Stuff the boss won't let us put on the other Logicmaze blog

"I've got a great idea for a website!"

2010-09-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

Being in my line of work is great. It's fun, challenging, rewarding and all that. It definitely beats flippin' burgers. But if I had to think of one major drawback, it would probably be the fact that few people know what I ACTUALLY do, nor to they understand the complexity and worth of it.

Much like somebody who works on cars for a living will get a phone call from a friend looking for some cheap labor any time their car is acting a little bit funky, I've had friends approach me with a look on their face that says it before their mouth ever does. "I've got an idea for a web site!"

This generally yields one of three outcomes:

1. Their "idea" is actually something they've already seen and think they have an original variation of (they don't).

2. Their "idea", though slightly original, is something that would generally take an entire staff of programmers months, if not years, along with LOTS of money to actualize. The friend expects me to make this happen by myself with no monetary backing whatsoever.

3. They really just have a domain name in mind, which is in no way descriptive of what the site will do. Odds are they also haven't bothered to check that domain for availability, which means I will have to, only to find that it's a porn site laden with viruses.

Sometimes I get a combination of those things.

Now let's set aside any conflict of interest of making web sites on the side whilst gainfully employed by a web design company. Let's just throw that non-compete clause in my contract out the window.

If some friends of mine have a band and they want me to design them a simple site or fix/add features to their existing one, that's really not a problem. In fact, I'm happy to do that, considering these friends in bands will often get me into shows for free and things like that. Plus, being friends, I get to take more artistic liberties than I would with a client and, if they don't like it, I can tell them tough doodoo.

But when a friend (or worse, an acquaintance) comes up to me with a glimmer in their eye and mutters this post's eponymous phrase, only to pitch to me something like "A Facebook for people who hate Facebook. Call it Hatebook." or any variation of search engine, my blood runs cold.

I try to calmly explain the complexity of what they're suggesting, and the workload they would be asking me to take on during my free time. That's when I usually get hit with "I'll help you!" I don’t want to knock any of my friends’ abilities or their intelligence in anyway, but the odds of them being any actual help to me are nil.

So, were I to take on any such project, what I would essentially end up doing is a boatload of work while someone with no real knowledge base in my profession feeding me “suggestions” while offering no payment for my time. What’s not to like about that situation?

So I guess all I’m really saying is, if you’ve got a “great” idea for a website, before you approach somebody in the web biz on their free time (honestly, if there’s a beer in my hand, it’d better be the best idea anybody has ever come up with), make sure you have a serious grasp of what that idea entails. Google is an amazing resource for the unknowledgeable to get a basic understanding of what they’re looking for and how feasible it is.

And if you’ve really got a REAL idea for a website, along with the commitment (financial and personal) to making that idea into a reality, well, you know I do this for a living, right?

This darn weather...

2010-05-14T13:03:00.000-07:00

The entire LogicMaze staff would like to thank all of our friends, family and clients for the amount of understanding we have received over the last few days.
We lost all power to our offices on Tuesday night. Three of our staff members also lost all power to their homes. We moved our equipment to a residence Wednesday morning and almost immediately lost power to that residence. We were able to stay connected by laptop and Alltel broadband card just enough to troubleshoot and keep everyone's websites running. We are completely back up and functional as of this morning (Friday, Dec 14th) but we will probably not be back on schedule with project work until Monday or Tuesday of next week.
Thanks again, and our thoughts are with everyone out there who had a rough go with this weather.

With this kind of weather. . .

2010-05-14T10:01:00.000-07:00

As ridiculously slick as everthing has gotten lately, I'll bet we all wish that we had a 4x4.

Effective Industrial Maintenance

2008-10-06T12:33:00.000-07:00

In the current economic situation, it's no doubt that a business must be run as efficiently as possible. That's where Peterson Predictive Maintenance comes into the picture. Through use of infrared imaging and ultrasound testing, they are able to detect problems with machinery in advance, saving potentially millions of dollars and repairs and routine maintenance.

It's a sound idea for any industrial business looking to cut costs, rather than staff.

Kansas Drivers

2007-10-17T13:05:00.000-07:00

I recently rejoined the illustrious mass that is Kansas drivers when I purchased a car. In my hiatus, I had forgotten that the bulk of them are crazy. It's almost enough to necessitate an armor-plated vehicle just to ensure my safety. I actually saw somebody eating and talking on their cell phone at the same time whilst driving. When I say I saw them, I mean I got a very up close view when they swerved, erratically, into my lane without looking. Luckily, Mario Andretti has nothing on me. I deftly avoided an accident in that instance. People like this are prime candidates for license suspension.

The problem is that these people somehow manage to maintain their Kansas drivers license, despite their indifference toward common sense and the safety of others.

Here's another example: Have you ever seen somebody driving with their left foot hanging out the window? What could possibly put the idea in somebody's head that it's a good idea to have a critical appendage like a foot jutting from the window for all to see? Maybe he had to air it out. I don't know. I couldn't possibly begin to pretend to know what would possess someone to do that. The point is it's dangerous. Such behavior is grounds for immediate drivers license revocation in my book. And potentially chemical castration.

That's the end of my rant, ladies and gentlemen.

All my hard work down the drain!

2007-08-24T10:23:00.000-07:00

For the past several months I have kinda ignored my duties here at LogicMaze to work on my first Novel.

Here's the premise of the story:

A bunch of guys who are nerds and geeks in the truest sense have decided to band together. The form a website about being nerdy and geeky and profess their wisdom and pride in such matters. Then out of nowhere their Golden Calf type idol loses some weight, shaves his head, gets a decent wardrobe and they turn on him. They comlpetely destroy his life by inferring he is a sell out and they now hate him. Ends up though that the guy is making Bazillions of dollars is actually a cool guy and has the greatest job in the world and somehow he doesn't seem to give a rat's ass what these guys think, nor should any other human being in the world.

Anyhow that's the story, I took it to my lawyers and literary agent and we were just about to start pitching it to publishers when our crack legal staff discovered someone else had already written this exact same story. HERE IT IS!!

CRAP!! Back to the drawing board.

Paintball Extravaganza in Hutchinson, KS

2007-06-21T10:23:00.000-07:00

Ever make a great plan only to get to excited about what you are going to go do and forget the whole damn plan and end up having to wing it?

The LogicMaze staff (most of us) and some of our friends/family went paintballing last Thursday at Extreme Crossfire.

We forgot to call everyone and remind them before the day of the party, only 10 of the 20 people we invited remembered to put it on their schedule.

We forgot to bring a camera, not one single picture was taken all night.

We still had an incredible time and will definitely be planning another party out there. What a great place for a company party or a birthday party. Great people running the place that are honestly concerned about whether or not you feel like you got your moneys worth. If you are within driving distance of Hutchinson, Ks and want to have some great, extremely affordable fun. Give them a call at (620) 664-7262 or check out their site here!

Tamara, who is the boss around here got some embarrassing bruises. Might ask here about them next time you run into here!!!!

Immitation is the highest form of flattery.

2007-06-11T13:05:00.000-07:00

So they say.

