What is Wunderlist you ask?

Wunderlist is a free online task management tool that allows you to keep track of anything and everything from any device. I use it on a daily basis on my desktop, laptop and phone.

You can of course create any lists you want, but here is how I use it.

Day of Week

I have a list for each day of the week. I use this for my day to day to do’s like which workout I’m going to do or things I need to get done that day.

General To Do

This list has things that are not day specific such as “Do Taxes” or “Return Clothing”.

Wants

This is where I keep bigger type items that I want. The General To Do List might have something like “Get Picture Framed”, but this list has things like “Get New Laptop”.

CVD Work

I use this list to organize my business leads so I know who I’ve spoken to, what kind of project they want, when we may begin working, etc.

CVD To Do

If I want or need something specific to my business I will put it here. For example buying and installing a new plugin or WordPress Theme.

Household

The household list has specific items to the home such as “Buy New Den Furniture” or “Replace Kitchen Light”.

Music

How many times are you in your car, watching Late Night with Jimmy Fallon or Saturday Night Live and hear a band you like? It happens to me often and so this list is for those situations. I just enter the artist and look them up later when I have time. No forgetting their name.

Groceries

Grocery list on pen and paper is so 2009. Using Wunderlist make this a breeze. As the days and weeks pass since my last trip to the store I just pop in and out of this list adding things I will need for my next trip. And if you happen to make an unexpected trip all you have to do is open it and get what you need. No forgetting your paper list at home. There is now also a great new app called Zip List. It’s a grocery list and recipe app all in one. Its main use is for this so I’m likely to transition my grocery list usage over to Zip List.

Foursquare Badges

My final list is used to notify me of potential badges that I can still earn on Foursquare. Yes, this is super dorky, but I don’t care. I like my worthless digital trophies and this helps me get new ones by reminding me about the unlock rules for each badge.

So this is my Wunderlist. Do you use Wunderlist? If so, how do you use it?

Top Tweeple

Grid Magazine Issue #13
1/16/2012
by Paul Spicer

So, why do you Tweet?

I tweet for many reasons. I work from home as a web designer so it gives me the social interaction that an office provides others. I also use it as a promotional tool by sharing my work, as well as informative blog posts and tweets from people I follow that my audience might enjoy. It’s a great source for breaking news, helping others with their questions, and even finding a missing person or a lost item. I tweet looking for recommendations on new restaurants or services I am interested in and that’s where my followers have an opportunity to lend feedback. Furthermore, if you travel a lot like me, having a Twitter following is extremely useful because you can instantly get feedback regarding the local surroundings.

And on an average day, how often do you figure that you tweet?

Howoftendoyoutweet.com will tell you. Currently I’m at 4.1 per day, but it takes into account your total number of days on Twitter vs your total number of tweets so mine isn’t exactly accurate since I’ve been a member for so long. In the early years people weren’t using Twitter like they are today. They either didn’t know it existed or if they did they didn’t know how or why they should be using it. I would try and interact with people, but it just didn’t catch on until a few years ago so my activity wasn’t like it is today. One of my favorite tweets to look back on now was from a friend that said: “What’s so special about this app? Seems just like email or IM.” That pretty much sums up what most people thought about Twitter until the last few years and today I would bet many would still say the same thing.

Time to brag — do you have a favorite tweet of your own that you’ve posted?

My brag would be my first tweet. I’m betting I’m the longest standing Twitter user in RVA. As of today, December 16, 2011, I have been active for 1751 days, or March 1, 2007. The actual project started on March 21, 2006 by @Jack, but didn’t go public until July 15, 2006. Until that point it was still an internal service being used by Odeo, a company that Jack and some others started. In April 2007 Twitter was officially its own company and I was already a user. That’s kinda baller I guess. If anyone can beat that, holler at me. We should be friends. www.howlongontwitter.com/

Which of your tweets have been the most popular, caused the most stink, or generated the most buzz?

