Personal

One day, at work, I received a text message from a colleague. All it said was the following:

I was busy doing a few things at once, at the time, so it took me about a second to get back into the context. Basically, she had ordered food for lunch, and was looking to collect the cash before the restaurant actually delivered. It wasn’t long before I dropped the money off, and went on with my day. But when I looked at the text message again, I saw more than just a request for action – there was some humor to it, in my mind.

It was the sheer simplicity of the text, “money please,” that spoke to me. To me, those two words perfectly summed up what some unfortunate, bitter men might think of women: that they’re only after money, in life. Though I absolutely didn’t agree with that view of women, and their desires, I did find humor in the fact that those two words, together, were so brilliantly suited to be matched with that stereotype/mindset. So I kept it in mind, and knew that eventually, I’d want to make use of that idea in some way, for humor.

And today’s the day that I show the result of that effort, a book cover:

Money, Please: How the Key to Female Attraction Was In Your Wallet This Whole Time (Photo of woman by TaxCredits.net)

Now, I’m the type of guy that isn’t afraid to make fun of himself when he makes a mistake, as you’ve seen before. But I also like making fun of certain things that I feel are ridiculous, by nature. Stereotypes, in my mind, are pretty ridiculous. How, I ask, can generalized beliefs about a group of people possibly be valid if they were concluded after only encountering a tiny subset of that group’s population? If you were a guy, and all your girlfriends (or boyfriends, whatever floats your boat) happened to be primarily motivated by acquiring money when looking for a partner, then I can understand that in your frustration, you might start believing that that’s the way the world works. I’d sympathize with your unfortunate luck, but in my mind, this can’t possibly reveal anything about women (or men) as a whole. The only thing it might do is start revealing something on an incredibly limited geographical basis, and even then, prepare to adjust your statement accordingly: “most of the women I’ve dated in this area have been primarily motivated by money,” rather than the dramatized “women are always after money.”

But anyway, it’s by playing with that type of stereotype that I designed the book cover you see above. And though I got really silly by making it a dating book whose contents were focused on finance, I still wanted to make sure that the audience understood that I was aware of my own ridiculousness. Hence, two female quotes on the cover which aren’t exactly supportive, and a few questionable sources of income listed as money-making tips. You know, in case the base premise of the book wasn’t obvious enough.

In the end, I really enjoyed making this book cover, much like I did when I made “Feel Free to Approach“. So much so, in fact, that I started to wonder if I should also write the contents for these books as well, rather than just doing the cover page. So in the future, you might see me go a bit further with these ideas.

Photo credit

Last photo by Nick Ares

You know those moments where you wish you had thought a little bit more before you spoke? I know I just finished writing a blog post about not using my brain wherever possible, but those kinds of moments aren’t exactly what I meant.

So, I was at the grocery store today, and I set my eyes on pizza crust… otherwise known as the first ingredient in a meal that is pretty much destined to be tasty. As I typically do, I scanned the available packages, and looked for the one with the furthest best before date. I soon located the freshest, most suitable candidate for my eventual consumption, but right as I was putting it in my shopping cart, I did a double-take. There was something about the best before sticker, seen below.

As I was pondering, I noticed a short grocery employee walking by with a dirty metallic rack of some sort, and gestured that I had a question. She noticed, and soon moved up next to me to look where I was pointing, the best before sticker. To do this, she had to balance the awkward chunk of metal on one side, angling her body to better hold the weight. Once she could see, I asked my question:

“Is it possible that this thing expires in 5 days?”

She paused, briefly, and responded with a flat “yes,” with her tone slightly hinting what she felt: that the question had a fairly obvious answer. I nodded, and she carried on with her work.

Now, see, what I was thinking about (and you have every reason to doubt me right now, but I assure you, I was thinking) was the date format, which was ambiguous due to its numbering. The typical date format that I prefer is month, day, year, but in Quebec, it tends to be day, month, year, as that’s the configuration in French. I knew it was likely the French version, but I wasn’t totally convinced. And before solving that mystery, my brain jumped immediately to another: the length of freshness advertised, and what clues it might give about the format. Based on the look of the pizza crust, I kind of expected it to be loaded with preservatives, and thus, have a longer shelf life than a measly 5 days. But I didn’t get a chance to check the ingredients, or anything. Before I could think to do that, I spotted the helpful grocery store employee, and opted for a human exchange.

But I soon realized the humor embedded within my question. If, in fact, the date format were in English, then that would mean the bread was packaged on the January 7th, with a best before date ending the same day, but in June. That, obviously, would be one mutant piece of fresh food, with the most powerful preservatives ever to bless a piece of bread. Clearly, the most logical solution, had I completed my thinking before seeking human assistance, was that the expiry date had a far higher probability of being 5 days, rather than 5 months. And, seeing as the product actually had a “packaged on” date on an external sticker, it was likely printed and pasted on the spot, and thus, it was likely never super sealed for an endless shelf-life; instead, it was probably baked in-store, for freshness. You know, exactly the type of thing that bakeries generally do.