The question is: when it crosses over into ripping someone off, is it still flattering? Other guys at the office brought to my attention this site. Looking at the site itself, that's obviously not what I'm referring to as the copying. HOWEVER! If one were to view the source on their site as well as ours. . .well:

<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="website designer hutchinson ks website design website designer hutchinson kansas mcpherson wichita salina newton reno county kansas web site design shopping cart sell items online">

<META NAME="description" CONTENT="Website designer - Hutchinson Ks Website design by a Hutchinson Kansas website designer -

Serving All of Kansas including clients in Wichita Salina Mcpherson and several other states offers logical thinking, graphic design, website hosting, logo design, search engine optimization, Ecommerce.">

You'll just have to take my word that ours was there first. If you try to, you can find the navigation links on their site (white on white background, but they highlight red on rollover) and navigate to the contact page to learn that they run out of Miami, but have an office in Olathe. Why, then, would they shoot for Hutchinson in their Meta info? Maybe they answered that question for me: "Your conpetitors....already have an website!" *cough*spell check*cough*

Absolutely they do! Just use their stuff!
Anyway, I'm a total jerk for bagging on these guys, but I just had to. I mean. . .

King Egret Speaks Out

2007-05-04T13:06:00.000-07:00

Sometimes when I get a wild hair, I go into sort of a journalistic streak. This week, I really wanted to do an interview. I scanned the newspapers for important stories, where I felt that only one side was represented. That was when I found the article "Officers on 'egret patrol'." I'd link to it, but after a few days, it will get archived and you'll have to pay to read it. Here's a link that will give you a little more info on Hutchinson Police vs. Egrets.

Here's the jist:

Ask the Hutchinson Police Department what Lt. Troy Hoover and Chief Dick Heitschmidt are up to these days, and you're likely to get a startling answer.

"He's still out on egret patrol," the officers' administrative assistant said.

Egrets have been, for lack of a better word, infesting the Southeast part of Hutchinson for a couple of years now. It's not uncommon for somebody who lives in that area to find dead egrets on their property, or maybe their excrement. Our police department has been given the seemingly impossible task of keeping this migration of inconvenience from happening.

It's certainly easier said than done, considering that federal law prevents the police from simply pulling out a shotgun and laying the pests to waste. It's a shame, because that would probably be pretty fun. I realize that this is going to be a major pain in the arse for those enlisted. Tying shiny ribbons to trees and deploying owl decoys are just two of the tactics employed.

There's one major question that was gnawing at me while I thought about this situation: What's the egrets friggin' deal, man? I decided that I would get to the bottom of this. There was only one way that I saw to possibly do that: interview the King Egret. That was how I found myself in the lair of the egrets, just off of Lorraine and G street in some poor, unsuspecting sap's attic. I was surrounded by what I assumed were drone egrets, ready to attack if I made any sort of threatening movement toward the King Egret. Yes, this was journalism at it's most dangerous.

The King Egret spread his wings, as if to humble me with his not-so-impressive wingspan. I humored him, and politely bowed my head, as I figured a subordinate egret was likely to do. It was time for me to begin my interview.

Here's a transcript:

Me: King Egret, let me just thank you for taking the time to talk to me. I really appreciate this, and I want to get to the bottom of the bad blood between your kind and my kind.

King Egret: Let's just get this done quickly. I've got females presenting outside.

Me: Right. Of course. So I guess my first question is: What gives?

King Egret: What gives?

Me: Yeah. What's the deal with you guys all comin' up in our business and poopin' on our stuff? Why Hutchinson?

King Egret: What do you mean 'Why Hutchinson'? This place is great! I mean, we tried Burrton, but. . .it's Burrton. We like it here. The property tax isn't too high, you've got that awesome zoo in the park and you have five Subways. Five!

Me: You. . .uh. . .like Subway, huh?

King Egret: We also dig going to the Cosmosphere. Entry is free to Reno County residents, so we've gotta live here.

Me: Oh, come on! There's no way that they let you into the Cosmosphere.

King Egret: Bet me?

Me: No. . . So what do you do to occupy your time while you're here in Hutchinson? Besides make a lot of mess and noise, that is.

King Egret: Well, a couple dozen of us have taken to opening payday loan stores. One of them pretends like he's a kangaroo. He says that kangaroos are 'more presentable,' but I take that as a disrespect to his species.

Me: As you should. . . So, how do you feel about local law enforcement's efforts to scare you away from the regions of town that you frequent.

King Egret: I'll tell you, I don't like it one bit. They shouldn't be able to do that, because, from what I understand, I have diplomatic immunity.

Me: You are referring to the federal law that prevents law enforcement from killing you?

King Egret: Exactly.

Me: Wouldn't you rather live somewhere that you're more welcome?

King Egret: We've made our decision. The people of Hutchinson are just going to have to learn to tolerate us, like in Alien Nation.

Me: Wow, that's an obscure reference.

King Egret: You like that?

Me: Yeah.

King Egret: Look, I've got things to do. It's been nice talking to you and all, though. Tell me where you live, and I'll make sure that we don't poop on it.

And just like that, my interview with King Egret ended. He flew away, letting out a great. . .whatever sound egrets make. I don't know that my interview gave us any insight of how to get rid of these pests, but it definitely helped us understand why they're here.

Fun with Google Maps! LogicMaze Vacation Ideas

2007-05-01T13:06:00.000-07:00

We work hard here at LogicMaze.

Well. . .most of us do *cough*Scott*cough*

Anyway, I feel that we are all due for a vacation. To keep things fair while deciding what we're going to do for the vacation, I devised the ingenious plot where each of us creates a potential vacation itinerary on Google Maps, and posts it here. We will then pick the best one.

Here's Mine

Let's see if anyone else gives this a shot.

Gus from Lonesome Dove

2007-04-17T10:22:00.000-07:00

Ok, now all I can think about is Lonesome Dove. Watch this!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVBjBClBSao]

Westerns Rule!!!

2007-04-17T10:21:00.000-07:00

GUS FROM LONESOME DOVE

Ok I just wrote a kinda serious blog on the real LogicMaze blog. In the end I got kinda crazy and named the blog Long Lost Blogger returns and I put a picture of the Lone Ranger and his trusty steed Silver in the blog. The picture kinda got me thinking about westerns. I love westerns, there is no better kind of movie. Lonesome Dove is the greatest western and greatest movie of all time. I might have had teary eyes when Gus died. Open Range is the second greatest western of all time, not sure if it is the second greatest movie ever but it's close. Robert Duvall is in both of them, not a coincidence!!

Someday I will be a great actor in a westerns or... maybe I will just keep selling websites and marketing plans for LogicMaze.

Boys and Girls Club of Hutchinson Web Site Award

2007-04-16T13:07:00.000-07:00

Throughout the internet there are any number of "awards" that one's site or blog can earn. The truth of the matter is that if you want an award for your site that you can post on the home page to appear more distinguished, you can just make one up. Who is seriously going to check it out?

Seriously, though, one of our clients: Boys and Girls Club of Hutchinson has recently received word that they have won Gold in the Website category of the 20th annual Boys and Girls Club of America Marketing and Communications Awards Program. That's a mouth full, so let me break it down: bgchutch.com (which we designed) has been recognized as the best out of all of the Boys and Girls Clubs in the same budget range. The prize for that is $1,000.

