Benefits of this guy versus a moving company:

1. Service time versatility: “Move your stuff now, later, tonight, tomorrow, whenever”
2. Awesome testimonial: “Championship moving/delivery”
3. Customer service rep is the CEO - His direct line: 310.954.7631
4. Scalability to the market: “Additional dudes available”
5. Credibility: Reference upon request
6. Walk-ons available: Short notice okay

Sweet deal.  I’ll soon follow up on this dude to help me with my moving.  Will keep you updated!

Craigslist Market: Dude With Truck is a post from: Joe Nguyen

A couple of reason why this sucks.

1. The clean, white-space background that Google has branded itself with is no longer there.
2. Google advertisements on their homepage is the ultimate ad spot. Now I can’t read the HTML text there.
Google’s New Custom Background Homepage

Google's New Customizable Homepage

A couple of reasons why this is awesome.

1. I can upload my Picasa picture and look at myself every time I open Google
2. It’s another source to look at awesomely cool photos “editor’s picks”

Google's Changing Background Option

Google's Editor's Pick Homepage

All in all. I like the metallic blue balloon dog.

Google’s New Background Can Suck is a post from: Joe Nguyen

Joe Nguyen Upside Down At Warrior Dash 2010

The Course:
Green trees? Absent. Big Obstacles? Non-present. I completely did not expect the 3 mile course to be located in a patch of dried grass with a few crappy obstacles thrown together. It looked like they shoved some beat up cars and haystacks in various locations and had us zigzag through the patch of dried grass to stretch the course long enough to be 3 miles. The fire jump and cargo net climb. Lame.. Big disappointment. There were no staff to direct runners so some headed off course and ended up baking in the sun for a couple miles longer than they had to.

The Staff:
Those that I interacted were good (well the ones that weren’t baking under the sun). They were responsive and helpful. Friendly volunteers as expected.

Area Setup:
In a marketing perspective, this Warrior Dash set up was “Retarded”. You would think they would organize it so that they can maximize their beer sales and tailor to their sponsors, but nope. If you have an event that has 13 waves of 300+ people walking through, organize your booths in a way to maximize its effectiveness. Think about how much money you could have actually pulled in for charity in addition to your ticket sales and $10 parking per car.

The People:
Awesome. There were a lot of people and characters. I saw Willy Wonka and an over-sized Umpa Lumpa, the Braveheart Crew, Mr. Incredible and my favorite, Rambo, who the announcer called out for smoking a cigarette in the field of tall dry grass. Rambo actually had a second on the mic and gave an inspirational speech. It sounded exactly like this:

In the end, if you’re okay with handing over 45 dollars to run in an oven like patch of dried grass under the glaring sun to hop over a few haystacks and play in the shallow end of dirty Pond Elsinor, then this is the gig for you, or if you like Rocky. If not, leave it in your history book. You’re better off putting your money aside and doing the Rock and Roll 1/2 marathon in San Diego.

Warrior Dash in SoCal. Less Than I Expected. is a post from: Joe Nguyen

I went to Amazon, added it to the cart and checked out. So at the bottom, Amazon will give suggestions of items that were “Frequently Bought Together”.

And this is what it came up with the White Strips.

Crest White Strips + Barbie Superstar Doll Frequently Bought Together From Amazon

“Customers buy this White Stripes with ‘Barbie Superstar Doll’ by Mattel”. OMG! both for $36.98?! Pricing so incredible, I am buying!

Okay.. now that the excitement is gone, I’d like to say.. “WTF!?”

Honestly Amazon, how “frequently” did people actually buy these two items together?

It makes you wonder what kind of algorithm Amazon is using to yield these results. I mean, there could have been a possibility that 500 other people or 1 other person may have bought these two combination together, but they could have definitely done a better job at upsaleing me.

How? Well, by..
1. Looking at my recent search history (other white strips packages)
2. Looking at my history of my purchases (camera bag)
3. Giving me related purchase items (toothbrushes, floss, mouth wash)
4. Giving me seasonal purchase items (sunblock, SPF spray)

Just to name a few. Anything else could have been better!

Or maybe I am wrong and their algorithm is much more advanced. It could it be that their algorithm takes into consideration the following..
A. Individual is searching for bargains and stumbles upon white strips from SlickDeals (a coupons site),
B. which has a targeted demographic of mid to later twenty young mothers,
C. who love to keep their teeth nice and white,
D. who generally have family with kids age 4-8,
F. that would love a barbie dolls similar to their mothers at that age.

Or not.

Either way, it was hilarious none the less. Cheers to Amazon for making my white strips buying experience a humorous one.

