UPDATE: Wow. A bunch of questions have flooded in today, and I already threw away a podcast that was over 40 minutes long where I tried to answer them all. I mean, I think I’m a swell guy and all, but forty minutes of me rambling on is about 32 minutes too much.

So I pulled out a few that I think I can give interesting answers to, and I’m about to start recording them. I should have Radio Free Burrito Episode Zero up in a few hours. Huge thanks to everyone who has sent in questions. 🙂

WWdN poker tourneys this week

Posted on By Wil

After taking last week off for holiday awesomeness with my family, the WWdN poker tournaments at PokerStars are back in action.

Today, we have the West Coast Warmup number three:

What: WWdN: West Coast Warmup #3
Where: PokerStars.
When: Thursday, December 1. 7:30 PST
Password: monkey
Tournament number: 15885231
Buy-in: $10+1

Tomorrow, we have the WWdN: ZowieZ Invitational

What: WWdN: ZowieZ Invitational
Where: PokerStars.
When: Friday, December 2. 7:00 EST
Password: monkey
Tournament number: 15886396
Buy-in: $10+1

I was doing really well in the HeyKidsItsBG Invitational, right up until I got sort of unlucky trying to bust a short stack. After a limp and a raise, I was getting 6-1 on my money with pocket fives, so I re-raised all-in to isolate the short-stack. I was in the lead, but just barely, against hands like KQ and AQ . . . until the KQ flopped two pair. Ouch. Two people went broke on that hand, and two others were crippled. Nice hand, well-played. A few hands later, I found AKo, and lost a race to a pair of eights. Here’s what I blogged at CardSquad:

He raised it 4x the BB, so I came over the top for 3x his raise, which
pretty much committed me. When he went all-in, I knew I was behind, but
getting 3-1 on my money, I thought it was a good call, since I was at
worst 50-50 unless he had an ace. Oh, there’s an 8 on the flop. D’oh!

I finished fourteenth, which was pretty awful, considering my chip position right before the debacle with presto (that’s pocket fives, for you non-BARGErs.) It illustrates the reality of a no-limit tournament: you can go from first place to the parking lot in just a few hands if you get stupid, unlucky, or both. Of course, you can also go from last to first just as easily. "That’s no limit, baby!"

Hope to see lots of players tonight and tomorrow!

blaze of glory

Posted on By Wil

The Bet rolls on, and Annie is almost half way home, with posts three, wherein Annie comes to terms with my asskickery:

Young Wil: “Ooooo…look at me. I’m a movie and TV actor…boo bitty bee
bee. I live in a fort where I battle cardassians with my Teddy Ruxbin.
My best friend Shane Nickerson is coming over tonight to play truth or
dare and ride Tron bikes. I really want to ask Lando Calrissian to the
Spring Fling but Princess GAY-A keeps cock blocking me. Fucking Whore.
Shane’s going with Boba Fette just to up his cool factor. Plus he can
score some juice boxes. Did you know Shane can pound one? Oh man, he’s
my hero! Come on unicorn. Let’s go to the Northern Quadrant and cover
an X-wing fighter with maxi pads. Boo bitty boo boo bippity boppity
boo, I’m was in Stand By Me.”

Ok Wil, I’ll admit it.  I don’t know what ‘5d20 times’ means.  Nor do I know the actual size of a ‘nanosecond.’

But do you know what this means? 
Dscn3791

Beware of my ghetto photoshop.

Elbow, double bird, and Send.

And four, where the tragic reality of a month without Nickerblog settles in and takes hold.

Nickerblog Nickerblog, boo bitty boo, 
Rest in peace nerd diggity doo.

But know this…

As you ‘unplug’ yourself, I will be hacking my way into your encrypted
mind with my multi vector assault mode and GHz GHB Built-in Boot ROM A
DOM DOM . Oh, I’ll find you bitch. Hiding under the covers with a
penlight trying desperately to reread Harry Potter or making out with
your hand to pictures of Jessica Stover.