Needless to say, we at LogicMaze are pretty psyched about this. The fact that we have been able to help Boys and Girls Club of Hutchinson not only by helping them represent themselves online, but also by helping them earn recognition from their peers makes us feel like we have contributed to the cause more than sufficiently.

Leave the Explosions to the Pros

2007-04-12T13:07:00.000-07:00

If you were to ever meet up with one of my friends and ask them about stupid things that I've done in the past, you would undoubtedly have to clear your schedule for the rest of the day to hear a good chunk of the stories. I generally never did anything extremely dangerous like jumping onto moving cars or anything like that. Stupid: yes Ballsy: no.

Ranking up as one of my more dangerous evenings would be a couple of years back on the 4th of July. I had a friend whose parents owned some land in the North part of town, and we all got together for an amateur fireworks display. Needless to say, mixing a good-sized group of young (but legal) people, booze and fireworks isn't the greatest idea ever had. Everybody surprisingly behaved well. Somebody brought some big/expensive fireworks, and we had a pretty good show going.

Unfortunately, the show ended long before the party did. What we basically had was a large group of slightly inebriated people in an open space with a large assortment of small to medium sized fire crackers: bunker busters, black cats, Roman candles, etc. An inevitable war broke out: everybody scrambling in every direction avoiding and throwing lit fireworks at one another. It was during that melee that I realized how tiny and potentially harmless (don't stick them in your eye or anything) the black cats were. Someone would throw them at my feet, and I would just step on them and let them go off. I still have the shoes to this day, which is indicative of how little damage they did.

When the battle fizzled out and entertainment began to run short, an idea occurred to me about how to maximize the wow factor of the few fire crackers that we had left. In no time at all I was setting them off in my back pockets as I ran. It looked pretty funny, somebody was taping it, but I'll be damned if I know where that footage is. Eventually, I graduated from back pockets to the bill of my hat. That looked scarier than it was. It was loud, but I couldn't feel anything but pressure on my hat. The one that really got me was the shirt pocket. The bunker buster popped, burning a whole in the inside lining and outside of the pocket, and singing the small patch of chest hair that I lovingly refer to as my Halflehoff.

After it was all said and done, nobody got hurt. The only casualties of the irresponsible use of explosives were my shirt, hat, pants and Hasselhalf (that's right, I switched the pun around). This doesn't mean that nobody could have gotten hurt. Which brings me to the point of this rambling: don't be stupid.

Mitchell's American Safari

2007-04-06T13:08:00.000-07:00

You guessed it right from the headline: I packed up some clothes and a gun, and went on a safari here in the United States. On my safari, I hunted such game as whitetail in Pike county, Illinois, waterfowl in Kansas, and the dreaded Colorado Hippie

I used Google Maps to illustrate my epic trek. Check it out.

Behold! Efficiency!

2007-03-30T13:08:00.000-07:00

We at LogicMaze are always interested in finding new ways to make our operations here more efficient, if even a little bit. A countless number of steps have been taken on a countless number of occasions to change the basic routine to make things go a little bit more efficiently.

I’d hate to sound like the jerk taking all of the credit for it, but. . .well. . .I’m sort of a guru on that sort of thing. I think that my latest idea is going to be the end-all be-all of great strides toward maximum efficiency:

Installing a pneumatic tube system!

Ok, I’m going to be honest with you, I don’t know for sure who in the office first suggested the idea. I can’t handle the guilt of taking the credit. We’ve actually been kicking this idea around for some time. I think that it’s actually an adaptation of Cody’s idea to hardline the coffee from the pot in my office directly to his office, to which I explained that the maintenance and cleaning of the line might prove a grueling and disgusting task. Good idea though.

Back to the actual tube system.

Here’s a common scenario here at the office as illustrated by an instant message transcript:

1:08 PM Scott – Hey, do you have the folder for {name omitted to protect the innocent}?
1:08 PM Mitchell the Coolest – I don’t know, let me look.
3:51 PM Scott – ?
3:51 PM Mitchell the Coolest – ?

3:52 PM Scott – Dude, I asked you if you had that folder like three hours ago. What gives?

3:53 PM Mitchell the Coolest – Who says “what gives?” these days?

3:53 PM Scott – Do you have A.D.D or something?

3:54 PM Mitchell the Coolest – So?

As you can see, the file system can be somewhat of a hassle. The folder could be in a number of places like my office, Cody’s office, Tamara’s office or, sometimes, the file cabinet in Tamara’s office.

That’s the beauty of the pneumatic tube system! Regardless of the location of the folder of interest, it can easily be transferred from one person’s possession to the next by doing little more than putting it in the tube and pressing a button. No more getting up and walking to things. Who needs that?

In an effort to really drive this idea home, I went ahead and drew out a diagram of the convenience to come. I was reluctant to draw this out, though, since I’m kind of a really good drawer, and now everybody around the office is going to be asking me to draw stuff for them. I don’t like all that pressure.

The Matrimonial Mixup

2007-02-26T13:09:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned in my last blog, I was awaiting the arrival of my mail-order bride.

Well, there's some bad news.

In an attempt to cut costs of bringing her into the country, I decided to book the flight online with Traveltron5000.com. That site seemed to have great rates for online travel. Now I know why it was so cheap.
First of all, rather than first class like I had arranged for her to be flown here, they put her in a cargo plane full of chickens.
Second, they, for some reason, flew her to Panama.

When I tried to book a flight online to bring her to the intended destination, I was informed that she had said that she didn't want to fly to America. Apparently, she had met somebody in Panama, and opted to marry him instead of me.

Bummer.

One more Dolph Lundgren Joke. . .

2007-02-22T13:10:00.000-08:00

I ran into Dolph Lundgren the other day (really. . .).
"Hey, Dolph," I said. "How the heck is it going?"
"Good," Dolph replied. "I've been really busy working on my new movie."
In an attempt to hide my utter lack of interest, I decided to go ahead and ask about the movie.
He explained to me that the new movie will be a Rocky spin-off. He will be reviving the Ivan Drago character. There didn't seem to be much of a premise, though. They had hired Tony Dungy of the Indianapolis Colts to co star. The movie would be called Dungys and Dragos.

Waaaah waaaah waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.
Admit it, that's good stuff. . .

Mitchell's Getting Married

2007-02-22T13:09:00.000-08:00

That's right, ladies and gentlemen, I'm getting married!

I just ordered the bride yesterday, and she should be on her way into the country as we speak.

Once she's here, I plan to contact Rainbow Fireworks about setting up some awesome fireworks displays for the wedding. A lot of people don't actually think about fireworks at a wedding, but they should realize that it's a good way to celebrate a special day (or show off your new mail-order bride).

You're all welcome to join Ling Pao and I for the special day and enjoy an amazing fireworks show.

SEO Hutchinson: The Ghost of Talent's Past

2007-01-25T13:11:00.000-08:00

As I looked at myself in the mirror, I wanted to vomit so badly. After my lack of success with the David Blaine thing that I had last tried, I really had to lower my standards (as though that could possible). I splashed some water on my face and attempted to regain my composure before my guest showed up. No sooner than I had toweled off, there was a knock at the door. My stomach filled with acid immediately.