I’m not a confrontational person by nature in real life so I don’t try and hide behind a handle in Twitter life and cause drama or just be a troller. I’m here to make friends, not enemies. I’m here to help people and in return be helped when I need it. I’m here to hopefully make you laugh and say what’s on my mind while treading that thin line of what’s appropriate and what’s not. Being confrontational on Twitter is the quickest way to get followers, because we all enjoy watching a good Twitter fight, but I just have no desire to be part of one. A recent tweet I posted linking to a blog post I wrote about a new restaurant in town got a lot of traffic because one of my followers endorsed it. That led to a dramatic increase in clicks and views on my blog. Thanks @ksiddall.

Got a good Twitter story?

Why yes I do. In March 2011 VCU Mens Basketball made it into the NCAA Tournament. Some of us on Twitter who had mostly only been virtual friends planned a meet-up at Home Team Grill to watch the game. We won the game so we met again. We won that game so we met again. We ended up hanging out for four games and had quickly formed a solid bond with each other. We are now all friends and hang out in real life.

Any favorite (good or bad) replies?

When you have an open forum like Twitter it’s the bad replies you should be worried about especially if you are tweeting as yourself or a business and not tweeting fictitiously. Having a tweet is awesome especially if it’s a well known Twitter personality, but that doesn’t compare to having someone or a group of people bash you for all to see. I’ve seen it a lot and if handled improperly it can greatly hurt your brand. #boomgate (@orlandowynn) anyone? It can of course also make the person or persons doing the trolling look terrible, but they probably have nothing better to do so I’m sure they don’t care.

Who are some of your favorite Tweeps that you’re currently following?

Design: @DesignerDepot provides good fresh content. News: @mashable because they know pretty much everything first. Sports: @danawhite and @RealSkipBayless because they are controversial. TV: @jimmyfallon because he knows how to use Twitter in a fun and creative way. Health: @EatThisNotThat because they provide healthy alternative food options. Comedy: @KF*CKINGP and @danieltosh because their shows are hilarious and you never know what they are going to say. Social Media: @garyvee because he

tells it like he sees it and @hubspot for amazing content and ebooks. My RVA crew mentioned earlier and any other RVA person who will share and communicate with me.

If you weren’t using your current Twitter handle, what would you call yourself?

@chadwilliams. Honestly I don’t even know what happened. As mentioned earlier I started using Twitter in 2007 with the handle @echadwilliams, because my first name is Emory, but the handle @chadwilliams wasn’t created until May 22, 2008. I don’t recall creating that account and it only has one super informative tweet, “Wmtpjm.” I’ve asked Twitter for years to clear it, but they haven’t supported that in years and at this point it’s irrelevant, but it wouldn’t be worth starting over.

When you’re not using Twitter what other platforms tickle your fancy?

I am very active on Facebook, yes one of their 800+ million users, since it’s still the best place to connect with friends, family and now even strangers via the subscribe feature which is like following on Twitter. I also use Facebook for my business. Klout is the newest and most interesting site because it ranks your social relevance (aka Klout) online. I’m also a member of Google+ personally and for business. It’s a more tech heavy, man demographic currently, but is growing. I use Tumblr for my one of my personal blogs and I was among the first 3% of Foursquare’s 15 million plus users, where I am a Level 1 Superuser. I also have profiles on Stumbleupon, Last.fm, Digg, Pandora, and Spotify. So you shouldn’t have any trouble finding me.

What’s coming up next for you in 2012, in terms of how you plan to use Twitter or other platforms?

I am a fan of all social media, but there is still a long way to go to educate the every day person on all the different options and why they might want to join a certain network or how they could use each to benefit them. Part of my job is to try and help educate those who want to know more, but just need a little help. The more people on these networks share information the more robust they become. Content is king in today’s Internet so the more valuable content you have out there or share the more recognition you will receive.

What I’m looking forward to is taking all the social interactions we share on platforms like Foursquare, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etc. and using it to predict where we should go or what we might want to be doing, not where or what we are currently. We haven’t even begun to scratch the surface so I’m very excited for 2012 and beyond.