Amazon Is A Comedian - Oh You’re So Funny! is a post from: Joe Nguyen

1. What is hunger? One of the biggest realizations is the distinction between physical hunger and mental hunger becomes a little clearer the days go by. I felt like 80% of the time, the hunger was due to mental cravings and only 20% of the time was it physical hunger. Makes me wonder if I even need to eat 80% of the time that I am “hungry..” Cutting all the unnecessary calories could make me healthier.

2. The sense of smell heightens 3.2x. How did I come up with that number? Educated guess. But really, I was standing in my cube at work and when the time was approaching for lunch, BAM! I was able to narrow it down to a tee! ::sniff:: “The Habit, seared tuna burger with a side of medium fries and a diet coke”. ::sniff:: “Lean Cuisine, orange glazed chicken with rice and a side of string bean veggies with a sprinkle of pepper!” Everything smelled delicious. Even the plain multi-grain wheat bread smelled amazing. The smell of food has become a new found appreciation in my life.

3. “Fuck you, banana!” Yep, I said it. Sometimes, the most random-est things are said when we’re delirious, which can happen quite often when the intense hunger is actually physical. “Mutherfucker!! Give me some wheat thins!!” I screamed as I attacked and choked Christian. He was a casualty between my war with food when he waved a box of wheat thins in front of my face.

4. Food talk. “So the other day, I took out my sketchpad and pen.. and then I just started writing down everything I wanted to eat!” - Kennard. I realized that all of our conversations (and any moment we spent not working and not asleep) would revolve around food. What sounds delicious, what is the first thing we’re going to eat when we’re finished, what our favorite cakes were, why can’t we eat just a little bit, etc.. and the list goes on and on. Every minute of the day that we didn’t keep our minds busy, our minds wondered in foodland. Food talk fun. Food talk without food, not so much.

5. Relate to the starving children. After I got pass the intense hunger moments, where holding my stomach and curling up was the best medicine, the constant hunger became less distracting with the help of the daily chores of life. I began to understand how being hungry with nothing to eat feels like. Although I’ve been extremely hungry (including moments on this cleanse), I realize that I have never been starving. Starving is another level of hunger that we are fortunate to not have to experience too often. Calorie intake matters.

6. Ideas and visions come plenty. From iPhone apps to business plans to bucket list additions to what ingredients would taste good together. Enriched as well as dumb ideas arise in rapid succession. It was very interesting because ideas that may seem far fetched to the sober eye, would seem extremely rational to someone that hasn’t eaten for 5 days. It was like an innovation light bulb being flicked on and off with an “ichy fingered kid” next to the witch. Positive lesson? Of course! We all know that innovation first always draws a crowd of many doubters.

7. Fearlessness inherited. I was driving down the 405 next to the center divider. Generally people would gravitate away from it, but I wanted to reach out to touch it, so I crept closer and closer. Eventually so close, my elbow could have easily made contact if I had extended it out. This and many, many other eventful moments made me realize that once I had been deprived of the most important thing in your life.. food, I became immune to the other generally fearful things like heights, rejection, boiling water (yes, boiling water can be scary sometimes). This reminded me of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Eliminate the bottom of the pyramid and the higher functions begin to not matter as much.

These moments of realization had definitely changed my perspective of my life and others. Read on for my final thoughts. Joe Nguyen and Part 3/3 of the Master Cleanse Experience.

“Reality Check!” - Post 2/3 Of The Master Cleanse Experience is a post from: Joe Nguyen

Some call my reason for doing it “stupid”. Others, “crazy”. Honestly, I didn’t do for the weight loss (I don’t have any weight to lose). Nor did I do it for the detox (I believe shiting is a good enough detox). Nor because Beyonce did it (I love her music by the way). I did it because lately, I’ve been making too many empty promises to myself.

Now that may be a little difficult to understand, but if you take a minute to reflect upon your past and count how many times you have said “I am going to…” or “I want to…” and you never went through with it, then you’d understand where I’m coming from when I say “empty promises.”

Who am I doing this for? Who am I trying to prove that I have the will power to do it? The most important person.. myself of course. Joe Nguyen. There are very little consequences when I fail to not perform for myself. I’m done making empty promises to myself. Let’s prove it. Although the Master Cleanse actually lasts for 10 days, I’m going for 5. I can’t afford the muscle loss. So here was the game plan that I was going to stick with.

Goal:
5 days.
No solid foods.
2 liters of “lemon water” per day.
Record my thoughts and behavior for the next 5 days.
Share it with the world.