I opened the door, for my guest, Dolph Lundgren. You may remember him from Rocky IV as Ivan Drago, or if you're an uber-nerd, Masters of the Universe. That's right, he played He-Man. I remember totally digging on that movie when I was younger, but I'll bet if I watched it now, it would just shatter my memories of it being awesome.
Cool movies aside, Dolph hasn't done anything worth anything in a while, and he was in need of my marketing abilities. Coincidentally, I hadn't done any marketing worth anything in a while and was in need of his money.

"Ok, Mr. Lundgren - May I call you Dolphy?" I started things off.
"No," my monosyllabic new client responded.
"Alright, Mr. Lundgren. I'm very interested in doing some marketing and search engine optimization for you. First thing's first. Do you have a website?" I asked.
"No."
I could tell already that this was going to be as easy as a walk in the park. . .a park full of ninjas bent on killing yours truely.
"Are you sure that you don't have a website? I'm relatively sure that I've seen dolphlundgren.com."
"Yes, that is my website," he responded.
"Great! We're making progress now. I am very excited," I lied. "What. . .uh. . . are you looking to market/optimize for?"
"Deer hunting and turkey hunting," he said, completely catching me off guard.
"I'm sorry?"
"I want to open a hunting outfitters. I will dress up turkey and deer to look like Jean Claude Van Damme and we will hunt them like Universal Soldier."
I struggled not to laugh at this crazy idea. "How about dressing them in red white and blue, and pretending like they're Apollo Creed?"
"Good idea," he didn't get that I was joking.
I paused for a moment to seriously consider what I was getting myself into. I then remembered some of my previous endeavours and decided that this one may actually be the least insane. I collected my thoughts before I spoke.

"Ok, Dolph, here's the deal-"
As soon as I got that much out, I heard the sound of keys jingling in the door. Crap I thought it's my roommate!Somewhere down the line, I had unwittingly allowed Phil Collins to move in with me. It was some crazy sort of odd couple-esque situation that I often tried to block out of my mind.

"Hey, Ralph, I got you some more of that bath gel you like, since I used all of your-" he stopped talking and froze as he came in the door an saw Dolph Lundgren sitting on the couch.
"What's he doing here?" Phil asked.
"Phil, this is Dolph Lundgren, I'm going to be doing some work for him," I explained.
"Oh I know who he is! We've met before, isn't that right, Dolph?"

I didn't know what was going on, but I certainly didn't want to know. There was no way that I could even imagine for Phil Collins and Dolph Lundgren to have even met before, let alone have some sort of conflicting past. All I know is that what happened next was both one of the weirdest and coolest things that I had ever witnessed.

Phil went on and on, calling Dolph a huge list of names and discrediting him as an actor, while Dolph simply sat on the couch, expressionless as usual. This went on for about a minute before he went across the room like a blur, and knocked Phil Collins out with one swift punch. Groceries went everywhere as Phil fell against the wall and slid down to the floor.

"Wow! You knocked him clean out!" I said in disbelief. "Thanks!"

Dolph turned to me dramatically and said "If he dies. . . he dies."
He then pulled out a huge knife, cut off one of Phil Collins' ears and strung it on a necklace with a bunch of other ears (Universal Soldier style).
I threw up.

I Should Have Called Rainbow Fireworks

2007-01-12T13:11:00.000-08:00

My friend Randy called me the other day.
"Mitchell," he says to me. "I'm getting married, man!"
"Really? What's his name?" I respond. That's what we do. We make jokes.

Long story slightly less long:
I wanted to do something snazzy for my friend Randy on his special day. Here at LogicMaze, we have been working with Rainbow Fireworks to help spread the word about them doing fireworks displaysat weddings. That seemed like the perfect idea. Unfortunately, I don't have the kind of money that is necessary to pay the professionals at Rainbow to put on the show for my friend. Consiquently, I opted to do the show myself.

I figured that all I would need is the fireworksand a lighter. I had done quite a few amateur 4th of July shows, so I was fairly confident in my abilities.

Randy and his fiance plan to reschedule the wedding after his skin grafts.

justtwogirls.CON

2007-01-11T13:12:00.000-08:00

Ok, if you haven't heard about this yet, here are some links so that you can do your homework. Trust me, it's worth the time. Here is some stuff from itsbadbusiness.com and customersarealways.com.

This lady is crazy. She actually had her clients afraid that she was going to do physical harm to them. I'll probably get some dirty looks for saying this, and please believe me that I am in no way going against the whole women's lib, female equality thing when I say this, but: The majority of the work that justtwogirls.com did (from my understanding) was oscommerce site, primarily for female clients. It's very likely that there were one or two of Christina Stevens' clients that could take her in the instance of "a rumble," but here's my point. If she did websites for marshal arts acadamies or something, it would have been over before it started. You know what I'm saying.

Here at LogicMaze, a healthy chunk of the clients for whom we build sites, host sites, market, whatever are hunting outfitters, like Ashlenz Outfitters. If I ever ballsed up enough to say some things like Christina Stevens said about "taking care" of people's families or started messing with their businesses. . .well I sure as hell wouldn't be typing this blog right now. I'd probably have an appointment with the taxedermist.

For the non gun-familiar web site clients, I am considering offering some Women's Internet Self Defense Classes. We will cover things like kicking web predators in the virtual junk and using one of our most innovative products: LogicMace.
I will post class times someday when I feel motivated.

MitchHole Storage to Announce Announcement of Potential Expansion

2007-01-03T13:12:00.000-08:00

"I'm pretty excited. My business capacity will double. . .more than double," said Mitchell in reference to the acquisition of more storage space for his underground storage company: MitcheHole Storage.

MitchHole Storage was started when one young entrepreneur came up with the genious idea of digging a hole in his back yard and offering to bury people's most valuable possessions in it for safe keeping. I was fortunate to sit down and have an interview with Mitchell: proprietor of MitchHole Storage.

Good Morning, Mitchell.

Good morning, how are you today?

So you're announcing an expansion of your business facilities. . .

Actually, I'm not announcing the expansion just yet. What I'm actually doing is announcing that there will be an announcement soon about the expansion of MitchHole storage, which will afford us more space for the storage of people's most valuable possessions.

So you're announcing an announcement?

Exactly.

O.k. Will there be any new services offered or just an increase in space?

Well, we will begin offering private vaults like that one over there.

That's a Coleman cooler. . .

Right. . .

Moving on: You run your business out of your back yard. This brings me to the question of how you intend to expand without buying one of your neighbors' property.

Don't worry about it. Let's just say that none of my neighbors is gonna be able to build a pool.

Following that comment, I felt it necessary to end the discussion for fear of having to testify at a court date in the future.

So we got an office monkey for Christmas.

2006-12-26T10:20:00.000-08:00

The title is not fiction, but the Monkey is not alive!!

We all love the career builder monkey ads so much (see below) that we have been bugging the boss to get us an office monkey, she did, we had a contest to name it and I won. The proof is here.