In the end, as stupid as I might have come off, I enjoyed the situation. Every now and then, I say things to strangers that show a serious lack of thought, and yet, I do feel that I possess a fairly satisfactory level of intelligence. But if you asked those people, and their limited interactions with me, I’d probably seem to be lacking in the brain department. But you know, that’s the comedy of life… the more mistakes I make, the more stories I can laugh about, and often, blog about. It’s a good life.

Photo credit

Bottom photo by Nicola Jones.

You know what I like? Not using my brain. Sometimes, I find it refreshing to just hand over control, and enjoy a pre-established solution. Consider GPS navigation systems in cars, as an example – here we have a device that is capable of directing us, and as long as we follow its instructions (with common sense), there’s really no need to know every single step in the trip. We can just have faith that the automatic directions are gonna get us to where we want to go. If we miss a turn, no problem – the GPS adjusts itself to the new trajectory, and once again, no need to worry, no need to think.

Now, of course, the brain is kind of completely essential when driving vehicles, so don’t take this as an official endorsement from me to drive around wearing an Occulus Rift, or anything like that. All I’m saying is that is can be refreshing to outsource certain responsibilities, and to me, directions seem like a good candidate, especially considering the state of modern mapping technology. And in the end, all of us are better than one of us: regardless of the service provider we’re talking about, you can probably bet that their solution is the sum of many competent minds. Probably.

So even if I devise the ultimate path to a given destination, mapping software will likely be better. After all, mapping solutions are built on a foundation of data, and the exploitation of that data is always getting better. Sure, there’s the basic concept of calculating the shortest path to a destination based on the distance alone. But then there’s other elements, such as traffic, something Google, for example, improves over time by having its Android phones automatically relay their positions. Not only that, but Maps also shows live traffic incidents like accidents and construction. Microsoft has a similar offering with its Bing Maps, where it uses artificial intelligence known as ClearFlow to predict the best routes. Altogether, it leads us to a point where mapping software can quickly suggest the fastest path, with a good chance of it being accurate. And if anything’s wrong with the directions, we can report that to our almighty mapping overlords, and the service improves for all, not just us. And that’s if no one else reported the error first.

Now, I don’t have a car, as some of you know, so I generally don’t get to use GPS navigation for that. Instead, when I have multiple errands to run, I tend to make use of Montreal’s public transportation: metro and bus, all the way. Often, I have to drop by multiple spots on my trip, but here’s the great part: if you were to ask me in the middle of my day how I was going to get home, I wouldn’t know the details. That’s because I figure out what my next step is only when I’m ready to act (lazy loading). So, for example, if I’m at my first destination, and I want to go to my next destination, I’d ask my phone how to do that (via Google Maps). My phone then calculates based on my current location how I would get to my next destination, and it’s at that moment that I actually find out what I’m going to do. Oh, I have to walk to that corner and wait 5 mins for bus 93? And pay $3? Sounds good to me. And if I miss it, no problem… I can see alternate buses that will get me to the same destination.

In the past, a multi-stop day like that would have to be planned carefully with bus schedules, maps, all that jazz. These days, I find it one of the most relaxing endeavors – I don’t even need to know what’s going to happen, exactly, and I know it’ll all get done anyway. After all, if I get to a destination, there’s a good chance I can find a way back… and if all else fails, I’ll pay for a taxi… but I have yet to be in a situation where that was necessary. The biggest hurdle I faced so far was having to walk a good 20 minutes to get to a particular destination from a bus stop, which, in my mind, is just another happy moment to torch some calories, and also, this time of year, to accumulate a fashionable amount of skin damage.

 Altogether, I’m the type of guy that dislikes stress and needless complication of my everyday life. If I can delegate certain tasks and responsibilities, I’m all for it – as long as it gives me more time to do what I truly enjoy doing. I like that I can generally trust my phone for directions, that’s progress… but what fascinates me further is the innovations that have yet to appear. For example, I really want to see a solution to the modern day need of doing one’s own laundry. Now, I know, some of you may joke and say “isn’t that what women are for?”, and while your comedic exploitation of a ridiculous stereotype would amuse me… I’d still disagree completely. I rather have some sort of automated solution where I drop all my dirty clothes in a machine that sorts through colors, has all the detergent, and uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to know when to do a wash, and when to present me with automatically dried, folded clothes, and a free mint. Okay, maybe not that last part.