On November 15, 2011 Amazon entered the tablet market. I had already pre-ordered mine because I was eager to see what a tablet priced at $200 could do and I didn’t already have an iPad2. I am normally not a first generation device kinda guy, but since I’ve been using Amazon for a long time and think they do a really good job of customer services my decision was pretty simple.

I’m going to give you a quick run down of why I bought a Kindle Fire and then you can decide for yourself if it’s worth the investment.

Price – $200

At $200, this is a very capable device. Does it lack some of the bells and whistles that the iPad2 offers starting at $499? Of course it does! I’m on a computer all day every day and so far I haven’t run into very many situations where I felt I really NEEDED the iPad2 for $300-$629 more. Is the iPad2 and amazing device? Absolutely! Would I love every second of owning one? Absolutely! But for now I think at this price to enter the tablet market most people will be very pleased with their purchase.

Books

I think it goes without saying that Amazon has been in the game a long time and they originally started out selling books so for me to have basically any book at my fingertips anytime is nice. They have also start to let publishers determine if their books can be available for “lending“. If they are you can lend someone your book for a period of 14 days or they can do to same for you. Since Amazon has a desktop software to read any book you don’t even need to have a Kindle to participate.

Amazon Prime

If you are smart you already do a vast majority of your shopping online. However, when you shop online you have to pay shipping and wait an unknown amount of time before getting your product. It would be as quick as a few days or it could be a week or more depending on the vendor. Enter Amazon Prime and you get it guaranteed in 2 days. I’ve even gotten it next day before. This is not only awesome, but sometimes it’s a lifesaver if you need something asap. So if you do buy online often this is a must have for $79 as it will save you money and then you get services like Prime Instant Video and Cloud Drive which I’ll comment on later.

It can’t go without saying that the discounts over your local store are just too great to ignore. For example, I recently looked into getting a Canon 60d dSLR. I was at my local camera shop and asked how much it was. Their price was $1200. The exact same camera was listed on Canon.com for $999. The exact same camera was listed on Amazon.com for $899. Now you tell me where you are buying that camera from? Supporting the local economy is one thing, and I try and do it whenever possible especially when I go out to eat, but do I feel obligated to spend $300 just to support that local vendor? NOPE.

On top of that you have Amazon Protection if something happens when a product is sold through a third party of theirs.

Amazon Cloud Drive

Once you purchase Amazon Prime you will receive 5 GB of free online storage and unlimited access from any computer. You can store an unlimited amount of music in the cloud provided you purchased it from Amazon, but if you want to upload your own personal music, photos or videos you can and it goes towards that 5 GB. As you can see this is very nice since most of us have our own MP3 collections or have purchased music from another store. You can also purchase different amounts of data. I opted to pay $20 for the 20 GB so I could load up some personal music, photos and videos when I go on vacation and I don’t have Internet access. Their plans go all the way up to 1000 GB for $1000.

Amazon Instant Videos – Free with Amazon Prime

On top of  Amazon Prime and Amazon Cloud Drive you also get UNLIMITED Streaming of Amazon Prime Instant Videos from your phone, Kindle Fire, computer, computer connected to TV or a slew of DVD/Blu-Ray players and my most recent purchase Roku. There is a lot of good content and it will constantly grow over time. You can also purchase most new shows or movies for a small fee. The Roku allows me to wirelessly connect to my home network and stream any content from 1000′s of sources. Amazon, Netflix and Hulu Plus are amount that list.

Email PDF documents to your private Kindle email address

If you are like me and read e-books which often come in PDF format this feature comes in handy. You can send an email to your private Kindle email address which you will get during the sign up process. You then just need to attach a PDF with “convert” as the subject and they will show up under the Docs section. I use this all the time for content I download from the web or books I find in PDF format online. The conversion process enables you to be read it like a book with progress points instead of the normal functionality of a PDF which has no memory of where you were if you close it.