No Dice on the Phil Collins

2006-12-14T13:13:00.000-08:00

Well, if you didn't already know, you can check for yourself. I sent a letter to Phil Collins imploring him to contract us to fix his crappy, crappy web site. Of course, I did so in much nicer terms. It wouldn't have mattered if I called him a fart sandwich, in all actuallity. I apparently sent the letter to the wrong Phil Collins. Read for yourself:

Dear Mitchell,

I appreciate your letter, but I regret to inform you that I am not the Phil Collins that you intended to reach. I am Phillip Charles David Collins, from Pike County Illinois. I am relatively sure that you are looking for Phillip David Charles Collins, who lives in the U.K. I think. I'm afraid that I can't be of much help for you to get a hold of the intended Phil Collins.

In reference to the web design business you mentioned, I was wondering if there was any way that I could get in touch with you about potentially building a site for my Illinois outfitters company that I run from my land. I wouldn't want anything major, maybe just some sections for deer hunting rates, some turkey hunting rates and some pictures of big trophy buck.

I hope to hear from you soon. I'm ever so lonely.

Your friend,

Phil (not Phil Collins) Collins

I guess that logic should have dictated to me that Phil Collins didn't live in Illinois. Oh well.

Online Travel

2006-12-06T13:14:00.001-08:00

Let me ask you a simple question, ladies and gentlemen: when it comes to planning your trip and booking your flight online, who are you going to trust, an efficient machine, like a robot or an inanimate lawn gnome?

I can look back through my entire life, and most likely not find a single good experience that involved a lawn gnome.
I know what you're about to say: "Mitchell, are you trying to tell me that you've had any experiences at all that involved a robot?"
In response to this, I will quote my coworker and friend David and say "Shut up and let me finish."

So there I was, trying to figure out a way to book my flight, save a little money and (most importantly) not have to leave my living room.

"Man, I wish there was some sort of online travel site!" I exclaimed as I threw up my hands in exasperation.

It was at that very moment, that Travletron5000 burst through my living room wall in an almost Kool Aid Man-esque manner.

Once I got passed the terror and Travletron explained to me that he was simply there to help me book my flight, I offered him a drink. He politely declined and explained to me that robots do not drink.

As we talked, he opened my eyes to the whole world of online travel and showed me the many ins and outs. In a short time, I had bought my plane tickets online and Travletron was on his way out. I asked him as he was turning to leave if he would fix my wall that he had crashed through. The answer was "No" as he explained that he "wasn't programmed to fix walls" he "just does the online travel thing."

As I stared at the giant hole in my wall, I began to wonder if there was a way to find a new apartment online, but I tried to not put too much thought into it, as I wasn't sure if there was another robot that was programed to do that to come crashing through my other wall.

Smellvertising!

2006-12-06T13:14:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm a little bummed out. Would you like to know why? Sure you would.

So earlier this week, the folks behind the Got Milk? campaign launched a genious idea: stickers that smell like chocolate chip cookies in the same bus stations as got milk ads.
Personally, I think that maybe a company like Nestle would benifit from that campaign, but I can see where they were going with it, so all's well.
Like all other good ideas, it was scrapped a day later.

The worst part is that I was getting the folks here at LogicMaze to really get behind the idea. Thanks to technology that we had already developed with our product: LogicMace, we were able to integrate what I have coined as Smellvertising (I'm working on it, jerk!) into our web designs. It's so crazy that it just might work.

The first company to be brave enough to allow us to try it is our friends at Wilson Waste Management. Take a look. . .or should I say take a smell: Click Here.

LogicMaze Owner Buys Orville Redenbacher Popcorn

2006-12-01T13:15:00.000-08:00

It was only a matter of time, according to employees at Hutchinson Kansas web design company: LogicMaze.

"Her interest in popcorn just kept growing and growing," stated an annonymous LogicMaze employee, who's married to Tamara. "At first, she would just eat it at lunch time. Before long, she was making popcorn pancakes for breakfast and popcorn casserole for dinner."
He then paused for a moment to sob.
"She tried to make beer out of popcorn," he continued. "Beer."

It was this overwhelming fixation eventually became all encompassing. Colleagues began to notice little things like a picture of Orville Redenbacher as her Windows desktop background and the necklace that she had made by stringing popcorn kernels together with fishing line. Occasionally, things would slip into the crazy when she would wear an empty popcorn bag on her head.

Then it happened, Tamara wasn't seen around LogicMaze for a solid week. Nobody knew where she was. The halls of the office were a whirlwind of speculation. Each had their own idea, but there was one common factor in all of their hypothesis: it had something to do with popcorn.

The following Friday, almost a week and a half after she disappeared, Tamara Heitschmidt returned. She had some big news for everybody at the office: she had bought the company Orville Redenbacher. Everyone at work was baffled by this sudden decision. To a firestorm of questions, she responded simply by telling them that Orville Redenbacher popcorn "pops up lighter and fluffier than ordinary popping corn." She then finished with "Eats better too." before she went to her office and shut the door.

Nobody knows for sure the fate of companies LogicMaze and Orville Redenbacher. Friends and family are currently attempting to talk Heitschmidt out of changing the name of the popcorn company to LogicBacher.

Callin' Phil Collins

2006-11-28T13:18:00.000-08:00

As I have mentioned in a previous LogicMaze Fiction Blog, I had intended on getting a hold of Phil Collins in reference to his crappy, crappy website, and attempting to get him to let us do it for him. Well, I've finally mailed the letter. Here it is, if you'd like to take a look:

Mr. Collins,

My name is Mitchell Hargrave, and I work at LogicMaze WebDesigns in
Hutchinson Kansas, U.S.A. I recently took a look at your website, and I have to say that, in my personal opinion, it is relatively lackluster. I could go through a veritable list of things that could be fixed on the site to make it more fitting for a man of your reputation, starting with consistency of all of the pages, but I wouldn’t want to bore you with the technical details.
The bottom line is that talent of your magnitude deserves representation of the same degree on every medium available. In modern times, the internet is, by far, becoming the largest of all mediums. We at LogicMaze have a client portfolio of over 80 clients; each one has received an original site design that is consistent and cohesive. Although I couldn’t positively know anything about the market prices of web site design in your neck of the woods, I could confidently venture to assume that we could also quote you a price for design that would be considerably lower than that of the site which you now currently have.

I’m confident of LogicMaze’s work, and like to let it speak for itself, so please feel free to visit our site at www.logicmaze.com and view our clients page.

We would love to hear from you on both business and personal levels.

Thank you for your time,

Mitchell Hargrave
LogicMaze WebDesigns
1021 North Main Suite "B"
Hutchinson, KS 67501

Let's hope the sucker takes the bait. . .I mean expresses a sincere interest in our services. . .

But I'm Not Bitter. . .

2006-11-28T13:16:00.000-08:00

I've bitten my tongue on this issue long enough!

It took a lot of deliberation for us all to agree on a name for the LogicMaze newsletter. After two days, we finally agreed on one that properly represented us as a company and our abilities in both web design and marketing. What animal makes more sense than the omnipotent Carrier Pigeon?
I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't psyched. Pigeons are the coolest ever. They're so majestic.

Anyway, I sat down and got right to work on creating our Carrier Pigeon and, after much toiling, produced this masterpiece:

Apparently, though, the bosses opted to go with David's design instead: click here.
Needless to say, I was furious. I busted my hump on my version, and they just tossed it aside. They're reasoning was that "Dave's was better" and "He didn't use Paint to make it."

Poo on that.

Man, if I didn't love my job, I'd totally quit.