Overall, I see my desire to simplify as a reflection of my interest in usability, originally fostered as a web design interest. I spend a good deal of my life interacting with software and websites, and when there’s a lack of intuitiveness, or needless complication, as I sometimes call it, it just adds that little bit of stress in my life that I feel I could really do without. Most of the routine stuff we do should be straight-forward, and with little to no thought necessary to figure out. It is in this spirit that I titled my post after Steve Krug’s book “Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability,” a great guide that helps developers and designers avoid usability mistakes.

So it’s all about technology, if you ask me, folks. I’m always looking to simplify, and as along as companies develop great ways of helping me do that, I’m on board.

Well, shit. Guess I’m walking.

Jokes aside, sometimes, there are bugs – but that’s to be expected. The issue above had something to do with my phone being confused about my current location. I got around it by just typing in my location manually.

BONUS: Notice how I included a laundry photo in this post, and it just-so-happens there’s a woman in it? As part of my usual approach to finding photos, I considered many options on Flickr – but that one was the best quality option given my licensing needs. Unfortunately, the woman’s presence kind of looked like it played into my whole “woman doing laundry” joke, which I didn’t want it to do. And when I clicked through, I laughed at my bad luck – the description even had a quote from Burt Reynolds about marriage being the most expensive way to get someone to do your laundry. Anyone that spends enough time with me in real life knows that my enjoyment of stereotype humor is derived from how completely ridiculous I think it is. The idea that a person of a particular gender should be destined to fulfill a certain role is so incredibly ludicrous to me – and that’s exactly why I find it funny – it’s totally warped and out of place, in my mind.

Photo credit

First photo by Sandor Weisz.

Second photo by Matt Johnson.

Third photo by Peter Kirkeskov Rasmussen.

This week, I decided to seek the advice of a pharmacist. “It’s actually pretty simple,” I said, “I’d like to go to La Ronde [an amusement park] without being sick.” The pharmacist laughed. See, the last time I rode a roller coaster, I was really young, and the result wasn’t pretty. It didn’t result in extreme projectile vomiting, or anything graphic like that. I just felt really, really nauseous, and after that one ride, I’d had enough.

But time passed since then, and I’m the type that likes to face obstacles, fears, and basically anything that brings me discomfort that I feel shouldn’t. So when a colleague invited me to visit La Ronde, I knew what I had to do. My body didn’t like being thrown around like a ragdoll, it was pretty clear about that before. But I wanted to be flung around… it seemed like it might be fun. So I thought about it, and it hit me… why not prevent my body from expressing itself? Surely, that would solve everything… right?

And so I sought anti-nausea/motion sickness pills, and soon enough, I had to make a choice. There was this one patch that you could wear on your neck for up to three days (hardcore), or, there was something far simpler: ginger root pills. One had a list of medicinal ingredients, and the other, one ingredient… and a fairly harmless one at that. Since I’m the type that likes to eliminate as many ingredients as possible, and only take what I need when I need it, I swore loyalty to the almighty ginger root; however, my choice came with a risk. In my experience, with alternate medicines, you never really know whether they’re going to be effective, or not.

Given my background, I knew that the responsible thing to do would be to test the solution before actually trying it out in the field. So, like a bold urban cosmonaut, I grabbed hold of a book, and boarded a local bus. There, I performed a crucial test that in no way reduced my overall manliness… the basic travel sickness test: could I possibly read while traveling? And not feel sick, for once? Could my body, with ginger, achieve what was previously unachievable? (If the event had been televised, viewers would no doubt have held their breaths in suspense.)

I travelled to an electronics store, bought some stuff, and came back, reading both ways. The result? Projectile vomi- nah, all went well… I just felt about 10% of my usual motion sickness. Good enough for my upcoming roller coaster torture session? Time will tell… but either way, I can officially say that I once boarded a bus primarily to see if I’d get sick from it. And that’s something.

Update: Actual shuttle launch resulted in zero nausea. Success!

Credits

Featuring: Simon Captain Canuck

Filmed by: Joseph Pereira

Credits

Featuring: Joey MacDonald

Filmed by: Joseph Pereira

It’s not exactly uncommon for me to roam the city of Montreal on my bike, as I enjoy a fitness-oriented life. Like most, I’ve been awaiting the arrival of summer with enthusiasm; spring being an appreciated intro. Today, I set out to do my usual routine: 20km, with no specific plan, trajectory-wise. I tend to vary the paths that I take, and I don’t usually know what I’m doing until I decide in the moment; however, there are certain trends that can be observed. My most frequent location, for example, is Parc Jean Drapeau, a local park that hosts the yearly Grand Prix races. Parc Jean Drapeau is fairly accessible, and it has a nice balance of greenery and asphalt, where the latter culminates with one major feature: the Gilles Villeneuve racing circuit. The significance here lies in the racetrack’s availability to cyclists – as long as the track’s not being used for an event, and the weather’s appropriate, it’s open to all.

