I am one lucky S.O.B. that I no longer have to drive to work anymore. But if you’re looking for the cheapest gas in the area, GasBuddy.com is chock full of the latest updates in prices nationwide. Just enter in your zip code to see all the various gas station prices in your town.

Below is a map of every county in the U.S.

Melissa and I had 2 Devotchka tickets to sell, and we thought that we had a couple of takers, but they both bailed! Melissa surprised me with the tickets one day, but then we got a late invite to a wedding of people near & dear to Melissa, causing us to have to try and sell them online.

So, if you’re on the market of getting married, send out your invitations a little bit sooner than 2 months away from the wedding date!

Tonight, we’re supposed to go see the Phillies vs. Blue Jays, but it’s looking like steady rain. I decided to give AccuWeather.com a shot, as Weather.com seems to be making shit up again. The forecasts truly are different in terms of precipitation.

What really got me is how much this guy loves his job. Check out the video below for the delivery by this meteorologist. I must say, he can really let off some steam at his job, and have loads of fun doing so. Or, maybe he’s just liquored up a bit.

The ATV problem in Fishtown seems to be escalating again. I just keep seeing more and more of them zipping by as I work on my computer, walk to the El, or just searching for my car that I rarely use anymore. I can understand "the need for speed" as a young kid, but this is insane. I truly feel like an old man that can’t relate. Back in my day, and still today, I just rode a bike — the good ole healthy means of transportation for expressing yourself. Here’s the main reasons I don’t like ATVs being used in Fishtown:

• Although they stand for "All Terrain Vehicles", driving around in circles in city blocks is just lame. Get some balls and at least break the Fishtown boundaries with those suckers.
• They’re way too fucking loud.
• The people that use them end up using them on the sidewalks as well, just as fast as using them on the street.
• They go through stop signs and don’t obey traffic signs at all.
• The people that use them like to just idle them.
• The cops just don’t seem to give a shit. I’ve seen them drive by a couple of ATV dorks and they just looked at them. Great. They are illegal, right? Yep.

OK, that’s my old man rant for today. I think a good way to compete with them is to get a band together on a flatbed truck and drive up and down the streets while creating an intense noise jam. I’m ready to plug in.

Taking on four freelance projects at the same type was probably a very dumb idea, but that’s why I haven’t posted anything in a lonnnng time. Combine that with my day job and researching for our wedding, I have officially decided to stop blogging until the end of February when the madness will be over. Oh, I was also in the middle of re-designing my Philadesigns.com site from scratch. Woah.

As any web designer knows, freelancing while have a 9-5 job is a social life killer. Extra cash = good. But, when it’s not a dire situation to attain extra cash, it’s just insane. Our new kitten, Santucci, must think that my iMac is my lifeline and that the iMac is my mother, feeding me nutrients that only Santucci may possibly partake in someday if he gets his own Mac. I’m sure Steve Jobs is working on pet-based iPods as I type this.

I think web designers must enjoy punishment. Why else would we design something that looks beautiful in Firefox, but than completely crashes in Internet Explorer 7. And then, once you fix it for IE7, you have to do it for the dreaded IE6. And, of course, we all like to follow web standards. But, have you ever validated some of those big name web sites out there? Even the web standard advocate, Boagworld.com does not pass XHTML validation. Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys this pseudo winter that we’re having and diving deep into 2008!

Back in April of 2006, I wanted to put a fence up in my backyard. So, I wrote a letter to the City of Philadelphia’s Department of Licenses and Inspections to find out what kind of permit I needed and what the fee would be. I also sent them the necessary $50.00 Filing Fee.

Soon after, I found out on my own that I didn’t need a permit for erecting a fence, as long as the height was 6 feet or under. So, I was good, and my dad and I put it up.

Ten months letter I received a letter from the Department of L&I, giving me the go ahead to put up the fence for $25…Ummm, ten months? Thanks L&I. You guys are tip top.

About a year ago, I was going to one of my favorite South Philly BYOB restaurants when I was greeted by a protest outside the entrance. A woman was holding up a large poster board covered with photos of young girl, and the writings stated that the owner of this restaurant (which I won’t specify here) was responsible for a hit & run fatality.