Now this is cool

2006-11-20T13:19:00.000-08:00

Habla espanol?

Me neither. Lanuage barriers didn't stop this blogger from showing interest in Traveltron5000.com. Thanks to his blog, Traveltron5000 got 39 visits! That's more than Traveltron gets in a week usually. Here's a rough translation of his blog that I got from Free Translation.com:

First National Travel Agency, one of the agencies online more veterans of the United States, has created a parody of the traditional agencies of trips that only offer on the internet a service automated and depersonalized: Traveltron 5000. With it they intend that the client themselves of account of the advantages that has to travel with them, that say to offer all the contrary thing, deal personalized and human. Considerations aside, the certain thing is that Traveltron turns out to be nice, above all by that air of old web of before of the explosion of the digital bubble .

That's pretty slick, if you ask me.

Wii for Me.

2006-11-20T13:18:00.000-08:00

Ok, so here's the deal:

I had a choice this weekend. I could either wait in line to get a Nintendo Wii, or I could go to Italy and be a guest at TomKat's wedding - that's Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, for the fortunate ignorants who haven't heard about that. It was a tough choice, but I opted for the Wii. Nothing is quite as compelling as spending $300 on something that I know absolutely nothing about.

One plus: the Wii crowd was a little less violent than the PS3 crowds- somthing I attribute to the fact that Nintendo makes games that are a little less concerned with pure violence. There was one altercation, however where one fellow (I think he was a level 14 Mage) put an Ice Spell on another, which was then quickly countered by an Amulet of Dante's Flame.
Luckily, nobody was harmed in that situation.

Long story short, I never got a Wii, but I did make some new friends. I'll be meeting with my new buddies: Irwin and Ant on Wednesdays now to play Dungeons and Dragons. I have no idea how to play, but I bet I'll win!

The LogicMaze Office Pet

2006-11-20T10:19:00.000-08:00

For the last 4 or 5 years here at LogicMaze we have been raising and training a office pet. We have all fallen in love with the pet and it was really getting prepared well to do it's job to the best of it's abilities.

Well, last friday was the big day. We decided our little friend was ready to go out and do the task it had been training for so hard. We strapped his little jetpack to his back (In house wanna-be-NASA engineer, David built him a little jetpack out of 2 ink pens) and sent him on his way. Click here for the picture Mitchell took as he was leaving the LogicMazeplex!

We thought he would be back by now???

Please let us know if you see him and if he is ok????

Hutchinson Web Design Company Solves all Problems with Dry-Erase Board

2006-11-14T13:20:00.000-08:00

Hutchinson Web Designer, LogicMaze, aims to “get it together” with help from a wall-mounted dry-erase board, which they acquired November 13^th.

Organization, communication, visualization: each an issue in an office setting, and each something that the staff at LogicMaze WebDesigns fully intended to nip in the bud. With a staff of six, each of which buried in the screen of their respective computers, the use of the newly-installed dry-erase board is meant to bring about a more collective and organized method of operations beyond that which is accomplished merely with only Windows Messenger, Microsoft Outlook, Google Docs, Google Calendar, a Blackberry, countless Excel Spreadsheets and cellular phones.

“See. . .” began Cody Heitschmidt: the mastermind of Operation Mitchell Don’t Sniff the Markers, “before, we didn’t have something that we could get in a big group and draw on. Now . . . we have something that we can get in a big group and draw on. It’s cool.”

When asked about concerns of inappropriate things being drawn on the board, the staff responded with a unanimous shrug of the shoulders.

“I already drawed some boobies,” said Mitchell, with blue and red marks all over his nose.

Tamara “Boss Lady” Heitschmidt had little to say about the dry erase board. She simply rolled her eyes and said: “All the guys seemed so excited about the idea, and I’ve learned that they’re a lot more productive if I just let them do little things like that. Few things are less fruitful than an office full of guys with bruised egos.”

Concerns were raised when they realized that one of their staff members telecommutes from his home in McPherson Kansas. There is already a plan pending approval to solve this problem, however. The idea is to train a web cam on the dry erase board and install another dry erase board at the home of Josh Krannawitter in McPherson with another web cam trained on it, so that he and the
Hutchinson staff can share ideas on their respective boards.

“Stay out of my house,” responded Krannawitter to the suggestion.

The bottom line is that the dry erase board is a definite aid for the LogicMaze staff to get their proverbial poop in a group, and they have nothing but high hopes for it.

Security from LogicMaze

2006-11-14T13:19:00.000-08:00

We at LogicMaze don't just want to make, host and maintain your site, we would also like to do everything within our power to ensure the safety of your site. Let's face it, there are hackers out there, and it doesn't matter what your site is about or what product you're selling. Hackers can and will hack your site just for the sake of doing so because they a spiteful, disrespectful little pieces of - I'm getting off subject, I digress.

Hackers want to hurt your site. We want to hurt hackers. That's why we've developed our newest product:

LogicMace.

It's the newest, and most effective hacker deterrant on the market. After we make your website, we install LogicMace. If it detects an intruder in the site, it releases a powerful pepper spray through the monitor into the eyes of the hacker.

Ouch! You can bet that he'll think twice before he messes with your site again.

Contact us online if you're interested in having the most secure possible website, because whether you're running a secure database or just trying to sell some widgets, you deserve it!

Happy Birthday Marine Corps.

2006-11-10T10:18:00.000-08:00

OK this is cool as hell!
What you have to realize is that every other precision Drill team in the world has a cadence. Whether it's a drum or someone calling cadence they have SOMETHING that gives them a beat to work off of!!!

Traveltron5000: Notorious Playbot

2006-11-08T13:22:00.000-08:00

Anybody that knows Traveltron5000 as well as I know Traveltron5000 is fully aware of his free-flying swinger ways. He is a notorious player in every sense of the term. I think that he may have taken it too far this time, though.

I was walking along, on my way to get a Chalupa at Taco Bell, when I saw our friend Traveltron5000 on what appeared to be a date. He and his lady friend (I guess, I don't really know the sex/sexual preference of robots) seemed to be having a good time. Not wanting to kill Traveltron5000's mojo, I decided that I would talk to him about it later and go about my business.

I did run into Traveltron5000 two days later though, and couldn't help but ask him about it.

"Hey, Trav, what's up, dude? Who was that I saw you with a couple of days ago? She seemed. . .nice. . ." I said.

"Oh, her? Yeah, she's alright, I guess. . ." he replied, seeming a little less excited than someone who had just started a meaningful relationship would.

"What's up, man, don't you like her?"

"It's business, Mitchell. Business." he said patting me on the back (which hurt quite a lot, considering that he has metal pincers, rather than hands.

I was extremely confused, and couldn't help but inquire further into the situation. As it turns out, Traveltron5000's mistress of the evening was actually one of the Google servers, and he wasn't seeing her out of interest, but actually "playing her for better search engine placement."

Being a good friend, I had to tell him that he had reached a new low and that he should probably call things off as carefully as possible, before it got out of hand and he actually ended up getting banned. Traveltron5000 let out an exasperated sigh. As it turned out, he had already called things off, and it didn't go so well. His intention in going on the date was to do a little sneaky search engine optimization for terms like online travel, online travel site and even a big one like travel. This is not how things went when all was said and done, however. Angry and spiteful, the Google bot actually put him to bottom ranking for all of the keywords that he was shooting for. He did make it to the top for some keywords, but none of them are appropriate enough that I could mention them here.