Usually, after zipping around the racetrack a few times, I take a moment to lay in the grass, where I read a book, and also catch up on social media. Today, I sat down to do just this, and realized I was thirsty. As usual, I opened my bag to find my water bottle, only to realize that I had forgotten it… many miles away, in my fridge. It occurred to me, at that moment, that I wasn’t sure where I could find water fountains at the Parc. I remembered that they put up signs promoting their social media presence, and my brain came up with an interesting question: if I tweeted my location to the Parc’s Twitter account, would they actually help me find the closest water fountain? From previous interactions, I knew they would be responsive… but would they be so good as to respond to my miniature moment of distress? As a social media consumer and consultant, I was really curious to see what would unfold. So, I sent a tweet their way:

@ParcJeanDrapeau Where might I find water fountains, considering where I am now? Please see photo. #INeedSustenance pic.twitter.com/lvvRL6y4Eq

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

Of course, I was completely aware that my request was coated with a certain amount of ridiculousness. (You know, in case the Thor reference didn’t give it away.) In the spectrum of thirst, it’s not like I was so desperate that I was considering drinking puddle water, or was looking for droplets on leaves. I was just slightly thirsty, and if I had decided to use my adult brain to locate water, I was sure I could figure something out. I’d check around buildings first, and if that failed, I’d just ask random humans or, worse case, head home. But, being me, I thought why not? Let’s see if they reply. Let’s see if they’re that cool.

After waiting about 35 minutes, I didn’t receive a reply… and considering the timing, I felt that perhaps they had finished work for the day. So, rather than continue waiting, I figured I’d just, you know, use my brain. So I started biking towards a major building that I suspected might have water fountains, and accidentally rode up the wrong path, which lead up to an entrance. An employee of the Parc was there, and he asked me if he could help me find anything. I mentioned water fountains, and he explained how to get to an area where there were bathrooms and a fountain, through the gardens and under a bridge. I thanked him and moved in that direction.

Sure enough, it was at that location that I found the water fountain. Reflecting on the tweet I had sent, and my journey to water, I found myself amused with how silly it was for me to wait for help, rather than just head out and use my own intelligence to find a solution. To poke fun at myself and the situation, I thought that it would be entertaining to write a dramatic series of tweets about the adventure. So, I did that.

About 40 mins ago I tweeted the fine folks at #ParcJeanDrapeau with a photo, asking them where water fountains were relative to my location

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

I decided to venture into the wild, desperately seeking to survive the circumstances that had befallen me. Surely, water would be found.

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

My mild discomfort couldn’t continue… Dazed and confused, I bumped into a park employee. He told tales of a nearby fountain. Hope.

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

While writing these tweets, the Parc Jean Drapeau account replied to my original tweet with the water fountain location, which is totally awesome in terms of service. It really showed their devotion to having an active social media presence. Because of their reply, I decided to keep my dramatic story short, though I could have honestly kept it going for quite a while, exaggerating everything. Even in its brevity, I felt it had just the right amount of drama, considering how incredibly insignificant the entire situation was (universally-speaking). To further highlight the ridiculousness, I knew I had to end with something really silly, so I figured I’d, I don’t know, take a selfie with the water fountain.

And then… water, my salvation. The legendary fountain located, and an awkward selfie to immortalize the moment. pic.twitter.com/bH88aeCrRJ

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

I had a choice of three photos, and this one looked the most ridiculous. My expression communicated a certain… slightly-crazed excitement about what I’d found, but yet, my actual problem remained so undramatic. It was a perfect match. It also put me in an incredibly awkward public situation, which amused me further.

This whole experience has taught me exactly how awkward selfies can be. #DontMindMe #IReallyWantToBePicturedWithMyPalTheWaterFountain

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

So, at the end of the day, Parc Jean Drapeau’s Twitter presence really came through. If they hadn’t replied to me, I would have found my water source, but it would have been a cold, one-sided experience. While social media can sometimes be judged to be socially damaging, I would argue otherwise… it’s there as an additional way of connecting – an option, to be used or not. From a support perspective, there’s something quite satisfying about the quick responses one can get on Twitter, and similar services. I’ve seen this with other companies as well, in the past: Netflix and Buffer, mainly. When I communicate with either of them about an issue, they reply really quickly, and that response time plus their tone/delivery shows me that they care. Buffer, in particular, really believes in this: they speak regularly of customer happiness, and it closely relates to their social media presence. So even though I could clearly summon the mental capabilities to solve my own problem, I appreciated the assistance. It was quick, and it was social.

While I was tweeting my dramatic search 4 water, the #ParcJeanDrapeau ppl replied with the location. Great service & #SocialMedia devotion!

— Matt Refghi (@mattrefghi) May 13, 2014

Credits

Featuring: John and Chelsea

Filmed by: Ryan Josey

Credits

Filmed by: Ryan Josey

Credits

Filmed by: Ryan Josey