There are definitely more reasons why I’m glad I purchased a Kindle Fire, but as you can see there is some great value behind this product. To highlight that value take a look:

Kindle: $200

2yr Insurance: $49

Hard Case/Stand: $44

Amazon Prime: $79

20 GB Cloud Drive: $20

Steve Jobs: $15

Roku: $89

As you can see I not only bought a the Kindle, with a cover/stand plus insurance for 2 years, but I renewed my Amazon Prime, added 20 GB of cloud storage, bought a book and a Roku for $496. To get the entry level iPad2 you would still need $3.

So I would say that is some serious value. What do you think?

I don’t make resolutions. To me they are the same as diets. Temporary solutions that are forgotten over time or don’t last. Instead I make lists and make them public for all to see. For me this not only motivates me to cross the items off, but it creates a level of accountability. If you want to eat better or start exercising or volunteer or quit smoking starting tomorrow more power to you. But just because the calendar says 2012 shouldn’t be the driving force behind this change. Do it because you want to change your lifestyle or be a better person.

Here are some of the more memorable things I did or accomplished that I can happily look back on and say 2011 was a great year.

1. Raised over $2000 for the Special Olympics of Virginia.
2. Rappelled 25 stories from the top of the Suntrust Building.
3. Met some great new friends during VCU’s run to the Final Four.
4. Went to California and took a road trip from San Francisco to Laguna Beach with my Dad stopping at many towns along the way. (Thanks Georgeanna)
5. Went to Squaw Valley and Alpine Meadows in Lake Tahoe, California (Thanks Dillon).
6. Went to St. Thomas, St. John, Tortola, Virgin Gorda, Jost Van Dyke, Normal Island, Cooper Island in the US and British Virgin Islands. (Thanks Ed, Genelle and Kwasi)
7. Went to Riviera Maya in Mexico for a bachelor party.
8. Went to Anguilla to celebrate my parents 40th and my sisters 3rd Anniversaries.
9. Ran the James River Scramble 10k and the Dominion Riverrock Filthy 5k.
10. Went to 26 concerts.
11. Went to 96 new restaurants.
12. Featured in Richmond.com’s 5 Questions With A Foodie by Stephen Robertson.
13. Richmond Restaurant Group trip to Snowshoe, West Virginia.
14. Saw Girltalk live at RVA Music Fest.
15. Attended both NASCAR events in Richmond (Virginia 529 College Savings 250 and Wonderful Pistachios 400), went to Victory Lane for both (thanks Richie), met Sgt. Lee Earny and Wendel Middlebrooks “The High Life Guy”.
16. Had a Walmart Commercial for Velveeta Cheesy Skillets filmed in my house.
17. Saw Manchester United play Barcelona for the World Football Challenge at Fed Ex Field.
18. Entered and won the 1st Challenge Nation event in Richmond

A great deal of what I do steams from my Day Zero Project: 101 in 1001 which is an excellent motivator. The basic goal is to make a list of 101 things and accomplish them in 1001 days. Take a look and try it for yourself. I’m 100% confident that you will be glad you did.

Another year has arrived and I’m ready to take it on like all the previous. As always the goal is simple, grow your current relationships, create new ones and have fun as much as possible.

Thanks to all those who have helped make 2011 such a great year.

Happy New Year!

Do you know what your blood type is?

UPDATE 2/22/2012

I donated blood recently and the results are in. I’m an the most common of them all O+.

For those of you who have visited my site before you may already know about my Day Zero Project that I started on December 17, 2010. The general idea is to make a list of 101 things you want to accomplish in 1001 days. It seems easy at first thought, but just making the list is difficult and then following through with it is even harder. You have to make a conscious effort and even print it out and check it often to not only remember some of the items, but mark off what you may have done and since you last looked at it.

#57 of my Day Zero Project is to find out my blood type. This one seems very easy right? Wrong! At least for me that is. Now that I know what I know I could find it much easier but here was my method of figuring this out the hard way.