That's what happens. . .

I Hope Phil Collins Doesn't Sussus-sue Us!

2006-11-08T13:20:00.000-08:00

I have to be honest, as much as I've been blogging about Phil Collins, and kinda ribbing him, I actually like him. The boss and I have been watching the video for Don't Lose My Number regularly since it got posted.

I looked at his site a couple of days ago, and, well I've gotta admit that it's quite. . .lackluster. It could certainly use some work, and I know for a fact that we at LogicMaze could spruce it up significantly. I think Phil deserves better than he's got.

I intend to attempt to get in touch with Mr. Collins and try to appeal to him and let us do his site for a price, which (although I'm sure that it will be great for us) would be marginal for him. We've got a very creative staff here, of which I'm confident. I'm sure that he would be pleased.

I only wish that we had the marketing wherewithall to be in charge of him advertising as well, but that's not happening. . .yet.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On another note: I've been cruising around Wordpress lately when I get writer's block, and I have to say that there are some cool sites on here. Here are a few that have helped me:

Deskbound: It's that perfect cross of crazy and the Onion that I personally love, as some might be able to tell if they read some of my stuff.

Creative Juice: Being in the marketing business, this site helps with just that: creative juices. I don't like to copy other people by any means, but sometimes seeing other people's creativity sends sparks in the ol' melon and things start to work again.

Pigeon Blog: Everybody at work actually had a loooooooong discussion about pigeons on Messenger one day, which lead people to Google it and come up with funny stuff. I happened upon this blog and by far took the cake on funny stuff about pigeons. What are the odds that I would find it again? Crazy. . .

A little rest and relaxation

2006-11-08T10:17:00.000-08:00

Ok, honestly we have been busting our butts around here at LogicMaze. We are pushing hard on several new web design projects, alot of search engine optimization projects and a quite a few full service advertising clients.
So..
I decided to suprise my lovely wife(who also happens to be the boss around here!) and plan a little getaway for some peaceful rest and relaxation. I did what any technologically savvy person dos these days and on jumped on the internet. I went to www.traveltron5000.com and told the online travel agents that I wanted a calm quiet place to relax with my wife and enjoy a little peace. We booked the trip the automated system recommended, loaded up the video camera, and headed out.
Here is our video below!
Not exactly what we expected and while I wasn't all that upset about it, my wife was pissed that they booked us to stay in the same Hotel room with this blond chick we had never met before.
[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-4879566594474123372]

Ant wins world championship of Darts!!!!

2006-11-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

Ant did it!!!
Anthony D'Alessio LogicMaze's "Vice President of Doing Whatever Everyone else needs Help With" went to Slappy O'Flannagan's pub in Dublin Ireland last week and was crowned the "KIng of The Professional Dart World" by the International Darting Commission.
When he is not doing website maintenance for clients of ours he is constanly practing his dart throwing in the LogicMaze lobby. Honestly he was gone long enough we actually discovered we were ok without him and we were gonna let him go, but we are getting so much press from the fact the Dart Champion of The World works in our office we decided to keep him on for a while.
WAY TO GO ANT!!
** Extra special thanks to the computers at Travel Travel 5000 for lining up Ant's travel arrangements. They can help you with all your online travel needs!!

Major success in literature!

2006-11-06T10:14:00.000-08:00

This is working splendidly!! I finally found a way to get Mitchell to write about real life things on the original LogicMaze blog. All we had to do was give him a place to play in his pretend little world.
He is making alot of fun of Phil Collins here. I can handle that, but anyone who trys to tell me they didn't love "Don't lose my number" is flat-ass lying!!!
[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-965323295516927225&hl]

Traveltron5000 hearts LogicMaze

2006-11-03T13:24:00.000-08:00

Seeing how we built the Traveltron5000 Online Travel web site, it's only right that we at LogicMaze should get a free trip out of the deal. Our buddy Traveltron5000 was more than happy to oblige.

Not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth (I honestly have no idea what that means), we just told him to pick an exotic destination that wouldn't put him out.

"Oh sure! I'll take care of you," he said. "I'll send you guys somewhere really nice and you'll get nothing but first class travel and accomidations the whole time!"

One giant wooden crate, a 45-foot drop and three days wandering in the desert later, we're all starting to wonder when the vacation will begin and these "first class accomidations" are going to kick in.

We have since learned that using an online travel site wasn't the option which we should have used for our much-needed vacation.

2006-11-03T13:23:00.000-08:00

I woke up in a cold sweat, leaned over to the night stand and lit a cigarette.

My head was pounding. Why was it pounding? I hadn't had anything to drink the night before, so it definitely wasn't a hangover.

Then I heard it. Someone. . .something was singing from the kitchen!

"I can smell eggs coooookin' in the air tonight. Hold oooon."

That's when it dawned on me: my headache wasn't from a hangover at all, it was from listening to Phil Collins music all night long.

I got up from bed and tottered into the livingroom. There were wadded up blankets and a pillow on the couch. The smell of eggs and bacon was coming from the kitchen. Dreading it the whole way, I walked into the kitchen to find Phil with his head in the refrigerator.

"Do you have any milk?" he asked, sensing that I was in the room.

"What are you doing here, Phil? Why didn't you go home?" I asked, already exhausted of the conversation.

"We've got important things to talk about, mate! I wanted to be here bright and early so that we could get a jump on things. I thought if we got the jump on the other folks, we could get me up to number 1 for fireworks display!"

My head was spinning. "Fireworks display!?! Wha-you-wha? I though you wanted to get to number one for Jeep accessories?"

Phil looked at me as if I were the crazy one. "That's old news, mate. Fireworks are where it's at! Coffee?" He held out a pot of coffee and a mug.

That was the first and only thing that he said that made any sense all day. I accepted a mug. Upon taking my first sip, however, I immediately regretted the decision. It was the most wretched, vile substance that I had ever drank. I spit it all over the floor.

"Isn't it good?" Phil asked innocently.

"No, Phil. No it's not good. It's not good at all."

Phil looked down at his own mug and took a drink.

"I made it from my own secret recipe."

That explained a lot.

"Does this 'secret recipe' contain ketchup?"

A look of utter astonishment swept over Phil Collins' face. "How did you know?"

"Just get out, Phil," I had had enough.

"But we've got to talk about fireworks, fireworks displays, and fireworks for fundraisers! I want number one on all of them!"

"Phil, you are a singer/songwriter. . .kinda. You have absolutely nothing to do with Jeeps, Jeep accessories or fireworks displays of any kind. You have better things to do. Besides, I heard that Disney was making a cartoon musical about a one-eyed armadillo that perseveres through adversity. You'd better hurry before Randy Newman gets the gig."

"Really? Oh geez, I've got to go!"

With that, he grabbed his coat, hat and scrambled out the door.

Just as the door was almost fully closed and I going to let out a sigh of relief, it opened again. Phil stuck his head in.

"Hey, before I go, do you know of any good realtors in McPherson Kansas?"

"Just leave, Phil."