This suddenly altered my mood, and made me weary of entering, but we were on a mission to down a bottle of wine and enjoy a nice meal. Of course, I couldn’t side with anyone in this protest because I didn’t know the facts at all. (The restaurant has since closed.)

Today I was heading into Urban Outfitters on Walnut Street when I saw quite a large protest in front of the store. Apparently, the Mothers United Through Tragedy (is their acronymn really MUTT?) were angry that the store was selling a “tasteless” Christmas Ornament…a glittery gun. On the tagline stated: Bust a cap in your tree with this super glittery ornament in the shape of a handgun, complete with a satin ribbon for hanging.

Now, with Christmas trees and Santa having NOTHING to do with what Christmas is all about, I could care less if you used bullets on your tree instead of garland. And there’s a lot more “tasteless” products for sale in Urban Outfitters besides that. It just all seemed so ridiculous! Why not protest in front of Toys ‘R Us for selling large plastic guns in which kids will use to set up fake battle lines in the backyard?

I understand that the suffering of losing a child to street violence is immeasurable. But a lot of what people go to Urban Outfitters for is to check out the goofy, tasteless, and HARMLESS products that they sell.

I am on my lunch break now at work…As I am typing this, I have been on hold with Verizon Technical Service Support for 53 minutes. The awful Kenny G type of tenor sax loop that is repeatedly playing, mixed in with “Thank you for your patience!” is absolutely revolting.

If you want to taste the awesome hotness of this little diddy, call 1-866-479-1634.

I live on the 2200 block of Memphis Street and it’s been almost 2 weeks with no DSL Luckily, I have a cell phone and can take my laptop to the Rocket Cat Cafe for checking e-mail. But some people, such as the elderly lady two doors down, do not have a cell phone.

All that I know is that a tree fell down on some wires on Tulip Street and they’re still fixing the problem.

I totally respect the fact that it may take a while for them to fix this, but, my god, their Customer Service Department simply blows…Has anyone else out there had the luxury of dealing with them? Does anyone else out there have their Verizon Service down?

I’ve never had a problem with Verizon before, but I see their trucks driving around my block quite often. They are almost in the same cycle as the Pizza Truck and the Ice Cream Truck.

I’m thinking maybe all the cheap-o bottle rocket type’ve fireworks shot by the Fishtown kids have caused this? Maybe they took aim at a power line until it snapped in half and turned into a massive sparkler…Perhaps the kids around here just need a more powerful array of fireworks to choose from the next time that they are in Thrift Way.

Verizon used to be one of my boys, but I won’t be giving their cultish “V” finger shout out to all ma’ peeps anymore. I used to
watch that commerical and think, man, one day I’ll be representin’ the “V” finger shout out with a big dumb smile on my face, but now my index finger is down and the other finger is up.

Biking down 3rd Street in Northern Liberties today, I saw the angriest white man I’ve seen in quite some time. It was around 2:00 p.m. and he was outside in a public parking lot and literally pulverizing a pink bike with an aluminum baseball bat. The guy was dressed up with a white shirt and tie and looked like he had just gotten out of lunch somewhere. The dude had a red Jeep Wrangler with the door ajar, so I figured it was his. I memorized the plate and ran into Higher Ground Coffee Shop and copied it down on a piece of paper.

When I stopped back outside, the guy was still going at it and destroying the bike. He looked around once in a while, but was clearly in some “zone” of no turning back.

Soon he noticed me and was suddenly walking briskly towards me with the baseball bat. I figured I was about to get my ass kicked or suddenly pull off some kung fu shit that I learned from watching Kill Bill. But instead, asked if I had seen anyone rooting through his car. I told him no and he stood there panting.

“I was parked for just 2 minutes, man, and come back to having my car door open and shit all moved around” said the guy walking back to his Jeep.

He drove off and I sat there quite puzzled. Was this guy really legit? Was some guy that had a pink bike really rooting around his car? Even so, did that give him reason to fuck up his bike? The story still remains unclear.

If this is your pink bike (see photo), shoot me an e-mail. I have the guy’s plate number.