I first scheduled a physical since it’s not only good to get one every few years until you are 40, but because I’ve been going to the same doctor for a very long time to surely they would have this information. “Hey doc. What’s my blood type?” He says, “oh we don’t have that one file.” This seemed odd to me since if something was to go wrong you would think your family doctor should know what your blood type is? So from that I was sent on my way, but was told as part of my physical to go get blood work done at LabCorp. I made my appointment, went in, got my blood work done and before I left I said, “so since I have been here before and you guys have a record of me already could you tell me my blood type?” She said, “oh we don’t have that information on file because it’s a separate test and unless you have been hospitalized for something serious you would have to order that specifically.” Again, I thought to myself this is very odd that my own family doctor and the lab that does blood work has no clue of what blood type I would take in the even that I needed it. What I took from that conversation was “if you have ever been hospitalized before they would definitely have it”. Ah ok, I have been hospitalized and they would have to know my blood type because I had to get Plasmapheresis. I guess I should tell the quick story for context.

So in 2004 I went on Sticky Rice’s Cannonball Run event. It was their 4th year doing it and everyone always had a good time. It’s the classic get a clue, decipher it and get to the next location. We would compete in events, drink, figure out more clues, you get the idea. So we were at Chicks Beach in Virgina Beach, VA. The event was physical challenge which was right up my alley, however, due to lack of sleep, plenty of alcohol and no water, dehydration set in and took me down. What happened next was the kicker. I was given 4 Motrin and left to rest. As the day/night went on my body got worse. Pains in my back and stomach were getting unbearable and my team decided to take me to the Sentara Hospital in Virginia Beach where I was put in a waiting room and pumped with fluids thinking that’s what my body needed to recover. They blew me up like a balloon until I almost popped. I wasn’t peeing. At this point a few hours had gone by and the doctors still hadn’t admitted me. When they came in and noticed the fluids weren’t doing the job it became more serious. I was admitted and they discovered that I was close to having kidney failure. My kidneys were shutting down because of the exertion I had put my body along with taking 4 Motrins while being completely dehydrated. VERY BAD COMBINATION!

So the long of the story was that I was hospitalized for 10 days if I recall, was transfered to MCV to be closer to home and my family and had Plasmapheresis done for several days. Basically I was hooked to a machine that removed my blood, circulated it through a cleaning process that removed plasma and recirculated it back into my body. If this didn’t work they would have had to remove one or both kidneys so it was pretty serious. For a few days the news wasn’t good, but eventually my body kicked in and started fighting again. I remember the day that I peed for the first time and it was like I’d won the Superbowl. This was a very important step to recovery.

Fast forward to today and we are back to me trying to figure out my blood type. Yea almost forgot why you were reading this right? So with this info for sure Sentara or MVC would have my blood type. I called MCV and requested this information from their Medical Records Department. I was told I had to contact their 3rd party records company Health Port and would have to fill out a release waiver in order to obtain this information. So clearly our blood type is top secret information right? Not so fast.

I called Health Port and here was our conversation:

HP: “Medical Records how may I help you?”

Me: “I would like to know my blood type.”

HP: “Ok, you will have to fill out a release form that I can mail to you or you can come pick it up.”

Me: “So you can’t email it?”

HP: “No, we do not have it in email format.”

Me: “Really? Well go ahead and mail it to me please.”

HP: “What’s your name and address?”

Me: “Gave just that info.”

HP: “Ok, I will get it in the mail for you.”

So let me get this straight. I have to sign a release form to get my blood type, that you can’t email because you don’t have the form in a digital format such as MS Word of Adobe PDF and the only info you ask me to verify is my name and address. No SSN or any other personal identifiable information? I could have been Joe Schmo and just requested your info and gotten it mailed to my house. Not like it would personally do me any good to know your blood type, but if the point of this entire process was security what the heck kind of security was that?