For more information about search engine optimization or website marketing: visit LogicMaze or read our other blog.

For fireworks, fireworks displays and other things like that, check out Rainbow Fireworks.

Just a little Humor in a place where humor has got to be hard to find!!

2006-11-02T10:12:00.000-08:00

Ok to hell with any political views that's just funny.

Cody

Kansas Web Designer #1 in the World, According to Recent Survey

2006-10-31T10:11:00.000-08:00

Kansas Web Designer #1 in the World, According to Recent Survey

Hutchinson, Kansas October 30 – LogicMaze WebDesigns was recently proclaimed number one web design/internet marketing company in the world by an in-office survey.

The six-person staff at LogicMaze WebDesigns (http://www.logicmaze.com) has plenty of cause for celebration lately, after recognition for their many accomplishments and abilities in their field. The results of a recent in-office survey have proclaimed LogicMaze WebDesigns number one in the world and a close runner up to number one in the universe: “Tom, the Myspace.com guy,” who was written in.

“It’s like we’re better than everybody else, and it’s so great that we can finally give ourselves the recognition that we deserve from ourselves,” said Mitchell Hargrave, Project Manager at LogicMaze.

The victory was a near landslide, at 4 to 2 in favor of LogicMaze. The outcome seemed bleak for a short time, however, after some complications with the absentee ballot from one of the employees, who works from home in McPherson. After five requested recounts, the results were finalized and the celebration commenced.

“I can’t even read!” exclaimed Anthony D’Alessio, completely off subject.

When asked how he planned to celebrate this accomplishment, Project Designer David Planthold simply said, “I’m going to Taco Bell. . .,” he then continued “. . .no, seriously, I’m gonna get some lunch, but you’re in my way.”

Cody Heitschmidt explained that this major victory will not go to LogicMaze’s collective head. They intend to remain humble and true to their small-to-medium-sized business clients, for whom they concentrate largely on quality of service. The money from the first place victory will be spent on things to help with production and streamline operations: for instance, an ottoman for Cody’s office, to take preventative measures against having to replace his desk in the near future and save his chair the strain of remaining in such a reclined position the majority of the time.

Tamara Heitschmidt, who started LogicMaze was asked to comment on the situation, but declined. She explained that she will not report to anything of a “lesser social importance than Time, New York Times and Highlights.”

About LogicMaze:

LogicMaze WebDesigns was started around seven years ago from home by Tamara Heitschmidt, who started designing web sites for small and medium sized local business. Shortly after, Cody Heitschmidt joined to handle sales and marketing. The company has grown into a staff of six and their own office since and now handles a large amount of web design, maintenance, logo design, hosting, internet marketing and traditional marketing for a long list of clients.

Additional news, and information about LogicMaze is also on their blog (http://logicmaze.blogspot.com).

LogicMaze WebDesigns
1021 N Main Suite B
Hutchinson KS, 67501
(620)-860-4237
www.logicmaze.com

Check out the LogicMaze Blog for more info on Internet Marketing and client progress.

2006-01-02T13:15:00.000-08:00

This is going to seem very strange if you don't read the first two parts:
Part 1
Part 2

The tiny engine in my sedan whined as I drove quickly along the highway toward home. The loud banging from the trunk had ceased. I guess that David Blaine must have gotten tired of struggling.
I'm not generally one for kidnapping, but I have to admit that, the couple of times that I've done it, it was a rush.

At any rate, I didn't feel the least bit guilty about this instance. I had presented Mr. Blaine with a fair deal, which he rudely declined. I couldn't accept his response, so I used a little chloroform persuasion. So, there I was headed back home, David Blaine in trunk, with big marketing plans for an underground storage company. I couldn't help but smile as my car chugged along.

"What are you smiling about?"

I nearly lost control of the car, I was so terrified. I looked in the rear view mirror. David Blaine was sitting casually in the back seat looking back at me.

"How the hell did you escape the trunk?" I asked, bewildered.

"Dude, I'm David Blaine," he replied, smuggly.

I felt stupid. I don't know what made me think that I could restrain him.

"Where are we going?" he asked me as he sat back and made himself comfortable.

"We're going to Kansas, where I'm going to chain you up and bury you in an underground vault, from which you won't be able to escape."

"Are you stupid?" was all he said in response.

I pulled the car over so that I could talk to him, threw it in park and turned to face him.

"Look, I really need you to do this for me. It's the only way that I'll ever be able to match the level of success I once had," I tried to appeal to his charitable side.

"You kidnapped me, man. . ."

I paused for a moment to contemplate my options. There was only one thing that I could do.

"Look, it's Chris Angel, and he's ripping off one of your tricks!"

Of course, in typical fashion, he turned his head, leaving me an opportunity to render him unconcious. I hauled back and nailed him in the head as hard as I could.

It didn't work.

"Why did you hit me? That's pretty messed up, you know. . ." he said as he rubbed the side of his head.

I just silently threw the car back in drive and continued the trip home.

"Wow, how'd you actually get David Blaine, and what happened to the side of the head?" my friend from MitchHole Storage asked.

I assured him that he didn't want to know the answer to either of those questions.

"Did you put the fliers up that I made and spread the word?" I asked him.

"Oh. . .sure. . .I put the word out, man. There should be a big crowd," he said.

He did, in fact, put up the fliers. The only issue was that he put all of the fliers up in one place. The worst fact was that that one place was his grandmother's recreation center. Within a couple of hours, the yard was-for lack of a better word-infested with wheelchairs and oxygen tanks.

"Ok," I said to myself. "Let's do this." I took a deep breath, and made my way out to the crowd, with David Blaine in a sack on a wagon trailing behind.

To Be Continued . . . again again. (Man this story's getting stupid long. as well as just stupid)

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I've Got Sloppy Handwriting. . .

2006-01-01T08:50:00.000-08:00

It's true, I do have sloppy handwriting. Almost illegibly sloppy. I get by, though. People can generally get the jest of my intended message, after asking “Is that an ‘L’ or a ‘5’?” a couple of times. All through school my teachers would complain, and even some times lower my grades on papers because of it. I was one of the couple of kids that everyone knew in class that the teacher would give the stinkeye when she suggested typing papers for neatness. Little did she know that my ongoing feud with printers as a race, due to their “do what I want” attitude. Consequently, I seldom printed anything. I would venture to guess that by now you’re wondering why I would talk about something so pointless. Right now, you’re probably saying: “Hey nimrod, you spend like. . .90% of your day typing now! Why should anybody, especially you, care about your handwriting?”I’m going to be honest with you, I’m not so sure that you’re speaking to me in the type of tone in which I would appreciate being spoken to (a little preposition explosion for ya, there). Ok, here’s the point in this little stream-of-consciousness nonsense: Sloppy handwriting has character. Someday I’m going to be famous for . . . something. It’s simple mathematics, really: Someday, my handwriting will become a font. Some geeky fan of whatever the hell it is that I will do someday will slave for hours over a hot laptop to meticulously recreate my every script idiosyncrasy. It’s going to be like Comic Sans MS with a touch of Papyrus and a whole lot of attitude.

You’ll see. . .

I've Got Sloppy Handwriting. . .

2005-11-30T13:24:00.000-08:00

You’ll see. . .