However, for now, I mourn.

Oh, and you know what else we learned? Annie has a sister, who also has a blog:

This is Steffie, Annie’s sister…the brunette in the picture up on
the right hand side, holding Jesus’ Favorite precious hand. Yes, I
know, I was never "Jesus’ FAVORITE" but you’ll have to read MY blog to
get THAT story (wah wah) Although I’m proud of her trashing abilities,
I’m glad Wil and Shane get a taste of WHAT I HAD AS A KID, growing up
in her shadow sucked.

But really, I’ve had a blog for months and no ones ever read MY BLOG. 
"Oh look at me, I’m Annie and I probably have over a million hits and I
just started to BLOG." The counter on my blog has one hit, my dad, and
he just commented that I should be more like Jesus’ Favorite. But
you’ll have to read MY blog to get THAT story (wah wah). I mean, my
sister didn’t even know what a blog was until the guys made a bet with
her. I tried so hard…"Annie, it’s really cool, seriously, you should
have your own blog." "No Steffie, that’s only for nerds." So, that’s
the story of my life…thank GOD I have found some solace with the
nerds. Playing second fiddle to Jesus’ Favorite sucked. But you’ll have
to read MY BLOG TO GET THAT STORY. WAH FUCKING WAH.

One of these days, Annie is going to have her own show on HBO, or she’ll be a cast member on SNL (even though she’s really too talented to waste it on them). Some publicity jerk will make an appointment with Annie’s assistant’s assistant, and after waiting in the hall for six hours while Annie listens to Winger on repeat and drinks champagne out of the coke-rotted skull of Ashley Olsen, (who mysteriously died while hosting the show months earlier), that publicity jerk will be granted entrance to Annie’s gold-plated dressing room. After carefully stepping over the empty wine bottles and pot bellied pigs, the publicity jerk will tell Annie, "Excuse me, Ms. Ser –"

"Don’t look at me!" Annie will shout, from behind her veil.

"Sorry, sorry." The publicity jerk will say. "The network thinks it would be a great idea to synergize the audience by cromulently maximizing the interactive –"

"If you want me to start a BLOG, just ask me to start a BLOG," Annie will say, from atop her pile of plush velvet pillows. "Because I’ve had a BLOG since all the way back in 2005, right before Nickerson and Wheaton  . . ." Annie’s voice will trail off, a tear will form, and it will slowly work its way down her cheek, cutting through inches of blush.

"It’s not your fault," the publicity jerk will say, "that you were Jesus’ favorite. Being the king and the duke just didn’t compare. Nobody blames you for their mysterious disappearance."

The publicity jerk will offer some stock condolence, which was perfected by the network for use on Mike Meyers in 1993, and slowly back out of Annie’s gold-plated dressing room. As the door closes, Annie will look down at her computer, and evil grin growing behind her crocodile tears.

Someone looking very closely may see me and Shane, trapped inside, Tron-style, silently screaming for salvation.

Annie will look at the computer and say, "You heard the publicity jerk.Write me a BLOG, and make it . . . brilliant!"

The keyboard won’t make any sounds, but the words will appear, as if by magic, across the screen:

Dear Blog,
I often wonder how I got to be such a great master of blogging, and how I finally embraced my inner NERD. Well, from high atop 30 Rock in New York, while I’m waiting to go do a sketch with Rosie Perez, who is having some sort of inexplicable career revival, I’ll tell you. It all started at this little theatre in Hollywood, where I was never loud enough for the back row to hear me. That’s where I met the NERDS . . .

Elbow & Send.

The Art of War?

Posted on By Wil

Greatwaveofkanagawa43I haven’t read all of The Art of War in over a decade. I think it’s time I read it again.

This time around, though, I’m considering buying the audio version from iTunes Music Store. Has anyone listened to that? What do you think?

If you have a favored translation, annotated version, or other thoughts on this classic text, I’d love to hear what you think.