This was much more than I had expected to do in order to find my blood type, but I’m no quitter so I’m seeing it through. If I was never hospitalized I would have to specifically request and pay for the test to be done in order to know. I will be sure to let you all know what letter I am as soon as I know.

Any guesses?

At 1:51pm on August 23, 2011, Virginia had a 5.8 magnitude earthquake, the largest since 1875. My house started shaking, my cat ran upstairs to his hiding place and I ran outside to see what was going on out there. It lasted a solid 30 seconds before tapering off. All the neighbors came outside with amazement of what just happened. The epicenter was in Mineral, Virginia a town that is just 45 miles from my home in Richmond.  Then at 8:04pm we had a 4.2 aftershock that wasn’t anything like the original, but you could still noticeably hear and feel the earth shaking. I can only image what a severe earthquake feels like and I hope to never experience one.

Now let’s just hope Hurricane Irene spares us any damage as well.

U.S. Geological Survey info on 5.8 magnitude earthquake in Mineral, Virginia.

Velveet Cheesy Skillets

A few years ago I got a knock on my door from a gentleman who told me he was looking for homes like mine to possibly shoot a commercial. He then asked if I would be interested in knowing more. My curiosity wouldn’t allow me to say no and so I said sure what’s it all about. He said well I work for a company hired by The Martin Agency and we regularly do commercials for their clients. Now I was even more interested because The Martin Agency is one of the top agencies in the United States and they have some of the largest and most well know clients. A few times over the next year to year and a half I got a call saying that my house was in the running to be used but it never got chosen. Bummer right.

Move forward about six months and I get the same call again, but this time I was told the Director has chosen my house. The client is Walmart and they are doing a commercial for their client Velveeta. Sweet, now what? So 8am sharp I had what looked like an ATF Team about to raid my house. My street was lined with cars and one after another people kept coming in my house from the Director, Producer, Set Designer, Writers, Production Assistants, Lighting guys, you name it. They immediately set up shop and started talking about what was going to take place. This meeting lasted about an hour and they all left content with what needed to be done for the next day. Good thing I’m clean and organized because they looked in my cabinets, fridge, bathroom, etc to make sure everything was going to work.

Velveeta Commercial Crew Meeting

Then at 2pm a two man crew came in and began removing any items that would either be in the way or wouldn’t be used in the shots. My couches, fusbol table, chairs, carpets, etc are all in my garage and they are bringing in their own equipment to give the room the look and feel of the demographic the commercial is intended for which is a younger single mom. They are also laying down their own carpets and covering the walls up to about three feet for protection. So far everything is going well, but you have to be open minded about the process and trust that they won’t mess anything up and if they do everything will be ok because after all it’s for Walmart. They have a few dollars.

House Setup Complete

Yea, these guys don’t mess around.

So at 6:00 am sharp the entire crew of about thirty minus the actors shows up to get everything ready. Breakfast was served at 6:30 am and the actors came in at 7:00 am.

Starting to Set Up

So Much Stuff

At about 8:30am everything was ready to go and the first of three scenes began filming. There was very little talking or movement allowed during the next six hours. They even had to turn off my A/C and refrigerator because of the sound when they kick on and off. After they wrapped the three scenes up they took another few hours shooting the different food products. At about 6:30pm they wrapped it up and began the breakdown process. At 8:00pm they were gone.

The experience of seeing how much goes into even a small production like this was pretty incredible because it takes so many people and so much equipment to get the job done. If I had to do it all over again I would because it’s quick money, The Park Group was extremely polite and they left my house cleaner than when they got there.

Thank you to Isaac Regelson who scouted my house and The Park Group for pick my house

You want to see what a school with heart can do to the big guys? VCU has taken down USC, Georgetown, Purdue, Florida State, Kansas and now it’s time to beat the beloved Butler Bulldogs.

I was so busy cheering then deflated when they took the lead by one that I almost missed this moment. This was incredible and something all of us will remember for a long time.