Day 1: Monday

8:30 Hunger
9:00 Extreme irritation - Just knowing that I can’t have any food
9:30 Music is my savior - Talking to my coworker helps (she’s on the cleanse too)
9:50 Christian makes me laugh - Hunger subsides
10:20 Ping pong brightens my day. I feel motivated again. Hunger spikes and subsides. Missing something…
10:35 Thinking about food excessively - notice that it’s not even a physical hunger - we want what we can’t have
11:13 Proactive calls - started doodling and not even noticing. Pictures of food
11:43 The realization of obstacles to accomplish while on this plan - must accomplish goals!
11:45 For without struggle, there is no progress!
12:00 A hunger surge! Shit! Owl city chills me out! Lunch time! Need to get out of the office. Leave with Master Cleansing co-workers (there are 3 of us total)

During lunch, we leave for the park. Away from the office. I don’t take any notes here, but the green grass and warm weather puts me to sleep under the shade.

2:00 Must stay goal oriented. Get work done, love music, stay happy!
5:24 Work day done. Full of energy and feeling awesome!
7:00 Roommates burritos smell so good! fuck lemon juice!
8:00 Watched heroes and no reminder of food
10:00 Watched the movie, Taken - no hunger
1:00 Meeting with friend about side project
2:30 Bed time. Hungry.

Basically these are the exact notes I took that day. I agree that they lack an emotional thought process, but I wasn’t sure how to note take this experience exactly. For the other Master Cleanse Blog Posts, I won’t do this time outline. Instead, I’ll just write about my experiences and the lessons I’ve learned about myself. The first day there wasn’t much thinking, just doing. The next blog post will tell you more about my mental change.

Having nothing solid to chew on for a whole day was a very unorthodox for me. It was tough, but compared to the other days, this was nothing. I almost killed a man. Almost. Of 3 parts, read on for part 2 of Joe Nguyen on the Master Cleanse.

“More Walk, Less Talk” - Post 1/3 Of The Master Cleanse Experience is a post from: Joe Nguyen

You know when everything around you seems so serene, that it’s almost like a dream? Well I had one of those experience just this past weekend. It was one of the most unorthodox experiences ever since I’ve been here in LA and I must say, being at Deer Valley Monastery is an eye opener.

The weekend prior, I realized that every since Los Angeles became my new home, I’ve been drinking at least once every weekend and up to five times a week! The thought of it just blew my mind and I made a commitment for the following weekend. No drinking, no partying.

Deer Valley Monastery resides in the hills where there isn’t much outside contact, except Sundays when people are actually allowed to come to visit. I came to visit my friend. He is a monk and is definitely enlighten in a sense. His personality has changed dramatically since I’ve last seen him which was 4 years ago and he is now much calmer and in such a peaceful state. The interesting part is, we went to UCSB together and if anyone knows what happens in Santa Barbara, they’d be astonished of his commitment as well. Anyways, it is an awesome place. We walked transverse the stairs, played some ping pong, got some in and out (yep, burgers) and sat around drinking tea, hanging out with hummingbirds and watching the sun set behind the hills.

Their lives are so simple, yet so happy. Almost satisfying. Not too much technology and the music from the plentiful animals that crowd around the monastery is enough feel good.

I’m not saying I will abandon my strive for success or stop my experiences, but I wouldn’t mind leaving my cellphone off for a day a week and reconnecting with myself in the present.

You know what they say. Don’t stress it. The future isn’t here yet and the past is long gone. Now lets live in the present, because its a gift of now.

Deer Valley Monastery: Hidden But Simplistically Beautiful is a post from: Joe Nguyen

Stop motion is amazing. Something that takes a lot of time and patience. Applaud!

Google’s Smart Navigation - Fun Clip Of How They Do It is a post from: Joe Nguyen

On 9-9-09 a highly anticipated movie 9 by Tim Burton is coming out. Now generally I don’t really get excited about animations (besides Toy Story and the Madagascar series), but after seeing this trailer, this one is definitely on my “to watch” list.

The movie, 9 takes place towards the end of humanity. In order to save what is left of the human kind against it’s own creation, the machines, an ingenious scientist create 9 dolls who strive through post-apocalypse. Elijah Wood takes the main role as 9 and the animated movie is directed by Shane Acker, a renown short firm director. Full of action, antagonists and heroes with swords, along with superb CG, my expectations are through the roof. This could possibly disappoint me, but heck, the trailer really looks awesome! Check out the trailer below and tell me what you think?

Large cows can’t, but you can. Visit Tim Burton’s, 9, website.

Tim Burton’s 9, The Animated Movie Trailer is a post from: Joe Nguyen

Today was an interesting day. Shout out to my friend Ali for being an awesome friend and an incredible inspiration. Sometimes, we just need someone to grab you by the collar and tell you what’s truly important. I’m re-prioritizing. It’s a beautiful day today. It’s a new day in LA.

Thank you!

Reprioritizing Life Through A Friend’s Eyes is a post from: Joe Nguyen